Page 58 of Ashen Wings

Nausea whips through me.

I can’t breathe.

Maybe my heart’s stopped.

I don’t know anymore.

Not when those adolescent eyes, supposed to be filled with innocent wonder youthful life, are as grey and faded as the cloud cover. She’ll be okay, I repeat to myself, but I’m not sure if I’m still referring to the girl anymore.

My vision tunnels when Thaye wraps her arms around me. “Nova, I need you to go get some rest. I promise you, I can handle this myself.”

“No, I’m fine. I just need a moment,” I reply, fighting the tears welling in my eyes.

“Look at me.” She draws her palms to my shoulders and tips my gaze up. “You are not fine. If they see you like this, they’ll panic. It’s okay if you can’t handle this. Go home. Get something to eat. Rest. You’ve done enough today, I swear it.”

Everything outside of our locked eyes disappears, but my heart still pounds on my temples with a relentless force.

“I’m—”

“If you say you’re fine one more time, I’ll have you escorted home,” she snaps.

“Okay. I’ll go,” I say, sputtering on defeat, or guilt, I’m not sure which.

“I will see you in the morning,” she says, slow and steady.

“The morning…” I repeat solely because my tongue is incapable of anything else.

“Good,” she whispers.

I linger a moment longer, letting the sounds of the temple fill me—the hush of mumbled conversation, the groans of the Motherwood, even the distant, sorrowful cry of a gull.

Each is a small stubborn proof that life persists. I find myself cataloguing each face like contraband. All of these people, just like the shards of dragonstone they now carry, are little fragments of me. Maybe we collectively form something tired and broken. Maybe we’ll never really be whole, even amongst each other.

My head spins, my heart breaks.

I leave Thaye and the refugees in silence. The storm on the horizon creeps closer like a rolling drum of pressure.

Nausea overwhelms me and I dart into the shadows of an alley before I spill my damned stomach in broad daylight. The pain and heartbreak so clearly etched on that little girl’s face seers in my mind, coming again every time I shut my eyes.

This rage coursing through me is raw, unfiltered death and when finally I’ve emptied my stomach of bile and breakfast, I wipe the tears and stand tall.

27

The thunderheads rupture well after sunset, rattling the windowpanes and whistling through the cracks in the moulding. Sheets of rain slice across the dark streets outside. The guest room is quiet, lit only by a single candle flickering on the dresser. I lie in bed, back pressed against the pillows, but sleep refuses me. That girl’s hatred is an image I can’t cast out. I’ve clenched and relaxed my jaw so much, a cramp now aches in the muscle. My stomach groans for a dinner skipped, but my appetite fled hours ago.

The hollowed corpse I’ve become dangles over the precipice. One slip and I’ll lose myself to a rage now rising like the tides. The exquisite furniture and down-feathered blankets make a mockery of me. Guilt weighs so heavily on my chest, I can’t bring myself to look about the room.

I shouldn’t be here. Not when there are hundreds of others fighting for scraps. That girl, the countless refugees just like her, deserve this comfort more than I. They don’t have blood stained hands like I do. They haven’t slaughtered and hacked and murdered their way through life as I have. Yet, I sit here in silken sleep clothes, with clean hair and warm, floral scented skin.

Lock this up, Nova.

Focus on the mission.

The payout.

My usual mantra slips away, though, like a whisper in a crowded room. The air is too thick to breathe, the world too blurred by sobs. Gods, I’m a mess, unraveling at the seams, burning in my own anger. Self-pity such as this is foreign, but the intrusion refuses to release me.

A soft knock quiets the tears.