Something changes after that, after Adora's survival, or rather, brush with Death.
She comes back home, limping and craddling Lily's head, her soft pink dress drenched in crimson. The blood had time to thicken and grow heavy like shackles, a shame that plagues Adora's every step. It makes her a dichotomy, a portrait of macabre with flesh in her ebony hair. She is a small girl violently painted in scarlet, yet that same soft, ivory skin remains untouched by the creatures that tore her apart.
pieces of her flesh were gnawed on, slowly, one bite at the time and Adora screams
Adora catches sight of her Mother, beautiful and golden, at the edge of their property, her lips chewed into a mess of dry blood.
"Mo-" The word dies in her throat, almost shy, almost afraid.
Adora had called her Father to her when the world was about to tear her apart. And, he didn't answer.
Adora now calls for her Mother.
To hold her, to love her, to make her feel anything and everything as long as it is not the sharp teeth that had dug into her neck or the warm and thick blood that had splattered onto Adora, staining her with redredredredredred.
please don't abandon me too
Mother answers.
The blonde rushes towards Adora, hands wiping away some of the gore before pressing a kiss to the child's forehead.
"Adora," Mother breathes like a prayer in which she has suddenly found her faith rekindled, like an ember blazing into life as the older woman stares into her daughter's eyes.
Divine blue stares back, though you could not guess its divinity with how wild, frazzled, and agonized it is.
"Adora, Adora," Mother repeats softly. Lovingly. Fervently.
it shouldn't taste so sweet
that desperation in which mother holds adora like she would fade if she didn't it shouldn't feel so warm
her arms wounded so tight,
mother is suffocating her is
is this love, too?
The ten-year-old girl makes a small noise in the back of her throat: half a whimper of an small animal on its death bed, half a sob that makes her entire small frame tremble as if there was no more soil beneath her feet to keep her steady. Mother looks down, catching sight of whatever remains of the Avangarde daughter, her niece in all but blood and name. Her lips twist into a grimace of grief and apathy as if she has seen such a sight so often that she does not mourn. As if it has irreversibly taken something from her, killed something that was once soft until it became rotten.
"Give her to me, Adora," she says.
Adora doesn't move.
If anything, she curls into herself, dirty ebony hair shielding her and Lily from the world, from the woman who would separate them for one last time. Adora's grip tightens on Lily's head, keeping her nestled into her arms as if it will protect her now.
"Let her go," Mother whispers.
Adora shakes her head.
It does not deter Mother, however. Mother tries to take Lily's head gently, easing out Adora's clawlike grip from the appendage to no avail.
But Adora cannot let go.
(the child cannot let go)
A finger breaks, the pain like a knife in the throat. Sharp, sudden. It is automatically soothed away by Mother's golden hand, fingers very gentle as they hover over her injury, the golden light mending the bone till the pain is but a memory. At least it should, Adora thinks.
But the Delacour and memories have always danced to a melody none can hear. They like to hold their pain in the way one may hold a hand, tightly, with no intention of letting go. Their Her pain is not something that Adora can forget, in fact, it is not so easily forgettable.
The dark-haired girl cherishes it too, wears it everywhere like a necklace, like an heirloom passed on and treasured - from a mother to a daughter, from a half-blood to another halfblood.
"Sleep," Mother whispers.
"I can't-" Adora chokes back and gold fills her vision as she is put to sleep.
It is not a peaceful night by any means.
Devoid of light, laughter, or even softeness, instead, Adora dreams of Death turning her away and wakes up with Lily's ghost strangling her, whispering you should have died with me.
Mother takes the news of her daughter's death at the hands of monsters harder than Adora thought she would.
It is like something dies within her mother, crumbles into ashes never to return, another chip of herself gone to the cruelty of the Gods. If she thought that Mother looked a feet inside a grave comes every November, than Mother is but a rotting corpse as she takes in Adora's small scar at the back of her neck.
It starts slow, like a ripple before the tidal wave, the spark before the explosion.
Mother is drinking, she often is since Father has first arrived into their life, ironically, a shadow looming over her mother's sunshine. Now, there's a certain coldness to her, a rigidity as if she has raised a shield and has forgotten how to lower it or perhaps refuses to.
"Mother?" Adora calls out, her voice trembling. "It hurts."
Maybe it is because Adora shakes, tears silently trailing on her cheeks and dripping on the floor, that Mother softens.
Perhaps, it is because of the nightmares the little girl has just woken up from, a desperate and agonized cry tearing itself from her throat as she felt sharp teeth rip her skin open. Regardless, Céleste Delacour's soft and beautiful face crumbles in the face of her daughter's tears.
She stops and places her glass on the table before approaching Adora, who remains rooted in her spot. Frozen stiff and frail enough, the smallest and gentlest wind could make her shatter. Mother then crouches down. Her body, pale when she had been kissed by sunshine, sways lightly like a flower that bends to the ruthless wind. She takes hold of Adora's cheeks, fingers softly and so lovingly brushing on her warm skin.
"I never wanted this for you, my darling," she whispers, a sob building in her throat, a wave of grief in her voice as if Adora is already dead.
And maybe she is.
Dead like Lily.
It had been a closed casket funeral: dark with the sobs of her parents echoing like a haunting cry, a heartbroken wail that even now, Adora can sometimes still hear.
"It hurt," Adora whispers. "It hurt so much."
It had hurt dying. Being eaten alive.
Yet, that pain fails to compare to the agony of losing Lily.
Her best friend meant for the glamourous balls and adoring piano concerts. Her best friend, mortal and beautiful, unburdened by the danger of a halfbood's world yet still a casualty of it because of Adora.
Because Adora is the daughter of a God, holds his blood yet none of his care.
Silent tears splatter on the floor.
They are not Adora's.
"I thought he would protect you," Mother confides, taking her in her arms as if Adora was still the little toddler who liked to seek protection and warmth inside of her mother's arms. "I thought he would find you interesting enough."
"I begged him," Adora says brokenly. "I begged him to save us, and Father didn't answer."
Mother's chest shakes with what sounds like a watery laugh, more so a sob if Adora is to be honest.
"My father didn't answer my call, too," she responds softly. "But at least, you are alive." she stresses the words as if it is golden and precious. "You survived."
Adora shakes her head, ebony locks following her movement like rivers of silk. "I didn't survive," she corrects her mother. Mother stiffens; her arms grow stiff like a corpse's, as if afraid to suddenly break the little girl. "I died."
There's a small silence.
Adora wonders if Mother will throw a glass once more as shadows play on her face like a threat.
Mother exhales.
It sounds like a heart that shatters at her feet and like flesh meeting flesh into a slap, all at once.
Adora flinches as Mother shuts her eyes.
She makes a grab for her drink, stumbling over the small table to pour herself another one. Adora doesn't move, doesn't dare to breathe.
"Oh, my little star. You truly are your mother's daughter," Mother exhales bitterly, sadly, another glass of whiskey in hand and the piano left untouched for months till the dust has settled on the ivory keys like a thin blanket. But unlike before, that statement has no hint of quiet pride. It is resentful, sharp, and Adora lowers her head from the sting of its hatred.
"Gods, I should have known," the blonde's grip tightens on the glass so much so that Adora thinks it will shatter. Her voice sounds like heartbreak."I should have done better, I-" Mother pauses. Smiles with her teeth in what she must think is a kind smile.
It never is whenever Mother has her eyes muddled from the past.
"I'm sorry, my little love," she repeats.
The little girl wonders what her mother is sorry for.
It is late at night when she gets her answer. She is already half gone to her dreams, but clings stubbornly to consciousness, too afraid of the nightmares that loom over her.
"I'm sorry, Adora," Mother's voice is quiet. Sorrowful. The kind you would sooner hear it at funerals rather than at the bedside of your child's bed. Something wet and cold lands on Adora's cheek, slipping elegantly to the curve of her jaw. It tastes like salt. "I never wanted that fate for you. I never wanted you to be loved."
They move from their manor soon after that.
Too much memories, too much trauma, Mother excuses, brushes any worries aside as she packs their things. There isn't much to pack, and dust has already settled in most rooms, making it seem as if they had stopped living in that house for a while.
Adora clutches at her dress while sitting on her piano bench.
It is black, sleek, a concert hall piano that, a gift of a God, the sole one that her grandmother could not bear to throw away. Mother had been the same, yet there is a stubborn clench to her jaw when she refuses to bring it with them, condemning the instrument to linger in a building that is more a cemetery of ghosts that a house.
Shadows grow darker.
The smell of copper lingers.
Adora straightens, bowing her head in respect, keeping her voice carefully blank. "Lord Thanatos," she greets.
There's a small sigh as if bothered. The God of Death walks closer, his steps ever so silent and light seems to hide away from him.
"Won't you grace your Father with a smile, precious one?" Adora bites her lip and chews on it until it bleeds. She tries to smile, but it is pitiful, barely a curve, and it has more teeth than it should.
"That's not a smile, Adora," Father chides.
It isn't often that Father can visit and when he does, he likes Adora at her best. Always laughing, always smiling, always dutiful. But Adora does not change the energy to slip into that role that Father so wishes for her.
Not when he didn't answer.
"Sorry, my lord," she said instead, lowering her eyes.
"You don't call me Father now?"
"How would I dare to call you Father, my lord?" But she lifts her gaze anyway, meeting golden eyes unflinchingly. Something like wrath crawls over his sharp features, eerily similar to the same wrath that Mother wields like a dagger sometimes.
"What tales has your mother told you, now?" he asks, a silent accusation in his voice, low and dangerous. Godly, too. "For you to treat your own father so coldly?"
"She didn't tell need to tell me any tales." The 'you did well enough on your own' went unsaid yet her father hears it all the same as his brows furrow. As if he does not understand what has changed since their last meeting in which Adora had shyly pecked his cheek and hid in his arms after her parents finished their almost daily fighting.
"I have punished the horses, if that is your concern," Father starts slowly.
Something in Adora's chest eases despite herself, a sharpness to her heart that makes her glad for it, to know that those creatures were not left unpunished as they killed her best friend.
she had been killed too but adora sometimes forget it but never for long
The little girl supposes she should be thankful.
"Thank you, my lord."
"Father," Father demands, tilting her chin so that their eyes meet. His grip tightens and maybe blue will bloom on her skin in a day or two. "Call me Father, Adora."
He asks that of her as if it is his due, a title that is his by the Fates and by birthright. Maybe it is. He has given her half of himself, after all. She holds his blood. She shares his face. But as much as she is Death's daughter, she is also her mother's.
She is Céleste Delacour's daughter, the daughter of the half-blood who turned her back on Gods and survived past adulthood.
"Is that a command, my lord?" Adora's smile is sharp, and something glints in her father's eyes in response. It is an acknowledgment for her coldness, for the pettiness that coats her tongue heavily, because what good is a father who has abandoned his daughter?
"It is."
It is a decree.
"Then, Father," she spits the word too. "I will excuse myself."
She tries to move, but her wrist is snatched violently. Father's skin is cold like a corpse, tightening like a criminal's nose, a snake on its prey.
"Not so fast, little one," he growls before hissing a curse as a golden arrow flies worryingly close to his face, grazing a few ebony strands as it lands on the wall next to them. Adora looks to the side, taking in the sight of her mother's scowl, her tenseness as she draws another arrow.
"My, my, I forgot how violent you could get, Céleste." He sounds almost amused, if a bit annoyed.
"Let my daughter go, Thanatos," Mother snarls.
Father snorts, his grip tightening, and Adora swallows back a small, pained sound. "You think you could harm me?"
"I can certainly try till I do end up hurting you. Let go of Adora. You are hurting her."
"I would never hurt her-"
"You are!" Mother's voice interrupts. It grows shrill, high-pitched pitched, and angry. "You already did!"
Father snarls and the roses Adora so lovingly left next to Lily's favorite spot withers.
The petals lose their color, wilting till rot settles.
"Because you never hurt her?!"
"At least I never lied to her!"
They are screaming now, loud and angry, the kind that echoes in the house and cuts through any semblance of serenity till Adora stands frozen, shoulders drawn tight. Father has let go of her wrist abruptly, dropping it without any thought or semblance of care as he walks closer to her mother, who holds him at an arrow point.
His fist hits the wall.
Mother doesn't flinch, unlike Adora. She simply juts her chin higher, a challenge in her eyes and words crueler and crueler till they scrape both of them raw.
"Stop it," Adora whispers, her hands drifting to cover her ears.
But her plea is lost, drowned out in the cacophony her parents so lovingly conduct with bitter words and snarls.
They do not stop.
They never do.
Adora breathes in, the cold air shredding her lungs as she does so, copper filling her mouth. "Stop it."
They do not hear, too lost in their anger at each other and at the world to hear.
"STOP IT"
Outside, everything becomes deathly still; all of the bird's chirping has stopped suddenly. The fight, too. There is only silence, and Adora can finally breathe.
However, it only lasts a moment - short and fleeting - before it shatters, like ill-made glass that shatters in front of winter.
"Look at what you've done." Father sneers.
He then walks closer to her, crouching till they are face to face, almost as if they are on equal grounds though Adora knows better for he is a God and she is his mortal daughter. Unbeknown to her, she curls into herself, like a child trying to appear smaller than she already is.
"Why are you crying, my love?"
Adora hadn't noticed she was crying. "You're mad," she breathes shakily, and Father frowns. She tenses at the darkness that swirls in his golden eyes, and, as if reading her mind, he swiftly erases his frown.
"No, I'm not."
Adora would have called him a liar if it did not implicate Mother too, for Mother was always the first to call Father a liar. But the dark-haired child knows it would only rekindle the flame, pouring oil on a wildfire.
After all, for her age, Adora is quite proud of her maturity and her perceptiveness. She knows when to be good, to swallow words, and to weather the storm.
"Then, why are you yelling?"
why are you always yelling at mother?
"Your mother and I- We have business to discuss, and it can get a bit - heated."
"I don't like it," Adora mutters.
Mother softens, drops her bow, and her golden arrow disappears. Father too.
"I don't like it when you are mad."
"But am I not mad at you-" It is evident in his trailing voice, in the question that dies on the tip of his tongue, that he does not understand. He does not understand that for all of Mother's grief, which swallows her whole until she confuses love with hatred and turns it on Adora, Mother is the only home she has known, and Father is threatening it with his anger.
Mother is strong, but Gods will be Gods.
what is a mortal next to a God?
nothing
Another tear escapes her.
It is quick as it falls prey to gravity and Adora has no control over it though she must because she cannot be so weak in front of a godly father who does not know humanity as he should, who does not feel as she does and-
"You do know how much I love you, precious one?" His confession is quiet and loving, so much so that Adora chokes out a small sob, so pitifully weak and wet that her father surges forward, uncaring of how Mother tenses, and wraps his arms around her.
"Don't-" Adora sniffles. "Don't lie."
"I am not."
Adora shakes her head, a small fist hitting her father's chest, in denial, in anger, she does not know. "I begged for you and you didn't answer." She hits his chest harder, as if she could harm him the way that his betrayal has left her at the mercy of monsters. "That's not love- you don't abandon the people you love"
"You're still here. And I love you."
Lies.
lieslieslieslies
"Why would you love me?" she grips her father cloak with a desperation so raw that it cuts her open, leaves her heart and guts spilling out in a broken voice. It has hit her, a few days after Lily's death that she had done nothing to earn her father's love, and perhaps, that is the reason why Lily died. "I have brought you no gold or glory-"
"I don't need you to," his voice is soft, deceptive. "All I need you to be is my daughter. To live and survive."
It sounds like a blessing, her Father's love.
Adora dares to believe it.
But what did Mother say again?
Ah.
to be loved by a God is the greatest curse of all