Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
If I can stomach the lies.
“I have to go, Finn. But I’ll see you tonight at the Extraction for Haryet. I’ll be with the Matrons, of course, not by your side.” Then my mother places a hand on my cheek as she gives the other a small kiss.
Her robes swish as she turns towards the door.
“Wait. Will I see you again after that, Mother?”
Her head turns, just a little so she can look across her left shoulder, but she doesn’t meet my gaze. “No, Finn. Our time together is over now and my place is in the Matron Tower.”
A moment later she steps through the door.
And then she’s gone.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
My head is swimming with emotions. Confusion, and sadness, and fear, and anxiety, and frustration. All of them, all at once. And those fucking bells will not stop tolling. Which only adds to my distress.
It’s a form of torture, these bells. For all of us, but especially poor Haryet. She’s crying, and even though our rooms are massive, and the walls substantial, and she is a whole floor below me—there is no way not to hear her wailing.
It’s so heartbreaking.
But the worst thing is my reaction to it all because there’s a part of me—a pretty substantial part at the moment—that just wants Haryet to walk through those doors, right now, in this very minute. Hell, there’s a part of me that wants to push her through myself, just to make the wailing and tolling stop.
Which adds shame to the list of swirling emotions inside my head.
Stop it, Clara, I chastise myself. You are not that selfish.
Normally, anyway. But today is far, far, far from a normal day and all I want to do is go back to Finn’s quarters—not that palace of a place he took me to earlier, but his real quarters—and lie in bed with him, and let him put his arms around me, and believe his whispers when he tells me it’s all going to be OK.
But that’s not going to happen. I’m at home, he’s at work, and this is the very last day I will ever spend with one of the dearest people to ever grace my life with her presence.
I get up, leave my room, and take the stairs down to Haryet’s floor. When I peek into her doorway, I find a whole slew of Matrons surrounding her as the maids fuss over her dress for the Extraction.
My gaze darts over to the right where Gemna is standing off to the side, a scowl on her face as she watches Haryet be criticized and hushed for displaying her anguish.
I actually catch the words “poised, proper, polite,” in the cacophony of scolding.
“OK,” I say loudly. “That’s enough. Every one of you needs to get the fuck out.”
The whole group of them—Matrons and maids alike—turn to look at me in open-mouthed surprise.
“Don’t look at me that way. Because I’m not about to apologize. This is Haryet’s last day and it will not be ruined by the lot of you making her miserable with tongue-lashings and dress-fittings. Who gives a fuck what her dress looks like! The god? Who cares what that asshole thinks! He’s stealing my friends! One by one, he’s stealing my friends. And I”—I’m practically screaming now—“have had enough!” I point a shaking finger at the door. “Get out!”
There are a few seconds of absolute shocked silence. But then they are all in motion at the same time and just a few moments later they are out in the hallway and I’m closing the doors in their faces.
My outburst has silenced Haryet as well, so even though the bells are still ringing, the clamor has been toned down several degrees. I go over to the windows—which are open because it’s midday and hot as hell outside—and close them. And once they are all shut, the tolling fades and the feeling of discord begins to fade with it.
To a tolerable level, at least.
Then I turn back to a still-crying Haryet—though it is the silent kind now—and let out a long breath. “Sorry. But I couldn’t take it anymore.”
She sniffles, staring at me with wide eyes. Then walks over to her bed, sighs, and, even though there are still pins in the hem of her dress, she flops down onto it. “Thank you.”
“Yeah.” Gemna walks over and flops down next to Haryet. “That was amazing, Clara.”
I huff, then smile. It kinda was. Though I’m sure, once all the drama is over, I will pay dearly for my outburst. I mean, last night I slapped a Matron with spark and today I was the picture of insubordination in front of a whole group of them. Not to mention the maids.
Oh, the gossip happening right now down in the servants’ quarters must be epic.
One slip-up in a moment of high stress might be overlooked. But two in as many days?