Chapter 4

Citlali's POV

He crossed the room in three long strides, and I made myself stand still, made myself not flinch or run or show any of the terror clawing at my throat. Running made it worse. Crying made it worse. The only thing that sometimes helped was to take it in silence, to disappear inside my own head until it was over.

His hand caught me across the face, hard enough to snap my head to the side and fill my mouth with the copper taste of blood. The dried meat fell from my fingers as I stumbled, catching myself against the rough wooden wall.

"Worthless," he spat, and his hand was rising again. "Just like your mother."

The second blow caught my shoulder, then my ribs, and I was curling into myself when I heard the door from the back room bang open.

"Balric, stop!" Caitlin's voice cut through the air, sharp with fear and desperation, and suddenly she was there, her body pushing between us, her hands raised to ward off the next blow. "Stop it, please, she's just a child—"

His fist caught her instead of me, connecting with her cheekbone with a crack that made my stomach lurch. She stumbled backward, and I saw the shock in her eyes, the way her hand flew to her face, the red mark already blooming across her pale skin.

"Stay out of this," Father snarled, but Caitlin was already straightening, already stepping back between us despite the tears gathering in her eyes.

"She was hungry," Caitlin said, her voice shaking but determined. "The harvest was poor, we're all hungry, she's a growing girl—"

"She's a thief!" His hand shot out and grabbed Caitlin's arm, yanking her aside, and she cried out as she lost her balance and fell against the table. "And you're too soft on her, always have been. That's why she keeps doing it!"

I wanted to scream at him to leave her alone, wanted to throw myself at him, wanted to do something other than stand there frozen while he hurt the only person who'd ever shown me kindness. But my body wouldn't move, locked in that terrible paralysis of fear and helplessness.

Caitlin pulled herself up, one hand braced against the table, the other still pressed to her bruised cheek. She looked at me, and I saw the apology in her eyes, the guilt, the love mixed with powerlessness that I'd come to recognize as the only protection she could offer.

"Go," she mouthed silently, jerking her head toward the door while Father's attention was still on her. "Go."

I went, slipping past them while Father was still ranting about ungrateful children and interfering women, my bare feet silent on the dirt floor. Outside, I pressed myself against the wall of the cottage, my whole body shaking, listening to the sounds of their argument through the thin wooden walls.

I heard the slap of flesh on flesh, heard Caitlin's sharp intake of breath, heard Father's voice rising and falling in that familiar cadence of rage. And I stood there, useless and small and hating myself for running, for leaving her to face him alone, for being the reason he was angry in the first place.

Never show them it hurts. Never let them see you break.

That was my first lesson, learned through years of this same dance.

When the sounds finally stopped and I heard Father's heavy footsteps heading toward the front door, I pushed away from the wall and ran for the pig pen, my eyes burning with tears I refused to let fall. Behind me, I heard the door slam, heard Father's muttered curses as he headed toward the village and the tavern and whatever oblivion he could find at the bottom of a cup.

I didn't go back inside until I was sure he was gone. When I finally did, I found Caitlin sitting at the table, a wet cloth pressed to her face, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs. I wanted to go to her, to apologize, to beg her forgiveness for being the cause of her pain. But the words stuck in my throat, heavy and useless, because what good were apologies when this would just happen again tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that?

Instead, I whispered, "We could leave. We could run away, just you and me. We could go somewhere he'd never find us."

Caitlin looked up at me, and the expression on her face—tired and sad and infinitely gentle—told me the answer before she spoke it. "I can't, baby. I'm sorry, but I can't. Where would we go? How would we live? We have no money, no family, nowhere to run to."

"We'd figure it out," I insisted, hearing the desperation in my own voice. "We'd find a way, we always do—"

"Citlali." She reached out and took my hand, her grip warm despite the trembling in her fingers. "I know you're scared. I'm scared too. But running won't solve anything. We just have to... we have to endure. That's all we can do."

Endure. As if survival was the same as living. As if making it through each day was enough, even when each day brought fresh pain and fresh fear and the slow erosion of everything that made us human.

I pulled my hand away, something hard and cold settling in my chest. "Fine," I said, and my voice came out flat, empty of everything I was feeling. "I'll go feed the pigs."

Yes, we had pigs. But they were two skinny pigs who were about to be slaughtered because we couldn't even afford our bread.

I left her sitting there and went back outside, back to the familiar rhythm of chores and hunger and the gnawing certainty that this was all there would ever be. That this was my life, and no amount of wishing or dreaming would change it.

The people who love you can't always save you, I thought again, scooping slop into the pig trough with mechanical precision. Sometimes they can't even save themselves.

That was my second lesson, and I was learning it well.