Chapter Twenty-Two – Shards on Marble
The air in the Leclair mansion felt heavier after the scream.
Not louder.
Not busier.
Just... heavier.
Like grief had slipped through the cracks in the old windows and settled into the cushions, the floorboards, the lungs of everyone who remained.
Nuria didn't sleep that night. She didn't lie down, either. Her back was pressed against the wall of the guest chamber Milo had pulled her into after he'd seen her in the hallway. She stared at the pale wallpaper, patterned with golden vines. It looked too soft for how her throat burned.
Her voice still trembled from when she told Milo, "Don't let him come near me."
And Milo—face rigid, jaw locked—had stood guard all night. Because he refused to let her leave the mansion last night, even though she begged and cried. He said he wouldn't—not with the rain falling heavily—even though he was just a butler.
He sat with his elbows on his knees. Watching the door.
"You okay?" he asked, sometime before dawn.
Nuria didn't answer.
He didn't push.
---
As sunlight broke, Milo helped her pack. She didn't speak as she folded her dress from last night. Her hands moved mechanically. Her eyes never lifted.
She was numb.
Not from shock. Not from fear.
But because she didn't understand how a man who kissed her forehead could put his hands around her neck.
There was no noise from the halls. No servants shuffling past.
The house seemed to know something had broken—and was holding its breath.
---
Vivienne found them on the front steps.
She wore a dressing robe—cream silk, cinched tight at the waist. Her face was bare. Still beautiful. Still unreadable.
"Leaving without breakfast?" she asked.
Milo kept his hand wrapped tightly around Nuria's small bag.
Vivienne's eyes suddenly landed on Nuria's neck, and she couldn't help but stare at the girl's bruised throat. Her gaze darkened.
She stepped forward and, with surprising tenderness, fixed Nuria's collar.
"Where will you go?"
Nuria hesitated. Her voice was hoarse.
"My mother."
Vivienne nodded once.
"Good."
Milo opened the door.
"Tell Asa nothing," Vivienne said suddenly. "Don't even say goodbye. Let the absence speak for you."
Nuria turned.
"He doesn't deserve silence."
"No," Vivienne said. "But sometimes silence cuts deeper than any word."
---
The road was grey and long. Milo drove.
Nuria sat in the back seat, arms wrapped around her knees, face turned to the window.
Fields blurred past. Crows gathered on fence posts. The sky hung like stone.
She didn't cry.
---
Back at the estate, Asa hadn't moved from the floor.
His breathing was shallow. His hands were limp.
There was no sound in the room except the tick of the grandfather clock and the faint creak of floorboards from above.
A shadow fell across the doorway.
A man stepped in.
Not in a rush. Not loudly.
He crouched beside Asa and looked at him.
"She left," he said simply.
Asa didn't react.
"You couldn't end her life, could you?"
Still no movement.
The man leaned closer, voice silk.
"You let her go. But I won't let you break. Not now. Not when you're so close to remembering what this is all for."
Asa's lips parted slightly. A dry breath escaped.
"I didn't want to hurt her."
The man touched his shoulder.
"And yet you did. Now let that pain shape you. Use it."
A pause.
"You think you're broken. But you're not. You're becoming what you were assured you would be."
He rose. Walked toward the desk.
Opened the drawer.
And there, a gun lay—silver and glittering in the morning light.
But he did not take it out. Just stared.
Not yet.
"Sleep," he said softly. "When you wake, you won't feel like this anymore."
He left the room, closing the door gently behind him.
Asa closed his eyes.
Sleep never came.
---
Nuria reached her mother's house by mid-afternoon.
The moment her mother opened the door, the older woman gasped at the sight of her daughter.
Nuria fell into her arms immediately.
And that was when the tears came.
All of them.
Like they'd been waiting for permission.
Her mother rocked her on the doorway floor, stroking her hair as she sobbed.
Milo stood outside watching. Then quietly walked to the car to give them privacy.
---
Later, after warm soup and bandaged knees, Nuria sat in the living room. Her mother paced.
"You're not going back there. Ever."
Nuria didn't argue.
"And that boy," her mother hissed. "I don't care how torn he is inside—he lays a finger on you again and I swear—"
"He needs help," Nuria said softly.
Her mother froze.
"He needs to be far from us. But at the same time, he needs help. I think someone's been poisoning his mind, from childhood. Instead of getting him a therapist, his wound was opened too wide—for some unknown reason."
"I want to make sure he gets help."
"You're not serious."
Nuria looked up. Her eyes were swollen, but clear.
"I am."
---
Back in the Leclair estate, Vivienne entered Asa's room late in the night.
He sat in the corner now. Still hadn't changed clothes. Still hadn't moved.
She knelt before him.
"You want to disappear again," she said.
His eyes flickered.
"I already have."
Vivienne nodded. Then kissed his forehead, like she used to when he was small.
"Then we'll find you. We always do."
She stood, gave him a last look, and walked out.
---
That night, Nuria dreamt of a house with no doors.
She was inside, and Asa was outside, and the walls between them were made of glass.
He screamed her name.
But she couldn't open anything.
And he couldn't find the entrance.
She woke with sweat on her collarbones, and her mother asleep in a chair by the bed.
The morning light was grey.
Outside, birds gathered on telephone wires.
Waiting.