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I let out a sigh and removed the mask to let my skin breathe.
“I have tried,” I whispered to the phantoms all around me. “I have tried time and time again. I have nothing more to give, other than seeing to it she does not fall.”
“Who are you speaking to?”
My blood went cold. I scrambled for the mask, but froze in a bit of horror when Calista’s slender fingers curled around it and lifted it off the ground.
I clapped my palm over the scars and hurried to my feet. My back pressed into the corner of the mausoleum, the shadows like a warm robe.
She tilted her head, glancing first at the half mask, then to me in the darkness. “Who were you talking to, Silas?”
“Ghosts.”
I expected her to turn back, to flee from the madness I carried. Perhaps, I expected her to laugh. Calista did none of it, merely nodded her head. “I’ve done that a time or two. What is this place?”
I didn’t answer. She’d already began rummaging about and would figure it out soon enough.
She scanned the shelves, read through some parchment. “Wait, are these fate songs?”
“They are.”
Calista rustled through more of the parchment. “These look like some that were found in the Court of Stars during the battle. Why do you have them?”
“They are bits of comfort from a lost world. Memories I do not wish to forget.”
She paused, licking her lips. “The parchments found in the fae isles spoke of my royals. Curses and memory thieves. Things of that kind.”
“The fated paths,” I muttered.
“Yes.” Calista returned the parchment to its place. “Why were they there when they were the tales of future storytellers?”
I glanced over my shoulder. “I do not know how to answer that when you do not want to know the truth.”
“What if I do?”
I closed my eyes. “Then, I would tell you those tales came from the same song of seidr.”
“How is that possible. They are all different tales, from different fate workers.”
I didn’t answer. She was not ready to know the horrible truths of our lives.
In my silence, Calista studied the tapestry, then pulled it aside. A little gasp slid from her throat. “All gods.”
She traced the names etched into the stone I’d crafted and built into the earthy walls.
“My parents? Are they . . . is this where they rest?”
“I do not have their bones,” I admitted. “But they deserved a place.”
“You made this?” She smiled, tracing her mother’s name. “You cared for them. Didn’t you?”
A strange burn built in my skull, sharp and aggravating. It caused me to blink more than once. “They were my home. Without the queen’s help, I would’ve had long, matted hair to my feet, and clothes with patches. Perhaps no clothes at all. I certainly wouldn’t know it was considerate to wash under the arms.”
“I’m sure she took pride in doing so, since no amount of washing can tame this hair.” Calista coiled one of her rolled braids around her finger.
Her hair was wild. It always had been, like her spirit. Older gentry boys had often tugged on her braids or tried knotting them, thinking the little princess was alone.
They never got far before I stepped in their path and sent them to their mothers with bloody noses or chipped teeth.
