When Stars Die (The Stars Trilogy) (13 page)

With a gentle push from Nathaniel I glide into the foyer and make an abrupt right turn into the parlor, where a roaring fire burns my eyes and makes my skin feel like it will melt off my bones. Even the parlor looks the same. Mother still has that hideous pink-and-white striped settee on the far wall Father has wanted her to get rid of for years. The lion statue that Nathaniel broke the paw off when he was little sits in the corner with dull eyes. Father’s couch, my high-backed chair, Nathaniel’s cushions, the scuffed glass table in the center, the peeling pink wallpaper, it’s all the same.

While it’s arranged the same, the parlor seems somehow stuffier, unkempt. When I sit down on my chair, a layer of dust rises, assaults my nostrils, and I sneeze. Nathaniel throws himself on his cushions, a layer of dust rising from them too.

“Everything’s so dirty,” Nathaniel says, rubbing a finger on the ceramic tiles by the fireplace, exposing a line of pristine white. “Isn’t Lily supposed to keep the parlor clean?”

Now that I think about it, Lily wasn’t there to greet us at the door, to take our coats, our boots, our hats and gloves. She isn’t shuffling in here to offer us a cup of tea, some water, or a hot bowl of soup. She was like an older sister to Nathaniel and I, whenever she could be. Where is she? Not having any sign of her presence here is disconcerting.

“Oh well,” Nathaniel says, stretching on his cushions. “I’m so happy to be home. I wonder what Mother and Father are going to do? I want to go back to our tutor, Mr. Lordes. He’s so much nicer than the nuns. And then, when it gets warm, I want to go to our grotto.”

Nathaniel starts prattling off a list of things he wants to do now that we’re home, but I can’t be excited for any of it. This is not the life I wanted to come back to, not the life I wanted to keep. I still crave a life at Cathedral Reims with strict rules, decorum, pain, and something to look forward to every day. Here, I never had anything to look forward to, other than a life belonging to someone else. I’ve always wished I could be born a boy because at least boys could do something beyond themselves, something beyond staying home and raising children.

I grab the knitted blanket off the back of the chair, just as Father comes into the parlor, and wrap myself in its dusty warmth. This is one item in the entire mansion I never wanted anyone but me to touch, not even Lily, who insisted on cleaning it every opportunity she could. I knitted this entire thing myself, and it is one part of my life from here I wish I could have taken to Cathedral Reims with me. The blanket is like a cocoon for me, wrapping all my nerves in a tight ball to keep my rumbling heart from bursting.

Father sits down on that garish settee, looking directly at me. The mansion hasn’t changed in three years, but Father has. When I left, he had an entire head of brown hair. Now it’s all gone, only a few wisps of gray in place. Lines mar his face, his eyes are dull, and instead of the laugh lines I used to see on him every day, there are frown lines so deep a tiny pang of guilt jumps through me over realizing I may be the cause of those lines.

I swallow deep. “F-Father, you look so tired. Why don’t I ring for Lily to fetch you a cup of hot tea?” It’s the nicest thing I can think of in a moment where not even a tiny bit of guilt makes me want to have a full conversation with Father.

Father sniffs. “I let Lily go.”

Nathaniel sits up on his cushions. “Where’s Mother?”

Father closes his eyes, bringing out deep crevices in the corners. He looks so much older than a man in his forties should.

I grab the edges of my blanket. “What do you mean you let Lily go? And where is Mother?” Mother and Father have always been inseparable. I’ve never seen one without the other, even when they were angry with each other. “Is she sick? And what of Lily? Please, tell me.”

Father keeps his eyes closed. His hands curl on his lap. I look at his fingers. The skin is so papery. They look like gnarled claws that remind me of Mother Aurelia’s hands. That woman is in her seventies. Father should not be having the hands of a seventy year old. “Your mother died.”

That tiny pang of guilt grows, and the buried tears involuntarily leak out of my eyes in tiny trickles. Nathaniel looks at me, his small jaw dropped. He then looks at Father like he wants to crawl in his lap and rest his head there as he did when he was five. He stays at the cushions.

“W-what do you mean Mother died?” I ask, feeling the chill of outside creep through my blanket.

He opens his eyes. “An opium overdose. It was the opium that killed her.” His hands start to shake. “She’s been hoarding opium. I don’t know if you knew that, but that’s what she’s been doing. Those weekend trips where we all thought she was visiting Malva with her lady friends, well she was off in the opium dens. I suppose her body couldn’t handle it anymore. She died a few months after you--after you left.”

Gluttony. That was the sin that gave birth to Nathaniel and I. Or could it be greed? Lust? Or all three? Even more damning. My Father’s hands shake more, and without thinking, I sweep over to him and wrap my arms around his shoulders like the good daughter I used to be. I used to lay my head on his shoulder in the evenings while he read from The Vulgate, smoking sweet-smelling tobacco from his pipe. Oh, how I remember that tobacco. This makes me want to find it and smoke some myself, if only to be lost in nostalgia for as long as the tobacco burns.

I hold my hand out for Nathaniel. He doesn’t hesitate, comes over, and buries his head just underneath my breast. He doesn’t make any crying sounds, but I can feel wetness seeping through the wool of my dress.

Father doesn’t seem moved by any of the affection. I don’t expect him to be, not after what a horrible daughter I’ve been. For three years I’ve blamed both Mother and Father for Nathaniel, when really it was Mother who was in danger of unraveling our family.

“Why did Mother do it--I mean, go to the opium dens?” I ask.

“She’s always been out of sorts, but has always done her best to hide it from you children. She saw things, heard voices that weren’t there. At night she used to wake up clawing her face. She’d hide those scars underneath layers of make-up.” I do remember the uncanny way mother used to rouge her cheeks and powder her face. As a girl, I often wondered if she were going to take off to the circus one day. “When your mother was a child, she was in an asylum for a few years. Most women never get out, but she found ways to suppress her ailment through opium. She only took small doses at first, just to bring on euphoria. It made her happy, and I suppose her caretakers saw this and released her.

“I married your mother a year after she got out, not knowing what I was getting myself into. One night she had hysterics, and then for the next few months, she was fine. She would have repeated bouts of the hysterics every so often, with moments in between that were calm. I suppose she just kept increasing the amount of opium each time. Then she started taking those blasted weekend trips, and I should have checked to see if her lady friends really had gone with her, but I was a foolish, foolish man.”

Father buries his head in his hands and breaks into tears. “I suppose I couldn’t hide your mother’s condition well though. I don’t blame you for taking Nathaniel and leaving. When your mother was dying, things became too much. With the opium withdrawal, she was violent. She almost harmed Lily. That’s why I let her go, to keep her safe. I was devastated when you and Nate left, but during that moment, I was grateful you weren’t there to see the damage. I suppose you’ve known your Mother’s condition for a while, Amelia.”

The real truth sits on the edge of my tongue. I wind it back into my throat, knowing the real reason I left would kill Father if he knew Mother’s opium addiction gave birth to two witches. A witch is never the pride of the family. It’s like Deus gave human beings this natural inclination to stop loving their children once they find out they’re witches. One thinks love is unconditional, but it can be snipped like a thread in an instant. I don’t think there are any exceptions where unconditional love is real.

“Father, I--” My throat goes dry. He is better of not knowing the truth.

“I was so happy to hear from your Mother Superior, Amelia. She told me she had no idea you were there without our knowing, but that you two have been a blessing to the establishment. She said churches can never use too many priests or nuns.”

This is the nicest compliment anyone average at Cathedral Reims will ever receive from Mother Aurelia. I don’t believe it though, not with the way she wanted us gone as though our progress meant nothing to the Order.

“She was upset she had to let you go, but knowing what she did, she felt it was best you come home for a little while, and I am happy to have you and Nate home. I want to fix our family, you know. Rekindle things with no burdens on our shoulders. We can make things different this time around. Better.”

I sit there, Nathaniel still curled against me. This is too much to take in. First Colette, then the train, Oliver, and now this. What am I supposed to say when there is still too much going on with me to be able to reestablish a relationship with no burdens? I can’t. I feel sad for my Father, I’m not completely heartless. And yet, I still hold on to Cathedral Reims and to everything there.

What is Father going to give me besides a marriage to some stranger? That was his dream for me. Is it still the same? My dreams have changed. I have changed. I know what is out there for me, and I know I can get that. This may be selfish of me, as a daughter should always be there to care for her father when he needs her. Nathaniel, on the other hand, is better suited for that. He wants to be here. He wants to mourn for Mother. I can feel it in the tears brushing against my ribs. I can feel it in the heavy pounding of his heart. I am a naturally selfish individual. I can’t be happy unless I am pursuing what I want.

I pull Nathaniel off me and lean into his ear. Silent tears still course down his cheeks. “Please stay here with Father.” He nods, wiping his eyes. “Father, if you don’t mind, I need to take a walk. This is all--this is all so overwhelming. I need to be alone.”

Father nods as I rise from the settee. Nathaniel reaches for Father, like he used to before we left for Cathedral Reims. Father takes Nathaniel and rocks him. I can’t help but smile as Father turns into a younger version of himself while he sits there, making soft shushing sounds. If I didn’t know any better, I could believe our life has always been this way--no witches, burdens, or dark secrets.

I push out of the parlor, thinking of seeking Oliver out for comfort. He never told me where he’d be. He just has to be around here. He wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye. Yet, as I search all over the mansion, the grounds, and even the drive and edge of the woods, he is nowhere. In the end, I fall into the snow, feeling stranded in a place that is supposed to be home but feels like that tiny cell did during my second trial.

Chapter Thirteen

Even after several days of being home, I still don’t know how to feel about Mother’s death. I’ve even circled the statue erected of her in the snowy lawn out back several times to unearth any emotions I might be hiding. As expected, I feel nothing, and I feel like an awful daughter for not feeling anything at all because I do have wonderful memories of times I’ve spent with Mother. The memory that sticks most to me is the time I was looking in her vanity at myself, and she put her arms around me and said I was beautiful. Her heavily done face would stare back at me, hiding what she looked like beneath, my never knowing if she had the complexion of a rock or the complexion of a lily. All I could see were those eyes that Nathaniel has, the blueness of the ocean I wish I were born with. Maybe then I’d feel beautiful.

Not even this can bring a tear to my eye, and I hate myself for it. Isn’t a daughter supposed to cry over her own Mother’s death, in spite of that small bitterness over knowing Mother is the reason for her children being witches?

I circle her statue again, locking my eyes on her stony face. It’s not an exact likeness of her at all, but it at least catches the shape of her face, her hair, and the dress she might have been buried in, her favorite evening gown. It’s a Gareth tradition to have statues erected of deceased relatives in our back lawns. A morbid one, I think. If Father dies soon, I’m not going to erect a statue of him. I’ll have him buried somewhere nice, and that’ll be all.

I turn away from the statue, my mind set on locking myself in the library where I’ve been these past few days avoiding everyone. I’ve been avoiding Father because I don’t know what to say to him about reestablishing our family. That seems impossible considering that Mother is gone and his two children disappeared three years ago. How can we come back from that? I’m a daughter who has her own desires. I’m a selfish daughter who has no desire to hold on to this dwindling family. Father has been able to manage these past three years, and while he hasn’t been managing well, he’ll survive. Nathaniel can provide for his emotional needs, even though he is only eight. I’ll visit every once in a while, but my life will be mine and no one else’s.

As for Nathaniel, I’ve been avoiding him to give him some room to mourn. I don’t know what it’s like to be an eight-year-old suffering through the loss of a parent. Mother and he were close. When she wasn’t away on trips, she’d take him out for ice cream, to the park, and to the toy store in the city—which was one day out of the week. He was devastated the day I told him we needed to get away. I think he even might have hated me for a moment, but I ignored his feelings in favor of preserving us as brother and sister. This is the only familial relationship I want to hold on to because in the end, Nathaniel and I will be all that is left when Father is gone.