Wayfarer

Shadows. Etta let her lip curl back in disgust. That last, small hope in her that Henry had been wrong, that they’d jumped to the wrong conclusion, turned to dust.

Beneath her hands, Henry shifted, and Etta grabbed him by his lapel as if she could hold him there, conscious. As a child, she had always hidden her tears from her mother, too aware of how little patience Rose had for them, but she didn’t care now—not when Henry’s eyes opened. They moved from her face to Rose’s.

Her mother’s hands went slack at her side. Neither moved, but Etta felt his heartbeat as it began to drum harder and harder against his ribs. She leaned down, straining to hear him. “Come…to finish me off, Rosie?”

Her mother’s face was stone. She stood, unflinching, even as her voice iced over.

“You never understood. You never believed me—”

“I understood…me…” he rasped out. “But Rosie…Alice? Why…why did she have to die?”

Alice.

“Etta, she’ll protect you…go now—” He clutched her hand, trying to get her to look at him.

Alice.

Rose’s face appeared in front of her own, still speaking loudly, urgently, “I can explain as we go, but—”

Alice.

Etta stepped back, out of her mother’s reach.

She’d been taken and manipulated and shot and nearly lost her hearing for Rose. Everything Etta had ever done had been to earn a smile, squeeze a measure of respect, from her. She’d made excuses for her mother time and time again, even as the material she was using to build those protests dwindled down.

Etta turned, gripping her elbows, trying to fold in on herself. Disappear.

She killed Alice.

Had she watched Etta go through the passage with Sophia? Had she smiled, knowing she’d won that round, too? All Rose had to do was pretend to believe in her, just one time, and Etta had let her shape her future.

She left Alice to die alone.

Her eyes pricked with shame and a humiliation that would not quiet. She’d been so proud of herself, so defiant, so ready to show everyone in this hidden world that Rose’s daughter could be just as strong and sharp and cunning as the woman herself. But she wasn’t Rose’s daughter—she was her tool. Years spent fighting for her love, her praise, for some kind of acknowledgment…

“You—” she choked out. She pressed a hand to her eyes, felt the fat, hot tears spill over her fingers. Look up, Etta ordered herself. Look and see who she is. Who she’s always been. “It was you—”

Rose met her gaze. Defiant.

Denying nothing.

It was Alice’s face now that she saw, freckled and young, in the uniform that brought her so much pride; in her apartment on the Upper East Side, smiling as Etta learned her first scales; upturned in the audience, as she watched Etta perform from the front row. Her life.

I was raised by a stranger. The words roared through her mind, barbed and scalding. I never meant anything more than what I could do for her.

Maybe this was the reason her mother hadn’t told her about their hidden world, about her father—because she knew Etta’s soft heart would twine her together with the Thorns, and she would lose the best hope she had of seeing this fantasy through.

No more.

Alice, the woman who had raised her, who had given her love, attention, focus, everything of herself—Alice had been her true mother, and this was the woman who had taken her from Etta. Murdered her.

She straightened at the sound of pounding feet, and looked up in time to see two figures in black cloaks race down the edges of the hallway, long, curved daggers in their hands. Rose spun, swore viciously, and without a second’s hesitation raised her gun and fired. The attacker on the right dove into a marble table to avoid it, but Rose fired again, and this time did not miss. Her aim, as always, was perfect.

Until she ran out of bullets. She fired again at the other attacker, but the gun clicked in her hand, the chamber empty.

Henry watched, riveted, still trying to summon his strength to rise. His mouth was moving, he was saying something, but Etta couldn’t hear anything over the sound of her own furious heartbeat, the static of the blast.

Rose threw the gun aside and charged the remaining attacker, slamming him to the ground. When she rose to her feet again, the man sprang up as well, his blade arcing up as if to pierce beneath her chin.

Etta kept her focus on the soldiers charging down the hall, the footmen that rushed in behind them. By the time they were within reach of the dining room, Rose had already run past her, shoving her aside as the attacker leaped forward to follow.

The impact of slamming into the wall jarred the grief from Etta’s mind, leaving nothing but pristine, pure hate. Fury would have to be enough to carry her for now.

“Etta—” Henry was trying to sit up, choking on his own breath. She could barely hear him over the ringing in her ears, as he was surrounded and lifted by four of the soldiers. One tried to grab her, but she slipped away again and again, pulling out of their reach. “Listen—listen to me—!”

This has to end. If her mother had started this, then Etta, the only other living Linden, would take the responsibility of righting it. Any doubt she’d had was gone now, blasted away. The original timeline had to be restored. It was the only hope she had of salvaging everything, possibly even the lives that had been taken.

The choice was offered to her. It should have been frightening, the weight of it, but as Etta shook off the past, the unbearable questions and the uncertainty, it freed her instead.