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Several nights after Autu

It was just a white hand towel, fresh froround bathroo that Autumn hadn&039;t handled either at the Brotherhood mansion or up in the Sanctuary over the course of decades and decades and decades

But that was the point

As she held it in her hands, feeling the waran to think of all the laundry she had done And the trays of food she had delivered to the Chosen And the bedding platforms she had made And the stacks of johnnies and scrubs and towels

Years and years of maid service that she had been proud to do

You&039;ve beena martyr out of yourself for centuries

"I have not" She refolded the towel And unfolded it again

As her hands ry voice refused to yield In fact, it got even louder in her head as she went out and saw the floors glea, and the kitchen neat as a pin

That syht of the world is all your fault -

"Stop it!" she hissed, cla her hands on her ears "Just stop it!"

Alas, the desire to become deaf was thwarted As she limped around the small house, she was trapped not by the confines of the roof and walls, but by Tohrment&039;s voice

The trouble was, no matter where she went or what she looked at, there was soht in front of her And her plans for the night had included h there was no de

Eventually, she forced herself to sit down in one of the two chairs that faced the river Extending her leg, she looked down at the calf that had not looked right or worked right for such a very long ti the victihts, she thought It had taken her three nights to ht into the role of maid -

Actually, no, she had started in as soon as she had woken up after that first sunset

Sitting by herself, she breathed in the lerance of furniture polish and felt an overwhel tabletops and counters Which was part of her pattern, wasn&039;t it

With a curse, she forced herself to stay seated as a replay of that horrid conversation with Tohrain

Immediately after he had left, she had been in shock Next had coht, however, she actually heard his words And considering she was surrounded by evidence of her behavior, it was hard to dispute what he had said

He was right Cruel though the expression of the truth had been, Tohrh she had couched it all in terms of service to others, her "duties" had been less of a penance, more of a punishment Every time she had cleaned up after others, or bowed her head under that hood, or shuffled off to stay unnoticed, there had been a satisfying lick of pain in her heart, a little cut that would heal nearly as quickly as it was inflicted

Ten thousand slices, over too many years to count

In fact, none of the Chosen had ever told her to clean up after the her own existence in theover millennia

And all because of

An ie of that symphath came back to her, and for a brief moment she remembered the sht of his six-fingered hands on her flesh

Yet as bile rose up in her throat, she refused to give in to it She had given hiht for far too many years

Abruptly, she pictured herself in her rooht before she had been abducted, ordering around the doggen, unsatisfied by everything around her

She&039;d gone fro herself between the two extremes of unqualified superiority and self-enforced inferiority That sy the ends of the spectruedy overtaking the entitle in its wake a ruined fe her new status quo

Tohrht: She had punished herself ever since then and denying the drugs during her needing had been part and parcel of that: She had chosen that pain, just as she had picked her low station in society, just as she had given herself to a male who could never, ever be hers

I&039;ve been using you, and the only person it&039;s working for is you - it&039;s gottento give you a great excuse to torture yourself even longer

The urge to attack some manner of dirt, to scrub with her palms until sweat beaded upon her brow, to work until her back ached and her leg screarip the arms of the chair to keep herself where she was

"Mahmen?"

She twisted around and tried to pull herself out of the spiral "Daughter otten home so late Today was busy"

"Oh, that is fine May I get you so to - " She stopped herself "I"

The force of habit was so strong, she found herself holding on to the chair again

"It&039;s okay, Mahmen," Xhex murmured "You don&039;t need to wait on me I don&039;t want you to, actually"

Autu hand up to the tail end of her braid "I feel quite undone this evening"

"I can sense that" Xhex ca and sure "And I knohy, so you don&039;t have to explain It&039;s good to let things go You have to if you want to move forward in your life"

Autu the river beyond "I don&039;t knohat to do with myself if I&039;m not a servant"

"That&039;s what you need to find out - what you like, where you want to go, how you want to fill your nights That&039;s life - if you&039;re lucky"

"Instead of possibility, I see only emptiness"

Especially without -

No, she would not think of him Tohrment had made it more than clear where their relationship stood

"There&039;s sohter said "About him"

"Did I speak his name?"

"You don&039;t have to Listen, he&039;s - "

"No - no, do not tell in Scribe, that hurt to say "There never was - so there is nothing I need to know about hi up his house - the one he and Wellsie stayed in He spent all last night packing up stuff, giving her things away, getting the furniture ready tothe place"

"Well good for hi to come see you"

Autumn burst up fro in her chest "How do you know"

"He toldHe said he&039;s going to apologize"

Autuers going nuht that he was right about? Or would it be the honesty hich he spoke when he said he felt nothing for me - that I was merely a vehicle to free his beloved? Both are true, and therefore, short of his tone of voice, there is naught to offer apology for"

"He hurt you"

"No greater than I have been before" She retracted her hands and began rubbing theether for warmth "He and I have crossed paths twice now in our lives - and I can&039;t say I wish to continue the association Even though his assessment of my character and ain, even gilded by syllables of &039;I&039;h the first tith of silence

"As you know," Xhex said quietly, "John and I have been having proble ones, the kind of shit I couldn&039;t live with even though I loved hiht it was all over - what convinced me otheras not what he said, but what he did"

Tohrment&039;s voice came back: You know daet Wellsie out of the In Between

"There is one difference, hter Your mate is in love with you - and at the end of the day, that o, he will never love oing to give you a great excuse to torture yourself even longer

No, she thought She was done with that

Tih Autuure it out

"Listen, I have to hustle," Xhex said "But I&039; - I&039;ll colanced over her shoulder "Do not rush on ht as well start tonight"

As Xhex left the cabin, she was careful to lock up behind herself - and wishing she could do more for her mother than just turn a dead bolt: Autumn&039;s emotional reorientation was extrerid turned upside down on itself

But then, that hat happened to people when they finally got a clear picture of themselves after aeons of sublimation