“Postpone until when?”
“I’m not sure, if I’m being honest.” Nouria’s nerves and apprehension are growing louder now. I try to meet her eyes, but she keeps glancing at Castle, who only shakes his head. “I was hoping maybe we could look at the calendar,” she says to me, “think about planning something when things are less crazy around here—”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Of course I’m serious.”
“You know as well as I do,” I say angrily, “that there is no guarantee things will ever calm down around here, or that we’ll ever be able to get this situation under control—”
“Well, right now is a bad time, okay?” She crosses her arms. “It’s just a bad time.”
I look away. My heart seems to be racing in my head now, pounding against my skull. I feel myself dissociating—detaching from the moment—and struggle to remain present.
“Is this some kind of perverse revenge?” I ask. “Are you trying to prevent my wedding because I won’t let you bring in civilians? Because I refuse to put Juliette’s life in jeopardy?”
Nouria is quiet for so long I’m forced to look up, to return my mind to itself. She’s staring at me with the strangest look in her eyes, something like guilt—or regret—washing her out completely.
“Warner,” she says quietly. “It was Juliette’s idea.”
Five
The small velvet box weighs heavy in my pocket, the right angles of which dig into my thigh as I sit here, at the edge of a short cliff, staring down at our very own graveyard. This area was built shortly after the battle—a memorial to all the lives lost.
It’s become an unexpected refuge for me.
Few people come through here anymore; for some, the pain is still too fresh, for others, the demands on their time too many. Either way, I’m grateful for the quiet. It was one of the only places to escape while Ella was in recovery, which meant I spent quite a bit of time acquainting myself with this view, and with my seat: a smooth, flat stretch of a massive boulder. The view from this rock is surprisingly peaceful.
Today, it fails to calm me.
I hear a sound then; a distant, faded trill my mind can only describe as birdsong. The dog lifts its head and barks.
I stare at the animal.
The dirty little creature waited for me outside the war room only to follow me here. I’ve done nothing to inspire its loyalty. I don’t know how to get rid of him. Or her.
As if sensing the direction of my thoughts, the dog turns to face me, panting lightly now, looking for all the world as if it might be smiling. I’ve hardly had a chance to digest this before it jerks away to bark once more at the sky.
That oddly familiar chirp, again.
I’ve heard birdsong more often lately; we all have. Castle, who’s always insisted all was not lost, claims even now that the animals had not died out entirely. He said that traditionally, birds hide during severe weather, not unlike humans. They seek shelter when experiencing illness, too, during what they believe to be the last moments of their life. He argues that the birds went into mass hiding—either from fear, or from sickness—and that now, with Emmaline’s weather manipulations gone, what’s left of them have come out of hiding. It’s not a foolproof theory, but lately it’s grown harder to deny. Even I find myself searching the sky these days, hoping for a glimpse of the impossible creature.
A cold wind barrels through the valley then, pushing through my hair, snapping against my skin. It is with some regret that I realize I left my coat in the war room. The dog whimpers, nudging my leg with its nose. Reluctantly, I rest my hand on what is no doubt its flea-infested head, and the dog quiets. Its thin body curls into a tight ball at my feet, tail tapping the ground.
I sigh.
The day had dawned bright this morning, the sun unencumbered in the sky, but each passing hour has brought with it heavier clouds and an inescapable chill.
Nouria was right; this night will be brutal.
Anxious as I always am to be apart from Ella, my impulses were blunted after meeting with Castle and Nouria. Confused. I wanted nothing more than to seek out Ella; I wanted nothing more than to be alone. I ended up here, in the end—my feet carrying me when my head made no decision—staring into a valley of death, circling the drain of my mind. This morning had been agitating but rewarding; full of irritation but hope, too. I hadn’t resented the ticking clock against which I’d been marking time.
In the end, the afternoon has proven empty.
My evening, cleared.
Save the myriad domestic and international disasters that remain unresolved, I’ve no reason to hurry anymore. I’d thought I was getting married tonight.
As it turns out, I’m not.
I tug free the velvet box from my pocket, clutching it in my fist a moment before taking a sharp breath, then carefully opening the lid. I stare at the glittering contents not unlike a child witnessing fire for the first time. Naive.
It’s strange: of all the reprehensible things I’ve known myself to be, I’d never thought I was stupid.
I snap the lid closed, tuck the box back into my pocket.
Nouria didn’t lie when she said my wedding wouldn’t happen tonight. She didn’t lie when she told me it was Ella’s idea to postpone. What I don’t understand is why Ella never mentioned this to me—or why she said nothing this morning at the dress shop. Perhaps most confusing of all: I’ve felt no hesitation from her on the matter. Surely, if she didn’t want to marry me, I’d have known.
I clench my jaw against the cold.
Somehow, despite the howling wind, the dog appears to have fallen asleep, its body vibrating like a small motor at my feet. I take a moment to study its patchy brown fur, noticing, for the first time, that there’s a piece missing from one of its ears.
I exhale, slowly, and rest my elbows on my knees, drop my head into my hands. The small box digs deeper into my flesh.
I’m trying to convince myself to get going—to return to work—when I feel Ella approach. I stiffen, then straighten.
My pulse picks up.
I sense her long before I see her, and when she finally comes into view my heart reacts, contracting in my chest even as my body remains motionless. She lifts a hand when she sees me, the single moment of distraction costing her a fight with a bramble. This area, like so many others, is carpeted in half-dead brush, ripe for a wildfire. Ella struggles to disentangle herself, yanking hard to free her shirt—and promptly frowns when she’s released. She studies what appears to be the torn edge of her sweater before looking up at me. She shrugs.
I didn’t really care about this sweater anyway, she seems to say, and I can’t help but smile.
Ella laughs.
She is windswept. The gusts are growing more aggressive, whipping her hair so that it wraps around her face as she heads in my direction. I can hardly see her eyes; only glimpses of her lips and cheeks, pink with exertion. She swipes at her dark hair with one hand, pushing at overgrown weeds with the other. She is gently rendered in this light, soft in a nondescript sweater the color of moss. Dark jeans. Tennis shoes.
The light changes as she moves, the clouds fighting to hide the sun and occasionally failing. It makes the scene feel dreamlike. She looks so much like herself in this moment that it startles me; it’s almost as if she’s stepped out of some of my favorite memories.