| |
David found Lady Tessa sitting next to a partially frozen fountain, crying into her arms. He hesitated before stepping out of the shadows on the other side of the water. She gasped, sitting up, but was only startled for a moment before she dropped her head again and returned to her misery.
David made his way around the fountain, his feet crunching on the frosted grass, resting a hand in an awkward but comforting way on her shoulder. "I saw your expression when I delivered the sad news to your father. I am so sorry. I didn't realize that you—"
"We were to marry," she wailed pitifully. "I was going to run away with him. It was so perfect. He was so perfect!" David rubbed her arm, and she jerked it away. "Please, do not touch me. Your cold reminds me of his. Please, just leave me to my grief."
David swallowed and nodded, stepping away from her. He didn't know if there was anything he could say that would provide any comfort. He was so numb with his own loss that he couldn't imagine comforting another. Would Ferremor have wanted him to look after Lady Tessa? Would the lady prefer not to be reminded of Ferremor whenever David was near? Did David have any compassion in him for someone who had loved Ferremor for only a fraction of the time he had?
"I'm sorry." Without another word, David traveled to the burnt ruins of the chapel he had once called home. He stepped out of the shadow of the mass headstone, falling to his knees in front of the list of names. He couldn't cry, couldn't grieve as Ferremor's fiancé had. Was the part of him that loved and opened up to others dead? He stared at Alexandra's name for a long moment.
David passed his hand over the smooth surface below the list and pushed tendrils of shadow magic into it, drawing small portions of the stone into the non-corporeal realm of shadows. When he pulled them back into the physical world, they crumbled to the ground, severed cleanly, to reveal Ferremor's name beneath Alex's. "I hope he's with you now." A tear fell unnoticed onto his robes. "I wish I were."
David looked down at his heavily bandaged arms and hands and stared in silence for a long moment. Eventually, he rose to his feet and stepped into the shadows, traveling to the burned circle where Ferremor had perished. The ruins of the ancient castle were still, dark, and peaceful. David's dearest friend had died on this very spot, and the forest hadn't even noticed. By the following spring, the dead patch of grass would be verdant and unmarked, but Ferremor would still be gone.
David looked up at the waning moon, feeling completely alone in the world. "I miss you, my friend. Ever so much. I miss you both. I wish I hadn't wasted the last three years hiding when we could have been together." He plucked some of the dead grass and stowed it in a pouch around his neck that already held ash from the chapel.
None of the shadow masters he'd questioned had known what happened to Ferremor. Their best guess was that he'd faded away in a violent fashion because of his demon blood. "I don't accept that," he whispered. "I never will."