Pi's memory reads kind of like a gaslight romance (Steampunk-style romance), which I really like. She's very romantic, as you will soon find out. Reading her memories in Kirsten Dunst's voice also helps there. :D
Further, I probably removed Epsilon and Sigma from the Big Book of OC's in my profile because they are so minor. But they are in this chapter, and are voiced by Christopher Lloyd and Jennifer Anniston, respectively. We will also meet Mu, Pi's crazy older sister, and some 'punks from the other clans—particularly Parsley, who will be important much farther down the road. (Deets in the Big Book. ;D)
Also, if you haven't listened to Mary Black's rendition of Both Sides the Tweed, DO IT NOW! 9 sings the harmony part this time! 8D
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An Explanation
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Something was different. Very different. Pi couldn't place the feeling, but it was light and floating, and felt like it might be nostalgia. Or déjà vu. She slowly opened her eyes; with a joy and relief that took it sweet time registering, she found 5 sitting beside her on the sofa. He had her head cradled in his arm, and held her hand in his own. And she found at once that she had been untied.
But mostly, she was just overwhelmingly happy to see his smiling, goofy face.
"Welcome back, Pi," he said softly, sounding like he might begin to cry. "How are you feeling?"
Pi gave him a vague smile as she searched herself, not entirely sure how she was feeling, exactly. What had happened before she had fainted…?
Remembering brought the onslaught of painful emotions that always came whenever she was momentarily free of her curse. Guilt, shame, confusion, fear—all punched her in the stomach. Her smile faded in an instant, and she began to tremble violently. Before it could dawn on her that she was actually free, she realized something just as important:
5 was here, and Alpha was not. She was safe.
"Help me," she whimpered, gripping his arm with all the strength she could find. "Please help me."
As she dissolved into tears, 5 pulled her up into his warm embrace. There was a fierceness in the way he held her so close, a protectiveness that dared anything evil to try and touch her. She hadn't felt so safe since her father had been alive. Thinking of her father and how bitterly she had failed him only made her cry harder. 5 began to rock her slowly, gently hushing her and whispering soothing words in her ear. She could barely hear them over her own anguished sobbing, and all the terrible thoughts running through her mind.
But hearing his voice somewhere in the background did comfort her, and gave her something reassuring to cling to. After what seemed like an eternity of wheeling psychological torment, 5 took her face in his hand and directed her gaze up to his.
"Pi, who did this to you?" he asked gravely. "Tell me what happened to you."
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Back in their bedroom, 7 watched her husband with concern. She was less than pleased that he had allowed Pi back in their home, whether she was unconscious, cursed, or whatever. In any case, she had been fully prepared to stab the witch through the heart and have it done with it. (She had briefly considered doing the same to 9, while she was at it.) Up until mere minutes ago, it had appeared to be the only choice they had.
Up until mere minutes ago, she had also thought her brother was a love-struck idiot. But mere minutes ago, she had been proven incorrect on all counts. Again. And now she wasn't sure what she thought of anything. Neither was 9, who was now pacing uneasily back and forth across their bedroom floor.
It was unlike him to be so unsure of anything—especially of the outlandish and fantastic. Usually, he was the first of them to believe in fantasy before logic. She wondered what it was about their unusual situation that made him doubt himself so. There was a long list of reasons to be upset, she supposed. But being upset was what the rest of them always did, while he somehow managed to keep his head on straight. While her husband, her captain, felt so directionless, she wasn't sure what to do with herself.
Oh right. She was his wife, and it was her duty to support him and help him find direction. It had been a long time since he had particularly needed her full support to lean on. She had nearly forgotten.
"9, come sit down with me," she insisted, patting the empty space on the bed beside her. He was reluctant to abandon his pacing at first, maybe even a little surprised that she wasn't so angry anymore. But he stopped in mid step, and came to sit beside her. His head sank into his hands, and he gave a heavy sigh.
"I'm so confused…"
She reached up and began gently rubbing his back, hoping her touch would soothe him. "Why are you confused?" she asked, feeling more like a therapist than a wife.
"I don't know. I feel so… strange. Not like myself."
That gave 7 an idea. Maybe he was sitting in the wrong place. She took his hands and hauled him to his feet, leading him to sit in her rocking chair instead. As he sat down and slowly began to rock, she stood beside him and gave his shoulder a squeeze.
"Use your marvelous brain and find the words you need," she encouraged him. "I'm listening."
"I have no idea what to make of what just happened," he said finally. "It doesn't seem real. But I can't pretend it isn't. He really did just… free her, didn't he?"
7 slowly nodded her head. "Yes, he did."
"And you know what that means. You know everything that means."
"Well… True love, for one. I know, dearest, I can't quiet grasp it, either."
"It's a good thing," 9 insisted blankly, more to reassure himself than anything. "It's exactly what I'd always hoped for. I mean… It's 5—he's my brother. And he's loved her since we found her. Even when it threatened to tear us apart, he wouldn't back down. He refused to give up on her. After all this time… What could be truer than that?"
7 couldn't help but smile. "Dreams really do come true, sometimes. You have a habit of forcing them to."
"Then why does it make me feel so bad?"
She paused and considered this. While the turn in events was wonderful and more than deserved, she didn't feel so terrific about it either. She sighed and rubbed his arm comfortingly. "You're not one to make a lot of mistakes; when you do, you take it too personally. We all misjudged them. Badly. We're all going to have to own up to that."
"What about the picture? What does it mean? What does it have to do with Pi, or the curse, or our family? I don't know if we can trust her. If I give her another chance and she crushes us…. I can't do that, 7. I wish I could, but I just can't do that to you. I'm… I'm afraid. I don't' know what to do."
It pained her to see her beloved so out of sorts. She took a moment to search her own heart, evaluate her mixed up feelings with a little clarity. And finally, she made a command decision. It wasn't necessarily in her nature to take orders exclusively from her notoriously fickle heart. But looking there, the answer she found was too overwhelming to be ignored.
"9, do you trust me?"
He looked up at her, his expression a little hurt that she would ask such a thing. He put his hand on hers and said, "Of course I do. I trust you with my life."
Reaffirmed, she came around and slid into her husband's snuggly lap, swinging her legs over the opposite arm of the chair. He wrapped his arms around her and held her like a teddy bear, rocking the chair a little faster. In spite of his fears, she felt safe. She always felt safe with him. Given her revelation and all that she knew to be true, she could only imagine that back in the common room, Pi felt the same under 5's watchful care.
"We need to listen to them," she said quietly.
"…You think so?"
"If she's free, she's free. Believe me, I know. Pi can't hurt us anymore."
"Are you sure about that?"
"Trust me."
So that's what that was about. He sighed heavily and was silent. She didn't doubt that he trusted her, but she could appreciate the precarious burden on his shoulders. She couldn't imagine how nervous she would have been in his place.
"What shall we do, then?" he asked.
"We should talk to her, for starters. She must be terrified. I know I was. Terrified, confused, guilty… And she's only a little girl, after all."
He thoughtfully ran his hand over her thigh, savoring her comforting warmth and solidness. "Oh… You're probably right, I know. You always are. I just wish I didn't have to make the best decision for all of us. It's all on me. If I screw it up again, what will we do?"
Sitting up a little taller, she turned his face to hers, nuzzling his nonexistent nose. "You don't have to do this all by yourself. That's what you've got me for—I'm your wife. I'm here for you." With a short laugh, she added, "They do say, behind every successful man is a woman who actually knows what's going on."
9 laughed, as well. "Is that what they say?"
"Well, I might have stretched it a little."
His spirits impossibly lifted, he snuggled her closer with a smile. It was good to see him smiling again. Resting her head on his shoulder, she decided he could also use a song. And the third verse of their favorite song came to mind at once; it was more than fitting.
Let virtue distinguish the brave,
Place riches in lowest degree.
Think them poorest who can be a slave,
Them richest who dare to be free.
To her pleasant surprise, 9 joined her on the chorus in perfect, soaring harmony:
Let the love of our land's sacred rights
To the love of our people succeed
Let friendship and honour unite
And flourish on both sides the Tweed.
In the middle of the bed, deep asleep on her tummy, Dixie stirred a little at her parent's sweet singing. Her eyes flickered open ever so slightly, only to slide shut again with a cute little yawn. Naptime was nowhere near over yet. Suddenly, the world was perfect again.
"You and I have been through so much together," 7 quietly commented. "There's a lifetime ahead of us for more. And now, there's one for them, as well."
"In spite of how confusing this all is, that's comforting. Alright, then. Let's go see them."
As they walked hand in hand back to the common room, she wondered how the rest of their clan was taking the news. They had all been informed of what had happened, and some of them weren't satisfied. The elders were still angry, and still felt like bashing the girl's head in before she tricked the rest of them like she had their leader, their beta, and 5. (Again! Not surprising.) But there had to be an explanation for this that even 1 and 2 would entertain. She was certain of that now.
6 has probably known what it is all along, and just won't tell us…
When they came into the common room, they found 5 and Pi alone, on the sofa where they had left them. She was awake now, and seemed to have imploded on herself, curled up in a pathetic ball and sobbing miserably. 5 held her defensively close, as if protecting her from something. She knew that look—his attention didn't dare be elsewhere, while the one he loved was so distraught. He had waited unflinchingly for this moment for so long…
When he heard them come in, he turned his head to see them. His expression was neutral, but sort of expectant. They knew what had to be said, but they suddenly weren't sure what to say for their error. After a long, tense moment of silence between the three of them, 9 finally found the words they needed.
"5… We're sorry."
Which was all that needed to be said. He nodded his head and answered, "Come here. We could use your help."
It seemed like they had been through something serious while they had been alone. How long had she been awake? That didn't matter, really. 9 came forward first and knelt on the floor in front of her.
"Pi?"
She slowly looked up at him, her eyes completely clear, but full of despair and fear.
"We're sorry to you, as well. Will you let us help you, this time?"
She trembled and sniffled, but couldn't answer him. Her eyes darted back and forth nervously, finally looking up to her protector her guidance. He gave her a gentle, loving look, and ran his fingers over her hair.
"Pi, honey, you need to tell them what you told me."
7 came to stand beside her husband and added, "We want to help you. If there's anything you need, we'll listen."
Pi finally, weakly nodded her head. "Gather the others," she whispered.
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Four years earlier…
You could say it began with the congress. At the beginning of each season, the four remaining clans would gather at what used to be city hall, before the war. It was a fitting place, we supposed, since we met to exchange news, company, and occasionally goods. It started as nicely as any other congress, except that the fourth clan appeared to be… diminished. Three of their number had vanished already that year. Members of other clans were also missing.
But our clan—the first clan—was as intact as always. My big brother, Kappa, had been killed during the war; but there were still the eight of us. Of course, Alpha never came to the congress. He preferred to be alone, he said. Instead, he always relied on my sister for news. Mu was his mate, and I supposed they made a fine pair; he was very handsome, and she was very beautiful, and they got along quite nicely, even if she was gone most of the time. Perhaps that's what made their relationship work so well.
I always wished they would marry, but they never did. I had always pictured their wedding as romantic and lovely. They always said that it would never do, and that such things were for people who had no trust. I could see their reasoning, I supposed, but it still seemed wrong to me, somehow. Father and mother didn't like it much, either, but they allowed it, in the end. The other clans were against it, as well, even though it was none of their business.
Parsley, the leader of the diminished fourth clan, was the first to point out how odd it was that our family was the only one who wasn't missing people. She approached my father, Epsilon, before everyone, that magnetic bar she always carries nonchalantly in hand. (She has an addiction, but manages to make it look ever so classy, dignified, and refined.)
"You should look into that," she said in her aged but beautiful voice. "Whatever is snatching our people will probably come for yours, eventually."
Father wasn't amused that she would think that we had something to do with it. All the same, he neutrally answered, "We will certainly look into that. Thank you for your advice, Parsley. And we will watch for the missing. With any luck, they will turn up somewhere in the ruins; and if we happen upon each other, we will make sure they make it back to you at the next congress."
That evening, we were all startled to look up and find that Mu had vanished, along with Rosemary, another member of fourth clan. Very fearful, the four leaders dismissed the congress early, and my family rushed off to find my sister. We prayed that whole trip that she had returned home ahead of us to see her mate; but we were terrified that she had been taken by whatever was abducting everyone.
Therefore, you can imagine our relief when we got back to the garage and found Mu safely inside with Alpha. And you can imagine our surprise to find that Rosemary was with them, safe and sound. Once again, father was less than pleased.
"Do you have any idea how distracted we went, looking for you?" he thundered at the two girls. "We thought you had vanished like the others! Parsley already thinks we have something to do with it—she'll have my head for this! Do you know how this makes us look?"
To this, my sister rolled her eyes. Alpha snapped back, "They didn't mean to cause any trouble. They were only looking for a good time, weren't you, girls?"
"Of course," Mu agreed. "It's so much more fun here with us, don't you agree, Rosie?"
Rosemary giggled girlishly. "It's way better than being stuck with a bunch of crusty old geezers, sitting around chatting about the weather. Boring," she sang.
Father shook his head, ready to yell at them again, when mother interceded in her calm manner. "I suppose we can understand that. All the same, young ladies, you should have warned someone before you wandered away. We were all worried about you."
"Right, right," Mu dismissed.
"And Rosemary, you need to go back to your clan in the morning. And Mu, you need to go with her, make sure she gets back safely, and apologize to Parsley for all the trouble you caused."
That was the last the triplets and I knew of it, because in the morning, Rosemary and Mu were both gone. Mu showed up again in the afternoon, said that she had done as she was told, and that we shouldn't worry about it again.
We shouldn't have listened to her…
A few weeks passed, and she took off again, wandering off into the ruins by herself as she often did. Given the number of missing people without an identified cause, mother and father didn't want her to go again; she had to sneak out in the middle of the night. We were all worried again, and didn't expect to see her for many days, if ever again.
Only a day or two passed, and father could bear it no longer. He packed a few things and marched out on his own to find her. But he returned in only a few hours. To our utter horror, he returned carrying her mangled body in his arms.
What was worse, it wasn't the random, haphazard work of a machine. All her limbs were broken, one of her smoky purple arms completely severed and missing. The left side of her pale face was slashed open, so she could barely form her final words. Her right eye was smashed in, destroyed beyond reckoning, and the lens of her other eye was badly cracked. Several crucial parts of her wiring had been ripped right out of her body, leaving feeble sparking.
This had been the planned, intentional work of other Stitchpunks. Someone had attacked her, ripped her to pieces, and left her in the wilderness to die. Who would do this to my sister? And why? Why?
As she lay in her bed, her life ebbing away, she seemed more furious than anything else. Not frightened, not sad, not even comforted to be surrounded by her family. Just furious, like a wounded beast. Then something else terrifying and awful happened. Alpha came and knelt beside her, leaning into her face with a bland, slightly annoyed look on his own.
"Why have you failed me, Mu?" he demanded.
Still furious, she looked startled, and now perhaps a bit frightened. And so were we. He was her mate. How could he say something so cruel to her, when she was on her deathbed and needed his compassion? He then stalked away to his private quarters, and refused to speak to her or even look at her again.
When the last of her life slipped away, I cried. I had never been particularly close to my sister, and she had never really cared for me. She said that I was a silly little girl, that I couldn't do anything useful, that I didn't have a purpose. But she was still my sister, and she had died a violent, painful death at the hands of our own kind. And in spite of our strained relationship, I was sad. Whatever we could have been with time was gone.
While our family sat in grief, Alpha suddenly reappeared and approached my father. But before our Bearer could say anything, my father shoved him back.
"This is all your fault!" he thundered. "If you had been with her, you could have saved her! She was your mate! Where were you!"
"That doesn't matter anymore," Alpha answered coolly. And then I looked up, surprised to find his finger in my face. "I'm here for her."
Mother pulled me close, away from him, as I began to shake. "You've already allowed one of our daughters to be killed," she spat back. "We won't let you touch another one of them!"
"That's not your choice, Sigma," he answered. "I'm taking her. Now. It is my decision."
"You can't have her," father snapped. "I'll die first!"
Alpha shrugged. "Alright, Epsilon. Have it your way."
He spoke a sharp, ugly sounding word in a language I didn't recognize—though somewhere deep in my core, I knew it from… somewhere. As he spoke it, he cast his hand out at father, and then at the rest of us. All around me, my parents and my sisters all went stiff and dropped to the floor like flies, frozen, paralyzed. Only I remained untouched by the spell, unarmed, undefended, completely in the open with no hope of shelter or rescue, and terrified. Only one though occurred to me:
Run.
I turned and tried to escape, but he caught me in what seemed like an instant and hauled me off, dragging me kicking and screaming toward his quarters. I screamed for help, for my father, for anyone who might be nearby to hear. But I went unanswered. I was alone. With him. I was almost certain that I was about to die.
That assumption was misplaced, though not far off.
He shut the door behind us, and flung me onto his bed while he barred the door shut. I had never been in his room before—it was his and Mu's, and they warned me never to go in there. Bad enough he had dragged me there and trapped me alone with him, his room made me uncomfortable. The bed was thick and warm, everything about it soft, bright and luxurious. Everything about it was too sensual. On the floor in an adjacent corner was a rug woven from colorful threads—the one mother gave to Mu on her birthday a few years ago. On the other side of the room, I was alarmed to see the corpse of a mechanical spider. I remembered when he had slain it, with the impressive sword that hung on the wall nearby. He had brought it back with him, but I had never seen what he had done with it. What he had done was arrange the front four arms into chair legs, and form the back four legs into a back rest so he could sit comfortably on the body. It was a magnificent throne, fit for the monster we now knew he was.
He turned to me with an odd look on his face, and no trace of anger. Just an intentness that filled me with even more fear. I skittered back against the wall, wishing I could just dissolve into it and disappear. He was surely about to kill me or—ew—worse…
"Alpha, please," I begged, barely more than a whisper. "Whatever you're about to do to me, don't do it. Please don't!"
"I have no choice," he answered seriously, advancing on me. "I can't go hungry, now can I?"
Perhaps death would be preferable to what was going to happen…
"I didn't do anything," I insisted feebly. "I didn't do anything!"
"You're right. This isn't your fault, girl—it's your useless sister's. If she'd had the good sense not to go and get herself butchered, this wouldn't have had to happen. It's also not your fault that you're the next oldest, which is the way it must be. Damn that Mu," he growled, cracking his knuckles and neck. "Thanks to her, I have to start from scratch."
Had I been less frightened, there might have been more room for curiosity and confusion. Mu had been his mate for two years. They shared a bed. She had loved him, and I had thought that he had loved her, too. How could he suddenly hate her so much? And what could he want with me, now? I couldn't think of that much, though. Full of overwhelming fear, with nowhere to run to and no hope of escape or rescue, my whole body was paralyzed.
"This won't be long, and it won't be painful," he informed me bluntly, casting his fingers at me again. With a sinister smirk he added, "Who knows? You might like it."
There was nothing left to do but meet my fate. But nothing could have prepared me for the fate I met. He uttered another strange word in that same strange language I didn't know, but knew from somewhere. My breath caught in my chest, and I felt my mind open up, my memories lingering in the air as if they weren't even real. Then he spoke again, in words I understood clearly.
"My Pi, you know I never really loved her," he insisted with a more genuine smile. "I had to play along with her, keep her amused… Until I could have you. You are the one I love, Pi. It is you I want for my mate, and my priestess. I need you. I love you. I can't survive without you. Pi, don't you love me, too?"
And just like that, all the fear and confusion of the previous moments melted away. Everything I knew to be true wasn't real anymore. It had never happened. It didn't exist. Suddenly, it was just me and him, him and me, us, forever.
By all the powers… How I loved this handsome young man.
He came and sat down beside me, took my hand, and raised it to his lips. "How are you feeling now?" he asked.
"Different," I answered, searching myself. "But I feel… good. Very good."
"As it should be, my love," he smiled, pulling me close. It felt so natural, as if this was the way it had always been. Then his face turned serious. "Pi, we have work to do. You know what I mean, right?"
At first, no… But then I realized that yes, I knew exactly what he meant, somehow. "Mu never brought you back a sacrifice! You must be starving! What shall I do?"
He caressed my face and decided, "You're in no state to go out on your own yet. I will make this easy for both of us. Instead of having to spend days searching in the wilderness, why not use what we have around our home?"
"I don't understand. What do we have around our home?"
His eyes were grave. "Your father spoke back to me, Pi. He blamed me for your sister's death, and he had the nerve to push me. Me! He must be punished."
I wasn't worried or concerned at all, merely puzzled. "…He is my father. It would be a shame, Alpha."
"All the more fitting for your first sacrifice, my dear. Your first sacrifice. Is that not exciting?"
"Oh. I suppose it is," I agreed blankly, still not sure how I felt about this.
"He has been in my way for years, always battling against me, always talking back to me. His errors are too many to count. His fate is long overdue. Who better to deliver it than his own daughter, who is protecting him and everyone else from himself? You would be doing us all a service. And besides, I've already made my decision."
Well, if he had made the decision, that was it. And it must have been the best decision that could be made. So I took heart in that, and gave him an optimistic smile. "Alright, then. I'll do it. Shall we go now?"
He lowered his head to my shoulder and began to gently, sweetly kiss my neck. It was so warm, it felt like my whole body was on fire. But it was so pleasant. If I could have died in that blaze, I wouldn't have minded.
"There's no rush," he whispered in my ear. "Mu can never stand in our way again. Now is our time, and it begins right now."
And to that, I had no complaints. He was a capable, clever, beautiful man, who deserved to be our leader. And he was mine. He was my mate now. How could I refuse?
An hour or so later when we emerged from our quarters, I confidently carried our clan's precious talisman. I knew what had to be done, and it wasn't what I would have designed; but if it was for the greater good—if Alpha deemed it a worthy cause—then I was at peace with it. My family had reanimated while we had been busy, for the floor was empty. Alpha put a protective hand on my shoulder and stopped me. He looked around suspiciously, waiting for an ambush.
"That Epsilon is up to something, as usual…" he muttered.
He suddenly shoved me to the ground and jumped away, as my father's short hoplite sword sliced through air where we had been standing. Father had darted out of a shadow, sword in hand, and aimed for Alpha's head. I looked up to see my mate simmering with rage, as he flung his fingers toward my father, uttering a spell. But father was quicker, and leapt for cover before the spell could catch him.
While this continued, churning into an epic battle, I scurried out of the way. There was no way I could be of use in this perilous moment. All I could do now was protect the talisman, and wait for my own moment of use. I looked past their battle, looking for my mother and sisters, and finally spotted them on the other side of the garage. Mother spotted me, as well, and a look of relief came over her face. She urgently beckoned me to get up and run to her. But I shook my head in response. I didn't need her support or shelter anymore. I had Alpha now, and I had to stand by him and help him.
Mother looked confused, disappointed, and very worried. I suddenly couldn't understand why.
My poor, aging father couldn't hope to outrun Alpha's spells forever. In the barest fraction of a second, his movement slowed just enough that my mate's well-placed spell hit him full-on. He froze in mid-step, and his hourglass shaped sword fell from his hand as he toppled to the ground in a twitching heap. Alpha loomed triumphantly over him. I suddenly got the feeling that my moment had finally come, so I rose to my feet and calmly walked to join him.
"Oh, Alpha, that was amazing," I sighed, completely in awe of his abilities. He smiled back, thoroughly amused. He stepped back with a bow and a grand gesture.
"After you, my dear priestess," he said.
I looked at my father's face as he watched us, and as I stood over him and began the sequence that would suck out his soul. He was frightened, but not for himself. It was for me. What was I doing? What had that maniac done to me? Why was I doing this? Why?
"I am sorry, father," I said regretfully. "But I think we both know that this was the only way it could ever be."
As I pressed the second button, I heard mother yell, "Pi, stop! What's gotten into you?"
I looked up at her and shrugged. "I'm sorry to you as well, mother. It has to be done. I can't help that."
"No, Pi, no! You don't have to do this! Please don't do this!"
I chose to block her out after that. I pressed the third button and aimed it at my father's head.
"Goodbye, father."
The beam of glowing green energy that followed nearly knocked me off my feet. But I held my ground, determined to fulfill my duty to my hungry mate. The connection broke, and the energy retreated into the talisman with a lightning-like snap, I found myself shaking. I had killed my own father. And I really didn't mind it.
I turned to Alpha and handed him the talisman, now heavy with what he hungered for. He grinned his appreciation, and I beamed back proudly. We chose to ignore my mother and sisters as they ran to my father's lifeless body.
"Excellent work, my darling," he said with a smile. "You will serve me well, indeed."
"It's my pleasure, Alpha."
He looked down at the talisman, weighing it slowly. "Your meddling father had a substantial soul. It should hold me for a few months, at least. We will have all the time in the world together, thanks to this. You should be very proud."
"Oh, I am."
"No more doubts? No more fears?"
"None. When you made this decision, I knew that it had to be for the greater good. Of course it had to be. How could I doubt you, my love?"
"That is exactly what I want to hear. I am going to go and enjoy this," he informed me, glancing down at the talisman. "In the meantime, that body is of no use to us anymore. Put it with the rest."
Once again, that oddness of not understanding what he meant, and then realizing that I suddenly knew exactly what he meant. I went straight to gather the body, as I had been told. It was no longer my father—just the shell that had housed his soul. It wasn't special or important anymore. But my mother sat on the ground, rocking the shell back and forth maniacally, unable to see this clear truth from behind her invisible tears. But her grip was almost nonexistent, and dragging the body from her arms was no terrible feat. She moved to stop me, but I refused to hear her.
"Mother, please," I insisted gently. "This was better for us all. I know you're hurt now; but you'll come to grips with it, in time."
She stared up at me with the most brokenhearted face I had ever seen on anyone, in all five years of my life. She couldn't understand why I would do this to my own father—to my own family. The triplets stared at me in horror, Gamma and Theta hiding pitifully behind Delta as if they depended on her to rectify everything.
Instead, the little prophet's eyes glazed over, trapped in a vision. Behind her lavender veil she muttered, "The spider… The curse… The kiss… Freedom…"
I had no idea what she meant, and no time to find out. I had a chore to complete. Without a soul to fill it, father's body was very light now; one of the girls could have carried it easily. I picked it up in my arms and walked away toward my new quarters, leaving my family behind.
Alpha sat like a king on his spider throne, his chest wide open, with the talisman attached to a fixture in his wiring. He appeared to be enjoying his meal immensely, as the energy of the soul within slowly flowed into him, strengthening him, filling him and slaking his starvation.
"You know what to do with that," he commented with a smile.
I nodded. I most certainly knew what to do with the body. I walked over to the rug in the corner and slid my foot beneath it, kicking it away to reveal the deep hole underneath. Somehow, it felt like I had always know it was there and what it was for. It was very deep, a long way to the bottom. But if I looked hard enough, I could make out the vague shapes of other empty Stitchpunk bodies. All the missing from the other clans. All sacrificed to Alpha's insatiable hunger.
I instantly recognized Rosemary's green and purple form on top, the most recent sacrifice. Feeling like I finally understood everything, I let the shell of my father fall from my arms, adding it to the pile.
No one ever had to know. It was our secret.
Ours.