Page 41 of The Nightmare Bride

Zephyrine gave me a choice, all those years ago. When you came of age, I could return you to her, or offer myself instead, thus buying you an entire lifetime out here in the world. It comes at the cost of my blood—all of it, this time—but I can’t think of anything I’d rather spend it on.

Still, it’s hard to say goodbye. I keep falling prey to the lure of one more day, one more laugh, one more hug. The nourishment of hearing you call me Mother one more time.

It will never be enough, but I doom Oceansgate by staying. I know that.

Soon. I’ll go, I promise.

I have to.

And I’ll hide this in a place your father will never think to look.

I only hope it finds its way into your hands someday.

I want you to read this and understand why I’m gone, that it’s not because I didn’t love you enough, but because I loved you too much, enough that I couldn’t bear for you to miss out on all the moments that have brought me such joy.

I want you to fall in love someday.

I want you to forge friendships that remake your idea of the world.

I want you to laugh, and cry sometimes so the moments of laughter shine even brighter, and I want you to travel, and have children of your own, and see a thousand sunrises and maybe, when you’re old and wrinkled and exhausted, return to the swamp smiling.

When you’re ready. When you’ve seen and done it all.

Or maybe you won’t want any of that. You’re a goddess, or borne of one—I still don’t understand exactly how that works—so maybe your desires will be different than mine. That’s all right, too.

Most of all, I just want you to have a choice.

So this is my gift to you, my beloved girl, blood of my blood.

A choice. It’s yours. Do with it what you will, and know that I gave it freely.

I love you, forever and ever, through life and death and everything in between.

Your adoring mother,

Coraline Marche

When I finished reading, quiet tears drenched my cheeks. Amryssa wept, too. She pressed one hand to her mouth, her fingers trembling against white lips.

“That’s... Wow,” I whispered. “Are you okay?”

“She died for me?” she warbled. “ This was why she went into the swamp that day?”

A sob escaped her, one that sounded like it had cracked her chest open, and I caught her in my arms. She cried against my shoulder. All the while, the letter ran on a loop in my mind.

Goddess, but that was love. Real and true. Amryssa was lucky...and cursed, for having lost her mother that way, but so unbelievably lucky to have experienced love like that in the first place.

I smoothed her hair. She eventually pulled back, leaving a gluey mess of tears and mucus along my neckline.

“This explains so much.” Her voice fractured into quiet pieces.

“It does? Like what?”

“Like why I’ve always felt so...apart. Why I’ve never truly fit, why I’m not shaped like other people inside. Why I sometimes feel like a shadow of something greater, or like there’s this hole in me where something more should be. Why the swamp calls and calls and calls to me and never stops.”

I stiffened. “ That’s how you’ve felt? Always?”

She trained tear-bright eyes on me.

I felt like I was choking. “Why haven’t you ever said so?”

“Because.” She sniffled. “I didn’t want you to worry. I know it hurts you when I’m unhappy. So I’ve tried. I truly have. I’ve tried to be content.”

I inhaled sharply. “You’re not, though?”

“I am,” she said, averting her eyes. “Sometimes. With you, when we’re laughing. Or when Lunk tells me chicken stories. But it’s hard, Harlowe. The swamp. It shouts louder every day.”

I took the diary and set it aside, needing a moment to concentrate on something other than her crumpled face.

How I wished things had gone the way the Lady Marche had intended.

But they hadn’t—not only did Amryssa not want the same things, but her mother’s sacrifice had gone awry.

When the Lady had finally ventured into the swamp, she’d been waylaid by a nightmare.

She’d died before offering herself to Zephyrine, thus leaving Olivian with an impossible choice: consign his daughter to the marsh, or curse Oceansgate with the nightmares.

But at least this explained why the seneschal had stayed. He was responsible for this.

My next question stuck in my chest, blocking my airway and squatting on my heart. I had to ask, yet the prospect terrified me.

So I closed my eyes and took a cleansing breath. After all, I’d battled a nightmare and almost won. I could do this.

“What do you want?” My words were about as firm as last night’s pudding, so I repeated myself, louder this time. “Now that you know, what do you want to do about this?”

Amryssa’s chin trembled. She stared and stared and stared, and in the quiet, the two halves of my heart declared war on one another. I need you to be happy, but gods above, please don’t leave me .

“Let me ask you something,” she said. “Would you be all right, if I went?”

Oh, goddess. I caged my answer against the roof of my mouth, feeling like a monster for having it ready.

“That’s not fair, I know,” she rushed to add. “But I want you to tell me the truth.”

I tried a few versions out in my head, then shaped my denial into something suitably gentle. “I’d be...lost.”

She nodded, as if she’d expected that. “And my father? Do you think he’d be all right?”

“No,” I blurted, because that had no shades of gray. Olivian had gutted his territory for her. Knowing what I did now, I suspected losing his daughter might actually kill him.

He’d have nothing left. Just ghosts and guilt and nightmares. Ones he’d brought on himself, but...still. He hadn’t made any choices I wouldn’t have. “No. He wouldn’t.”

“Then I think...I have to stay.” Amryssa scrubbed at her cheeks, her eyes solemn. “Because I could never hurt him like that. Or you.”

The iron band around my ribcage loosened. “Really?”

“Really.”

“But is this actually what you want?”

“Yes.” She squared her shoulders. “I want...this. My life. My family.”

I missed a beat, then threw myself at her, my lungs expanding in a rush. “You’ll marry Ky, then? Go to Hightower with me?”

She patted my arm, then attempted a giggle. It was a sallow, trembling thing, but a giggle, nonetheless. “I will.”

“Oh, goddess, I want that so badly,” I said into her shoulder.

She smelled like flowers. Like night-blooming jasmine and plumeria, which must have been some kind of goddess thing, considering no one in this house had been able to afford perfume for years.

“But only if it’ll actually make you happy. ”

“It will.” She patted my arm. “Also, you’re choking me.”

I eased back, my limbs syrupy with relief. I felt heavy, like someone had poured me full of molasses. “Thank Zephyrine. I mean, not Zephyrine—that’s actually kind of rude to say, now that I think about it—but thank you . Zephyrine can wait. She can have you back when you’re eighty.”

Amryssa mustered a smile and fondled the diary. “Until then, what do we do with this?”

I considered the journal. If Olivian found his wife’s letter—if he learned about the blood-price—he would offer Zephyrine his life. Of that, I had no doubt. But that would kill Amryssa as surely as fading into the swamp would. “I’ll keep it hidden, in my room. Olivian can’t know. No one can.”

“All right. And Harlowe? Do you think I could have some water? I’m thirsty. And tired. And I think I need to lie down for a minute. This is...a lot.”

I jumped to my feet, ready to go join the stewards’ lawn war, if necessary, so immense was my relief. “Of course. I’ll go grab some from downstairs. Be right back.”

She lay down, her shoulder blades jutting beneath her dress like wings. I strode into the hallway, then dug for my keyring and locked her door, just in case Vick was prowling around nearby.

But in the end, I shouldn’t have worried, because Vick didn’t come for Amryssa.

He came for me.