House of Salt and Sorrows - Erin A. Craig Page 0,122
mother begged me to return home, but I stayed in the capital. One day I crossed paths with Ortun—he was there on business at court, and he…he was so lost without Cecilia, so in need of comfort and care…so I got him over his grief the only way I knew how to.” She smiled, her face relaxing for a brief moment as memories washed over her. “Ortun sent for me every night that week…. When he returned here, he wrote, saying how he longed for me, yearned for me.” She closed her eyes again. “And like a stupid calf, I believed him.”
Another contraction. Another crash of thunder.
“It went on like this for months. Nights of bliss, followed by weeks of waiting for him. Publicly, he needed to mourn Cecilia. I only needed to wait a year. Just one little year.” She swallowed. “Five years passed. Every time one of your sisters died, Ortun had to start the mourning process all over again. He said I needed to be patient and then we could be together, but I…I should have known better.”
Morella paused, her face blood red and thick with sweat.
“One night, I was coming home from a delivery and I saw your father. I didn’t know he was in town. He hadn’t written, hadn’t sent for me.” Morella pushed back a damp lock of hair, wheezing. “And on his arm was a woman. Just a girl, really.”
She rippled in pain, but I couldn’t tell if it was from a contraction or memories of that night.
“I flew at him, cursing and shouting, making such a scene.” She gasped, then let out a deep groan. “Water, please.”
Camille pointed the poker toward her neck, and she tipped her head back, cringing. “Keep talking.”
“He struck me. In front of his new little whore. He didn’t even care that she saw. He called me names, screamed, berated me. Said I was a fool for ever believing a person like him would marry a nothing like me. I wasn’t titled, I wasn’t rich. I was just…me.” Tears now openly streamed down her face.
Despite the horrors she’d confessed, in this one awful moment, with my own words ringing in her voice, I wanted to comfort her. She’d been hurt by my own father, a man who claimed to love her.
A sharp crack of thunder sounded directly above us, snapping me back to my senses. Impossibly, the afternoon grew darker still, the storm ready to slash the sky to bits.
“He left me there, lying in the street, as if I’d never mattered to him.” She let out a broken sob. “But even after all that…I still wanted him.”
A groan welled up from the very bowels of Morella’s belly. Her legs flailed with such force, it gave the impression there were more than two under the sheets. My gaze strayed to the Thaumas octopus at the top of the bed’s canopy. Its eyes seemed alive with condemnation, squinting down in judgment as it listened to her tale. Its arms spiraled down the posts, beaten metal against dark mahogany, reaching out in retribution. The silver reflected shots of lightning outside, and the wind picked up, howling past the windows in uneven pitches.
“So you summoned Viscardi,” I filled in. “You summoned him to make Papa fall in love with you?”
Morella nodded. “And to become pregnant with a son. If I was with child, Ortun would have to marry me. After all I’d done for him…I deserved that much. Once I returned to Highmoor, I saw Eulalie watching closely. She was starting to remember. Then that awful night…she confronted me, saying she was going to tell everyone. I…I couldn’t let her ruin everything.”
Edgar’s shadow on the cliff.
“You killed Eulalie?”
Her fevered eyes darted over mine, beseeching me to understand. “She wouldn’t keep it a secret.”
I recoiled, as if hit in the stomach. I’d befriended this woman, and all along she’d been killing off my family with no greater pain than crossing items off a list. A red mist clouded my vision, and my heart beat in double time. Fury raced through my body, pulsing from my core out to the very tips of my fingers. I grabbed the poker from Camille and pointed it at Morella’s throat.
“You used us as payment for a son.”
She cringed back toward the headboard, trying to escape the metal hook. “And it was all for naught. My son is dead, and I will be too before the night’s end.”