When Stars Die (The Stars Trilogy)

by Forbes, Amber Skye

  He opens his eyes. “An opium overdose. It was the opium that killed her.” His hands start to shake. “She’s been hoarding opium. I don’t know if you knew that, but that’s what she’s been doing. Those weekend trips where we all thought she was visiting Malva with her lady friends, well she was off in the opium dens. I suppose her body couldn’t handle it anymore. She died a few months after you--after you left.”

  Gluttony. That was the sin that gave birth to Nathaniel and I. Or could it be greed? Lust? Or all three? Even more damning. My Father’s hands shake more, and without thinking, I sweep over to him and wrap my arms around his shoulders like the good daughter I used to be. I used to lay my head on his shoulder in the evenings while he read from The Vulgate, smoking sweet-smelling tobacco from his pipe. Oh, how I remember that tobacco. This makes me want to find it and smoke some myself, if only to be lost in nostalgia for as long as the tobacco burns.

  I hold my hand out for Nathaniel. He doesn’t hesitate, comes over, and buries his head just underneath my breast. He doesn’t make any crying sounds, but I can feel wetness seeping through the wool of my dress.

  Father doesn’t seem moved by any of the affection. I don’t expect him to be, not after what a horrible daughter I’ve been. For three years I’ve blamed both Mother and Father for Nathaniel, when really it was Mother who was in danger of unraveling our family.

  “Why did Mother do it--I mean, go to the opium dens?” I ask.

  “She’s always been out of sorts, but has always done her best to hide it from you children. She saw things, heard voices that weren’t there. At night she used to wake up clawing her face. She’d hide those scars underneath layers of make-up.” I do remember the uncanny way mother used to rouge her cheeks and powder her face. As a girl, I often wondered if she were going to take off to the circus one day. “When your mother was a child, she was in an asylum for a few years. Most women never get out, but she found ways to suppress her ailment through opium. She only took small doses at first, just to bring on euphoria. It made her happy, and I suppose her caretakers saw this and released her.

  “I married your mother a year after she got out, not knowing what I was getting myself into. One night she had hysterics, and then for the next few months, she was fine. She would have repeated bouts of the hysterics every so often, with moments in between that were calm. I suppose she just kept increasing the amount of opium each time. Then she started taking those blasted weekend trips, and I should have checked to see if her lady friends really had gone with her, but I was a foolish, foolish man.”

  Father buries his head in his hands and breaks into tears. “I suppose I couldn’t hide your mother’s condition well though. I don’t blame you for taking Nathaniel and leaving. When your mother was dying, things became too much. With the opium withdrawal, she was violent. She almost harmed Lily. That’s why I let her go, to keep her safe. I was devastated when you and Nate left, but during that moment, I was grateful you weren’t there to see the damage. I suppose you’ve known your Mother’s condition for a while, Amelia.”

  The real truth sits on the edge of my tongue. I wind it back into my throat, knowing the real reason I left would kill Father if he knew Mother’s opium addiction gave birth to two witches. A witch is never the pride of the family. It’s like Deus gave human beings this natural inclination to stop loving their children once they find out they’re witches. One thinks love is unconditional, but it can be snipped like a thread in an instant. I don’t think there are any exceptions where unconditional love is real.

  “Father, I--” My throat goes dry. He is better of not knowing the truth.

  “I was so happy to hear from your Mother Superior, Amelia. She told me she had no idea you were there without our knowing, but that you two have been a blessing to the establishment. She said churches can never use too many priests or nuns.”

  This is the nicest compliment anyone average at Cathedral Reims will ever receive from Mother Aurelia. I don’t believe it though, not with the way she wanted us gone as though our progress meant nothing to the Order.

  “She was upset she had to let you go, but knowing what she did, she felt it was best you come home for a little while, and I am happy to have you and Nate home. I want to fix our family, you know. Rekindle things with no burdens on our shoulders. We can make things different this time around. Better.”

  I sit there, Nathaniel still curled against me. This is too much to take in. First Colette, then the train, Oliver, and now this. What am I supposed to say when there is still too much going on with me to be able to reestablish a relationship with no burdens? I can’t. I feel sad for my Father, I’m not completely heartless. And yet, I still hold on to Cathedral Reims and to everything there.

  What is Father going to give me besides a marriage to some stranger? That was his dream for me. Is it still the same? My dreams have changed. I have changed. I know what is out there for me, and I know I can get that. This may be selfish of me, as a daughter should always be there to care for her father when he needs her. Nathaniel, on the other hand, is better suited for that. He wants to be here. He wants to mourn for Mother. I can feel it in the tears brushing against my ribs. I can feel it in the heavy pounding of his heart. I am a naturally selfish individual. I can’t be happy unless I am pursuing what I want.

  I pull Nathaniel off me and lean into his ear. Silent tears still course down his cheeks. “Please stay here with Father.” He nods, wiping his eyes. “Father, if you don’t mind, I need to take a walk. This is all--this is all so overwhelming. I need to be alone.”

  Father nods as I rise from the settee. Nathaniel reaches for Father, like he used to before we left for Cathedral Reims. Father takes Nathaniel and rocks him. I can’t help but smile as Father turns into a younger version of himself while he sits there, making soft shushing sounds. If I didn’t know any better, I could believe our life has always been this way--no witches, burdens, or dark secrets.

  I push out of the parlor, thinking of seeking Oliver out for comfort. He never told me where he’d be. He just has to be around here. He wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye. Yet, as I search all over the mansion, the grounds, and even the drive and edge of the woods, he is nowhere. In the end, I fall into the snow, feeling stranded in a place that is supposed to be home but feels like that tiny cell did during my second trial.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Even after several days of being home, I still don’t know how to feel about Mother’s death. I’ve even circled the statue erected of her in the snowy lawn out back several times to unearth any emotions I might be hiding. As expected, I feel nothing, and I feel like an awful daughter for not feeling anything at all because I do have wonderful memories of times I’ve spent with Mother. The memory that sticks most to me is the time I was looking in her vanity at myself, and she put her arms around me and said I was beautiful. Her heavily done face would stare back at me, hiding what she looked like beneath, my never knowing if she had the complexion of a rock or the complexion of a lily. All I could see were those eyes that Nathaniel has, the blueness of the ocean I wish I were born with. Maybe then I’d feel beautiful.

  Not even this can bring a tear to my eye, and I hate myself for it. Isn’t a daughter supposed to cry over her own Mother’s death, in spite of that small bitterness over knowing Mother is the reason for her children being witches?

  I circle her statue again, locking my eyes on her stony face. It’s not an exact likeness of her at all, but it at least catches the shape of her face, her hair, and the dress she might have been buried in, her favorite evening gown. It’s a Gareth tradition to have statues erected of deceased relatives in our back lawns. A morbid one, I think. If Father dies soon, I’m not going to erect a statue of him. I’ll have him buried somewhere nice, and that’ll be all.

  I turn away from the statue, my mind set on locking myself in the library where I’ve been these past few days avoiding everyone. I’ve been avoiding Father because I don’t know what to say to him
about reestablishing our family. That seems impossible considering that Mother is gone and his two children disappeared three years ago. How can we come back from that? I’m a daughter who has her own desires. I’m a selfish daughter who has no desire to hold on to this dwindling family. Father has been able to manage these past three years, and while he hasn’t been managing well, he’ll survive. Nathaniel can provide for his emotional needs, even though he is only eight. I’ll visit every once in a while, but my life will be mine and no one else’s.

  As for Nathaniel, I’ve been avoiding him to give him some room to mourn. I don’t know what it’s like to be an eight-year-old suffering through the loss of a parent. Mother and he were close. When she wasn’t away on trips, she’d take him out for ice cream, to the park, and to the toy store in the city—which was one day out of the week. He was devastated the day I told him we needed to get away. I think he even might have hated me for a moment, but I ignored his feelings in favor of preserving us as brother and sister. This is the only familial relationship I want to hold on to because in the end, Nathaniel and I will be all that is left when Father is gone.

  As I walk toward the back entrance, I think of gathering Nathaniel and taking us to the grotto to talk things over. Even if Cathedral Reims won’t have me back, there are other convents on Norbury--though not as prestigious as the one in Malva. I’ll allow Nathaniel to stay here with Father, but I must do everything in my power to become professed because it is the only way to bring myself closer to Deus in a way that I hope will free Nathaniel and I. We can’t undo what we were born as, but I can only hope Deus will view us in a favorable light and allow us into Paradise when we die.

  So I climb the stairwell to the second floor, sweep down the hall, and find Nathaniel in his room at the end, looking out at the snowy hills through his window. I knock on the doorframe. “Nat, would you like to go to our grotto? I know you wanted go to when it was warmer, but spring is so far, and I really want to go there.”

  He turns around, his eyes glowing with this suggestion. He gives me a toothy smile, and I notice a small gap on the bottom row of his teeth. He beams. “I lost a tooth yesterday! Father told me to put it with Mother’s things, so I did. I would show you the tooth, but Father put Mother’s things away, in her special drawer. He only wants it opened if we have more special things to put in there.”

  I smile. That may have been a form of closure for Nathaniel to put a part of himself with a part of Mother, although I can’t imagine how healthy it is for Father to cling on to items that should have been buried with her. “Let’s go to our grotto then.”

  When we arrive at our grotto, I’m grateful not much has changed, except the icicles hanging from the entrance and the snow littering the dirt floor. Using my hands like shovels, I push snow off a rock shelf and settle a fleece blanket on it. We settle ourselves on the blanket, and I look around the cavernous grotto, at the striations in the walls from where nature has chipped away. Oliver would love this place. Then I remember Oliver abandoned me and I haven’t seen him in several days and don’t know if I will ever see him again. A pain swells in my heart, one that should be for Mother. His eyes float in my mind. They’re bright pieces of silver and not the usual watery gray. His complexion, too, is more flushed in my mind’s eye. It’s silly how we romanticize things in our heads. Even Oliver’s lips are fuller, more supple, a peach I could--

  I shake my head, internally chiding myself for thinking of Oliver in that way. We are friends, mere friends, with suppressed feelings. Oh, Deus, what is wrong with me? I’m craving him too strongly. Mother was right: absence can make the heart grow fonder. Foolish heart.

  “Sister!”

  Nathaniel’s voice pulls me from my reverie. I turn, and Nathaniel is clutching a stained, white string in both of his hands. “Cat’s cradle?” I say.

  He nods and goes about forming the labyrinth of crisscrossed string, leaving just enough space to put my hand through. Every time we come to the grotto we play cat’s cradle. There is something to be said about tradition, the way it brings people together, and the way it brings on feelings of nostalgia. This is one moment for me as I put my hand through, Nathaniel tugs, and the string falls limp around my wrist. This little game of cat’s cradle brings on feelings so hard to describe that frustration tugs on my heart knowing that in spite of everything looking the same, not everything feels the same.

  I sigh, letting the string fall from my wrist. “Not even the grotto feels the same,” I say, getting up and going over to the mouth of the grotto. The rolling, snowy hills stretch into the horizon, meeting at the focal point of our mansion.

  We used to play tag, hide-and-go-seek, tell stories to one another, eat down here, and sometimes sleep here, and there is nothing about this grotto anymore that makes me want to do any of that. I know this isn’t because I’ve gotten older either, but because I have allowed myself to detach from this place in order to connect more with Cathedral Reims.

  Nathaniel stands beside me, resting his head just beneath the crook of my arm. “What do you mean it doesn’t feel the same?”

  “Nat, I never wanted to come home.”

  “I know.”

  At this moment, I feel like I could talk to Nathaniel as though he is my age and not some eight-year-old. “I just don’t know how to react to any of this, Nat. I haven’t cried at all about Mother. And then Oliver told me the Professed Order is going to put Sister Colette in an asylum, and I may never see her again. You know how close her and I were. And, and--”

  I scan the horizon, trace the wispy clouds in the sky and scale to the tops of the pine trees. Colette and Oliver would love this place. I ball my fists by my sides, trying to suppress the shaking that wants to come out of me in waves.

  “You want to go back to Cathedral Reims, don’t you?” Nathaniel asks, looking up at me. “This place doesn’t feel like home to you, does it?”

  I shake my head, biting my bottom lip. “I’m sorry. I know how much you’ve wanted to come home for so long. For me to not feel that at all, you must hate me.” I feel lonely, a desolate wasteland in my heart.

  He grabs my hand, squeezes it. “No. But what are you going to do?”

  “I can’t stay here, that’s for certain.”

  “Father won’t like that.”

  “I know.” A choked sob crawls up my throat, and my voice comes out cracked. “I want my old life back!”

  Thinking about Colette and Oliver and Cathedral Reims, even the pain I endured there, I can no longer hold the tears back. They don’t simply slide out involuntarily, but they gush out, water bursting through a thick sheet of ice. I slide into the snow, tighten my overcoat around me, and sob. My body racks with the effort, and I swear the tears feel like they’re freezing on me, but I don’t hold them back anymore. Nathaniel sits down beside me and embraces me with his small arms. He even makes shushing sounds like Father does. This makes me feel like a child, but Colette did once tell me that if I’m going to cry, then I should cry like a child because there is no better way to be.

  I cry for a while, until my head feels like it will burst from the headache pulsing across my forehead. The tears soon slow, then die down altogether until there are only little sniffles left. I wipe myself of tears, my face burning in the cold from the salt rubbing away at my skin.

  “I’m going to go back to Cathedral Reims in a week, Nat, and I’m going to request they allow me back in. If I show up there myself, and maybe if I plead, they’ll take pity on me. If not, I’ll find another convent.”

  Nathaniel picks at his nails. There is less blood. Isis must have done something for him. Or maybe being home. Regardless, he hasn’t let Mother’s death affect him too much. “Why do you want to be a nun so badly? It seems so painful. I know you have welts from your back, and I know Mother Aurelia did that to you.”

  “You’ll understand when you find something you’re so passionate about you’ll do anything to obtain it, even if that means bleeding for it.”

&nbs
p; “I don’t want to be passionate about anything then.”

  This comment brings a small laugh from me. “Passion is the reason we live, Nat. When you’re little, the world is so open to you that every day is something exciting, but as you grow older, you find you have to search for other things to be excited about, things that are more complicated than a rainbow in the sky, or a flower unfurling from its bud. Certainly you still appreciate those things, but it’s not the same.”

  Nathaniel looks out at the horizon, seemingly lost in pondering. He then snaps his eyes back on me. “I think I understand what you’re saying. I think…” He sighs. “But I think I already feel that way.”

  He rests his head on his knees, and this action alone tells me I’ve robbed three years of Nathaniel’s life by taking him to Cathedral Reims, three years he could have used to be a child, to explore the world more, to know himself better. Instead he’s spent that time in a stuffy Cathedral, learning about Deus, doing endless chores for the sake of doing chores, and being teased by that Ann girl. He doesn’t look at the snow with the same wonder I did when I was his age. Cathedral Reims sapped that from him.

  I put a hand on his shoulder. “Nat, I’m sorry for doing this to you. I never should have taken you from here. And now Mother…”

  Nathaniel looks back up at me with eyes full of too much knowing. He shouldn’t have to know at such a young age that people can be so weak they spiral into devastating addictions that kill them. “Mother wasn’t your fault. But is that why you had us run away, because Mother was who she was?”

  I’ll let him believe this lie. “Yes, yes I did.”

  “Then maybe it was best.”

  I run my fingers through his hair. “Start acting your age, Nat. You’re scaring me.” He beams.

  “Oh, what a sweet little moment between brother and sister. I didn’t have any siblings. I was an only child, later hated in life by my parents.”

  Both Nathaniel and I whip our heads in the direction of a familiar voice. From behind a boulder resting against the side of the grotto emerges a familiar face, only this time he looks too human.