The Things We Do to Survive

CHAPTER FOUR

The Things We Do to Survive

“…you begged me to kill you before he could touch you again.”

For a moment, I forgot how to breathe.

I stared at Mara, waiting for her to laugh, to tell me it was some elaborate joke, to give me anything that would make those words less horrible.

She did none of those things.

“What did he do to me?”

Her lips parted, but no answer came.

“What did I do to you?”

That seemed to hurt her more.

She turned away, pressing a trembling hand against her mouth. I watched her shoulders rise and fall, and for the first time since waking in that cursed room, I wondered whether I was the only person who had been forced to live without my memories.

“Mara.”

“Don’t.”

“Tell me the truth.”

She turned so abruptly that I flinched.

“The truth?” Her eyes glistened. “You want the truth? The truth is that you have died more times than I can count, and every time you come back, you look at me as though I’m a stranger.”

My throat tightened.

“And every time,” she continued, her voice breaking, “I have to decide whether to save you or let you make the same mistake again.”

I wanted to comfort her.

I wanted to take her hand.

Instead, I asked the only question that mattered.

“Did I love him?”

Mara went still.

Her gaze searched my face, and something ugly flickered behind her eyes.

“That’s what you want to know?”

“I want to know why I feel like my heart is breaking whenever he looks at me.”

She laughed once, without humour.

“Because your heart has always been your worst enemy.”

Then she walked towards the passage.

I caught her wrist.

She stopped.

For one reckless second, we stood close enough that I could see the tiny scar beneath her lower lip. Her eyes dropped to my fingers around her wrist, then lifted to mine.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she whispered.

“Like what?”

“Like you might remember.”

My grip loosened.

She slipped away.

Before disappearing into the passage, she glanced back at me.

“If you want answers, there’s a room beneath this building. You’ll find it behind the oldest mirror.”

“What am I looking for?”

Mara’s expression turned cold.

“Your first death.”

Then she left me alone.

I stood there for a long time, listening to her footsteps fade.

Finally, I looked down at the dagger.

A fresh inscription had appeared along its blade.

Five words.

SHE WAS NOT YOUR FIRST.

My stomach dropped.

Behind me, somewhere inside the wall, a lock clicked.

A door opened.

And a man’s voice whispered from the darkness.

“She’s told you about the deaths, then.”

I turned.

The hooded man stood at the end of the passage.

This time, he wasn’t smiling.

He held a photograph between two fingers.

He extended it towards me.

I didn’t move.

“Take it,” he said.

Against every instinct I possessed, I stepped forward.

The photograph showed a girl standing in a garden beneath a blood-red moon.

She had my face.

Beside her stood the hooded man, his arm wrapped around her waist, his forehead resting against hers.

They looked happy.

They looked in love.

I turned the photograph over.

A date was written on the back.

October 19, 1897.

Beneath it, in handwriting I recognised as my own, were six words.

If he finds me, kill him.

I looked up.

The man had come closer.

“Now,” he whispered, “do you understand why you should be afraid of me?”

I stared into the darkness beneath his hood.

“No,” I said, tightening my grip on the dagger.

“But I think you should be afraid of me.”

For the first time, he looked genuinely frightened.

And somewhere beneath us, something began to laugh.