Chapter 5

When two legacy families marry, it is not unusual for the weaker piper to take on the name of the stronger. If a comedy piper is fortunate enough to marry a greed piper, the comedy piper's legacy ends in their family and joins with their new one. It is practically unheard of for two pipers to retain both their names, but it is still possible. In the year of the great harvest, Alison Bonaventure, a war piper, kept her name as well as her wife, Mary Wixx, a botanical piper, kept hers. Both were seen as powerful, and more so together. Their union is still spoken about with both admiration and fear to this day.

-A History of Pipers; A.A. Wesen

I'm surprised when Mother comes out hours later carrying a basket of bandages and splints. She kneels down before me and rearranged my legs roughly, making me cry out in pain. She doesn't even warn me as she grabs them, doesn't encourage me to breathe as she settles them into a semblance of order.

"Quiet, Fenwick," she orders. "Lest your father come back out and finish the job."

I clamp my lips shut, and eventually bite my arm to keep from crying out when she grabs my calf and snaps the bones back into alignment. There's no care, no mercy, as she moves them. Only meticulous movements. When she starts to splint them, I stare up at her. My mother. Who sneaks out in the night to bandage my wounds without Father knowing.

Mother has always been a beauty. The townspeople look at her like a goddess, though part of that is because she's an eros piper. When she plays her pipe, people fall in love in every direction, sometimes with those they would have never loved at all. Mother is single-handedly responsible for young princesses marrying crusty old kinds who couldn't accept no for an answer and for women settling for men they never would have. The problem is that children born from such unions are often unable to ever find true love themselves. The magic of the union destroys that part of them. I've often wondered why Mother didn't find someone who could actually love her and marry them instead of Father, but from what I understand, Father found her and demanded they marry. Her parents encouraged it as it was seen as a prime pairing, a Bonaventure and a Humblecut. She could have been so great. Her beauty could have moved mountains.

Instead, she's here, mending my broken bones six weeks before my own challenge.

"Why are you helping me?" I ask, staring up at her.

Her fingers tighten the bandages, making me wince. "You're still expected to clean the house," she mumbles. "The crutches we have are too short, the ones Finley used when she was young, but it's all we have. I won't be allowed to get you a new set."

I study her, really study her. All these years, she's been my father's slave. Fear dances in her eyes when he directs his anger toward her. Mother is no stranger to broken bones. I've helped her splint her own bones, but I never expected her to put herself in danger to help me now. I'm nearly grown, nearly finished. This should be the end of her being my mother, and when I get the worst of pipers in six weeks, any care she once showed me will disappear completely. I won't be able to help her. I'm too weak. I've always been so weak.

She doesn't help me completely, though. She can't. She gets me set up just enough that I'll be able to tend to my duties, but not enough for me to fully heal. I'll have to do that myself. She barely spares me a glance as she tends to me, as if she can't stand to look me in the eyes.

"Why?" I croak.

"Because your father won't allow me to use gold for you?—"

"No," I say, shaking my head. "Not why can't you get new crutches. Why have three children? Why not stop at two?"

She pauses. Slowly, her golden eyes trail up to meet mine. "Your father thought three was best to carry on his legacy."

"And what of your legacy?" I ask, my eyes welling. "Would it be so bad if I followed in your footsteps? Or anyone else's?"

"Yes," she whispers. "My legacy no longer matters. I signed it away when I married your father. My legacy is nothing, just as yours will be, Fenwick."

"Why can't it be more?" I rasp, the first tear falling. Mother doesn't look at it in disgust. She understands, perhaps more than anyone.

"The weak do not lead the strong," she murmurs. "My beauty saved me from a life of poverty. Your beauty will not save you in this house of war and greed. You have nothing." She packs away all her supplies and stands. This time, she doesn't look away, her golden eyes on me. Her next words are a blow I'll never recover from. "Your father is not the only one who regrets the third, Fenwick, though my regret is for different reasons." She takes a deep breath. "I only regret bringing you into this world to suffer this failure. I only regret not giving you the strength you needed to survive it."

And then she walks away, leaving me there with too short crutches and broken legs, with more shame than I've ever felt before. This time, it's not only my father's shame of a weak child I will carry, but my mother's shame of it as well. She meant to give me strength and could not. So she must watch me fail again and again. She must watch my demise.

I don't know if I should pity her or be angry that she allows it.

Giselle appears again and crawls up onto my chest, her whiskers twitching back and forth.

Your mother could have been great, she whispers in my mind. She threw away everything for the three of you.

"Including love," I rasp. "An eros piper who can't show her love. It's a painful life, but her chosen one. It's not something I can control."

Your challenge is in six weeks, she murmurs as she looks down at my splints. Your legs?—

"I'll be healed enough by then as long as I don't injure them further," I tell her. "Don't worry about me, Giselle. I'm nothing if not a survivor."

But that's not exactly true. I may not survive this challenge.

Part of me doesn't want to, and that's the saddest realization of all.

At least if I'm dead, this shame will end.

If I'm dead, everyone else will be happy.

Not me, Giselle reminds me. Never me.

And it's the only thing that makes me get to my feet. Otherwise, I might have just laid there and let the forest reclaim me.

Never me, Fenwick. Remember that.