Page 51 of Hollowed

He didn’t take it.

He stared at it. At me. At what it meant to be seen holding it.

“She was here,” I said.

His jaw tensed.

“Before me.”

He didn’t nod.

He didn’t blink.

He just said, “Yes.”

I stepped closer.

“You knew.”

“I did.”

“And you didn’t tell me.”

He exhaled slowly, like the breath had been waiting for years.

“Because it was never supposed to matter.”

“She was my mother.”

“She was an offering.”

The words hit harder than any lash.

He didn’t say them cruelly. That made it worse.

He said them like they were fact. Like she had never been anything else.

I stepped forward again. Pressed the book to his chest.

He didn’t move.

“Do you remember her?” I asked.

His eyes darkened.

Not with anger.

With ache.

“No,” he said. “Just her name.”

I lowered the book.

“She survived.”

“Not the way you did.”

I studied him.

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