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I longed for it. For him.
He lowered himself further atop me, his arms tensing as they carried his entire weight. His face came close to mine until he stopped a mere hairbreadth from my mouth. “Let me have you.”
I nipped at his lip, urging a low growl to bubble from his throat and replied, “You already do.”
21
With the days that passed, and the lack of Katharine’s presence, Marius fell into a dark cave of worry. His mood changed entirely. For a man so still, he did not stop moving. He would disappear for hours, sometimes even entire evenings, and return to climb into bed with me before morning arose.
The curtains in the bed chamber had been kept drawn for so long that I could not remember a time that they were ever open. The thick material kept all daylight from breaking into the room, making time harder to grasp a hold of.
I was thankful when Marius pressed his cold body against mine and finally gave into sleep, I was at peace when he was.
As Marius struggled with the internal storm of his worry for Katharine, I dealt with my own raging emotions. Knowing the final day was growing closer and with it the pending doom of what was to come.
One evening I woke in bed alone. Although I could not recall my dreams, I was certain they had been bad for I woke with a heavy chest and full mind. It caused my body to ache, as though I had been through a fight. Or worse.
Rolling over, I half expected Marius to have shifted to the furthest spot away from me. But the sheets had been left rumpled as Marius had slunk out of the room. Only his lingering scent was left behind.
I swung my legs over the bed and pressed my feet into the cold floor. For a moment I sat like that, fighting a yawn as I also fought at the iron webs of anxiety that had settled within me.
Perhaps he had gone to welcome Katharine? At last. Yet deep down I knew that was not the case. Her absence worried him terribly, and there must have been a reason for it. Not that he dared say it aloud.
Like I did most evenings when I woke alone, I sauntered over to the drawn window and slipped between the heavy sheets of material. The window frame had been upholstered with a faded, blue cushion. A place, I could imagine, reading from and admiring the once beautiful grounds below.
Now I just knelt upon the built-in seat and peered out the foggy windows to see Marius pacing the dark paths. His bloodhounds sulked behind him, their whining only adding to the atmosphere that seemed to spread through the castle.
He did this. Every night. Scouting the grounds as if Katharine had simply got lost among them.
“Victorya,” I called, letting my breath fog on the windowpane.
From the reflection I noticed the wisp of grey shadow form into view behind me. “Things are no better.”
I had called upon Victorya a lot during the past few days when Marius had left me for stretched periods of time. She ensured I had food and drink, although I had noticed the supplies dwindling as the days went by. Explained from the lack of Katharine’s visit. Without her bringing food from the town, there was nothing edible to eat inside the castle.
But hunger was the least of my concerns.
“You are certain I cannot leave for answers?” I asked her again, merely echoing what I had already found out from Marius days ago. “If I can get into town I can find out what has kept her from visiting.”
“You cannot leave,” she said, floating across the ground to where I knelt. “I can keep telling you, but the answer will remain the same each time.”
“I know,” I said, pressing my head into my hands. “I just… I cannot keep seeing him in such a way.”
“This is nothing compared to what he has been through before, Jak. This mood is a mere wave to the tidal storms we have endured. It will pass, and if Katharine does not return, another will in her place. It has been that way since the beginning.”
Victorya had been an open book, answering the questions I had for her. At least in some poetic, twisted way. Sometimes her riddles would stay with me throughout the long evenings, as haunting as my ignorance before she provided me with answers.
But the more I had come to learn, the deeper the seed of anxiety felt within me. Threatening to blossom into an uncomfortable, devouring sapling at any moment.
“It is not in my nature to simply wait. I want to help,” I told her, leaving Marius to his pacing as I faced the ghostly girl.
“Can you not speak with your… those who wait on the other side of the water? Ask them to locate her?”
“And give away my concern?” I snapped, realising immediately that I had done so. I peered down to my feet, teeth chewing at my lower lip. “I am sorry, but I cannot do that. Believe me, the thought has crossed my mind. But I cannot let Mother know that I hold some concern for Marius.”
The scrying bowl had stayed hidden ever since Marius had been occupying the room with me. Not by myself, as Victorya had explained. She had been the one to store it away to prevent him from finding it.
“Some concern?” Victorya tilted her head and narrowed her opaque eyes. “Even the dead can see you have simply more than justsomeconcern. You care deeply for him and do not want to voice that you are dying inside at the thought of what you have to do.”
