Mother was leaning over him, wiping the sweat from his brow. The room shrunk as her smile faded. Joy passed from her expression, morphing into something else, something sinister. Something unexpected.
Revulsion. Terror.
And utter disappointment.
6.
“One word
Frees us of all the weight and pain of life;
That word is love.”
~Sophocles (Oedipus at Colonus)
~
Mother turned without a word and the room continued to shrink around Ien as he wished for the black hole of unconsciousness again. But his wish went unanswered, and he remained painfully awake and aware, staring forever into the phantom of her face and the expression it held.
That look stayed with Ien over the next several days, invading his dreams and hiding in the shadows of his waking hours. It was the same look she had given him the night his brother died. The same look she had when he first told her about loving Kiera. A look that filled him with shame and fear, just like it always had.
Ien turned his head and stared out of the large window, wishing the world would swallow him whole and his suffering would end. The sun glistened on the glass, casting shards of brilliance around his room, rare for a day in December. It should have made him smile, should have brought him joy.
Nothing could make him happy now. Nothing but the death he wished for.
His own.
In a chair next to Ien’s bed, Jenna leaned forward. “What were you thinking about just now?”
Ien tried to roll over, every movement sending waves of pain rolling through his body.
Concern flooded Jenna’s eyes. “You look sad today.”
Jenna and Ien had been friends his whole life. The daughter of the grounds keeper, she lived at the Montgomery estate with the other servants. At thirteen, she took up her position as one of the housemaids. And now, four years later, she was still one of Ien’s most trusted friends.
“It’s nothing,” Ien mumbled. Friend or not, he wasn’t ready to talk.
Jenna stood, smoothing out her uniform. She was petite in build, her blond hair tied in a neat bun at the nape of her neck. She retrieved a damp cloth from the bedside basin and wiped his brow and hair, careful to avoid the bandages that seemed to cover all of his face save his eyes.
“Suit yourself,” she said, sounding far too familiar for a servant. “But you know you’ll tell me everything sooner or later.” She winked, a playful glint in her soft brown eyes.
Ien stared at her face. She was right, of course. He would tell her eventually. Jenna patted his brow with a gentleness that took him back to the other times she had taken care of him—the bandages she tended to after his brother shoved him into a tree, the jokes she’d tell to lighten the mood whenever his father yelled at him for being a disappointment. And the playful moments they shared exploring the estate whenever he wanted to hide from Mother.
Jenna had always been there for him.
Always.
“I’m sorry that I can’t talk about the accident yet. It’s just too…painful, I guess. Raw.”
“I understand. But remember I am here when you’re ready to talk. I hate seeing you like this.”
She softly touched the bandages outlining his face, sending a mixture of peace and agony through Ien. He shifted his weight, inhaling every moment of anguish.
“Ien?” Jenna touched his shoulder. “What can I do?” Her eyes reflected the suffering he endured.
“Nothing.” The pain engulfed him as every movement, no matter how slight, caused his stomach to clench and his vision to blur. “Just leave me alone,” he managed to say through gritted teeth before the torment overtook him completely. “Leave me alone!”
~
Days and weeks blurred together in a haze of thoughts and emotions. Ien found Jenna by his bedside every morning. Most days she would make mindless chatter while Ien tried to keep his thoughts from imploding. On rare occasions, she coerced him into talking about his memories.
“Ien?” she asked one rainy morning. “Do remember playing in the barn? The day it started pouring?”
Ien laughed, something he rarely did anymore. “You mean the time we planned on running away?”
“Yes, that time.”
“I remember that you dared me to kiss you.”
Jenna blushed. “I think it was you that did the daring.”
She was right. He had dared her. The memory opened in Ien’s thoughts. The soft smell of hay and rain. The smooth feel of her skin, her lips. The kiss lasted only a moment, but it was enough to fill Ien with thoughts and feelings that surprised him; feelings he shouldn’t have for someone of her station.
Ien felt his cheek grow hot as the memory wrapped around him. Silence grew between them. Until Jenna sucked in a sharp breath and turned away.
“When did you know that you loved Kiera?” she asked, the words turning her voice gruff.
The question surprised him. He furrowed his brow and reached out to Jenna’s arm. “I knew it the moment I saw her.”
Jenna nodded and turned, pinning him with a look that reached into his soul. “What happened the night of the explosion?”
“I asked Kiera to marry me, Jenna. Earlier that night. That’s why I was in town. I was walking back from Whitehall.”
The color drained from Jenna’s face, making her more pale than usual. “Marriage. That seems—”
“Rash? Yes. I know.”
“I was going to say uncharacteristic.”
Ien rolled over, unable to handle the intensity, the pain, in Jenna’s eyes.
“You’re not exactly the run-off-and-elope type, Ien. At least I didn’t think you were. Something had to have happened.”
Ien clenched his jaw. “Mother was forcing me to leave her. I just couldn’t let that pass.” He swallowed hard. “I need Kiera. I won’t leave her. So I decided on marriage. It was the only way.”
Ien had expected a quick rebuke from Jenna. Instead, she greeted him with silence.
“Jenna?” Ien rolled back to face her, half expecting that she had somehow left. “No sharp remark?”
“I understand why you did it,” she said after a long pause. “You were willing to sacrifice everything for love. I understand the feeling. I really do.” Jenna stood and walked to the window that faced the gardens and, in the distance, the family cemetery. “I’d sacrifice anything for love too, even if it meant giving up the one I needed most.”
Ien chewed on her words. Should he have given up Kiera? Could he? He lowered his head, allowing the thought to fill the whole of him. No. He would never give her up. Not then. Not now.
Not ever.
He touched the bandages still covering his face, sending fresh waves of pain rippling through him.
“What will you do?” Jenna asked, still staring out of the window. “If you don’t heal, I mean. What then?”
Anxiety tightened the muscles in Ien’s shoulders and back. His arm shook as he propped himself up on his elbow. He released a ragged breath, pushing out the agony such a simple movement still caused.
When will this ever end?
“Kiera and I are promised to each other now. Nothing will change that.”
He didn’t tell her that he feared for their future. Nor did he tell her about the ghastly images that plagued him every night. Deep inside, where he hid his darkest fears, grew a monster—one that threatened to undo him. He was too afraid to tell Jenna about that, too afraid to tell anyone.
Jenna turned back toward Ien, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “That’s what I thought,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. Releasing a heavy sigh, she changed the basin water and fluffed Ien’s pillow. “Get some rest, okay? I want more stories tomorrow.”
“Alright,” he said as Jenna started to leave. “Jenna?”
She paused at the threshold, the air thickening around them.
“Thank you for keeping me company. I’ve missed you, missed our time together.”
She nodded, retreating from the room without a word. Ien rolled over, smiling despite the ever-present pain he felt.
Sleep descended quickly, robbing him of the few pleasant memories of Jenna. His thoughts refocused into the nightmares he wanted most to avoid. Images of Kiera screaming as his body ignited. It all seemed so real…
“No. No!” he screamed, unsure if the sound existed only in his head. He tossed and turned, consumed by the thoughts of fire and ash, love and death. His death. And Kiera’s.
“Fantasizing again dear brother? Isn’t that what got you into this mess?” Erik’s disembodied voice floated through the never-ending pictures in Ien’s mind.
The voice startled him. “You’re not real, you’re not real, you’re not real,” he said, willing his words to be true. But the phrase brought little comfort as the images faded to black. They reformed, revealing the woods behind his house. The sound of galloping horses filled his ears. “No!” he yelled, unwilling to be forced into that nightmare. “No.”
“What’s wrong? Not interested in reliving my death?”
You’re not real. This is just a dream
“Go away!” Ien’s thoughts began to spin out of control as a silhouette formed in front of him, removed from the other images streaming past his vision.
“I assure you, I’m as real as you.” Erik’s voice exploded against Ien’s skin. “Didn’t you miss me?”
Ien hadn’t been bothered by dreams of his dead brother for more than two months, not since Kiera came into his life. She had managed to stop the chaos in his mind, as well as the nightmares of his brother’s death.
Until today.
“Must we again relive my death so you can remember why you need to live?” Every word dripped with disdain.
Ien pushed against his brother’s voice.
It’s just my imagination. It’s not real.
“Suit yourself. But you will find out soon enough that I am more real than you’d like to admit. I always have been.”
7.
“But, friends, I do not want to die,
I want to live, so as to think and suffer.”
~Alexander Pushkin (Elegy)
~
The nightmares continued night after night, as did the memories of Kiera. They coiled in and out of Ien’s thoughts while he floated somewhere between consciousness and unconsciousness. He stirred in the bed, his mind wrestling with the illusions he clung to and the realities that tethered him to a life filled with misery. Pain.
“How is he today?” Mother’s voice pulled him into consciousness.
“The same. He still suffers. His wounds are still raw.”
Jenna was the only constant in Ien’s life now. Still present every time he woke, she cleaned the sweat from his brow or replaced the bandages on his face. She never turned away from his gaze. Unlike the other servants that tended to his wounds, she never held horror in her expression, never seemed revolted by whatever it was he was turning into.
“Why doesn’t he heal?” Mother’s words were more of a thought than anything else.
Ien looked at his mother, trying to gauge his wounds by her expression. In the days since the accident he was not permitted to leave his bed. All he knew of his injuries were the raw, tender flesh on his arms, legs and torso, and the excruciating pain he still felt in his face.
His mother looked at him once, sighed heavily and turned away. The frustration grew within him. He was sick of everyone’s reactions, tired of the anguish everyone expressed when they dared a glance. He raised his hands to his face, desperate to feel what he could not see.
Mother caught his hands before they reached their target. “No, son. You mustn’t.” It was not a request.
Ien ignored her, pushing against her hold. But she was strong and tightened her grasp on his arms.
“Get help!” she barked to Jenna as she wrestled with him. “Ien, stop! You have to let your face heal.”
Ien stopped fighting against her.
“It will heal, son. I promise. You will be whole again.” The desperation in her voice was palpable, and Ien wondered who she was really trying to reassure, him or herself.
Ien’s father entered the room, bindings in his hands. Ien struggled again. He wasn’t about to become a prisoner to his bed. He writhed as his parents bound his hands and tied him down, moaning as pain wracked his body.
“It’s for your own good, Ien. You have to trust me.” Mother’s voice carried no comfort.
But he couldn’t. Not anymore. “You did this to me, Mother. I know you did.” The words never escaped his throat and Ien collapsed on the bed, drained from the struggle.
You did this.
Moments turned to hours, and hours to days as Ien continued to merely exist, bound to his bed. Nothing Mother tried eased his pain or healed his wounds. Not the doctors, with their medicines and talk of permanent disfigurement. Not the prayers offered by the Church as nuns and priests performed everything from quiet vigils to pseudo-exorcisms in an attempt to heal Ien.
“I don’t know what else to do.” Ien overheard Mother’s stilted conversations with Father. “I’m asking Madame Alexandra to do what she can.”
“You’re wasting your time, Katherine.” As always, Father sounded angry. “What can she do? Rub a cream over his face? Read his future? We already know what his future holds. We always have. I will not have you waste my money on spiritualists. Not again.”
Mother’s voice turned cold. “It’s
my
money. And I will thank you to stay out of this.”
“Stay out of it? He’s my son.”
“And mine. I will not let him die, not after everything he’s already endured. I have to heal him.”
“And if you can’t? If there is no way to fix him.”
Mother dropped her voice, the words muffled and lost. Ien struggled to hear her response, desperate to understand the future Father feared. Nothing but muffled sounds reached through the heavy mahogany door. Ien sighed, part of him hoping this Madame Alexandra could help.
He rolled to his side as sleep washed over him, bringing more images of death. Lost to the dreams, he wondered how long it would be before they consumed him completely.