Chapter Seven: May's Eyes
914 Words
POV May Raith
I help her out of the dress in silence.
The silk whispers as it slides from her shoulders, pooling at her feet like spilled ink. Mourning black, stitched by lantern light and grief both. My fingers know the fastenings by heart. I have undone this gown twice already today. Once for the public rites. Once when the weight of the hall became too much, and she needed air.
Now it is just us.
Awen stands still while I work, spine straight, chin lifted. She has not cried. Not once. That frightens me more than if she had shattered.
“Turn,” I murmur.
She does, obedient, distant. I loosen the gold bands braided into her hair one by one, careful not to pull. They slide free with soft metallic sighs, catching the lamplight before I set them aside. Too heavy for mourning. Too loud.
When the last braid falls loose, her silver hair spills down her back, unbound and wild. It feels like a truth she is not yet ready to speak.
“You should rest,” I say, because it is what I am meant to say.
“I will,” she answers, because she always lies kindly.
I fold the dress with care, smoothing the silk as though it might remember gentler days. My hands are steady. My chest is not.
“They watched you today,” I add, quieter. “All of them.”
“I know.”
Not arrogance. Awareness.
I hesitate, then reach for the comb. The slow work gives me courage. “Travis spoke to my grandfather.”
Her shoulders tighten. Just a fraction.
“When?”
“Before the rites ended.” I draw the comb through her hair. Once. Again. “He smiled when he did it.”
Awen exhales through her nose. “He smiles when he is certain.”
The words hang between us.
“He said your father promised you to him,” I say. My voice wants to shake. I refuse it permission. “He said it loudly. As if volume makes law.”
“And you did not believe him.”
It is not a question.
“No,” I say. “But others did.”
She turns then, slow, deliberate. Her eyes find mine in the mirror. Pale. Steady. Older than they should be.
“May,” she says softly, “did you hear the words he used?”
I swallow. “Yes.”
“Did he invoke blood?”
“Yes.”
“Did he invoke witness?”
“Yes.”
“Did he invoke my consent?”
I shake my head.
Silence settles, thick as ash.
She turns back, allowing me to continue. Trust, offered without ceremony.
“My father would never bind me without choice,” she says at last. Not loudly. Not angrily. As a fact. “If he promised anything, it was a future he believed would protect us all.”
I think of my grandfather’s face when Travis leaned close. The way fear hollowed his eyes.
“He threatened someone,” I say before I can stop myself.
The comb pauses mid-stroke.
“Whom?” Awen asks.
I meet her gaze in the mirror again. “Me.”
No. That is not true.
“My family,” I correct. “Quietly. Like it was nothing at all.”
Something shifts in her then. Not power. Not rage.
Decision.
Her hand closes over mine, warm and grounding. “You are safe,” she says.
I almost believe her.
Almost.
Outside the chamber, the halls murmur with the sound of a pack choosing sides. Inside, the future sits bare-shouldered before me, hair unbound, grief coiled tight beneath calm.
I finish brushing her hair and set the comb down.
Whatever comes next, it will not be gentle.
And I know, with a certainty that chills me to the bone, that Travis has already decided how much blood he is willing to spend.
“May,” she said.
Not sharp. Not commanding. Just my name, spoken the way it had been since we were girls hiding behind pillars and listening to elders argue.
I looked up, meeting her ice blue eyes.
“They are lying,” she said. Not a question. A knowing. “About my father. About how he died.”
The room felt colder.
“I need to know who,” she continued. “And how. And how far the rot goes.”
I swallowed. “Awen—”
She stepped closer. Close enough that I could feel the hum under her skin, Veluna’s tide pulled tight and leashed by will alone.
“You hear things I don’t,” she said softly. “You move where I cannot. Kitchens. Corridors. The places truth loosens its tongue.”
My hands clenched around the folded silk.
She took them. Pressed them between us.
“I would not ask if it were not dangerous,” she said. “And I would not ask anyone but you.”
There it was. The thing my grandfather had tried to protect me from by stepping back.
I thought of Raith’s silence. Of Travis’s smile. Of the way, fear had hollowed my chest when I understood what that silence cost.
I lifted my chin.
“I’ll listen,” I said. “I’ll remember. And I’ll bring it back to you.”
Her grip tightened once. Just once.
“Be careful,” she said.
I didn’t tell her I already was.
- Writer
