23 – 6
Edith looks between us, takes in the cold shoulder Clarke gives me, how reluctant I am to look at her, and declares, “Horseshit.”
Clarke goes wide-eyed. “What?!”
So do I. What?
Edith rolls her eyes. “The two o' ye left practically joined at the mouth, an' – this – is how ye come back?” she scoffs. “Horseshit nothing happened. My entire ass nothing happened. So,” she stops herself. Seems to realize where we are: stood just outside Agnes' room, the old woman inside just now starting to hack out the pneumonia that would've killed her. “Come on, the both of ye.”
Clarke digs her heels in; both verbally, “No, Edith, I – I don't want to!” and actually, after Edith takes us both by the wrists and starts to pull us down the hall. I follow along without a word, caught quite thoroughly off-guard.
“Well, that's too bad,” Edith says, without an ounce of sympathy, “I didn't want to cry myself to sleep for a couple months thinkin' ye were dead, but I did anyway. Here,” She lets go – of me, not Clarke – to open the door to a linens closet. She jerks her chin at it. “Go on.”
Clarke doesn't; she crosses her arms and glowers down at Edith. Through grit teeth, temper kept only by the most frayed of threads, she says, “Edith. I'm tired. I'm hungry. I haven't had a bath in days. I do not want to do this now.”
Edith glares right back, hands on her hips; her grandmother made young. “I grieved ye, both of ye,” she says quietly, “I got ye back, then I lost ye again. Do ye know what that's like?”
Sympathy – empathy – flickers in Clarke's sky-blue eyes. “I do,” is her answer, “more than you know, but –”
“But nothin'” Edith interrupts, “I'm done waitin'. I'll feed ye the finest o' meals, draw ye a lovely bath, and give ye the softest bed in the Rest, but I'll do it – after – the two of ye tell me what's goin' on.”
“Just do it, Clarke,” I say, or begin to; the sound of my voice alone is enough to snap that threadbare restraint on her temper.
She whirls on me, eyes flashing, mouth twisting into a snarl, “You –!” She cuts herself off harshly, draws in a shaking breath, and breathes out the rest, “You don't – you have no right to tell me how I spend my time. Not – ever – again.”
Her words strike harshly home, as they were meant to. I fall quiet after them, spying Edith's look of shock from the corner of my eye.
Clarke closes her eyes, hand rising to the hollow of her throat. She draws no power from the ice nestled there, but instead holds it for a moment. I recognize it for the gesture of comfort, of reassurance, that it's become. I did that to her; I made her need such a thing.
“Fine,” she says, after a moment, stepping into the linens closet and leaning herself against the far wall. Her arms stay tightly crossed, a defense against what's gone on so far and what's yet to come.
I find a place against the shelves, near to the door; Edith plants herself between us. “Well?” she asks.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
I give my quiet confession. This is it, I realize: the ending of my last friendship in the Timberlands. I find myself wanting it to be over with, to be done, so that I can leave this place with as clean a wound to my heart as I can. “I killed Merigold. I killed those Windrunners in Amberdusk, too. They...they killed Juliana, and I wanted –”
“Wait,” Edith interrupts, “– They – killed Juliana?” I nod. It still hurts to hear, to think about. “How? Why?!”
Clarke stays silent, her hurt and angry eyes fixed on me. I look back. “Merigold had her shot, but not before they chased us through the streets, all of us. They cornered us by the pier – the city guards, they said things to us, – about – us, what they wanted to – do – to us. When Merigold showed up, she had a man with her. He's the one who shot her. Before he did, she said that – that Juliana was the only person she couldn't bribe or blackmail, so...” I take a shaking breath. “They made me watch. She smiled. Juliana choked to death on her own blood, and that poisonous bitch – smiled – while she died!”
“Oh,” Edith says, while I work the clench out of my jaw.
“Yes,” I say, smiling humorlessly, “Oh.”
“Just wait,” Clarke chimes in, scornful and fierce with it, “There's more.”
Edith, overwhelmed, can only say, “There is?”
“Yes,” Clarke spits, “There's – why –.”
- - -
Clarke paints a portrait of a callous, selfish girl; one who sought to soothe her own pain without regard for the hurt she gave to others. She describes, with meticulous care, betrayal, and hurt, a girl who viewed people like they were tools: used when needed, discarded when not; worse than even the most careless of craftsmen, who would never dare be so callous. She streaks bloody red across this painting, staining the girl's hands and face, showing the murder sunk deep into her eyes.
When it's done, all Edith says is, “Oh.”
Clarke smiles bitterly, “Yes, 'oh'.”
I say nothing. There's nothing to say. It's well-made, this painting of me. Dust-motes drift in the still air, pallid daylight comes through the small, high window, and an awful quiet settles in. Edith frowns at the floor, coming to grips with all that's been forced on her. Clarke glares into nothing with hard eyes and a brittle posture, all but trembling from the effort of controlling herself. I find myself looking not at her, but at Edith.
Just do it, I want to say, be disgusted with me, cast me out, and let's be done with this.
When she does speak, it's slow and thoughtful, each word chosen with care. “After the two of ye left, I got Gran to tell me about what the Windrunners were like last time.” She still won't look at us. “Only seen her look so haunted once before. She had to get drunk to talk about it. All these things they've done: setting fires, killing, stealing and bribing, that's how they – started – last time. They stole folk right out of their homes, sold 'em down the river. Anyone who spoke up against 'em got made an example of. She told me about one she saw – one they made the whole town watch, and I –”
Clarke interrupts, outraged and indignant. “You can't seriously be condoning – did you not hear a – word – I just said?!”
Edith looks to her now, a keen edge in her steel-gray eyes. “I did, and I'll thank ye to let me finish. You say she did wrong; you say she hurt people and put 'em at risk to make herself feel better.” She shrugs. “I say you're right. She did. You did,” her eyes flick to me, “but...I still think about the scars Gran showed me, the ones they whipped into her back. When I wasn't having nightmares about the two of ye, I was having 'em about Windrunners. Had to burn 'em out last time, they were so stuck in.”
Clarke throws her hands and eyes to the sky. “I can't believe this is – why are you alright with what she's done; what is – wrong – with you?!”
Edith's jaw flexes. “Windrunners came for everyone, Clarke,” she says, too calmly. “not just knights.”
Clarke's eyes harden. I'd swear a small spark flickers in the depths of her silver-trimmed piece of ice. “I – know – that, Edith.”
“Then ye'll know why I say this,” Edith says, that steel-gray edge now in her words, “I'm glad those Windrunners are dead, I'm glad Merigold is dead, and I'm glad they can't hurt anyone else. I'm sorry about Juliana, about what happened to the two of ye, and I'm sorrier still it's pushed ye apart like this, but she did right from where I'm sitting.”
Clarke's lip curls in disgust and anger. She draws in a short, sharp breath and crosses a line. “Your mother would be ashamed of you, Edith.”
Edith crosses it right back. “My mother's dead, Clarke, not livin' it up as some lord's mistress.”
Clarke's brittle demeanor breaks. “Fine,” she says, voice wavering, eyes bright, “Fine. I hope you're happy together. The murderer and her enabler. What a pairing you make.”
She storms past, out; but not before Edith tosses, “Better than a magi and her pride,” at her back. She doesn't slam the closet door shut or storm down the hall; instead, she takes care not to disturb the now resting Agnes, who had finished coughing up her sickness while her granddaughter and her friends tore each other to pieces.
That awful silence returns. A sick feeling sours my stomach and pains my heart. “I'm sorry.” I say to Edith. Edith, who's turned away from me; Edith, who's looking with forlorn regret at the now-shut closet door.
“No,” her voice cracking. She clears her throat, “No, isn't anyone's fault but mine.” She clears it again. “I need to open up the inn. I'll – I'll see ye soon, Zira.”
Then she leaves; then I'm alone with that wound in my heart. It's as clean as I wanted, and it hurts. It hurts.