Lapidary

“I’m leaving for a few days,” I told Sachiel – it was the polite thing to do. She was sitting on the stone bench, with her wings sagging. She was looking at me but didn’t ask why there were bags under my eyes. I was glad she didn’t, because I wouldn’t have explained to her that the voices in my mind kept me up all night.

“Okay,” was all she said.

I swung my backpack, the only thing I was taking with me, over my shoulder. I caught a taxi, which brought me to the Saltcoast, before I climbed into a car and paid for a ride back to New Peace. The whole journey my stomach was turning, and I absentmindedly fumbled with my clothes.

Bellevue lived in the city center, in the most expensive part of New Peace. Although she was only a few blocks away from where Ryker and I used to live, she had never visited us. Had she visited Ryker, before he met me?

The cab stopped, and I thanked the driver before I got out. The building was tall and looming over me like a giant. For once, the voices were quiet, and I only heard the city: a car horn honking, a siren blaring, tires screeching on the tar road, people talking, footsteps moving. I closed my eyes and took a moment to collect myself before approaching the entrance. A motion sensor triggered the door, and I entered a spacious, well-designed room. Fine artwork hung on the walls, and leather couches stood with a coffee machine to my right. To my left was the reception, and I went there.

“I’m here to see Bellevue Featherswallow,” I said to the assistant, trying to sound confident so that she would think I should be there.

“Do you have an appointment?” she asked.

“I’m Natka Featherswallow,” I said with as much authority as I could muster. I had chosen to give Ryker’s last name, instead of mine, because, if things had turned out differently, we would have been married. I should have been a Featherswallow, and Bellevue should have been my mother-in-law.

I didn’t know if the assistant recognized my name or face because it has been in the mainstream news so many times, but I hoped she’d let me in. She picked up the phone and called Bellevue while I held my breath.

“Ma’am, there is a Natka Featherswallow here to see you,” she said. “Uh-huh. I’ll send her up.”

She hung up the phone before talking to me. “Room 906.”

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

I headed toward the elevator and ignored the sickening, sinking feeling in my stomach as I went up and up and up. I’d been scared of Bellevue and the impact she would have on my relationship in the past. That fear had turned into anger when she stole Ryker’s things from me. And now I simply hated her.

I got out of the elevator and told myself I could handle whatever was to come. I had killed a dragon, a daimon, and survived a sea serpent. Compared to them, Bellevue was not a big deal.

Instead of knocking, I took hold of the handle and discovered the door unlocked. I pushed it open and went inside to find Bellevue sitting on the couch, one leg crossed over the other, with a glass of wine in her hand. I closed the door, approached her, and halted not far from her. She was wearing a well-tailored, dark purple suit. Her long black hair was braided to the side, and her face didn’t have any wrinkles, which made her look deceptively young. Around her neck hung a string of pearls which glowed, like the moon, and I recalled that Neron had told her Ryker had left him the moonpearls. She opened her mouth, but I spoke first.

“Where the fuck is it?”

Her mouth stays slightly open, and her eyes widened. The tips of her fingers turned white, from gripping the glass. “Where is what?”

“The White Crystal.”

She cocked her head. “So, you know it has been found.”

I crossed my arms. “I know you have it.”

“You’ve got some nerve, storming in here, flinging those accusations at me.”

“You’ve got some nerve stealing everything that Ryker left for me! I know you found the White Crystal among his things, and you’ve used it to open rifts and torment me. Or maybe, you didn’t find it among his things, maybe you killed him for it!” The words were like a roller-coaster; once I got on, I had to finish. They tumbled out of my mouth, one after the other, and I was shaking when I was done.

The glass shattered from the pressure and scattered over the carpet, spilling wine onto Bellevue. She jumped to her feet, touching the stain. “You stupid slut. I never killed him!”

I locked gaze with her. “Then tell me what happened.”

She drew a shaky breath before sitting down and motioning for me to do the same. I sidestepped the glass and sat down opposite her. She ran a hand through her hair, and when she spoke, she sounded significantly calmer.

“Ryker came to me one day and asked to speak in private. He sat right there, where you are sitting now, when he told me that Lakelyn Shelby had written a letter to him in which she explained that she had found the White Crystal. He said that the letter’s seal had been broken when it arrived – which meant someone else knew that the crystal had been found.”

Robert, one of the Insurgents, had intercepted and read the letter, but I didn’t interrupt Bellevue to tell her this.

“He was scared that whoever read the letter would go after Lakelyn, so he used a half-rift to travel to Vesea, got the crystal, and came back.”

The rift in our apartment was so convenient for traveling back and forth to Vesea. That must have been the one he used it to go to Lakelyn.

“He told me that he hid the White Crystal and that he was going to travel to The Edge, so that he could throw it off the edge of the world, where no one would ever find it again.”

My heart tightened to think that he had lied to me, fooling me into thinking we were going there on our honeymoon.

“Ryker feared that someone, whether it’s The Risen, The Insurgents, or the Sky Watch, might come after him before he had a chance to dispose of the crystal. He knew if they killed him, they would search through all of his things – and they wouldn’t care who they hurt to get to it. So, he told me he wanted to change his will – he wanted to leave everything to me because he knew I was powerful enough to protect myself.”

“So, originally, he left it all to me?” I asked.

She nodded. “He did – in the will Zimran Waverly set up.”

Zimran, tortured and dead in his house – the insurgents had tormented him for information he’d never had. Bellevue hadn’t hurt him – I had been wrong in assuming she had.

“So, Ryker and my attorney set up a new will. In which I got everything. And when he died, they came.”

Devton’s gang might have gotten into everything Bellevue owned. They would have taken what they wanted, broken what they didn’t want, and they certainly wouldn’t have stopped if someone got in their way.

Bellevue continued, “But I had already gone through all of his things, and I couldn’t find the White Crystal. So, the daimons who came couldn’t find it either. If I was not who I was, with the power and protection I had, they would have killed me trying to find it.”

Ryker had never told me about the crystal because he had wanted to protect me. He had considered me weak, delicate, and in need of protection.

I drew a deep breath. “So, you don’t know where it is?”

“I don’t,” Bellevue said.

For some reason, I believed her.

“Why do you hate me?” I asked. “Because I’m human? Because I was never good enough for your son?”

Bellevue looked away quickly. “I hate you because he loved you – more than he ever loved me. I hate you because Ryker chose you. Even when he had the stress of the White Crystal, he was still thinking about you.”

“What do you mean?” As far as I knew, Ryker had been too busy smuggling diamonds, getting high, and hiding the White Crystal, to think of me.

Bellevue chuckled. “When he set up a new will, he made me swear to him that, should he die, I would take care of you. And I did.”

I swallowed. “Holy fuck. You’ve been sending me the ten gold coins each month.”

She nodded.

“Why?” I asked. “He is dead. He wouldn’t have known if you didn’t keep your word.”

“But I would have known.” She looked at me. “He might have hated me, but he trusted me more than anybody.”

He had trusted her more than me – he had confided in her. I shouldn’t be hurt, but I was. I hated that tears were welling up in my eyes.

“Remove those gloves,” Bellevue said. I had no idea why I obeyed. I held up my left hand so that she could see the silver ring with its black stone, as big as the tip of my thumb.

“I threatened to cut him off if he didn’t leave you,” Bellevue told me, which matched what Neron had said. “He told me to go fuck myself. That was the moment I knew he really loved you – he gave up everything for you. When he returned and told me about the White Crystal, he told me he had proposed with a cheap ring which he would later, after your trip to The Edge, replace with an expensive one. Such a human thing to do.”

Tears rolled down my cheeks now.

“He wanted to spend the rest of your mortal life with you.” Bellevue’s eyes went to the scars on my wrists. “And just look at what you’ve done to yourself.”

Ashamed, I hid my wrists behind me, but I didn’t lower my eyes. Instead, I focused on the moon pearls. I was desperate to change the topic, especially considering how honest and good Neron had been to me. “Those don’t belong to you.”

“They belong to Neron,” she stated. “I wouldn’t give them to him because, at first. I thought maybe he had something to do with Ryker’s death. Maybe they got into a fight about the diamonds or something.”

I tensed. I liked Neron and didn’t think he had killed Ryker. “Do you still feel that way?”

“No, I don’t think he had anything to do with Ryker’s death.” Bellevue removed the necklace and handed it to me. I stuck it in my pocket.

I braced myself before asking, “What do you think happened to Ryker?”

The muscle in Bellevue’s jaw jumped, making me realize she was biting hard on her teeth. “I don’t have to think about what happened to Ryker. I know what happened.”