Chapter 6- What the Letter Held

Elowen:

My mother's hands shook as badly as mine when she finally set the letter down on the small table between us. "Do you want me to leave you alone with it?" she asked softly.

I shook my head. I needed her there, close enough to touch, while I broke a seal I had waited two long weeks for.

The parchment felt heavier than it should have, as though the words inside had weight of their own.

I turned it over once, twice, delaying the moment on purpose, some small, frightened part of me still able to pretend, for just a breath longer, that nothing inside it could hurt me.

The handwriting was uneven, hurried in places, as though his hand hadn't quite obeyed him while he wrote it.

Elowen,

I keep starting this letter over. Every version sounds like an excuse, and you deserve better than that.

I was promised to someone before I ever knew what promises cost. For two weeks with you, I forgot that promise existed. I have never forgotten anything so completely, or so selfishly.

I am not asking you to forgive me. I am only asking you to remember one true thing, whatever this becomes, whatever you decide, I never once touched you and thought of her.

I am coming home. Whatever is left of us when I get there, I will not run from it again.

— Zarek

The letters swam before I could finish them, my eyes already flooding by the second line. By the last, I was sobbing openly, ugly and unguarded, the kind of crying I hadn't let myself do in front of anyone since the day this all began.

I found myself reading one line over and over, unable to move past it, I never once touched you and thought of her.

Something about the simplicity of it undid me more than the rest of the letter combined, no flourish, no excuse, just a single, plain confession offered without asking anything in return.

It carried me somewhere I hadn't let myself go in weeks, back to a quiet evening before any of this began, Zarek leaning against my doorframe with flour still dusting his sleeve from some kitchen mishap Odessa had dragged him into, laughing at himself in a way I had never once seen a man of his rank allow himself to.

I remembered thinking, foolishly, achingly, that I could fall in love with someone who let himself be that unguarded around me."He's coming home," I managed, my voice splitting apart on the words.

My mother pulled me into her without asking permission, rocking me the way she used to when I was small enough to disappear entirely into her arms.

"I hate him," I choked out against her shoulder. "And I miss him so badly it terrifies me. Both. Right now. At once."

"That's what love does, baby," she murmured into my hair, her own voice thick. "It never arrives clean. It always comes tangled with everything else."

I don't know how long I cried. Long enough that the letter went damp and soft in my fist, long enough that my chest ached from the effort of it, long enough for the candle beside us to burn down an inch before I finally quieted.

"What am I supposed to feel when he arrives?" I whispered eventually, staring at nothing. "Relief? Anger? I don't even know which one I'm allowed to feel first."

My mother tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, the way she'd done a thousand times before, back when the only things I cried over were scraped knees and burnt bread. "You're allowed every single one of them, in any order you like. No one gets to tell you how to feel about a man who broke your heart and still somehow kept it."

I laughed, wet and small, and it startled me how much lighter it felt than the crying had.

Three days later, a knock came at my door, sharp and certain.

Selene stood there, empty-handed. "Starting tomorrow, you work under the head housekeeper," she said. "Real duties. Real wages. Yours alone, not shared with your mother's."

I stared at her, and to my own surprise, my eyes filled instantly, spilling before I could stop them.

"Why are you crying?" Selene asked, something almost startled crossing her face, as if she hadn't expected this reaction from the girl she'd once told to understand how small she was.

"Because no one has ever offered me anything without asking something of me first," I admitted, wiping my cheek with the back of my hand. "I don't know what to do with kindness that isn't a trap."

Something shifted in her expression, softer than I had ever seen it.

She stepped further into the room, close enough now that I could see the tired lines around her eyes, the ones I hadn't noticed before, evidence of how heavily these past weeks had sat on her too.

"It isn't a trap, Elowen. You earned this." She hesitated, then added, quieter, "For what it's worth, I don't think I would have survived what you've survived, not with half your composure."

"Thank you," I whispered, and the tears came harder for a moment, grateful ones this time, unfamiliar in how much lighter they felt.

She let me have the moment before she spoke again. "My brother is well enough to travel. Word came this morning."

My breath caught somewhere between my throat and my chest. "When will he arrive?"

"Within the week." Her eyes held mine, steady. "Whatever happens between the two of you will not be quiet. Nothing in this house ever is."

"I'm not sure I'm ready," I admitted, the confession slipping out before I could stop it.

"No one ever is," Selene said simply. "You'll be ready anyway. You've managed everything else this house threw at you."

She left before I could ask what she meant by the first part, and I stood there a long while afterward, one hand pressed low against my stomach, crying again, softer this time, from something closer to hope than grief.

That evening, I sat by my window watching the last light fade over the grounds, one hand resting on the small, steady swell of my stomach, letting myself imagine, just for a while, what his return might actually look like.

I pictured him walking through the front gates, thinner than before, maybe leaning on someone for support, and I pictured myself standing there waiting, arms crossed, refusing to run to him the way some foolish, aching part of me already wanted to.

I pictured him saying my name the way he used to, soft and certain, like it was the only word in the world worth saying carefully.

I let myself sit inside that small, fragile picture for a long while, turning it over gently, the way you handle something you're afraid might shatter if you hold it too tightly.

I was still there, lost in that quiet imagining, when the door burst open behind me, shattering the stillness completely.

Odessa stood in the doorway, her chest heaving, tears already standing bright in her own eyes.

"Elowen." She could barely force the words out between breaths. "There's a carriage at the front gate. It isn't Zarek."

My whole body seized. "Then who?"

Odessa gripped both my hands, hers trembling as badly as mine had been all week. "I don't know her by sight. But one of the guards recognized the crest on the carriage door."

"Whose?" I asked.

She swallowed hard, like even saying it cost her something. "Aria," she breathed. "She's here. Asking for you. By name."

I felt the tears come again, instantly, unbidden, this time from something colder and sharper than hope, dread, maybe, or grief for a peace I hadn't even had time to enjoy.

"Why would she come here," I whispered, more to myself than to Odessa, "unless something has already gone wrong?"

Odessa had no answer for me. Neither of us moved for a long moment, both of us simply standing there, crying quietly in the fading light, waiting for whatever was about to walk through that door to finally arrive.