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nineteen

Grim

“ I don’t think my brain is fully developed,” she said, half asleep.

Astoria lounged on the couch in her suite’s sitting room, now dry and in clean clothes. It had been a struggle getting her drunk, half-dressed self out of her soaked dress and into something more comfortable. And her mood hadn’t improved after her confession.

“Why would you say that?” I sat down beside her, pulling her legs into my lap. She looked exhausted, mascara smeared under her eyes from the bath, but it didn’t matter. Astoria was infuriatingly beautiful even in this state.

She groaned, tugging the blanket I’d retrieved for her higher, as if it could shield her from the weight of her thoughts.

“If the curse set in when I turned twenty-two, and I haven’t aged, or changed at all for that matter…

” Her voice trailed off as she distractedly tugged a strand of her messy hair in front of her face.

“Don’t you think my brain is stuck, frozen, too? ”

I chuckled, rubbing her foot absently. Then I froze, realizing what I’d started doing. I pulled my hand back, but Astoria let out a soft, appreciative moan. Damn it. My fingers resumed their motion almost instinctively.

“Your brain is not frozen, Star,” I said softly, trying to rein in the warmth creeping up my spine.

She shot me a side-eye, muttering with a huff, “Scientists say the brain isn’t fully developed until the age of twenty-five. I had three more years to go.”

I thought about that for a minute. It was true, the human brain wasn’t fully developed until then. But who could be sure how her curse worked? There were a lot of unknowns about Astoria’s situation. What kind of twisted rules governed her immortality?

I kept my voice neutral. “It’s possible, but no one has studied anything like this. You’re different.”

She looked at me, her green eyes swimming with exhaustion. I could see the flicker of something else there, though. Something darker. A vulnerability she rarely let anyone see.

Reaching out to brush a stray curl off her forehead, I said, “You’re still you, Astoria.”

She sighed, letting her head sink into the cushion. “Do you think that’s why he did it?”

The question hit me harder than I expected.

Astoria had always been a force of nature. She didn’t dwell. She didn’t go back to old wounds. She wasn’t the type to dissect the past, especially not when there was so much of it. But now, she wasn’t looking forward or dismissing the past. She was trying to understand it, maybe for the first time.

Looking over at her, my heart stirred. Astoria rested her head back against the frame of the couch, eyes closed, as she drew each breath slow and steady.

The soft rhythm of her inhale and exhale was familiar now, one I’d come to recognize as a habit that soothed her, the way she breathed in patterns of three.

In for a long count, out for a long count, and in again.

“Who did what?” I asked, my voice quieter than I’d intended.

She opened her eyes, staring at the ceiling as she spoke in a low, soft tone. “Had an affair… he was always so… disappointed with me. ”

Belatedly, I realized she was talking about James, her late husband. The miserable excuse of one, at least. I was quiet for a moment, struggling to find the right words, the ones that wouldn’t sound trite or forced. “I don’t know why people make the decisions they do—”

“I tried, you know?” she interrupted. She wasn’t looking at me now, just the ceiling, but her words seemed as though they were spoken directly to me.

“Tried to ignore the fact that they were all moving forward, and I was frozen in time. I even warned him before we got married. That I could be cursed. He met my family.”

The hurt in her voice was thick and heavy. It blanketed her in the way that the wraiths haunted me, unseen but always present. I knew that pain well. Perhaps it was her burden to bear, just as mine had been mine to carry.

“I tried to be into the things that were supposed to be for my age. Dressing like the other older women…” She scoffed, the sound bitter but not entirely angry.

It made me smile slightly, though I knew she wasn’t aiming for humor.

“I took up knitting!” She paused for a moment, letting the absurdity of it all hang in the air.

And I had to admit, the image of Astoria knitting was hard to picture—she was never still long enough for something as tedious as that.

“He hated the rumors around town, the way our children connected with me in a way he never could. Nothing I did worked. It was never enough.” Her voice cracked, a sharp intake of breath cutting through the softness of her words. “Perhaps I was just too young, too na?ve… my brai—”

I couldn’t let her finish. “That is not what it was,” I interrupted, my voice firm.

I reached out, taking her other foot gently into my hands, rubbing the arch as she settled back into the couch.

The gesture was a small one, but it was all I could offer that might begin to ease whatever weight she was carrying.

“Then what was it?” Her voice trembled just enough to ignite the anger burning in my chest. A tear slipped down her cheek, one that James didn’t deserve.

“He was a bastard who couldn’t see the treasure before him. He didn’t deserve you. He didn’t deserve Bea, Leo, or Arthur.”

She blushed, the warmth spreading across her cheeks, and I couldn’t help but admire her even in the midst of her pain.

Society was different then. Women were taught to endure, not to choose.

She had weathered a century of shifting tides: corsets and suffrage, war and wage gaps, glass ceilings and whispered rebellions.

“You’ve been through so much for someone only twenty-two,” I continued, my voice softer now. “The life you’ve lived far outweighs the growth of an organ. Wisdom isn’t grown—it’s sewn over time. Through grief, laughter, heartache… even love.”

She surprised me then, pushing herself up from the couch to rise onto her knees.

I wasn’t expecting her to throw her arms around me or to bury her face in the hollow of my neck.

But once she was there, I realized I didn’t want to let her go.

My arms tightened instinctively around her small frame, pulling her into my lap before I could talk myself out of it.

I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t know why I had done it. Only that it felt right.

Her, here. In my arms. Plaguing my thoughts. Consuming my fears and doubts.

“Thank you,” she murmured against my chest.

Without thinking, my hands moved over her spine, tracing the soft curve of her back. Her skin was warm beneath the thin fabric of her shirt, and I couldn’t shake the overwhelming desire to kiss her again. “Astoria…”

“Grim.” She pulled away slightly, her gaze locking with mine. I couldn’t look away, watching the rise and fall of her chest, the movement pulling me deeper into her pull.

“I’m going to kiss you now,” I said, my voice rough as I reached up to grab the back of her neck, lowering my face to hers.

There was no protest, no resistance. Not like the other day when I was being a bastard. I shouldn’t have done it, but I couldn’t bring myself to regret it.

She relaxed into me, her body melting against mine. Her lashes fluttered to a close just before I captured her mouth with mine.

It would never be enough.

I’d bargained her curse for her soul, but it still wouldn’t be enough. Back in the middle of the Atlantic, I told her forever was a long time, but I never explained that—It. Wouldn’t. Be. Enough.

Not for me.

Not for us.

Not when she’d somehow burrowed her way inside me.

Astoria said nothing as she pulled away, and I wouldn’t dare to speak either. We settled into an unspoken truce, standing on fragile, neutral ground. The threads of fate, thin and delicate, wove between us. Feodora’s warning settled, echoing a cold fog, blurring reason with dread.

Astoria moved back to lay against my chest, and I cradled her there, relishing the warmth of her body.

Soon enough, she fell asleep, and I watched the rise and fall of her chest, each breath a silent rhythm I counted, as if somehow expecting it to stop.

I thought back to my conversation with Feo, the sorrow in her eyes as she had revealed the truth. Two threads. Two fates.

“It’s strange, don’t you think?” Feo said, her hands clasped on the desk.

I didn’t care much for her philosophical musings. I only wanted to find Astoria. I couldn’t leave her with Day—who had no self-control and even less discretion. “Get on with it, Feodora. I’m not in the mood to discuss the abnormalities of the universe with you.”

“She really has grown on you…” Feo mused, a faint smirk tugging at her lips.

“The point, Feo. Get to the point. I’d rather not find Astoria in the lap of a stranger at another one of your absurd parties.” Feo had an enduring appetite for decadence, no matter the era, even as she often chose to present as an eighty-year-old heiress.

“Calm down, Death. She’s fine with Day. Besides, I thought you said you didn’t care.”

I did say that, but that was before.

“Sit down and shut up. We really must speak.” Gone was the charm of a sweet old lady, now replaced by the commanding ‘powers that be’ attitude.

I stood my ground, crossing my arms.

She scowled and pulled a small book from the drawer of her desk. “Do you remember when I called you here all those years ago? When I showed you this?” She opened the book to a page, pointing down at something. “Your threads.”

I didn’t care about her books, or whether I had threads. It changed nothing.

“And?” I said, distracted, adjusting the fold of my sleeve where the skin beneath had begun to feel too tight—like it didn’t belong to me anymore. The human shape was always imperfect, too warm, too loud. Flesh was always so restless.

“They’ve changed.”

My curiosity finally got the better of me and I moved toward the book she lay open.