Page 128 of The Last De Loughrey Dynasty

I laid my hand on his arm and frowned at him in confusion. “Why does it upset you? I’m sure you’ll be a great brother.”

He shook his head in anger. “I’m not. I never was, and I don’t want another sister to replace her.”

Replace her.

I always wondered if there was a reason for Nathaniel’s constant state of anger and hatred towards everything. “I thought Jesse said you were an only child…”

“I am, but eighteen years ago, I was born a twin.” A single tear made its way down his cheek, but he didn’t cringe in sadness. All he did was continue smoking his cigarette. “Hername was Eleonora. She was my other half, my best friend. We were inseparable, did everything together. But twins are more prone to health conditions since most are born early. We were too, but Mum swore that we were born healthy, no conditions, no abnormalities. Eleonora was always a little slower than me, didn’t have much stamina, and I used to joke about it. How she was so slow in comparison to me, like a sloth.” Nathaniel took a shaking drag of his cigarette. “When we were ten, she got sick. At first, it seemed like a normal cold, but it dragged on for too long, and she became progressively worse to the point where she had to stay at the hospital. It took them too long to figure out that she had a hole in her heart causing her sickness. The physicians told my parents that she was too weak for surgery and that they had to wait until the medication improved her condition. I remember that we celebrated our eleventh birthday in the hospital. Four days later, she passed away from sudden cardiac arrest.”

Nathaniel looked so broken talking about his sister, I wasn’t really sure how to comfort him. There wasn’t really anything I could do.

“I’m so sorry, Nathaniel.”

“Do you know how cruel it is to have the gift of sight but not be able to save your own sister from her fate? After her death, I turned bitter, angry at myself and the universe for taking my other half from me. The night Maisie found me, I had planned to join my sister in death. But she sat down with me on that bridge, and we just talked. Something about that girl saved me that night and each one following after that.” The softest smile drew itself on Nathaniel’s lips at the mention of Maisie. I was so glad they both had another. Undoubtedly, I could say that their love was one of the purest and rawest I’d ever seen. They loved one another with their heart, soul and mind.

The answer to why my best friend woke at night crying out her boyfriend’s name in horror was now mine to know too. His fate. She assumed that every path she saw would happen in one way or the other, but they always came to pass if Nathaniel’s weren’t more potent than hers.

Maisie saved Nathaniel the night he wanted to take his own life. His fate had been to commit suicide, but because she intervened and changed his destiny, the fear of what she saw haunts her until this day.

I squeezed Nathaniel’s arm in empathy, his pain lingering right beneath his skin. “Do the others know?”

He plugged his cigarette out on the stone stair, taking mine from my hand and doing the same. “Maisie knows. But—But I haven’t had the courage yet to tell one of the others. I think, after I discovered the existence of the veil. That I was afraid. Afraid that Nora was all alone, bound to the place she died in. What if she’s still in that hospital room waiting for me or Mum and Dad to come and get her?” He rubbed his hands over his face. “Someday, I’ll quit being a coward and find exactly that out. But right now, I’m still just a scared eleven-year-old boy who wished that he could have joined his twin sister the day she left.”

Without a thought behind it, I suddenly did something I, months ago, believed I’d never do. I hugged Nathaniel from the side, leaning my head against his shoulder and trying to take half of his pain so he wouldn’t have to crumble underneath it alone. “When that day comes, I want you to know that I’ll be there to walk into that hospital if you want me there with you.”

While it took him a moment of hesitation, he returned my hug by laying his arm around my shoulders.

“Would Eleonora have loved to have a sister?”

“She always begged Mum to give us a baby sister as our birthday gift,” he said, the smile hearable in his voice.

“I’m sure she’s over the moon about the news of finally getting her wish fulfilled. And you know what your important job is now that you’re becoming a brother again?”

“What?”

“You have the responsibility to tell your baby sister about her beautiful older sister. She won’t feel so far away if you make sure to keep her memory alive, Nathaniel,” I promised him. I didn’t know where this came from because I know nothing about the grief of losing a person as close as a twin. But something in my gut told me he had to hear this.

“Thank you, Doe,” he said, squeezing my shoulders.

It was nice to see how far we had come as friends when our start had been so terribly rocky.

We both jumped up when the cracking wooden door swung open, looking at where Anwir was jogging down the steps to us.

“Is everything alright?” I asked, noticing the terror written all over his face. Anwir was as pale as death and sweat clung to his forehead.

“Kane is gone.” My blood froze in my veins. “I was talking to some parents and the next moment he was gone.” Anwir brushed a hand through his hair, closing his eyes in an attempt to get his breathing under control.

My pulse raced against the skin of my neck uncomfortably as I broke out into a cold sweat, turning my head to eye the entrance of the maze.

This wasn’t the only entrance.

It was a maze and not a labyrinth after all.

Nathaniel shoved him in the chest, taking hold of the collar of his shirt, clearly not caring that he stood above him. “You swore you’d watch him. If anything happens to them, I’ll give you the fault for the rest of my life,” he hissed.

“I kept my eyes on him for the past two hours, but I’m still in my workplace. I can’t just ditch a mother asking about herson’s improvement, Nathaniel,” Anwir tried to explain, keeping his never-fading calm.

As Nathaniel didn’t let go of his shirt, I grabbed my friend by the elbow and pulled him back. “It’s not his fault, and we don’t have the time for this.”

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