ONYX

Chapter Sixteen

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                     Sixteen
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No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.     

Steve Jobs
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“No!” Alessandra cried in the night, shooting upright in her bed with her hand extended in the air as if she was trying to reach for something.

Or someone.

Her Majesty, Former Queen of Evyon, Elizabeth, was gone and no matter how hard she tried, Alessandra couldn’t get her back. Tears sprung in her eyes and before she knew it, the Princess was curled in a ball and sobbing for her mother. It’d been hours since she left and within that time she’d been trying to keep herself busy with her ladies, but she’d finally given up and took herself to bed early. She didn’t know that she’d slept all night. Morning birds chirped from her cracked open window where a light breeze passed and brushed her sweat-drenched face. The air had dried the tears that’d leaked onto her cheeks, but she couldn’t stop the flow from her eyes.

Her mother was dead.

And it was all her fault.

“Alessandra, are you all right?” Greer asked when she opened the door to her chambers. Alessandra’s cousin was still wearing the dress that she wore yesterday and her hair was a little bit undone in the back.

“Greer?” Alessandra questioned, moving away from her cousin when she climbed on to the bed next to her. She didn’t wear her gloves at night and they were perched on the back of the chair facing her vanity.

“Yes, we haven’t left you.” Greer replied, eyeing the gloves that’d captured Alessandra’s attention. Greer retrieved them so that Alessandra didn’t have to get up herself.

“Thank you.” Alessandra said. She hated that she had to put them back on, but she had to be cautious if she didn’t want any more people that she loved to die.

The door opened again as Theresa walked through, she’d changed her dress and freshened up since the last time Alessandra saw her. “Theresa?”

“You look surprised.” Theresa said. She took a seat next to Greer at the foot of the bed. Both of the ladies had been worried for Alessandra’s wellbeing so they’d decided to stay with her through the night. When she was sound asleep, Greer and Theresa wanted to take turns and leave to change their clothes and come back so they wouldn’t be in the same attire, but Alessandra woke up before Greer could go.

“We never left you.” Greer said. “We couldn’t.”

“You need us now more than ever.” Theresa chimed.

Alessandra felt a new coat of tears develop in her eyes. She’d loved both of them so much and she wanted to hug them, but she knew she couldn’t. “My mother, she’s . . .” Alessandra couldn’t finish the sentence because somehow she’d hoped it was just a nightmare and that her mother was merely in her bedchambers sleeping.

But, she wasn’t.

Throughout the night Alessandra tossed and turned, she couldn't sleep. While her head pounded, her chest ached, her stomach churned, and her heart felt broken and shredded. However, she still managed to steal a few hours of much needed rest even though she was pained from the loss of her one true love—her mother. She had been there in so many ways that Alessandra couldn't count.