Cabe’s ‘residence’ began with a formal sitting room to greet you as soon as you left the hallway. It looked entirely unused, and even though everything had been kept spotless, I still felt as if there was a layer of forgotten dust that blanketed the space. I was quick to pass through the room and into the bedroom beyond. The bed had a headboard that stretched almost three times the size of a normal headboard, and between the dancing patterns carved into the wood were panels of golden suede padding. I shook my head a little, running my fingers over the pale gold bedding, briefly enjoying the slide of silk beneath my touch before I moved on to the windows. They were set high and wide, tempered glass held between the careful fingers of dark-toned wood, forming doors that I suspected led out to a balcony of some kind. I could see the winding, cobblestoned road below lit by lampposts and disappearing gradually into darkness. Beyond that, the moonlight barely hinted at a long stretch of flat, empty terrain.
There were no personal effects left inside the room, though the wardrobe was half-filled with clothes, and several pairs of shoes lined a special shoe cabinet. There were no photo frames, no paintings on the wall, and no books lying around. I shrugged off an uneasy shiver, moving to explore the attached bathroom. There were no toiletries inside the marble shower, but a full bottle of shampoo and conditioner had been stacked under the cabinet, waiting for someone to use them. I frowned, opening the cap and smelling the shampoo. A light spring scent hit me, causing something suspiciously like a sob to catch in the back of my throat. Cabe still used the same kind of shampoo.
I moved the shampoo and conditioner into the shower and then turned back to consult the mirror, notching my hands against the marble sink. My hair was a mess, my bandages were beginning to unravel, and my eyes were red-rimmed and puffy. If I was honest with myself, I looked like a crazed person. The collar glared at me from the mirror, looking annoyingly perfect and unmarred in contrast to my general appearance. I wanted to rip it off and shove it down the messenger’s throat, and now that my valcrick was back… I almost wished that he would hunt me down and try to end it once and for all. I would make both of us go boom, and if I was lucky, the valcrick would put me back together again afterwards.
Oh god… it suddenly hit me then, the real reason that Weston saw such value in me.
If the valcrick could bring me back from the brink of death, I could fool people into thinking that I couldn’t die. Weston could use to me scare off any interest the humans might have in victimizing us, because who really wanted to fight a person that couldn’t die? Groaning, I pushed away from the sink, disgusted that I was thinking along the same lines as Weston. I closed the bathroom door and pulled off my clothes and the bandages, kicking them to a corner of the bathroom before standing in front of the mirror again.
It felt strange to see my body unmarked, unbruised, and healthy. I had grown used to avoiding my own reflection at all costs, not wanting to be confronted with the inevitable signs of Gerald’s abuse. Now Gerald was dead, again, and there wasn’t a single mark on my body exempting the damage to my hands that I had done myself. Maybe I was staring at myself in an attempt to ignore the fact of Gerald’s second death, but I couldn’t seem to tear my eyes away, whatever the reason. I wasn’t as skinny as I used to be. Where my ribs had previously poked out, they now blended into my skin. There was a slight strain of muscle where previously there had been nothing; my hips had become more rounded and my breasts fuller. Maybe it was puberty, or maybe it was something else. Everything was somehow both stronger and softer at the same time. It was as though my very soul had been crowding into the corner of my frame, scared to take up any space, but now it had settled into my skin, completing my appearance.