Ophelia stepped closer to the bed, her movements jerky and uncoordinated, as if she were a puppet with tangled strings. She didn't look like a woman of the court anymore; she looked like a child lost in a blizzard. Her fingers twisted together, knuckles white, eyes wide and rimmed with a raw, stinging red.
"What's going on?" she whispered, her voice tight with a fear that vibrated through the stagnant air of the room. "Can you help him? Please you have to tell me if you can."
Eris looked at her. For a moment, the old resentment, the memories of the garden, and the shadow of the first life flickered in the back of her mind, but they were drowned out by what she saw in Ophelia's face. It was genuine. There was no artifice here, no political maneuvering. Ophelia loved Caelen, it was a complicated, desperate love built on the fragments he allowed her to have, but it was real.
