twenty-seven

Poppy

Two weeks later, it was as if nothing had ever happened. It was as if she had never danced with Rania, never eaten eggs with Dante, never spouted her opinions at poor Hades.

The memories were already fading in the back of her starved mind; she was desperately clinging to survival, and there was room for nothing else inside her.

That freezing February morning found her kneeling on the icy grass outside of the chapel, cleaning the graves. ‘Penance and service at the same time,' her brother had called it. He had made it clear that she would have to pay for her stay at the Hell Club for the rest of her life.

"What about you?" Poppy had dared to ask; it was the second day after she was back, and she had not yet fully remembered how she was supposed to act, if she wanted to survive. She was under the misconception that she could continue voicing her opinion. "You gambled away your fortune, and me, at said club."

Her brother had gotten absolutely still.

She had taken a step back, expecting an explosion of outrage, but none came.

Instead, there was ice.

"I," her brother had said, drawing himself up, "have already done my penance. I'll thank you not to interfere in my affairs, of which you know nothing about."

And then he had proceeded to make the servants refuse her food for the next three days.

Now, weeks later, Poppy finally knew better than to talk back to him. Or at all.

She knelt there in the snow, her knees numb, her stomach cramping, her heart dead.

And then, a voice said:

"Seize her."

The next instant, strong arms came around her waist like a vise, lifting her quite off the ground, and someone was carrying her through the frozen cemetery, not too gently but not too roughly either. She was carried all the way to a coach-and-four with a familiar crest painted on the mahogany door.

The door was flung open, and Poppy was thrust inside unceremoniously.

Her limbs were too frozen to work properly, and she nearly bounced off the silk seat, falling on the coach's floor, but a pair of hands caught her and held her. She lifted her eyes and came face to face with Hades.

"You…" she said intelligently.

"Me," he replied.

Seeing his face after all these days, without warning like this, was like a sudden burst of brilliance. It was as if she came back to herself with a jolt.

Every single memory of her time with him came back inside her soul.

It happened quickly and painfully, like the first gulp of air after nearly drowning. It felt as if she had been buried alive and someone had swept aside all the dirt covering her coffin, just as she was about to die.

She was suddenly in the light.

She blinked, as if in the presence of the sun after being in the dark for so long.

The waters above her head parted, and she took a breath—her first real breath in two weeks.

"Alexei." She was painfully out of breath, her voice rusty from being unused for so long. She tried again. "How are you he…?" She couldn't get enough air in her lungs.

"It's all right, breathe," Alexei said. He leaned over her and placed his right hand, fingers splayed, on her stomach and chest, and pushed gently, forcing her frenzied heart's beating to slow down. "Breathe deeply, from here," he said, his voice calm, his fingers seeping warmth all the way underneath the layers of her dress and corset. "You're all right."

"Did you…Did you order me to be kidnapped again?"

"I did," he said, watching her.

His eyes looked bigger in his face, his cheeks more prominent. He appeared to have lost quite a bit of weight, and there was a new paleness to his skin, making him look fragile.

"Why?"

She tried to rub her frozen fingers together to warm them, but she couldn't feel them at all. He took them between his own gloved ones and started caressing them slowly.

"I thought you might enjoy it," he said. "Do not fear me, Wyatt. Not you. I couldn't handle it if you…"

"Fear you? Are you mad?"

"You know I am." He smiled down at her, still rubbing her cold hands. There was a quietness about him, a certain calmness radiating from him that she had never seen before.

"Great God in heaven, you are almost completely frozen," he swore softly. "Were you being tortured again?"

Poppy looked out of the window. The snow was frozen into patches of ice, coating the grass and tombstones. The sky was a canopy of clouds.

"Don't tell me that he—" Alexei fought to control his voice, but his eyes were spitting fire. "That bastard is still at it, isn't he? You said…You said you would fight back, little seed. You promised."

"Well, I failed."

"It is not your bloody fault." His arm snaked around her shoulders, squeezing them fiercely, frantically. "I apologize for making it sound like it has anything to do with you, as if you—I shall kill him." He shut his eyes tightly. The peace was gone, and there was torment brewing behind those brilliant eyes. "Even your back is frozen, come here."

He blew warm air on her fingertips, and when he saw that she was still shaking, he took off his coat and draped it over her shoulders.

"Damn. You can barely breathe, you're so frozen," he hissed.

"Don't…" Poppy began, reluctantly taking her hands back from him, and wrapping them around herself. She angled her body slightly apart from his, and he did not press himself closer.

But he frowned, looking down at her fingers. "What is it, love?"

"You were supposed to abduct me, not rescue me," Poppy said.

Alexei smiled. "I always love rescuing you," he replied.

"What an absolutely abominable thing to say!"

Alexei gave her a startled look.

She had not expected that outburst either.

She licked her lips and tried to take a deep breath.

You have to remember how to speak your thoughts properly, she told herself. It was not long ago when you could do it. Come on.

"I meant to say," she said more calmly, "that you tried to do something fun and enjoyable, and instead you are here saving me. And I can't stand it. I needed to be kidnapped, not rescued."

"You needed…?" Alexei asked, looking confused and adorable.

Her hands turned into fists so that they would not reach for his lips. Feeling was starting to return to her numb fingers, and it hurt so much she hissed in pain.

"If you were to carry me away from my brother's house," she said, "it should be an abduction, so that I could enjoy it this time. I shouldn't need to be rescued."

"Ah." He was silent for a bit, the smile fading abruptly from his face. "I see. But maybe I needed to rescue you."

"Is that why you are here? To save me?"

"Don't you think you've saved me enough times already?" He shuddered, but it couldn't have been from the cold, because his body emanated heat, even without touching her. "But no, alas, I was not here for that; although you must believe me, Wyatt, if I had suspected for a second that I had sent you back to hell, I would have run after you as if the very devil were on my heels."

"You did not send me anywhere. You gave me a choice."

"Like a bloody fool."

"No, it was necessary." Poppy shook her head. "I needed to have a choice, because otherwise, how is any decision valid? How is any desire true?"

"I see." He ran a hand through his hair. "Don't…Don't do that."

"Don't do what?"

"Shake your head like that. It makes your hair tumble about your shoulders in this most appealing way, and I…" He swallowed, jaw working. "We are in such close quarters, and there is only so much a man can endure before he breaks. I have fought against myself, fought as if against a monster, from the first time I held you in my arms, not to fall on you and devour you and…"

"Kiss me," Poppy said, lifting her face to his. "Please."

Alexei reached out an arm and brought it with force to the carriage's paneled wall, half an inch from her head, pinning her in place. Then, his elbow folding out, he leaned in and fit his face to hers.

Poppy breathed into his lips and felt him go weak against her. His hand came up to her throat, tilting her face higher, and he worked his mouth over hers until neither of them could breathe.

Suddenly, he bent his head low, panting softly.

"Now I'm about to faint," he chuckled.

"I shall catch you," Poppy smiled.

"Will you, by God."

Then his lips were on hers again.

"Why are you here again?" Poppy asked at length, when they both came up for air, gasping as if they had been underwater.

"To kidnap you," he said as if it was the most natural thing in the world. "As I said, I thought you might like it.

She smiled. "You were right, I did."

"And also, to ask you to marry me once more." She began to move away, instinctively. "No no, wait, let me do it properly. It was all wrong the way I went about it before. I'll beg, you shall enjoy it."

She couldn't help herself; she laughed. But this had to stop. Now.

"There is nothing you could say that would persuade me," she told him in her most serious voice. "I'm sorry."

"You said you loved me," Alexei insisted, a mulish look about his mouth. "And you know that I…I like rescuing you," he finished lamely.

Poppy smiled sadly to herself; he could not say he loved her. Perhaps he did not fully do so. It did not matter.

She knew how he felt; and more importantly, she knew how she felt. She loved him so much her heart was breaking. She could love him enough for both of them. But she also felt such an abhorrence at the thought of having her own house, her own children, and one day turning into her brother…She couldn't even finish the thought. She froze just at the idea of marriage. She wouldn't know how to start being normal and proper.

No.

Even though she was certain of her feelings, she could never do anything about them.

It wasn't too bad, really.

She had never thought she would be able to love. Her heart had been numb and aching for so long that she had thought it dead. But here it was, alive and blooming. Blooming for him. It would have to be enough.

"Well, I don't," she said. Alexei flinched as if she had slapped him and she reached for his hand. Eager, warm fingers met hers, enfolding her hand completely. "Of course I do, Alexei," she amended. "It is the need for rescue I immensely dislike."

"Is that why you refused my proposal?"

"I do not like the idea of marrying you in order to be saved. But, no. That is not why."

"I'm dying," he said, and everything stopped.

She opened her lips, but she couldn't speak.

"I beg your pardon; I did not mean to distress you," Alexei said. "But the fact is that I'm dying without you. Ask anyone."

"It's true, he is," Wilder popped his head in, and Poppy realized that he was the one who had carried her here from the graveyard. How fitting.

He looked drawn and anxious. For the first time, Poppy began to suspect that this was not Alexei being his usual overdramatic self, but something bad had happened.

"What did—?" she started asking Wilder, but was interrupted.

"Some privacy, please!" Alexei yelled at Wilder, kicking the carriage door shut in his face. "I am dying without you," Alexei repeated.

"Please do not do that," Poppy replied. "Don't look at me this way, don't say that. I…I'm afraid it's still no." The profound sadness she saw in his face broke her.

"Do not—" Alexei fought to control his voice. "Tell me you shall not go back to him. I cannot bear it."

"It is my only home."

"I am your only home!" He brought his fist on the wall with so much force the tapestry shred.

"I want you to be," Poppy said softly and his eyes snapped to hers.

"You mean that?"

"I want to," Poppy repeated. "But I…Give me time, please."

"All the time in the world," the hope in his eyes was heart-wrenching.

Time won't help with what's wrong with me.

I don't even know what's wrong with me.

"Don't…don't be too optimistic," she told him.

I don't know if I will ever be able to fix myself enough for this. For us.

He turned to the window and his shoulders shook with sobs.

"Do not be sad," Poppy reached out to touch his elbow, then thought better of it.

A wet laugh was her response.

"Have you ever felt joy so great that it nearly takes your breath away?" Alexei gasped. "That it overpowers you so much that you…" His words were swallowed by another dry sob. His face was still turned away from her and all she could see was a waterfall of black hair.

Alexei tapped the ceiling and gave the order to the coachman to start for the club.

"Go," he said to her, opening the door without turning to look at her. "Go, before I leap out of this carriage and murder the hell out of your brother."

"Alexei…"

"Don't you say my name like that." His voice was a tortured rumble. "Not if you really mean it that you want space. I shall give you anything you want, space, time, take the whole damn universe. It's yours anyway. But saying my name like that and asking me not to eradicate every single breath of space between us, is beyond the powers of a mere mortal like me."

Poppy just sat there, stunned.

"Go, my dear," Alexei said in a kinder tone. "I shall wait for you."

He was crying again.

…

Wilder insisted on accompanying her back to the vicarage, even though it was a very short walk. Poppy refused him, knowing it would take her ages to walk on her aching legs, but he would not be deterred. He left her at the door with a bow, and a disgusted look towards the house where her brother awaited.

‘Before I leap out of this carriage and murder the hell out of your brother.'

Why was everyone so violently predisposed towards her brother today?

Why was…?

She was about to walk in, when the realization hit her. She nearly stumbled with the force of it.

Suddenly, everything made sense.

Suddenly, she knew why she was the way she was; she knew why the idea of marriage terrified her, why she was so broken, so destroyed. So changeable, so weak.

She knew everything.

She walked straight to her brother's study, and did not wait for the servant to announce her.

"It's you," she told him, striding in without permission and standing in front of his desk. "You are why."

"I beg your pardon?" His tone was absolutely forbidding, dripping with ice. She would have found it terrifying a few hours ago.

But something had changed inside her, and she was done with being silent.

"I found out what's wrong with me: it's you," she said simply. "You are the reason."

And the mere telling of it was the greatest freedom she had ever known.

She had done it. Just like that, she had made herself free.

No one had rescued her this time; no one but herself. It was the most powerful, the best feeling in the world. Freedom.

I did it. My God, I did it.

"The reason for what?" Her brother was all surprise and patience. Well, he pretended. Once she knew how to look for the lies, they were so easy to spot.

"You are the reason I am terrified of loving anyone, most of all myself," she told him. "You are the reason why the very idea of having a family disgusts and repels me. Terrifies me. It's because of you."

"W-w…" he sputtered.

"You have done your best to make me feel unworthy," Poppy said. "And I may be imperfect or sinful sometimes—I have sworn rather profusely within the last few weeks, and I know you consider that a deadly sin—but one thing I am not, is unworthy. I am worthy of love, of God's love, of a good man's love, and of your love. If you do not want to give it to me, or rather, if you are incapable of doing so, then that is your own problem."

She looked him up and down, and discovered that there was nothing left for him in her heart except pity.

"I daresay," she added more softly, "that it is your own sin."

Her brother inhaled sharply, turning puce. He made as if to get up, but Poppy lifted a hand to stop him.

"Do not speak, brother," she said. "I can tell you now, it stops today. The torture, the abuse, the cruelty. You can starve me all you like, but if you want to hurt me, you shall have to do it with your own two hands. I won't kneel anymore, not on the rice or the seeds, not for anyone. I may kneel in front of God, if I so choose, but that will be left entirely up to me and Him. There shall be no more interference from you."

"Poppy," he stuttered, "you are out of control. You are hysterical. You don't—"

Poppy interrupted him once more, mostly because he was boring her more than anything. She was quickly realizing something which made her heart ache with regret. She had spent all these years under her brother's thumb, and all the while she should have realized it: He was nothing but a coward and a bully.

He was weaker than the weak.

He would never have the strength to fall into a river instead of betraying his friend. To lean over the Thames to save a stupid boy and a stray cat. To wipe the blood from a girl's lips. To hide a broken boy, a lost girl, a wanted prince and a haunted dancer inside his house. To allow himself to feel pain.

He wasn't even brave enough to smile every once in a while.

He was so easy to interrupt, to talk over.

He was standing in front of her, quaking in fear of her newfound courage.

He was just…small. A prisoner to his own desires, fears and passions. He tried to control everyone around him—her, most of all. Most easily of all.

But it stopped now.

Poppy was already turning to leave, but she stopped by the door.

"And if all you can say in reply is that you are going to starve me until I obey you," she told her brother, "then I can tell you this: Go ahead. I would rather die."

…

She did not see or hear from her brother the rest of the day.

When she got hungry, she went down to the kitchen and fixed tea and bread with jam by herself. No one stopped her. The next morning, she went to her neglected garden and started uprooting the weeds. She had been banned from it since she had arrived from the Hell Club, and most of the winter roses were frozen, but some of the plants could still be salvaged.

To her surprise, no one came to tell her she could not be there.

So she worked with her hands, and the work quieted the frenzied workings of her mind and kept her safe from ugly thoughts.

She sat there in the cold and worked in peace for a few hours. Then a cat came, licking its paws on the snow.

"Oh, you poor thing," Poppy said to it, not that the cat paid her any attention. Poppy thought she recognized the cat's orange stripes, and buried her fingers in the soft fur. The cat purred, arching under her touch. "Did you escape from the club? Have you followed me here and stayed hidden in the garden for weeks?"

She turned around to start getting up from the frozen ground, when someone grabbed her from behind. She wasn't scared: the hands around her waist were a bit rougher than they had been yesterday, but she only smiled.

"Not now, Alexei," she murmured, "I am actually in the middle of something."

"It's not Alexei, sweetheart," a rough, unfamiliar voice said. "He shall be along soon, never you fear. Of course, you'll be long dead by then."

And then a large hand covered her mouth and nose, cutting off her oxygen.