The Warrior [The Selection]

Chapter Eight: Letter.

"Mania?"

No answer. Floorboards creaked under Nike's bare soles as she stepped into the din of the bedroom. Nothing but stale air, reeking faintly of sweat and vomit. Mania had begged them to close the curtains the moment the sun had risen, shrieking about it burning her skin away from her bones.

Nike, heart stuttering in her chest, took up a stance beside the massive bed that Elizabeth claimed as her own. She had relocated to the couch in her study so that Mania could have the room to herself. It wasn't really for Mania's benefit though, more to keep her from scaring the children.

If Nike was being honest with herself, and she certainly always tried to be, she wasn't entirely sure why they had strapped Mania down to the bed at all. Didn't know why they were washing down her sweaty grey skin or stroking back her matted cherry red hair. Nike definitely wasn't grateful for the duty of having to clean up her big sister's vomit, splattered over her own face and all over the floorboards. Then there was the task of wiping down her legs when she decided to piss over herself, Nike especially appreciated that task.

When Eris had carried Mania through the back door, Nike had thought she'd brought home a pile of bones. Bones wrapped in wet paper, sagging and fragile. When Eris had lifted her onto the kitchen table, shoved back the snarls of red hair to reveal their sister's face, Nike had felt nothing. Not relief, not happiness, not even cool acknowledgement that said she recognised the situation and accepted it.

It seemed like some cruel joke. Eris leaving was bad enough, but to have her replaced with Mania? It was like trading a dog for the stick it played with.

That analogy wasn't fair, to either of her sisters. But still. 

Nike had enough to worry about, what with her favourite sister working herself to her bones every day, and having those bones beaten and battered every night. Then to have Eris leave. Taking her strength, her competence, her good company with her... Nike had been devastated. They'd never been separated for more than a day, for as long as Nike could remember.

Then for this? To not only have the burden of the rest of the children on her back, but her big sister adding to that weight too? Deranged and hysterical as she was? Hissing about insects under her skin and calling for the release of the drugs she'd been shooting into her veins for who knows how long.

Sighing, Nike bent over Mania's form, wiped down her face and chest with one cool cloth, and then spread the other she'd brought with her over Mania's forehead.

Once that task was done, she tipped back Mania's chin to dribble the herbal water into her mouth from the chipped bowl she'd brought up with her. Valerie, the Medicine Woman who Eris had gone to find, had sent back a big pouch of herbs which would hopefully speed along Mania's withdrawal process. At the very least, it might soothe her insides while the drugs left her system.

Nike turned to leave, satisfied she'd completed her task.

"Ris?" Mania's voice rasped out of her, a skeleton voice. A voice that whispered from the pit of a grave. Nothing human about it, really.

Nike shrank away. "Ris isn't here." She couldn't help the snap in her voice. "It's Nike."

"Nikey." Mania garbled, trying hard to force open the heavy hoods of her eyes. Her cracked lips tilted upwards, "Baby sister. Baby, baby, baby," She crooned deliriously. "I sent you a present. Never forgot your birthday. You got it, didn't you? You got your present?"

"You didn't send me anything." Nike frowned, "You haven't been around for the last three birthday's." Eris had been. Eris had even bought her some fresh paints for her seventeenth just last month. Nike had no idea where she'd got the money from, or who she'd stolen them off, but Nike didn't care to ask.