21 — The Noble Reason

Lily didn't say anything for a long time.

That was the worst part. I had expected her to yell. I had expected her to grab my collar the way she did when I insulted Myra, or pinch my cheek the way she did when I said something stupid, or slap me the way she did when I deserved it.

But she just stood there.

Quiet.

The clock ticked. The candles guttered. Myra was still holding my hand, and I could feel her small fingers tightening around mine, one by one, like she was counting them.

Then Lily walked to the table.

She picked up her cup. The one Celine had stolen. The one Celine had sipped from. The one that had gone cold three times over.

She held it in both hands.

"Clara," she said. Her voice was very calm. "What the hell just happened?"

"I told you. I don't—"

"No." She cut me off. "No, you don't get to do that. You don't get to say I don't know and walk away. Not this time."

"I wasn't walking away."

"You were about to."

"I was going to find out. That's different."

Lily laughed. It wasn't a real laugh. It was the sound of something breaking very quietly.

"Find out," she repeated. "Find out. You just accused the headmistress of covering up a massacre. You just said her sister killed your parents. You just said the Ancient Demon Priestess is teaching theology at this academy. And your plan is to find out?"

"I don't have a plan yet."

"I noticed."

"Lily—"

"Ten years."

She said it quietly. Too quietly. Like she was testing the words in her mouth before letting them out.

"Ten years, Clara. You've been at this academy for a year. You've been my roommate for a year. You've been — I don't know what we are. Friends. Roommates. Whatever. I thought we were something. And in all that time, you never once told me."

"Told you what?"

"That your parents were murdered."

The word landed between us like a stone.

I didn't have a response.

"You told me they died," Lily said. "You told me it was an accident. You told me it happened when you were little. You told me the Kingdom took care of you, and your aunt and uncle took you in, and that was it. That was the story. That was the story I've been living with for a year."

"It wasn't a lie."

"It wasn't the truth either."

"It was — it was complicated."

"It's always complicated, Clara! Everything is always complicated with you! You never say what you mean! You never say what you feel! You never tell anyone anything, and then you act surprised when people don't understand you!"

"That's not fair."

"Isn't it?"

"No. It's not. You don't know what it's like. You don't know what it's like to have this in your head every single day. You don't know what it's like to remember his bag under the pew, and her ribbon in that woman's robes, and the smell of the church, and—"

"Then tell me!"

She slammed the cup down on the table.

It broke.

Not dramatically. Not the way cups break in stories. It just — gave up. The side split, the tea spilled, the handle came loose, and the whole thing came apart in her hands like it had been waiting for an excuse.

Lily looked at it. Looked at her hands. Looked at the tea running across the table and dripping onto the floor.

She didn't move.

"I don't know what to do with you," she said. "I don't know how to help you. I don't know how to be your friend. Because every time I try, you put up another wall. And every time I knock on the wall, you tell me there's nothing behind it. And now I find out there's everything behind it. There's a murdered Prime Minister. There's a demon priestess. There's a headmistress who's been lying to every student in this academy for a decade. And you didn't tell me. You didn't trust me. You didn't—"

"I was trying to protect you."

The words came out before I could stop them. The oldest excuse. The one I had been using since I was six. The one I had used on Arthur, on Celine, on everyone.

Lily stared at me.

"You were protecting me."

"Yes."

"From what?"

"From this. From — from knowing. From being involved. From getting hurt. From—"

"Clara."

"From the same thing that happened to them."

The room went silent.

Myra's hand tightened around mine.

Lily's face didn't change. Not at first. But something behind it did. Something that had been building for a year. Something that had been waiting for exactly this.

"You think I'm fragile," she said.

"No."

"You think I can't handle it."

"That's not—"

"You think I'm going to break if I know the truth."

"I don't think you're going to break. I think—"

"I think you're a coward."

The word hit me harder than it should have.

I had been called worse. By myself, mostly. Pathetic loser. Waste of potential. Greatest that never was. I had built an entire self-image out of those words. I had made peace with them.

But hearing them from Lily was different.

Because Lily didn't say them to hurt me. She said them because she believed them.

"That's not—"

"It is." She wiped her hands on her skirt. The tea was staining the fabric. She didn't seem to notice. "You're a coward, Clara. You're not protecting me. You're protecting yourself. You're protecting yourself from having to say it out loud. From having to admit that your parents were murdered and that you've been carrying it alone because you don't know how to let anyone help you."

"That's not true."

"It is true."

"It's not—"

"Say it."

I stopped.

"Say it," Lily said. "Say what happened. Out loud. To me. Right now."

"I already said it."

"You said the words. You didn't say what they meant."

I opened my mouth.

Closed it.

Opened it again.

Myra stepped between us.

That was the thing that broke the spell. Not Lily's words. Not the broken cup. Myra. Small, fox-eared Myra, with her tail tucked and her ears flat and her hands raised like she was trying to hold up two walls at once.

"Stop," she said.

Her voice was quiet. Smaller than I had ever heard it.

"Stop fighting. Please."

Lily and I both looked at her.

"You're scaring me," Myra said. "You're — you're yelling, and the cup broke, and Master is crying, and Lily is crying, and I don't — I don't know what to do."

Lily blinked.

"I'm not crying," she said.

"You are."

"I'm not."

"Myra's right," I said.

We both said it at the same time.

And then we both looked at each other.

And then — I don't know why — I laughed.

It wasn't a real laugh. It was the sound of a rope snapping. It was the sound of ten years of held breath coming out all at once. It was ugly, and it was short, and it stopped almost as soon as it started.

But it was a laugh.

Lily stared at me.

"What's so funny?"

"I don't know."

"You're laughing at me."

"I'm not laughing at you."

"You're laughing at something."

"I'm laughing because—" I stopped. I didn't know how to finish the sentence. I didn't know what I was laughing at. I didn't know what I was feeling. I didn't know anything anymore.

Myra pulled on my sleeve.

"Master," she said. "Sit down."

I sat down.

Lily sat down.

Myra climbed onto the table, between us, and folded her legs under her, and looked at both of us with those bright eyes that had seen too much and understood too little and wanted nothing more than for the people she loved to stop hurting each other.

"Now," Myra said. "Talk."

And so I did.

I told her everything.

Not the version I had given Celine. Not the version I had given Ren. Not the version I had rehearsed in my head a hundred times, the one that made me sound reasonable, the one that made me sound like I had been handling it.

The real version.

The version where I was six years old and I came back from the bathroom and the church was full of silence and my father's bag was on the floor and my mother's ribbon was in the robes of a woman with mismatched eyes.

The version where she held me and told me my parents were in Heaven and I believed her for three seconds before I saw the ribbon and understood.

The version where I didn't scream.

The version where I didn't run.

The version where I just stood there, in her arms, and let her hold me, because I was six and I didn't know what else to do.

The version where I have been carrying that woman's voice in my head for ten years, telling me it's okay, telling me it'll all be okay, telling me my parents are forgiven and at peace, and I have never been able to decide whether that was a kindness or the worst thing anyone has ever done to me.

The version where I have spent every day since trying to be worth something. Trying to be worth the space I take up. Trying to be worth the parents who didn't come home. Trying to be worth the life that woman let me keep.

The version where I lost my magic a year ago and I have never told anyone because if I admit it out loud, then it becomes real, and if it becomes real, then I have to admit that the Potential Witch is exactly what everyone says she is.

Just potential.

Just a girl who was supposed to be something and became nothing.

By the time I finished, the candles had burned down another inch. The tea had dried on the table. The broken cup was still lying there, in pieces, and no one had moved it.

Lily was quiet for a long time.

Then she said: "You lost your magic?"

I nodded.

"When?"

"Last year. During the tournament. I was supposed to win. I was supposed to — I was supposed to show everyone. And I just. I froze. And when I tried to cast, nothing came out. Nothing. And it's been nothing ever since."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want you to look at me the way everyone else does."

"How do they look at you?"

"Like I'm already gone."

Lily was quiet again.

Then she reached across the table and took my hand.

"I'm not looking at you like that," she said.

I didn't answer.

I couldn't.

"You're an idiot," she said. "You're a coward. You're the most infuriating person I have ever met. And if you ever hide something like this from me again, I will personally drag you to Professor Ren and have him explain every single chapter of the Codex of Magical Ethics out loud, in detail, until you beg for mercy."

"That's a lot of chapters."

"There are forty-seven."

"You'd really do that to me?"

"I would."

"You monster."

"You deserve it."

We sat there for a while, holding hands across a table that was covered in cold tea and broken porcelain, and Myra sat between us with her tail curled around her legs and her ears finally relaxed and her eyes finally bright again.

And for the first time in a year, I felt like maybe I wasn't alone.

"I'm going to find out what happened," I said. "All of it. Why she did it. Why she let me live. Why she's still here. Everything."

"I know you are," Lily said.

"You're not going to try to stop me?"

"No."

"Why not?"

She looked at me.

"Because you're not going to do it alone."