Beneath an overcast sky thick with morbid clouds, I stood beside my father. Heartache soaked the air and I swallowed it down with every inhale. The bereaved family's misery seeped into my chest, leaching warmth and filling it with sorrow.
My father and I were gathered with others outside the Crowthers' mausoleum. The ancient stone building was weathered and cracked with age. Ivy crawled up its sides and had crept over the carving of an enormous, savage wyrm that was coiled around the mausoleum as if it were guarding the Crowthers' ancestors inside of it.
While the living family members stood in silent vigil behind a glossy black casket that held the body of their beloved wife and mother, we sang a melancholy lament that spiraled through gloomy shadows. We were here to sing our farewell to Tabitha Crowther, the matriarch of Lower House Crowther.
She'd died tragically in a car accident last week.
Her body, minus a finger, would be placed in the family's mausoleum. The flesh from her removed finger would be burned away until the bone was left. The bone would be ground down and added to the Crowthers' ancestors' dust in an urn of power, that all of the Houses had sitting on their mantles.
Summer was turning to autumn. Thin strands of chilly wind stirred the green-gold leafy canopy high above, lifting the ends of my loose hair and sliding my skirt around my shins. It slunk between my ankles, nippy and bracing, to ruffle grassy blades like the surface of the sea.
It was a shameful thought and it was selfish of me to be enjoying the moment in such wretched circumstances. But it was the first time I was allowed to wear high heels. Not too high, modest in their height, but they screamed adulthood. I was eleven years old, wearing an elegant dress and heels, and it was the first time I felt grown up.
As the words of the lament tripped mindlessly from my lips, I glanced about, noting my peers and the elders in attendance. The funeral grounds, deep within the gnarled forest surrounding the Crowthers' estate, was large enough to host a great deal many more than those here. It was an observation even my father had noticed when we'd arrived, how many Heads and Houses that had chosen not to attend.
Tabitha had married Varen Crowther and risen to matriarch. However, she'd been a servant prior to her rise in rank after marrying the Head of Lower House Crowther. And it would seem many families from our dark world had refused to attend the funeral of a servant who had risen to a position she never should have achieved. Indeed, even my Ballet Mistress had muttered to me this morning as she slapped my wrists for poor poise, that our gods were punishing the Crowthers for being too bold and breaking with the tradition and bloodline of the Upper Houses, by ending Tabitha's life so early.
As I'd stood there trying not to cry and berating myself for disappointing her once again, with my wrist burning from the sting, the red welt puckering my flesh, I wondered if perhaps she was wrong. I knew deep down that she was right, there were rules and expectations for us all within the upper ranks, but a small part of me wished otherwise. A tinier part of me wished that one day, perhaps I could have what Varen and Tabitha once had. A choice.
Gathered around the coffin were the immediate family, along with Rosa Lyon. Rosa dabbed her tear-stained eyes with a handkerchief, her mouth wobbling with the heartache she couldn't contain. She was the only one outside of the family that stood next to Varen and his children as if she was considered one of the Crowthers. But I knew she wasn't blood-related.
Behind the extended Crowther family was a wall of black uniforms and grief. My eyebrows pinched together with curiosity. There were so many and I didn't recognize any of them. And then I realized that every single one was a servant. I inhaled a startled breath, my eyes flaring wide. I hadn't attended many funerals before, but even I knew this was unheard of. And Varen had not only let them attend, but they also stood amongst his family, as if ... as if he considered them family.
The coffin lay on a slab of stone that was so entangled around the stone that it seemed as if the casket was raised up from the ground on a bed of green leaves.
Behind it stood the Crowthers. They reminded me of a murder of crows, just like their name, with their black hair and black suits of mourning. Varen, the Patriarch, cradled his daughter, Ferne, in an arm. She was three years old and she'd lost her sight in the car accident. Her eyes, I'd overheard someone whisper to another, had been so badly mutilated they had to be removed. Now the little girl was blind, and a delicate strap of black lace had been tied around her forehead to cover her empty eye-sockets. She had her tiny arms wrapped around her father's neck and her face buried into his chest. Varen's other arm was bound around his youngest son, Jett, who was eight years old and clung to his side like a vine. Jett was the only one of his brothers that was openly crying. I couldn't hear him, but I could see the tears glistening on his lips, how they trembled and his shoulders shuddered in the same pattern that embraced me when I sobbed into my pillow at night. Varen, his face etched in stoic grief, held him close.
Kenton stood on Varen's other side, with Caidan right beside him, both of them were lost in their heads, violet eyes shining too bright with the film of unshed tears. The only one of the brothers who stood apart from them all was Graysen. He had his head bowed, his messy hair sliding forward to shield his expression as he stared down at his feet.
As I continued singing the sorrowful lament, our combined voices cresting and tumbling like teasing wind, my gaze scanned across the family members, I realized that Varen's twin sister, Valarie, was missing. As too was my mother who was too distraught at losing her best friend in such a horrific accident to be able to attend. My older sister, Lise, had stayed behind to look after her, while my youngest sister, Nelle, was too young to come along. I was the only one from our House who had accompanied my father, and a certain amount of pride warmed my chest, that I could.
My gaze drifted back to Varen and I shifted slightly with intrigue, my shoes crunching dead leaves beneath their soles, the heels sinking a little into the soft earth. Varen held something in his hand that was long and wooden.
I rose up, my spine straight, toes flat on the ground, just as I practiced every single day, keeping my posture poised and graceful, to gain more height to see what he clutched between his scarred fingers. My eyebrows nudged together in curiosity to see that his hand was wrapped around the long handle of a wooden spoon. A simple kitchen utensil, ordinary, but for the blooms of white roses that were twined around the spoon and up the handle.
How strange.
Varen unwound his arm from Jett and stepped forward to stop in front of the casket. Ferne shifted in his arms, her long black hair shielding much of her face as she seemed to make the same gesture one would do of peeking outward. Except she couldn't see. She could only cock her ears to listen. There was unease and distress on her little face, in the way she clutched her father, the shape of her mouth as if she'd whimpered. Varen took a moment to murmur softly to her, to run a gentle hand over her hair and soothe her. Ferne settled back in his arm, tucking her face into the crook of his neck while he rested his cheek on her crown of dark locks. He stretched his other hand toward the coffin to place the spoon and roses on its curved front, to be buried with his wife. I watched him blow out a deep breath as he let the wooden spoon go, his fingers spread wide as if he found it hard to let go and leave it there.
Inhaling a big breath he went to step back. But a sudden change came upon him and he jerked forward fast, and snatched the spoon up again, holding it tight in a trembling hand, as if he couldn't bear to be parted from it. As if the spoon and roses represented his wife and he couldn't bear to let her go.
The lament came to an end and silence reigned once more within the burial grounds.
There was only the sound of shifting boughs and ruffling leaves, the whispering wind winding through the ocean of trees. Even the forest critters seemed to have departed in respect of Tabitha. There were no insects buzzing nor birdlife or critters rustling through the undergrowth.
I was about to ease back down to the flat of my feet when I spotted Master Sirro. Astonishment exploded inside my head like a crack of stone on stone. Dressed in a somber suit of black, Master Sirro stood with his Familiar beneath the twisted branches of a Hawthorn tree, a fair distance away. Perhaps he didn't want to intrude upon the Houses and our funeral so he kept almost hidden within the gloom. The brisk wind feathered his dark hair sideways. The silvery lines of power that tethered his Familiar's lifeforce to his own, shimmered in the murkiness shadowing the sinister forest.
It was so odd that he'd attend a funeral, and one of a servant who had risen above her station too, that I blinked several times to make sure I wasn't imagining this.
Yet there he was.
"Come, Evvie," my father murmured quietly, startling my attention to swing sideways. My father offered me his arm. "We can't stay long." The wake would start soon but there were pressing matters within the world of Houses and my father had said we'd sing our farewells and soon after depart for home. I hooked my arm around his and walked alongside him across the shorn grass. When I went to look for Master Sirro, he was gone from beneath the thorny tree, and I couldn't spot him anywhere amongst the mourners.
We approached Varen and his children. I swallowed nervously when I cast a quick glance at the coffin, relieved to find it wasn't open like it sometimes was at other funerals with the dead on display.
The Crowthers bowed. We did not.
We were a dark world of casual royalty and I was a Wychthorn Princess.
I would never lower myself to another.
Rosa Lyon ushered the boys away to give my father the space he needed to speak freely with his vassal. I felt my father's arm tense beneath my hand when he spoke to Varen, giving him his condolences. Afterward, he cleared his throat and said, "Please pass on my condolences to Valarie as well."
The grief Varen felt was palpable, raw and naked, it was too much to take in. It hurt like a shard of broken glass piercing my flesh. Varen had glanced away to look at his sons gathered around Rosa. His angular jawline was clenched hard and mouth pinched tight, but when his eyes returned to my father's they were flat and empty. He nodded, silently agreeing to it.
Turning away, my father then went to speak with those families that had chosen to attend the funeral. The few Heads of Houses who had come to pay their respects. I tuned my father's conversation out as he gave orders of what was soon to come. There was insurrection within the mortal world of crime syndicates and the Houses were going to war. Instead, I chose to smooth my dress, to shift myself into a more grownup posture with my hands linked at my middle. And then behind me, I overheard the whisperings behind my back.
I lifted my chin higher, determined to ignore them as they continued to talk about me. "She'll be married off quickly when she comes of age," a male voice said. Whomever he spoke to, grunted in agreement. The first man continued. "Byron will need to align himself with a powerful family loyal to him, for he has no sons, no heirs, to be able to continue his family's reign without an alliance. Out of all her sister's she might be the one to produce a son first. He'll play her marriage to his advantage."
No one needed to tell me this. I already knew it. I was a dutiful daughter and that's what daughters could bring to their family—advantage. I would marry and if I was blessed with a son before my sisters, my husband would rule his stead until my son came of age. I just wished I might marry for love. It was a fanciful wish, one I knew that would never be fulfilled. I could only pray that when the time came for my parents to select my husband, he would be kind.
While my father continued to talk and give orders, in the corner of my eye, I watched Irma Pelan approach Varen. I always thought there once had been a beautiful, confident woman behind the insipid clothing. She was the wife of Aldert Pelan, a man my father did not like. He was always trying to usurp his authority within the Houses.
Irma Pelan reached out tentatively to touch Varen's arm.
He flinched before her fingertips could curl around his upper arm and she froze, a brief moment of shock slicing through her blank expression. She let her hand hover for a moment longer before she withdrew it, only to loop her hands together at her middle, much like I was.
Irma gave a furtive glance toward her husband with the red hair and beady eyes. He was standing not too far from where my father and I stood. A rat, that's what Nelle had called Aldert Pelan when she'd laid eyes on him at a recent House Gathering. One of a few she'd attended as a child. We couldn't allow her to attend many, but neither could we hide her away so completely that the Houses would be suspicious that there was something other about her.
Irma smiled at Varen and greeted him. I couldn't hear what they said, they were too far away. But I could lipread. It was something I'd learned to do to overcome the boredom of social events. As a daughter of Great House, I was to be there, but silent and pushed into the background.
"Thank you for coming, Irma," Varen said, readjusting Ferne in his arms. Her head bobbed drowsily and I suspected she'd fallen asleep.
"I'm sorry for your loss, Varen," Irma replied. "I know that Tabitha was ... she was..." Shaking her head, she faltered, stumbling over the words, unable to continue. And Varen glanced away, as if it was too much too.
Irma licked her lips and then continued. "I just wanted you to know that I can be here for you. Anytime you need someone to talk to ... Or not. I can be there simply to listen."
"There's no need to—" Varen was about to say more, but she interrupted him.
"Let me, please." She reached out and this time he let her touch him. A comforting touch I might have thought, with how her fingers squeezed around his forearm, if I didn't see what was lurking on her expression. Something he did not, too busy fussing with his daughter's comfort. Adoration and hope shone bright in Irma's hazel eyes. "Let me do this for you, Varen. You were there for me all those years ago, every time I needed you, and..." Her face collapsed into distress and she said in a tumble of words, her hands fluttering upward. "I should've listened to you. I should've..."
"Irma."
"It's okay. I'm okay," she replied, clearly not as she ducked her head to wipe away the tears that dewed on her lashes. She sucked in a breath, raising her head and widening her eyes dramatically in mortification at herself. "I'm sorry to have said that here, now, like this..."
Irma tried to say something else but her husband was approaching in hasty strides. Aldrert was curt when he spoke to Varen, offering his sympathy. Varen rocked his baby girl in his arms, resting his chin on the crown of her head. He didn't bother replying to Aldert. It was an awkward moment of silence before Aldert escorted his wife away.
Irma reluctantly left with her husband, casting a look of longing over her shoulder at Varen, but he'd turned away to head back to his sons.
My gaze went to the brothers collected around Rosa Lyon. She was murmuring to Kenton, fixing the knot on his tie, while Jett clung to her like he'd done to his father, weeping into her side.
However, I was arrested by Caidan Crowther and his windswept hair.
We'd never spoken before. Never met properly, only drifted around one another at House Gatherings without coming in contact. But I knew who he was, we all did. The Crowther family bloodied their hands as enforcers. They were also the family who bucked tradition with an heir who married a servant. At House Gatherings, I'd watch Caidan often. He laughed a lot, smiled even more. He was so confident and self-assured for someone so young. I didn't understand the difference between us. I was born a princess, self-assurance came with my birth, my role. I had a Governess. A Ballet Mistress too. My mother provided me with lessons on etiquette. I knew how to stand. How to speak. How to offer polite conversation. My education started at an early age and I had many benefits most of the Houses did not. And despite all of my advantages, Caidan still seemed to appear as if he knew who he was, while I did not.
I was jealous of him. Of his confidence. Of how he carried himself.
Caidan glanced up unexpectedly and our gazes collided.
Shock jarred my nerves to be caught staring at him and I felt heat beginning to crawl up my neck. I hated blushing and yet I couldn't stop it from creeping over my jawline to stain my cheeks. Anxious fingers kneaded my skirt because I suddenly didn't know what to do, what to say. I couldn't tear my gaze away from him either. We were locked in a tragic moment of wretchedness and sorrow.
I'm sorry—I mouthed.
Darkness entered his gaze.
Anger too.
His fury felt like a violent strike across my face.
I gasped in fright.
He jerked away, stuffing his hands into his pockets, his shoulders inching upward near his ears. He stabbed the ground with a toe, then glared sidelong at his brothers.
It was a moment later that his gaze finally lifted. Amethyst eyes met mine and they shone with so many emotions. The darkness that had raged at me across his mother's casket was gone. Now he looked young, vulnerable, apologetic almost as if he were asking for forgiveness.
I'm sorry too—he mouthed back.
His shoulders fell with a deep breath.
And then I was turning away, leaving, my father taking us back across the lawn, heading for home. I glanced over my shoulder wanting to steal one last look at Caidan.
He was staring at me, watching me depart.
I lifted my fingers in a goodbye.
And he lifted his fingers too. Misery tugged at the corner of his mouth in a ghost of a smile.
I couldn't help it. I smiled broadly in return as warmth and delight surged through me. It was wrong of me to be feeling happiness at a funeral. His mothers, no less. But I wondered, if perhaps one day, Caidan and I might be friends.
~THE END~