Page 2 of Beyond Those Gilded Walls

I knew she wanted nothing more than to see my brothers, and they her, but all of us knew they could not. Even the chance that tending to her would see them ill was enough for my mother to send them away the moment she began coughing.

I had been only one of a handful that had survived the blood plague, out of the thousands who had died from it, and it was not something I was willing to chance with my younger brothers. Caring for them, putting them first, had been all I’d ever known, and I would continue doing it until the last breath expelled from my lungs.

They were safely tucked away at a friend’s house, and I would send for them to return after our mother had finally passed. Looking at her from the door, I could tell it wouldn’t be long now. I let my head fall against the door frame, closing my eyes briefly.

I had no more sorrow left inside me. No more energy to mourn. No ambition to curse the gods that my mother so pitifully clung to even in her last breaths. All that was left was a soul-deep weariness. And the anger.

I let myself fall into the chair at our small table in the kitchen. I needed to eat, bathe, and then return to my mother’s bedside for her last moments, but I could not find it in me to move.

My gaze shifted back to the castle spires through the window, distracting me from any thoughts of food or hygiene. My fists tightened around the edge of the table, and I had to let my jaw unhinge and fall open to keep from grinding my teeth. I pried my fingers from the table, one by one, letting them instead catch my forehead as I let my head fall.

The familiar monster of my anger clawed at the back of my mind. Only my mother’s coughing kept it at bay.

There were whispers from the castle, from servants sent out to the city in the dead of night to obtain more supplies for the prince and his people. The whispers passed from person to person, until everyone in the city knew that since they’d closed the gates, no one in the castle had fallen to the curse of the blood plague. Rumors of a treatment, one that would chase away the cursed affliction, began to swirl, but none of the servants who entered the city on behalf of the prince ever did it twice, so it remained merely a whisper of a dream.

Once the castle had been sealed, Prince Eadric began to throw ridiculously opulent parties each night. Glancing at the clock, I realized that tonight’s should be starting shortly. Soon, the night would fill with the sounds of revelry and decadence, the peals of laughter echoing down from the balconies as those more privileged looked down at the city they’d left to die. I could not hear much after my bout with the plague had ravaged my body, but I could hear everything that came from the castle.

Each night now, as I listened to hints of music drifting down from the castle, I dreamed of what it would be to see Prince Eadric ill with the plague he’d abandoned us to. To see rivers of red run from every orifice and watch him choke to death on his own blood. It was the least he deserved.

Even when she’d first began showing the signs of the blood plague, my mother had been adamant that I not be angry with anyone, that it was simply her time. She’d begged me to focus on her life, and not her death, to focus on my brothers, and to remember the good childhood they had with her.

But I knew she could hear the parties every night, just as I could. I knew it hurt her that we’d been deemed insignificant by the prince whose family had sworn to serve and protect the kingdom. Listening to the music and the joy spilling down from the castle kept me up at night. It fed my anger, stoking the fire inside my belly until it was all I could think about.

My mother was too good, too kind. And where had that gotten her? She was dying in the next room, and Prince Eadric was throwing a party.

Two more dayspassed as I cared for my mother as she slowly drowned in her own body. Blood covered nearly every surface in the room, despite how often I cleaned it. The coughing had turned to retching had turned to vomit, until all I could see was red splattering our wooden floors, crimson soaking the once-white sheets. Stains I would never get out of both the house or out of my soul.

Every sip of water or bite of food came back up on a river of blood. Her teeth were stained pink and the handkerchief clutched in her hand was near constantly pressed against her bloody nose.

It was worse than dying myself, having to bear witness to my own mother’s death.

I was surprised she had clung to us so long, but it was no secret where I inherited my stubbornness from. Before she became sick, my mother had been a pillar of the community, someone everyone had relied upon and sought out for advice. Rarely was there a night when we did not have someone else joining our table for dinner simply so they could consult with my mother after. If she was not able to help herself, she did not rest until she had found someone who could.

I admired her dedication to those around her, but I cursed that same selflessness. Perhaps if she had not taken food to that last couple, caring for their dying daughter, she would have been safe from the blood plague. Perhaps she could have stayed out of the gaze of whatever curse controlled it.

My mother had scolded me for my anger at the couple and their daughter, had told me that we always cared for those we could, especially when we were better off. It was a lesson I’d taken to heart, even if my brothers hadn’t been extended the same teachings. She’d reminded me that there was no way of knowing how she’d contracted the cursed illness, and that all that was left now was to make my peace with it.

Still, sitting beside her with her hand in mine, I could not turn off my anger as I watched the pauses between the shallow breaths that panted from her chest get longer and longer.

“Odyssa,” she rasped, squeezing my hand.

“Yes, Mama?” I rested my hand on her forehead as I looked down at her, watching the words form upon her lips.

Death reflected in her eyes. She smiled, keeping her lips tight to cover her bloody gums. The words she could not muster the energy to utter were clear in her eyes.

“I will take care of them, Mama,” I promised, my heart shattering beneath my rib cage. Tears blurred my eyes but I didn’t dare pull away from her hands, instead biting down on my lip as I pushed a strand of my mother’s once-silky hair behind her ear. “Beyond this world, we will meet again, Mama.”

My mother closed her eyes, and they did not open again.

A single tear fell down my cheek, rolling into the corner of my mouth. It soaked into the dry skin of my lips and my tongue snuck out to catch it. My eyes fell closed at the flavor of salt-tinged sorrow.

I needed to get up. There were things to do, and I needed to send for the undertaker to collect her body, to send for my brothers to come home, to clean the house before they arrived. But I could not bring myself to move, to let go of her hands. I feltwrong, holding her lifeless hands. Hands that should have been warm and sure were now cold and limp.

Perhaps in the back of my mind, I had expected that my mother would survive as I had, but looking down at her now, her slackened face and her bloodstained nightgown… I knew it had been a fool’s dream. Our family would not be lucky twice, and the fates had wasted our only exception on me.

Carefully, I pulled my hand away from my mother’s, folding her arms over her body. I had things to do, and even in death, my mother would expect me to do them.

After I’d handled notifications and made arrangements with the undertaker, I found myself back in her room, once again staring down at her. My ears rang with a droning noise that so often filled my head when silence came, drowning out all else and making me grasp at my head in hopes it would stop. It never did; not when I wanted it to, at least.

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