Awry

47

Gabriel entered the gathering room where he and Scarlet were summoned to appear and immediately know something was wrong. His father looked upset and the guards around him shifted uneasily. Scarlet entered the room behind Gabriel and stood beside him as the earl motioned them forward.

Gabriel swallowed, the pit of his stomach falling heavy.

“My dear Gabriel,” his father said, looking at him, “and lovely Scarlet,” he glanced at Scarlet. “I am afraid Tristan has fallen in battle.”

Gabriel blinked. “What?” His voice broke.

“Tristan is dead.” His father put a hand on Gabriel’s shoulder, squeezed briefly, and moved past him out of the room.

Scarlet stared straight ahead with a pale face.

Gabriel froze, his body growing numb as he stood wide-eyed and stunned.

Tristan was dead? Tristan could not be dead.

Gabriel could not breathe.

Finding his legs, Gabriel stormed out of the gathering room, charged to the stables and mounted his horse.

He rode until the forest ended and then he rode more. Quick and angry, the sound of hooves beneath him was no match for the roar of his soul.

Tristan was dead.

His brother, his very first friend. Dead.

Gabriel had never felt so alone.

He stopped riding at the riverbank and jumped from his steed angrily. Wanting to scream, wanting to fight, wanting to break everything that was whole.

Frustrated, he gathered a large stone in his hand and threw it into the passing water. The river gave way to the weight of the rock and washed over it as the stone sank to the dark depths of the river floor.

He hurled another giant rock, and then another…and then another. He threw and threw, heavy stones flying through the air in anger and injustice, hitting trees, hitting the water. Breaking branches, breaking the waves.

And when his arms grew tired, his threw some more. He heaved until all the large stones around him were dug up and hurled away.

And then he fell to his knees.

Sadness ripped through him and left his mouth in a cry of rage.

Sinking his fingers into the upturned earth around him, Gabriel stared at the ground.

He had lost his best friend.

Scarlet walked down the stone hallway that led to the field as a stream of tears coated her face. People in the castle stared at her, guards turned their eyes from her.

She was not supposed to cry so openly. She was not supposed to break in half.

But she did.

She broke in half, one side of her soul severing completely and withering within her. Tristan was dead. Her love was dead.

When she reached the field, she headed to the trees. She walked. She ran. She stumbled.

She wanted to leave it all behind. The castle, the servants, the food…the emptiness of life.

Were it not for her mother lying on her deathbed within the castle walls, Scarlet would have fled forever. She would have made her way through the woods to live as a wild woman. Alone, angry and empty.

Instead, she sobbed aloud letting the forest wrap her up in the shadows of the trees. She laid her head against the broken leaves beneath her as she cried.

She would never be whole again. Pressing her palm flat to the ground, she let her tears fall to the dirt as half of her soul died forever.