Chapter 2: The Only One

Aviana's POV 

I don’t know how I made it back to my room with all the pain I felt.

I kept one hand on the wall. Putting one foot in front of the other. Blood dripped off me and hit the floor as I walked passed.

I bit down on my lip so hard I tasted more blood. 

Don’t make a sound. Don’t you dare make a sound.

If anyone heard me crying, it would start another round of beating. I knew that from experience. Weakness was an invitation here. 

So I kept my mouth shut and my teeth pressed into my lip and I moved one slow step at a time down the corridor.

I was almost at my door when something hit my back.The scream tore out of me before I could stop it.

“Arrgh…” I clawed at my own back, fingers scrabbling at the ruined skin, trying to stop the burning that exploded through every open wound at once. 

My knees nearly buckled. I grabbed the wall and held on.

“You look so funny when you cry like that.”

I turned around slowly.

Patricia stood a few feet away holding an empty bottle, her perfectly golden hair flipped over one shoulder, her green eyes looking directly into mine with so much it stole my breath away.

I had always hated this gift. The moon goddess had given me the ability to feel what other people felt and right now I wanted to rip it out of my own chest because what was coming off Patricia was pure disgust.

“Can you stop looking at me like that?” 

She wrinkled her nose. “You’re so repulsive. I saw you bleeding and wanted to wash it off so you couldn’t go around saying we were bad siblings. That’s all. You’re welcome.”

“Why.” My voice came out smaller than I wanted it to. “Why are you and Aldric doing this to me? Why won’t you just…”

“Doing this to you?” She laughed. It was a pretty laugh. Everything about her was pretty. 

“Doing this to you, dear sister? We aren’t doing nearly enough.” The smile dropped. 

“You killed our father even though he loved you the most. Did you think you would just get away with it? Did you think we would forget?”

“I didn’t…”

“You are a murderer,” she said simply. “You are a monster and you will be treated like one. Now get out of my sight before I’m sick.”

She turned, walked away and I stood in the corridor as I watched her go. I kept blinking and blinking until the burning in my eyes went away.

I made it through my door. 

My room had not always looked like this. I remembered, distantly, the way it used to be so beautiful with soft rugs, the carved wardrobe my father had made for my seventh birthday, the window seat cushioned in pale blue where I used to sit for hours watching the grounds below. 

All of that was gone. 

Stripped out years ago, piece by piece, until what remained was barely a room at all and then I was forced to move into the storage room. It had only a narrow bed frame with a thin mattress that dipped in the middle. 

A single blanket, rough wool, more grey than any color. A washbasin in the corner that leaked a slow drip onto the stone floor no matter how tightly you turned it. 

One window, high up in the wall, too small and too far up to see anything through except a small portion of the sky. 

There were no rugs. No curtains. Nothing on the walls. The stone was always cold, even in summer, and in winter the gap beneath the door let in a cold that nothing could keep out.

I made it about three steps before my legs gave way.

The pain in my back was terrible, and the thing Patricia had thrown on me had made it worse. 

I pressed my forehead to the cool floor and breathed in and out and tried to find the place inside myself where the pain couldn’t quite reach.

I couldn’t find it tonight.I don’t know how long I laid there before I heard a knock.

“Aviana.” A voice called through the door. 

“If you can hear me, open the door.”

I knew that voice, it was Philip the only person that remained my friend after all these years. 

No matter what I went through, he couldn’t save me in public. He was always here to clean up my wounds and talk me through the worst of it. 

I dragged myself up off the floor and crossed the room and opened the door.

Phillip had to duck slightly to fit through the doorframe. 

He was huge, his shoulder and chest was broad from years of training to be a knight. 

He was still in his training clothes, dark hair pushed back from his forehead, a few strands falling loose at his temple. His eyes were a warm deep brown … and it looked so kind.

He was carrying a cup of water and a cloth and a small jar of something that smelled herbal and medicinal.

He didn’t say anything about how I looked. He didn’t say anything at all for a moment. He just stepped inside, set everything down, and held the cup out to me first.

I took it with both hands, drinking the whole thing without stopping.

“Sit down,” he said quietly. “On the bed. Let me see your back.”

“Phillip you don’t have to…”

“Sit down, Aviana.”

I sat down.

He worked in silence mostly, which I was grateful for. His hands were careful … surprisingly careful for someone who spent his days training with blades and weapons. 

He cleaned each wound slowly, and when he applied the medicine from the jar he did it gently enough that I only had to hold my breath once or twice.

When he finished, he folded the cloth and set it aside and sat on the edge of the bed beside me.

“You should sleep,” he said.

“I will.”

Neither of us moved for a moment.

“Thank you,” I said. “Phillip. Really.”

He looked at me for a second with something moving behind those warm brown eyes that I couldn’t quite read. Which always puzzled me. 

Then he nodded once, stood up, and walked to the door.

He pulled it closed gently behind him.

I sat on the edge of my bed in the dark, quiet and I waited until I was sure his footsteps had faded down the corridor.

Then I pressed both hands over my face and I cried. I cried until my chest hurt and my throat was raw and there was nothing left to cry again.

Then I lay down on my side … carefully, so my back didn’t touch the blanket. 

My birthday was in three days.

Three days until I turned eighteen. Three days until the moon finally gave me the one thing I had been asking for.

“Moon goddess.” My voice came out hoarse and very small in the dark room. 

“Please. I know I have asked for very little. I know I have no right to ask for anything. But my birthday is three days away and I will finally get my mate and I am asking you … I am begging you … please.”

I pressed my hand flat against my chest.

“Please let it be Phillip. Please let it be him.”

The room was quiet.

Outside the wind moved through the oak trees and somewhere far away an owl called once and went silent.

I closed my eyes.

Please.