A second later, a soft sob escapes her mouth.
"Arlet, I am here," Estela says, gently straining against Teo’s arms.
I want to say something, too. But I don’t.
Instead, I watch as she blinks awake, her delicate lids fluttering open to reveal her regular eyes.
“Vann?” she says. Her hand comes up to touch her face, but it is still crusted in red. She sees her hand and her face twists into a picture of raw, unfiltered horror.
"Gods. Gods, no. Please—please, no."
Her voice splinters through me, cold as ice, heavy as stone.
"Where is—?" Her words catch, her breath hitching. She bolts upright, looking around the throne room, and seeing, in full, the blood covering most of her body.
Fira and Liana gather round, as a guttural sound tears from her throat. Without thinking, I wrap my arms around her chest, and pull her towards me. I feel the sound ravage her small body. The screams turn back to sobs. She is shaking, breaking, unraveling.
It is the most awful sound in the world. I have heard it before. On battlefields. In burned villages. From families clutching their dead.
It is ancient. It transcends the differences between humans and enduares.
And we bear witness.
The women surrounding us touch her shoulders and legs, but no one speaks. We watch the destruction of a piece of her soul.
It doesn’t matter that my body surges with a frost that threatens to make me immobile.
I realize that perhaps losing my heart made me forget the purpose of pain. Perhaps this is the first time I have wanted to remember.
“Mother Liana,” Teo says behind her. “Put her to sleep. It would be a kindness.”
I don’t protest as she takes out a new crystal and does just that.
Chapter 15
ARLET
“Iam so pleased you didn't get rid of my gift,”a voice slithers through my dreams.“It’s time for you to come back.”
I open my mouth to speak and my jaw hurts.
“What?”I croak.
No one responds.
Dark walls loom around me, but I don’t know where I am. The bed is warm, but my body refuses to hold the heat. I hear people moving, their footsteps slipping in and out of my awareness like whispers in a dream.
They aren’t safe.
None of them are.
Water had scoured my skin clean, washing away the evidence of blood, but not the filth. They thought a bit of soap could erase what happened, as if cleansing my body would cleanse my soul. But pieces of memories are scattered like shards of glass in my mind.
Diego was gentle.
I remember the warmth of him, the quiet, fleeting comfort of another body against mine. When he made to leave, I asked him to stay. I hadn’t wanted to be alone.
The world outside my door had felt too uncertain, too unsafe. And he—he had been something solid, something strong. Someonewho, for a moment, could have shielded me from the void of terrible uncertainty swirling inside of me.