“No.”
There was comfort in her blunt honesty. It was a rare thing in those so clearly enveloped with shock and grief. Yet it was becoming more and more apparent that rare things were a rather common trait in Saga Trygg.
“You spoke?”
Saga looked so small and lost under that blanket. “I tried.” She was sounding farther and farther away. “We argued. She wanted to stop talking about it and then she…” She took a shuddering breath. “Oh Goddess, what if I killed her?”
Avery ran her tongue along the edge of her teeth nervously. It wasn’t evidence, but it did at least abate any idea that Saga had done anything intentionally. “Why would you say that?”
“I should have asked Leigh instead. Mamó had been complaining about heartburn, her best friend had just died, I know stress increases the risk of heart attacks, why didn’t I just ask Leigh instead?”
Heart attack, seemingly non-magical causes. Yet Saga’s grandmother had been close friends with Eira Goff, who had also passed from heart failure, and while the connection was unlikely, Avery knew never to dismiss anything as mere coincidence. Still, there would be time to investigate later. “This wasn’t your fault.”
“No, but I’m hardly blameless.”
An autopsy would undoubtedly prove that statement to be merely an attempt to find control in a time of grief. Avery carefully lowered herself to a crouch so that their gazes met, hoping this simple action would help ground Saga in the moment. “Do you need to go with the ambulance?”
Saga’s eyes welled up and she shook her head. “Leigh’s with them. Reza is going to meet her at the hospital. I—” Her voice caught in her throat. “I don’t want to see the body again.” Her voice was tighter now, the sound much thinner.
Avery stood looking at the ambulance, which was now packing up with Leigh inside. She reached out her hands in an offering to Saga to help her to her feet.
This gesture, however, was misunderstood, and Saga took the woman’s hands to help pull herself up into an embrace. Her arms clutched around Avery, and she buried her face in the fabric of the taller woman’s shirt and coat.
To say it caught Avery by surprise would be an understatement. The shock of the touch felt like a burn that seeped through her skin to the bone. She couldn’t remember the last time she was touched at all with affection, let alone held. Nightmares were not without the illusion of physical contact, but they were attacks, never comfort. Not even for a moment. That she could feel anything that did not need to be deflected or healed was a new pain all its own.
Saga was sobbing into her, wailing. A sound, though muffled by fabric, that resonated and shattered the soul. Heartbreak did not require overture or context—it transcended circumstance and uprooted like-feelings in any who stood witness to it.
Avery could feel the vibrations of Saga’s labored breathing and shaking form against her. It beat into the pang of her chest and that new pain began to bubble up into her throat. She winced and exhaled roughly, attempting to expel the strangling sadness that tried to overcome her. Her arms awkwardly shifted, resisting the urge to push the smaller woman off her.It was increasingly impossible to breathe—not because she was held too tightly, but because the embrace sent tremors through her she could not quell. This small desperate act of comfort had unintentionally sent Avery into a spiral. She could not ignore it. She could not repress it. She could no longer distract herself from it. Two hundred years of isolation embedded its reality into her, and an ache of loneliness crashed over her like a tidal wave. A breath choked in her throat as she tried to keep above it, but it was stronger—so unbearable it might have swallowed her had she not then caught sight of Riddle.
The black cat was staring at her, golden eyes glowering. Disappointed. He eyed the two of them pointedly as if to suggest Avery was doing something entirely wrong.
It was enough of a distraction from the physical sensation and her own despair that Avery found herself grounding in the moment. Was this cat trying to communicate?
Riddle’s tail flicked angrily back and forth, and he sat up straighter, focusing on Avery’s hand closest to him. He raised one paw and made a batting motion.
Bewildered, Avery became keenly aware of her hands still awkwardly sticking out at her sides, not daring to touch the crying woman who had thrown her own arms around her. Tentatively, she rested her hands on Saga’s arms, then checked with Riddle for confirmation.
His tail continued to swish in exasperation.
Avery’s hands moved to rest on Saga’s shoulder blades, but upon checking in with the disapproving cat, they at last wrapped around her fully. It was a strange sensation, finding the exact spot her hands felt like they were meant to rest—much akin to the same satisfying rush when the last clue fell into place. The embrace would have been commonplace to any accustomed to such comforts, but to one familiar only with solitude, it was a phenomenon. A curious experience that her mind would later longingly return to whenever it found itself unoccupied. She said nothing for a good while, not of the embrace or of Saga’s tears. Words were clumsy and superfluous.
So she simply let Saga cry. And neither said anything.
There were, of course, things one should say at that moment; condolences were customary and polite but they felt hollow, regardless of how true they might have been. Expressing sorrow for one’s loss was especially appropriate. There was no better word than “loss” to refer to the death of the Hudson matriarch. It had been some mortal lifetimes ago, but unless the family had broken entirely from their custom, they had been a fixture in both fey and British society. But she could not bring herself to say something so bland and unspecific. It felt too dull a sentence to be spoken in the face of such grief.
Yet an uncomfortable nagging within Avery insisted somethingshouldbe said, and so after the ongoing nothing between them continued past its expiration, she finally spoke. “How long has she had a heart condition?” Platitudes Avery could not abide, but curiosity was an addiction even the sleeping curse couldn’t snuff.
“She didn’t,” Saga spoke into the fabric of Avery’s shirt and coat. “Or if she did, she never told me—but that doesn’t mean anything. Apparently, I’m not worth telling things to—”
“You know that’s not true.”
Saga pulled back enough to look at Avery, and while her face was streaked with tears, her eyes held something new: fear.
“What is it?”
“Something weird happened before I passed out. There was thisdarkness. I’m not sure how else to describe it. I couldn’t breathe—that’swhy I passed out. It was like what happened yesterday, only so much stronger. I couldn’t fight it.”
Avery’s eyes narrowed. “Saga,” she spoke very carefully, verydeliberately. Names had power and she needed the woman to hear her clearly, to be able to fully grasp the meaning of her following question. “Did it feelsimilar…or was it thesameas before?” She might have felt a little guilty for the magic interwoven in her voice, but there was little time to cater to shock. Every moment past meant magic would be fading.
