My Darkening Ember

Chapter Forty - Nine

I scrambled onto my hands, leaning against the iron tub as I clutched the jade, rubbing my palms to my eyes. Everything was exhausting. From where I sat I could spot the stain.

It would remain there, forever seeping into the floor until someone would devise to tear the boards up and replace them. It wouldn't matter if they did, I wasn't coming back here. I was leaving. I wanted to leave. This was not my home. The palace was a strange place. Edmunds's house would have been sold long ago. There would be nowhere for me to stay. It was no choice at all.

I found myself walking towards the marble hall a minute later. I had decided. I would leave, not that that decision was up to me anyway.

I had realized there was a second option to this, one that would make it all end. The pain, my grief, and all my problems. It was dark but not something I hadn't thought of before. But it was only a last resort although now I had reached my last resort, almost.

Only the guards had remained in the hall, waiting for me. Sarvin was nowhere and neither was Mayra.

"Lady Elora, are you all packed?"

I nodded, knowing I had nothing to pack. The jade was around my neck, and in my hand, I clutched the sun catcher, the one she had admired. The picture of my mother had gone and even as I looked everywhere I hadn't found it.

I suddenly wished I had stolen a dagger, anything to protect myself. The palace was not known to me and I had no idea what to expect from Aleron or anyone there.

They didn't say goodbye as I was guided into a carriage and the guards slammed the door shut. Not even Mayra came to protest or scowl at them.

They led me through the main entrance to the palace where I had been before, to the dark hall with the bare walls, through the ballroom and the door I had passed through when Lau followed me. Entering the same hallway where Xander had almost lost control of his rage, because of me, because of my words. Though I continued, to the locked door that had stopped me from running away at the ball, the same night she...

I shook my head, forcing the thoughts away, I wasn't going to do that. Not now, not while I was here.

Weakness, don't show weakness. 

The voice in my head almost prayed for me. The voice that had been so silent for hours.

The sound of doors opening cooled my thoughts and the guards stepped aside, letting me go the rest of the way. While under my thoughts they had led me up more flights of stairs, and down a wide hallway with large dome windows.

I carefully walked ahead, entering a large rounded room. To the side of it was a circular window with stained glass, in all colours.

It pictured a dark-haired woman in a white dress, riding down a thinning pathway. As the light penetrated the glass, its colours swirled around the room creating a calming presence.

A bed was placed to the side, with two wooden pillars on each side holding snaking vines growing up, latching onto the ceiling, and continuing.

Opposite the entrance, in front of me were two large couches placed in a half-circle with three fur pelts on the floor. It all surrounded a fireplace, that looked like it had been carved where it stood, into the wall with golden cracks in the white stone.

The vines almost covered the entire ceiling, even growing into a large closet, with a moon crest at the right of the bed. Next to that was a white door.

The guards closed the entrance behind me.

I was alone.

My hands rubbed each other, and I suddenly felt a cry in my throat. Dried blood was falling from my dress like dust. I needed to get out of it, gods I felt disgusting. She was all over me, gutting me, her eyes flashed before me again. Those sky-blue eyes. I rushed to the white door, and pushed it open, ripping off my clothes before crawling into a porcelain tub, and letting the water run.

I sat there watching the water rise, covering me every minute. My bloody dress was just a ball on the floor. I couldn't take my eyes off it. The dress, she had picked, that Lau had held me in, that Xander had covered so I wouldn't be seen.

She had lain in my arms, bleeding, trying to talk but failing because of the deep gash in her throat. 

I cupped my hands for water before splashing some on my face. Finally, as the water reached my chest, I slipped under, holding my breath for as long as I saw light.

When I finally emerged, it felt like half the day was gone already, and it probably was. No one had come to check or disturb me and I didn't know how to feel about that. I wanted to be alone, but I also started to miss Mayra.

I wanted her here, to curse her out or roll my eyes at her. I felt so much anger, and there was nowhere to place it. 

My room had been lit by candles when I stepped out from the bathroom covered in a robe. A small tray of what I presumed was dinner had been placed on my bed.

Considering I had thrown up everything I had, I was starving, but the image of Selene's widening eyes made me lose my appetite.

I slumped down on the bedside after leaving the suncatcher in the windowpane, studying the jade in my hand. It felt as if it burned into my palm.

A knock at the door made all my senses jump, I rose fast, and relaxed as soon as Mayra's head popped inside. I swallowed the fear that had settled in me.

Here comes the traitor. The one who doesn't care about you.

"Why are you here?" I said rather angrily. I hadn't noticed how her letting me leave by myself had upset me.

"Oh stop that, did you really think I wasn't going with you?" She said and gave me a careful smile.

She emerged fully from behind the door, my eyes immediately went to her hand, which held a large frame. Its front turned away from me.

She noticed my gaze, "She asked me..." She trailed off and took a deep breath. I knew what that was, it was her's. One of her works. I swallowed my beginning cry while trying to blink away the tears.

Mayra flipped it and my hand flew to my mouth and my lips began quivering. My tears couldn't be stopped, not with this.

It was my mother, her eyes smiled back at me. Her raven hair rested down her chest. Her features were calming, and young and her smile exposed her dimples. I was almost exactly like her, her cheeks, her beautiful tan skin, and her hair. Her oval-shaped face.

It was like looking in a mirror. The only thing that was my father was my ember eyes. Everything else was from her.

I took it from Mayra, staggering back until I hit the bed. Placing it in my lap, I let my hands graze over the paint. Even as the cold canvas met me I could almost imagine she was there. In my vision, I didn't have a face, not one that was clear. I hadn't known what she looked like, but now I knew exactly who she was. My mother.

"She told me about it before the feast, she was so excited to give it to you."

I lifted my eyes, watching the sadness wash over her.

Selene had done this. She had finished a painting, for me.

"I need to see her."