Earthrumbler

Chapter Nineteen: The Professor's Tale

I sat up in bed and rubbed my eyes. Faint light creaked in through my window. Somehow, I’d fallen back asleep until dawn without any dreams. I flopped out of bed, my entire body sore from travel. I pulled my nightgown off and dug my day dress out of chest where someone had put all of my things.

No one had disturbed any of my belongings, save my clothing, which had been neatly folded. I pulled my own socks onto my feet and smiled at my boots in the corner. They stood beside the slippers I’d worn to my father’s wedding; the slippers were still dusty with sand. I froze when I saw them, thinking of how differently that day could have unfolded. Shaking off the chills running over my body, I grabbed by boots and tied them tightly onto my feet. I undid my braid with blank thoughts. Last night still troubled me.

When I walked downstairs, guests were already awake, munching on bread and butter and sipping on tea and coffee. I kept my head down as I piled plates and pans to wash in the kitchen. I placed them next to the basin, but before I went out to the well, I peeked inside to spy soapy water with a mug already soaking. “Oh,” I said. They thought you were dead; someone else had to do the dishes. I dunked the plates in my hands and wiped them down. Once I’d finished, I wiped my hands on a dishrag.

Being home, being safe, twitched my senses. Paranoia clung to me like body odor. Every clatter startled me. When Papa entered the kitchen, I sprang up and fumbled with a knife. Realizing my mistake, I set it back down. “Papa, how’d you sleep?”

“Surprisingly well. I made it through the night without waking up in a panic.” He studied me. “You didn’t sleep too well, eh? Your eyes are surrounded in shadows.” Though his tone was light initially, his face drooped. “Your nightmares are back. I thought I hear someone fall out of bed last night. It was you, wasn’t it?”

My leg still throbbed from the fall. “Yes. I’ve a lot to catch you up on. Do you want to sit?” I offered him the small stool that I often sat in to watch bread bake.

It creaked as he slumped into it. With a heavy inhalation, he said, “Alright, start me at the beginning…and you can tell me anything. You know that.”

I smiled at him as my jittering grew worse, and I paced around the kitchen. “The rope that pulled me in was actually a vine from the mark that Persephone gave me. She’s a plant goddess and my mother’s sister. She aligned herself with Poseidon—he’s a sea god who hates my mother—in order to capture me and lure her down there, and—”

Papa stood from the chair. He grabbed my shoulders and anchored me in place. “Slow down, Jenny, slow down.” His eyebrows lowered as my chest rose and fell quickly. “You’re in a panic. What did they do to you?”

Unable to speak, I unbuttoned the second and third buttons of my dress. After tucking the flaps aside, I found my voice and explained, “They wanted her, and they lured her down by offering her my safety. They tortured me.”

“They burned you.” He studied it further. “What does this say?” When I didn’t reply, too ashamed, he repeated himself with more force.

My eyes pasted themselves to the floor. “It says bastard. He carved it with a hot blade. I’ve been waiting for it to fade. It hasn’t.”

He clenched his teeth and released my shoulders. “What else did they do?” His voice was teetering on the edge of anger.

I untied my boots and pushed my socks down. My bare calves were all scars. “Do you remember when I was young, and you told me not to disrespect you?” With his nod, I continued, “They struck me with a whip the way that you had with the sapling.”

Papa’s knuckles were pale from how hard he formed his fist. “You sobbed, and your legs were bruised for days. It was the way my father hit us. I regret ever trying it on you, but I’d no idea what to do with you. They used a whip?” Kneeling beside me, he ran his fingers along them. “Gods or not, I’ll murder them,” he growled. “They’d no right to hurt my daughter. Mary! Mary, where’s my sword?” He stood and stormed out of the kitchen to the dining hall. “Stop hiding my sword on me, Mary!”