Chapter 29

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

My words came out softly, yet brimming with emotions. Lena stopped just in front of me, as though paralyzed in place. Her face took on a much gentler expression as she heard the heavy despondency in my voice. For a moment, I questioned why I was so upset about this. Lena was allowed to have secrets. She didn't have to tell me everything about her life for us to be friends. But I knew there was something deeper to it than that. This wasn't just any secret. It held significance, an implicit statement about my trustworthiness and discretion, as well as our ability to talk about things with each other.

“I’m sorry.” Her eyes cast down to the side. Yet she still didn’t say why.

“I — I would have kept it a secret,” I said. “I…” my words trailed.

“Would you have?” she asked quietly, a trace of accusation slipping out.

“Yes!” I shouted, a bit louder than I’d intended as my anger flared, only to immediately fade. “I would have,” I spoke feebly. “For you, I would have.”

“I’m sorry,” she repeated. Her eyes glanced up to meet mine once more and I watched her take in a small breath of air, her lungs still recovering from her training. For a moment, I thought that was all she was going to say, and then she continued. “You know how insistent my parents have been that we not hang out together. At least, not with ‘Felix.’” Her eyes glanced to Rosetta, still standing beside us.

“She knows who I am already,” I said.

“I know,” Lena commented back, a queer tone wavering in her voice. “I just, I thought it was the best thing to do. I knew you would want to join in, or at least watch. And I wasn’t sure if you would accept a ‘no.’”

“You didn’t want me to know?” I muttered, my eyes shifting to a near-tearful look.

“I wanted you to know, Pearl. I did. I would have loved to have you here, learning with me even. But my father only barely allowed me to do this. I’ve been trying to keep this all out of their sight and mind, just in case they decide to go back on their decision. I doubt they even realize I’m still being taught, with how many months it’s been now.”

Months, I thought. She’d been doing this for months.

“And you…” she continued, “you have a tendency to not do as you’re asked.” I opened my mouth to deny it, but she quickly spoke over me, already knowing what I was going to say. “Just a few days ago you were sneaking in through my window. When I’ve asked you before not to.” The words stung, and I could tell she hated saying them as well.

I also hated how much sense it all made. As much as it hurt me, she did have a point. Would I have done something dumb like sneaking into the mansion to watch her lessons? Right now, at this moment, I didn’t think I would. But several months ago? I wasn’t so certain.

I stood there in silence, both in thought and not entirely certain how to respond.

“I need this, Pearl. My marriage is next weekend. After that, I will be his. Silas has had his own weapon training in the past, for much longer than I’ve been doing it.” In a quieter voice, she repeated to herself, hands clenching into fists, “I need this.”

My eyes blurred from the water collecting within them, and I took two steps forward before wrapping my arms around her in a tight embrace. My gut twisted as I realized just how close the wedding was now. Had time really slipped that much away from me? It was a mere eight —or nine?— days away at this point. She was right; she did need this. Even assuming that I was able to stop her wedding, there was no telling what the future would bring. Everyone deserved the power to be able to defend themselves.

And then the realization hit me, something that I should have put together already, given what Camilla had told me a few hours ago. If things were as dangerous for me as she’d suggested, if the Praevus truly would kill me over my curse, would I still be able to do what I'd planned to before? I’d been hoping to learn some kind of magic, to gain the strength to stand up against Silas and both of their parents. To stand in Lena’s defense and fight for her if I needed to. It wasn’t a great plan if I was honest with myself, but it was all that I’d managed to come up with so far. But to do so would quite clearly expose me and my Mark. Under my previous presumptions, that seemed scary but was something I was willing to bear. But with the danger of the Praevus, someone who might actually put me to death or do something else just as terrible, was that truly an option? Would I risk my life and potentially Camilla’s as well to save Lena from her marriage? As much as I wanted to consider it, I was useless to her dead. The ceremony would just be rescheduled, and she would have no one there to stand up for her again. All she would have was a dead best friend.

My hug tightened around Lena’s back, and I buried my teary eyes into her shoulder. Did I truly have nothing — no way to save her, no way to stop what was to come in just over a week?

“I don’t want you to marry him,” I sobbed out.

“I know. I know,” she said with gentle words as she rubbed my back. “I don’t want to either.”

Just tell them all that you refuse then! I wanted to shout at her, despite knowing the little good it would do. It would just push her away and make her angry.

“Please,” I muttered, or more accurately, begged — unable to stop myself from at least one more plea.

“I’m sorry, Pearl,” she whispered back. “I must.”

There truly was nothing that I could do, then. I slumped further against her, defeated. Perhaps there was nothing anyone could do, except Lena herself. We were all doomed, each in our own ways. What guarantee did I have that I could even save myself? The memory of my previous conversation with Camilla played through my mind as I thought back to what she’d said about the Praevus.

It was then that I remembered something, a singular statement just before the sentinels showed up that I’d almost forgotten about. She’d spoken of escape. A glowing light flashed brightly within my mind. Camilla planned to run, to escape from the Praevus’s clutches in this town and probably travel somewhere to hide. And she planned to bring me along with her. Could we not take Lena as well?

Hope blossomed in me, hope for all three of our futures. It wasn’t the most ideal of solutions. It meant leaving the town behind, and possibly my father as well. But it at least was a solution. Once more, my resolve was replenished and shored up. I refused to leave Lena to her fate. I would bring her along even if I had to drag her by her feet.

As our hug ended, I couldn’t hide the determination in my gaze.

“I won’t allow him to hurt you.”

Lena’s eyes squinted with suspicion. “Don’t do anything stupid, Pearl. I know you. I know you’re probably coming up with some kind of ploy that will end up just getting you into trouble.”

But this time, it wasn’t a plan of mine, but rather Camilla’s. Running away felt a bit cowardly to me, but I was quite certain that it was in fact the smartest thing to do in this situation, the odds stacked so definitively against me in hiding my Mark and stopping the marriage.

“I won’t,” I said. “Do anything stupid, I mean. I promise.”

“I’m serious. This is my choice, my burden to bear. Not your’s. I don’t need or want you trying to make my decisions for me.”

I winced and wondered whether this truly was the right kind of thing to do. Was it wrong of me to try and find a way to end her wedding, when she was so adamant about going through with it? I could understand her point. It was ultimately her decision. In a way, it was wrong of me to fight it, to try and force her onto another path. It was a subversion of her will, the same sort of thing her parents had been doing throughout her life.

The Praevus’s words came back to mind as well. If Lena didn’t marry Silas, some other unlucky girl would. The man was probably right that Lena would be able to handle him better than plenty of other women in her situation. Her obvious dedication to learning to fight and defend herself was clear proof of that. In those ways, I couldn’t help but feel how wrong it was to try and put an end to it when she had repeatedly stated she didn't want me meddling. It was selfish of me.

At the same time, Lena didn’t truly want this marriage. I expect she hated it even more than I did, and she hadn’t, in truth, made the initial choice to marry him. The decision had been made for her by both her and Silas’s parents, perhaps even Silas himself. She had merely grudgingly accepted it out of a sense of duty. In that way, while she’d acquiesced, it was her family’s actions that I was fighting against more than her's. That didn’t make my decision any better, ultimately. It just meant I was just as bad as those who forced the marriage on her in the first place, another person trying to deny her agency.

However, there was one other factor to this as well — Lena was my friend, and friends don’t let friends do self-sacrificial bullshit. At least I felt so, knowing how much it would hurt and destroy her inside and just what Silas was capable of on the outside. She might feel as though she owed this to her family and the town, that it was her duty as the Reeve’s only child, but I wasn’t willing to accept that. The Empire could make someone else the Reeve here, for all I cared. And her family could take the stick up their ass and choke on it.

No matter how presumptive it was of me to feel as though I could know what was best for her, no matter how wrong it was for me to deny her will and try to make this decision for her, and no matter how much it would make her hate me for it, I wouldn’t let her hurt herself like this. Not when the result would be a life of depression and misery, or worse, abuse.

If I was lucky, there was a chance that I could convince her to run away with us.

“Pearl?”

Blinking, I realized that Lena had called my name several times and was now poking me in the cheek. I’d been too deep in my thoughts to notice.

“Umm, sorry. I — I can’t promise I won’t do anything at all. But, I promise I’ll be as smart as I can be about it. I might ask Camilla what she thinks about it all. And, I’ll try to not keep things from you.” If she agreed to come along with us, there would be no need for secrecy. Though, I’d do what I felt I had to to protect her, and first, I needed to get Camilla on board.

Lena furrowed her brows and frowned in thought, a sigh of exasperation leaving her. But while she may have been visibly frustrated by my response, her lack of verbal objections spoke for itself. I expected a large part of her very much wanted me to succeed in finding a way to end it.

My mind flickered back to what we’d been talking about to begin with. The painful throb in my heart from lack of trust struck me once more. Even if she had good reasons for keeping secrets from me, it didn’t make it hurt any less. First, it was the harassment from Silas, and now the martial training. Were there other major secrets that she was keeping from me as well? The question popped into my head once more —

“Are we still friends?”

“Of course,” she replied automatically and took a step forward, my intense gaze seeming to make her hesitate. “Pearl, I know that I haven’t been as open with you as we used to be — that… I’ve been hiding things from you. But we’re still friends, alright? As long as you still want to be,” she said in a small voice lined with guilt.

Feeling a little relieved, I nodded and moved forward, pulling her into another hug.

“I do, I really do. And, I’m sorry if I’ve made you feel like you can’t trust me with these things. I know that I sometimes make mistakes and poor choices, but I’m trying to do better.”

The hug was brief compared to the last one. I pulled away with a small smile on my face, hopeful that things would be alright between us.

“A lot happened yesterday,” I said, my smile falling away as the severity and danger of my circumstances came back to me. I glanced over at Rosetta, wondering how difficult it would be to ditch her so that I could talk about it.

“There’s something else that I need to tell you,” Lena admitted mirthlessly. Her face was stricken with unease, and I could feel a tension lingering in the air. I nodded, preparing myself for what was likely another big secret. I’d handled one today, I could take on another. With a gulp, she continued, “I told Rosetta.”

“You told Rosetta?” My voice was laced with confusion, thinking at first that she meant about her training. But it couldn’t be that, considering that it was Rosetta that led me here in the first place.

She couldn’t mean…

In a wavering breath, she whispered, “About your Mark.” My eyes widened, darting around us in fear that someone might have overheard. But the only ones nearby were us and Rosetta, the maid standing awkwardly to the side, biting her lip in obvious anxiety.

“You…” I took a step back, shaking my head at Lena. I wanted to deny it, to say that I must have misheard her. It couldn’t be true.

“Pearl, I’m sorry.”

“No, no, you wouldn’t,” I cried.

Lena’s gaze was stricken with guilt. “I’m sorry,” she said again, her voice cracking. “I didn’t really intend to, but I did.”

My eyes darted between her and the maid, as though expecting one of them to somehow tell me it wasn’t true. For a long moment, my mind was stunned, unable to completely process what was right in front of me. My breathing became heavier, and a dark feeling that I wasn’t very familiar with welled up in my chest.

Betrayal.

Large drops of tears rolled and fell from my face, and all of a sudden, my emotions seemed to boil over. It was all simply too much. My body jolted and then turned, feet pressing down against the ground and bringing me to a sprint. I hadn’t thought about running, but I couldn't stop myself once I'd started.

“Pearl!” she yelled out, a few seconds before the doors to the courtyard shut behind me.