A symptom.
Taking a steadying breath, Luci nodded once.
Lady Margaret slid onto the bed and rested her hand on Brielle’s leg, rubbing it slowly in a comforting gesture as if she were lending her strength. Even the dogs understood as they jumped onto the bed. Stasia curled up next to Brielle in a small ball while Drusilla watched anxiously next to Lady Margaret.
“It’s a masked ball,” Brielle began, but her breath caught.
It was like being held under water, like she would never know the feeling of taking a whole breath. The sun setting feltlike a countdown that none of them had asked for. Tonight should have been filled with magic and fairy godmothers that only existed in stories. Instead, it was filled with the sound of desperation and loss.
After twenty years, it never got easier. Every spell felt like the last one. The one who would claim Brielle and leave Luci without her reason for breathing. A life without meaning. Who was she without Brielle? It was a question she never wanted to know the answer to. A blissful ignorance she could wrap around herself like the warmest of blankets.
“It is the one thing father has ever asked of me,” Brielle whispered.
Her voice was hoarse from disuse and congestion—none of the musical tilt that usually carried her words.
“He will understand-” Luci began.
“No, no, he won’t,” Brielle said.
A gentle hum from Lady Margaret said they all knew the truth of it. Lord Treveon's nature wasn’t understanding, even when it came to Brielle.
“I know I’m always asking too much of you,” Brielle began before the coughing took her.
Yet it was Luci who was choking on the words that Brielle gave life. A bizarre sentiment that shouldn’t have existed. As if there were any reality where Luci had given enough to circumvent the debt she owed to Brielle. There was no such world. Some debts could never be repaid.
When Luci was able to speak once more, she drank in a hungry breath. “But I must ask this last thing. Go to the ball with Lady Margaret. My father will hear the announcement, and once you have danced a few dances, he will be too distracted to notice you’ve left.”
“I won’t leave you,” Luci grit out because the anxiety of telling Brielle no was crippling.
“If we are meticulous about it, we can be back by midnight. I’ll tell Stefan I had a headache and you escorted me back. Easy as strawberry cake,” Lady Margaret said with an endearing smile.
Six hours. Two there, two at the ball, two back. Six hours away from Brielle.
“I have nothing to wear, and you are smaller than me,” Luci said, deciding on logic.
It was a sinking sort of feeling that took hold of her as Brielle and Lady Margaret shared a conspiratorial smile. It would have swallowed her whole if she hadn’t locked onto the paleness of Brielle’s lips. Too pale. Without saying a word, Lady Margaret crossed the room, but Luci’s mind was already working.
Too pale. Ginger and milk. Going to the table of tinctures, Luci scanned them with shaking hands, trying to ignore the racing of her heart. It wasn’t the first time Luci had been sick, and it wouldn’t be the last, but it felt like a change, and that was scarier than anything else. When Luci’s hands wrapped around the green-tinted vial, she turned to give it to Brielle, but Stasia snarled at her.
“Oh, hush, you beasty,” She said, ignoring bared teeth.
In her infinite gentleness, Brielle took the medicine without any protest, her faith in Luci forever stronger than her body. Luci watched as Luci swallowed it and prayed to whatever magic existed in the world.
As always, Brielle read her mind.
“Do you believe in magic, Luci?”
Everything shrunk to the solidity of this moment. Only twice had the fevers been strong enough to cause her mind to struggle with reality. At least it would explain her insistence that Luci go to the ball, but the implications of the illness were enough to make Luci’s throat dry and scratchy.
“I am lucid.” Brielle rolled her eyes with a small smile. “You are so dramatic.”
The teasing should have abated the thumping in her heart, but instead it only beat faster. Desperate.
“I believe in what I can see. If magic and fairy godmothers were real, you wouldn’t be lying in this bed. You would be dancing at the ball, sweeping the prince off his feet and winning the hearts of the most tedious lords and ladies.” Luci said, tears gathering in her eyes despite her best attempts.
The flush in Brielle’s cheeks was bright with life against her too pale skin. As she placed her hand gently into Luci's, she squeezed with the strength of a hundred men as if she had been saving it all for Luci, for this moment.
“That is precisely why I believe in magic. In fairy godmothers, because they brought you to me.”