Page 37 of Angel in Absentia
“Eh, eh, she can handle it!” Yvan replied with a wave of her hands, gesturing over at Iris. More footsteps hurried through the hallway, and Dae popped into the room.
“Gods, Clea!” Dae said, marching forward and stopping the customary three feet away from her. On the battlefield, it was more common for Dae and Yvan to approach and touch her. In the castle, they respected more formal customs of space, but that space felt oddly uncomfortable now.
There was something in that space.
“What are you doing here?” Dae said to Yvan, who raised an eyebrow.
“Can someone please tell me what’s going on?” Clea asked, glancing between them.
“You’ve been out for two months,” Yvan said. “Healed the king, then you took a dive.”
Iris continued the explanation. “Your pulse has been all over the place. You went from fevers to cold sweats, and no one could figure out what was wrong with you. They theorized that in the healing, you overextended yourself, and then some parts of you got stuck somewhere. We didn’t know if they’d ever make it back. You’ve been wandering in your sleep as if your body has been repeating tasks out of habit.”
Dae chimed in next. “We’ve been taking shifts checking in on you. Iris has been incredibly dedicated. We’ve had several Veilin screen you, and we’ve done it ourselves. They said such wandering was a common side effect of a body detached from its mind. You don’t have any cien infections. We’re not completely sure what went wrong, but can only assume you suffered significant backlash from that curse. That said, you were successful. King Hart is in excellent health, in fact, by his own estimation, he feels like he has a new life. He’s been out inpublic and back in council meetings without ceasing since the healing you performed.”
“That’s amazing,” Clea said and then backed toward the bed and eased down. “But two months,” she repeated, puzzled, and then glanced up at them all. “I’ve just been wandering around? You’ve all been watching me?”
“Making sure you didn’t eat anything poisonous, fall down stairs, bathe in the open fountain,” Yvan said.
“Those are all very specific,” she whispered with some alarm. She scratched her head, overwhelmed. “I missed my wedding.”
“You missed a wedding,” Yvan said, and Dae glared down at her.
Yvan and Dae then shared all of the events of the last two months that she’d missed. As they spoke, Iris retreated back to her chair, watching the three of them with an unusual quiet. Clea assumed that Iris was tired from being with her all day, and in light of the news that followed, she forgot the strangeness of it altogether.
†††
Clea stormed to her father’s study. The guards jerked their heads forward at the sight of her. Her hair was woven loosely over her shoulder, her tunic slightly wrinkled as she’d haphazardly changed.
She hadn’t slept since hearing the news and had asked servants to give her first word of her father’s location as soon as he was decent and left his room.
She didn’t knock on the study, instead bursting through the heavy wood doors.
Her father looked up from his reading, a slowly brightening window at his back where he sat with an array of reports, books, and articles he had previously read in his bed.
There was a brief lapse in anger in seeing that her father was a changed man, and he stared at her as if he’d seen a ghost. His cheeks were fuller, with color beneath a still graying but dark beard. His eyes were awake and alert, and he was dressed in stiff formal garb, layers of light blue and white, laced with gold. All of his rings were back on his fingers in addition to a new one, which glimmered with the others on his hand.
“You’re actually awake,” he pointed out, rising to his feet. He examined her closely as if to reassure himself. “Awake this time,” he repeated, which made her feel like she might have wandered into his office before asleep.
If the people didn’t think her mad before, they certainly did now after their princess had been haunting the upper halls in a mindless stupor. She found it extremely embarrassing, and yet right now, she felt more angry than anything.
“Three days?” she said, temper obvious.
He said nothing for a moment. She noticed how his beard had been freshly trimmed along with his hair. He looked so much stronger, standing a head above her for the first time in two years.
Relief flooded her but was quickly eclipsed by anger again when he opened his mouth.
Taking a breath, he said in his characteristic firmness, “I’m glad to see you’re awake. I was unsure you would wake up.”
“Three days?” she repeated, incredulous and not wasting another second. She started to pace and he said nothing. She rubbed her head with one hand and her heart with the other. Both hurt.
She wanted to groan aloud but resisted the urge.
“I am doing my duty. One which you have delayed tremendously,” he replied.
“You sound so burdened,” Clea said sarcastically, crossing her arms as she stood across the room from him. “In fact, you were so burdened that it took you a whole three days”—she paused as if tripping over the words that threatened to choke her—“to marry.”
“Her name is Eticia. She was a friend of your mother’s,” he continued. “A good match.”
