Duty and Deceit

Chapter 33

Eerie stillness gloomed the house as Roxas locked the door behind him with a soft click. Trees stood still outside the closed windows, a lone bird chirping in the woods until it too fell silent. No breath other than his own disturbed the strange silence that blanketed the dark hall. He stepped over the cluttered racks on the floor as he walked into the hall, his usually silent footsteps sounding loud to his ears. The floorboards creaked under his feet as he paused near the sofa, unbuttoning his cuffs before he fell onto it with a sigh. He cursed, his palms covering his eyes.

Ilm Amargil was dead. Imad Amargil was a fraud and Nadia Amargil was playing her part in ruining lives.

He tried to remember his mother's face, tried to remember if they ever seemed happy with each other.

He remembered his mother's laughter and the way his father smiled at her every time he bought her flowers. They were in love; he'd always believed it. Even if he'd been too young to remember, he couldn't have imagined the fondness in his father's eyes every time he looked at his children. Hell, his father had carried him on his shoulder everywhere for the better part of his childhood.

He waited for the tears to come, for his skin to crawl as he witnessed his father kissing the Ministress passionately at the end of the ball. He waited to feel the anger, the disgust, the hurt, pain.

Yet nothing came.

The more he watched his father, smiling as he greeted the guests, ordering the servants, hold Yun's hand around as though it really was his actual daughter's engagement, the more Roxas numbed.

Coal jumped on top of him, purring into his ears as she sniffed him. He pulled his hands away, sighing as he looked at Coal's big blue eyes.

He forced himself up, going into the kitchen to cut some slices of meat for a cat he didn't adopt. As he set down her plate, his eyes went to the bedroom, the door ajar.

The room was cast in darkness, the metal frame of the bed glinting back at him. He strained his ears, listening for her shallow breaths. Nothing.

He silently made his way to the door, stalling only for a moment, before he gently pushed it open.

The hair on the back of his neck rose as he took inventory of the room.

For the first time since Kaia had occupied the chamber, he found it in chaos. The bedsheet was in disarray, half of the blanket bleeding onto the floor from the bed, and pillows thrown about. Perfume and powder bottles lay broken on the floor beside the dressing table, the liquid inside long since soaked into the wooden boards. Clothes were tossed all over the room, some torn and ripped to shreds.

Moonlight slipped into the room from between the cracks in the windows as clouds drifted away from the moon. The first thing he felt was her eyes, staring at him from the shadowed corner of the room like a predator lying in wait. Little by little, as light invaded the chamber, the rest of her was revealed.

She sat in an armchair, the violet dress torn to her thighs. The scandalous slit parted to reveal a slender leg that crossed over the other. Strands of her hair fell free from her intricate bun, long auburn waves flowing over her shoulders down to her chest. Her chin rested on the back of her left hand that gripped a dagger so tight her knuckles were white while holding a bottle of silver wine in the right.

"How was the ball?" She asked with a tilt of her head, her voice raspy.

She sounded so calm, sitting so still he couldn't even hear her breathe. The room was cold without a fire in the hearth, cold enough that his breath misted in front of his face. Yet Roxas found his palms clammy.