When Lucian slipped back into his house after escorting Platina through her window, he found Father and Mama sitting at the table waiting for him. There was a single candle lit on the table and they were staring into it intently.

Lucian leaned back against the door after he latched it, nervously, fumbling for an explanation.

"Nice night to be out with the neighbour's daughter," Mama spat harshly, her arms folded tightly against her. Lucian noted the black circles under her eyes and the puffiness of her cheeks.

"Is…is something wrong, Mama?" he asked timidly, beginning to approach her, but Father stood up and he froze.

"All your evening disappearances have been for nothing. Whenever I hear the door shut at night I think that it's because you have gone off to correct your mistakes made during your daytime work," his gruff voice was unforgiving and strangely tense.

"But instead you've been thinking of yourself!" Mama shrieked, throwing her chair back. Lucian flattened himself against the door once more, frightened by her sudden, angry outburst.

"You're going to wake Maleah," he breathed unevenly, and suddenly eyed his parents with renewed scrutiny, "how is that for thinking of yourself? Quit badgering me!"

Mama looked at him sharply, her eyes wide and bulging out of her head. She trembled noticeably. "Just go to bed," she hurled at him savagely, and stomped out of the kitchen and disappeared into the next room. Lucian heard her crawl into bed. Father rubbed his thumb against the scruff on his chin and didn't seem to notice Lucian in the room.

The boy slipped past him and took to the stairs, using every ounce of control he had to shut the door quietly. He latched it, called out a soft goodnight to Maleah on the other side of the sheet and crawled onto his bed, in a rage.

When Lucian opened his eyes, sunlight streamed through his window. His mouth felt dry and spongy. It took a moment to think why he was still in his day clothes. Yawning and sitting up, he noticed that the sun was higher than usual.

He slept in late. Mama had left a bowl of soapy water on his bed table, and Lucian took a cloth to his face. It did little to wash away the dirty mood he was in.

Lucian's feet felt sluggish as he went down the stairs, hovering on each step in a daze. Slowly, his mother came into view. She was sitting at the table, alone. The windows were all open and a refreshing summer breeze hit Lucian's damp face. It felt good.

"Why didn't you call me?" he asked sullenly, heading to the stove to heat up the oatmeal Mama made every morning. There was a pot more than half full and Lucian doubled over to shove a few sticks in the oven. Then quickly he stood up, scratching his head.

"Why is there so much?" he asked, and looked to Mama pointedly. She was still sitting quietly, a deep frown melted onto her face, her brows pressing down to the sides of her cheeks. "Didn't Mal-"

Lucian let go of the sticks and opened his mouth to speak. Mama merely stared at him.

The silence that ensued made Lucian's ears feel like they were bleeding.

The lingering numbing contentment he had experienced the night before with Platina, fled his body and cold sickness settled into his stomach. Still Mama said nothing.

Lucian exhaled and then forced himself not to breath after that. With all the control and calmness he could muster, he asked, "What did you do with my sister?"

Mama burst into tears and it took less than a second for Lucian to fly over to where she sat and to pound his fists upon table beside her. She started screaming and Lucian started yelling, cursing, shooting off every string of threats he had heard in his lifetime, bending down and pressing his lips as close to her ear as he dared.

"WE HAD NO CHOICE!" were the words that ended it and all of a sudden the house was quiet, save for Mama's gentle weeping as she pressed her fingers to her trembling lips. Lucian's fists were still upon the table and he was bent awkwardly to her head, his mouth parted but saying nothing.

He pulled himself back and whirled himself into a chair. His heart raced and was paining him, and his knees were too rubbery to keep him standing. He rested one of his arms on the table, and his hands twitched. For many minutes, they sat like that, Mama huddled over and sobbing into her hand and Lucian staring off into space, remembering all the times Maleah secretly sat down with him after dark and showing her books to him so that he could learn to read.

"No money is worth the innocence of a child," he said, surprised by the steadiness of his voice.

Mama said nothing.

"I SAID-"

"I HEARD YOU!" she screamed, shaking her fists at him. She let them fall onto the table, and stared at them, delirious.

Lucian stood up with a force so great, his chair flew back and hit the oven, two legs shattering. Mama looked up in fright, but he was already behind her, a strong hand on her shoulder. She shrieked when he spun her body around with that hand, and the scared, pitiful old face of his father's wife stared up at him, pleading.

"The answer you give to my question," Lucian murmured menacingly, "determines whether you live to accept the consequences of your actions or not,"

She nodded, fresh tears flooding from her terrified eyes, and he continued. "Where is Maleah?"

"I DON'T KNOW!" she cried, her entire body convulsing into shudders, "t-the men came yesterday and and and offered a good price! I f-figured I couldn't say no especially after hearing of the f-f-failure of the expedition! Lucian there was nothing I could do!"

"LIAR!" Lucian shouted in her face and let go of her. She continued crying, her face pressed to the table.

"Father knew?" he asked darkly.

"Y-yes, he agreed to it. I-I didn't dare even think of it if he was against it…"

Lucian was overwhelmed by a fresh wave of hatred for his father.

"It was the men in black who took her," he realized, tasting salt as tears pooled over his upper lip. Mama cried harder.

Lucian stared at the back of her head for another moment through blurry eyes. Sniffing back more tears, he thundered out the door, satisfied that she had nothing else to provide.

His vision flooded with seething red as he cursed his household with every word he knew. He saw nothing, and no one as he followed the road away from his house, determined never to go back.

A sliver of blue caught his eye, snagged in the yellow coarse grass patches lining the stone wall on the side of the street. Lucian dropped to his knees in fright, and fumbled blindly until the hair ribbon was in his hands. He shoved it into his nostrils, sniffing hungrily.

Of course it was Maleah's.

Lucian's head struck the stone wall a second later as his body went limp, but he was already unconscious.