Peanut Butter Fingerprints

Chapter Twenty-Three

"Queen of Hearts"

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"The truth is rarely pure and never simple."

-Oscar Wilde

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Maxon

THE WORLD HELD ITS BREATH as Daphne's finger twitched on the trigger. She looked down at the gun in her hands with hesitant eyes and then raised her head to watch me. For a brief moment, she closed her eyes slowly and stood absolutely still. Then, in one swift motion, she released a long breath and tucked the gun into a hidden pocket in the tulle skirt of her dress. The world released a long sigh of relief.

Daphne let the silence thicken between us as she took careful steps towards me, her heels clicking against the filthy concrete floor. She raised her head as the toes of her heels came to a rest a handful of inches from where I sat. Wordlessly, she whipped a knife out of her other dress pocket and circled behind me.

She's going to stab me in the back. How ironic.

Instead, she placed the blade between the rope binding my wrists together and sliced my hands free. I drew my arms forward and leaned back against the wall, wincing as a fresh wave of pain rippled down my back. Daphne drew her skirts up a few inches before collapsing onto the floor next to me in a pile of dirty tulle. She leaned her head back on the wall gingerly and rolled her head towards me to face me.

Our eyes met, and all of the worry and fear in me about her disappeared. Daphne looked so hopelessly lost and broken; her stare was so hollow. I didn't fear her as much as I pitied her.

Her tired eyes held a quiet sadness and longing; if I ever had a look in my eyes while being imprisoned, it would have been like the one that Daphne had at the moment. Her eyes fluttered up and focused on the barred window six feet above the ground on the adjacent wall. I supposed that I wasn't the only one who'd been stuck in prison the last few weeks.

"Go ahead. Ask about these. I know you want to," she began in a flat voice as she peeled her eyes from the window to look at the splotches of blue and green on her arms.

I shook my head. "I don't have to," I replied quietly.

She sighed and looked down at her raw palms. It should have felt strange to talk to Daphne on such a casual level, but it almost felt familiar... Comforting, even. I sat up and shifted to find a more comfortable position-one that wouldn't sting my back-when Daphne's eyes flickered to my back.

"I always thought your father was cruel, Maxon, but... I never knew he was this cruel."

Her eyes followed the scars down my back, and she frowned. I swallowed and huffed a weak laugh.

"That's what everyone says," I snapped back, quickly irritated in the change of topic.

Since when did she care about what went on between me and my father? A tiny voice in me answered: Since she realized that you two were fighting the same losing battles. Even though we were both fighting for acceptance, our enemies were completely different. Whereas divorce was always an option for Daphne, I couldn't leave the Palace-and more specifically, my father-behind.

"Perhaps if you just asked for help-" she began.

I sat up abruptly and threw out my hands. Was she serious?

"Asked for help? Are you really that ignorant, Daphne?" I shouted back.

Was she really so blind? Ask for help? What kind of twisted joke was that?

My father was the king; his word was law. As if anyone stepping in and putting their foot down was going to change anything. If he wanted to continue taking his anger out on me, he would. And nothing anyone said or did would change that. To him, I was just another thing to worry about. If he could rid of me, he would have in a heartbeat.