Page 28 of The Madman and his broken Princess
Clinging to my father’s bone certainly wouldn’t, but I could see that he wasn’t ready for that conversation.
I touched his bicep, then turned and headed toward the bathroom. I had never been inside the primary bedroom. Father had taken it as his from the moment we moved in. The bathroom was held in black marble with gold veins. A massive round Jacuzzi bathtub was positioned in the middle. Four columns stretched from its marble edge to a vaulted ceiling with a painted night sky. The golden fittings complemented the gold accents in the black marble. A massive rain shower with a steam function took up half of one wall. The room was at least 400 square feet.
I removed my dirty shirt, sweatpants, and underwear and tossed them in the trash. They were littered with holes and blood. I was relieved to be rid of them. My skin was crusted with dirt and blood, and I didn’t even want to think about how badly I must smell. I stepped into the shower but hesitated before turning on the water. Shivers crept up and down my spine, remembering how I’d been doused with ice-cold water in the last six months. How painful it had been when the jet had hit my skin. My fingers shook as I gripped the faucet. It was just water. I had longed for a shower for months, so I wouldn’t let fear stop me. Taking a deep breath, I braced myself and turned on the water. Warm water pooled down on me, making me gasp and my body tense in expectation of pain. But the rain shower released water like a caress on my skin, and after the few moments that it took for my pulse to slow, I relaxed. I washed my hair three times before I felt as if it was clean after months of neglect, but I couldn’t untangle it with my fingers. I hoped I wouldn’t have to cut it off. After another fifteen minutes in the shower, I felt clean for the first time in a long time. I almost felt like past Amelia.I dried myself with a fluffy towel, wincing a couple of times when I touched tender spots. I wiped the steam off the mirror to regard my reflection. My ribs protruded, and my always only moderate curves were almost nonexistent. I was too thin, too weak, too bruised. I trailed my fingers over the bruises on my arms, wincing at the sharp twinge in my wrist. With the towel wrapped around my body, I tiptoed toward the door. I didn’t have any clothes.
I opened the door a crack and peered out to find Nestore still where I’d left him. His tall body looked frozen. In the light of the setting sun streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows, Nestore looked like he had fallen from the sky. The golden lights caught on his many scars, burn marks, and bruises. His head was tilted forward, and at first, I feared he was still staring at the bone in his hand, but his eyes were closed.
I padded toward him. He briefly tensed, then relaxed, but didn’t open his eyes. When I reached him, I put a hand on his bare shoulder blade. “It’s over. You survived. We survived. We’re free.”
His eyelids peeled open. “Free?”
I swallowed hard. “You can break through the shackles of the past.”
A sad smile tugged at his lips. “Not yet.” He raised a bloody hand but stopped with his fingertips an inch from my cheek. “It’s not over, Amelia. This is only the beginning of my long path to revenge. It’ll be cruel and merciless.”
A knock stopped me from telling him that revenge would only drag him further down into darkness. Nestore stepped in front of me, barring me from view as he opened the door to Nino, who carried a first-aid kit and a heap of clothes.
Nino scanned Nestore, who still looked like he’d risen from the depths of hell. Nino had cleaned up roughly and put on a newshirt, judging by its bloodless state. “You need to shower before I look at your injuries. I can start with her.”
Nestore pushed me gently back and made room for Nino to enter, but always kept his body between the other guy and me. “I’ll be present when you treat Amelia.”
“If we meant you or her harm, we would already have caused it, Nestore.”
“I’ll stay.”
Nino held out a heap of unfamiliar clothes. “I took them from your stepmother. Your father burned your belongings.”
I swallowed my sadness. Not so much about the clothes, but about the two photographs of my mother and me. “Thanks,” I said as I took the clothes and returned to the bathroom.
As expected, the clothes were too big. Flavia had more curves than I did, but she was five feet five like me, so at least they weren’t too long. I picked a wrap dress that I could bind tightly so it wouldn’t slip off me. The panties were loose but stayed in place. When I emerged from the bathroom, Nestore took me in as if I were an apparition. I flushed.
“Let me look at your wrist,” Nino said, unimpressed. I held it out despite Nestore’s sudden tension. He shadowed Nino as he grabbed my arm. I bit my lower lip at the pain in my wrist and cried out when he moved it up and down.
Nestore released a sound that could only be described as a growl and raised the bone a couple of inches.
Nino cocked an eyebrow. “I have to check her injuries. Pain is inevitable. I assure you, attacking me with a bone won’t do you any favors. I advise you to sharpen and treat it with a fixative to preserve and harden it before putting it to use.”
I blinked at the absurdity of the situation, but sank my teeth deeper into my lip when Nino twisted my hand again. “It’s definitely broken and has been mended wrongly due to a lack oftreatment. I need to break it again and then fix it with a cast for it to heal properly.”
A tremor went through me at the prospect of more pain.
“I won’t allow you to hurt her,” Nestore rasped.
“I’ll inject her with something for the pain.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I want it to heal properly. I can handle a little pain.” I wasn’t really sure. After eight months in the basement, I just wanted to be free of pain. I wanted to be free. Free to go where I pleased, eat what I pleased, sleep when I pleased. Freedom.
Though who was I to complain, considering that Nestore had suffered so much worse than I had?
Nino checked my other wounds, mainly bruises and smaller cuts where the belting had split my skin, before he gave me something for the pain in my wrist. “This will help you to sleep. To treat this accurately, I need to take you to a place where I can perform X-rays and have the proper equipment. I’d wait until the morning. One day more won’t change the healing progress.”
Nino glanced at Nestore, who still hovered beside us, covered in grime and blood, and clutching the bone. “You should shower so I can treat your wounds.”
“Maybe I can see Flavia in the meantime?”
“No,” Nino and Nestore said in unison.
I moved toward the window and peered outside. The gardens were unkept. The maze had grown out of control, thorny tendrils rambling across the entrance, reaching into the sky and out to the sides, like spindly arms. A few bodies littered the lawn.
