Devov’s body shudders against her and his eyes shut to hear and memorize the honeyed tones of her voice. From her vantage point she can see how he smiles and how neatly they curl into one another. Not until now had Cerva realized the emptiness of not having children; he is filling a void she was never even aware of. For years she had thought happiness would never reach her, that she would be overlooked because she lacked the fire that most others have. When she had been hopeful to find something like mother and father – whatever that dysfunctional relationship was – it had crumbled before her very eyes before it even began. On the verge of resignation Cerva realizes this intimacy of adoption is the balm to soothe her pain. This is enough as the world topples down around them. The world is burning and rising again, but none of it matters with Devov so innocently pressed against her.
”Son,” she concedes with a voice hushed for only him to hear, ”my sweet Devov.” He nips her but she sees it as play and not for what it really is. Within a single heartbeat the boy has declared his possession, his prize. A hand latches to her throat and the shackles clamp around her ankles, but Cerva is too ignorant, too blissful, to see and understand what dark tendrils are seeping into his thoughts. Where she sees motherhood he sees ownership. The view of freedom is soon to be obscured by the cylindrical bars of a jail cell because he wants her to himself and yet she wants more; Cerva wants a family and this is only a beginning.
This is the beginning to her struggles.
Underneath the somber sky when an iron curtain of silence closes on them Cerva lets her mind roam to the Gates and to the Valley, to her life before the mountains crumbled and the rivers flooded. ”Maybe one day you can meet my father,” she knows Eight is still here; his scent often chokes her when she wanders. ”Or maybe someone I knew from before,” but where would that lead? They left her, and in this muted reminder her eyes glaze. ”We will find a place to go where we won’t be alone,” it’s how she intends to dive into this new chapter where the turns are unexpected and the results are fruitful.
Cerva