Annalise steps away from the clearing when Nathan eats the heart. There’s no way she can watch the boy she loves eating her father’s heart any more than she can keep looking at the remains.
Her father. The man who had braided her hair when she was little, who held her hand during her first day of school when she was too anxious to move, and encouraged her to go on with the promise of ice cream after school. That night, when he braided her hair before bed, he congratulated her for being strong.
“You’re my strong, big girl. Growing up so fast,” he had said. Then he read her her favorite story and tucked her in bed.
Annalise doesn’t make it too far before her legs buckle and she falls to her knees, sobs fighting their way out of her throat. A cold breeze blew through her. It was barely past dawn, yet she felt as if she had been awake for over a week, which wasn’t that far from the truth.
Coming up behind her slowly, Gabriel sits next to the spot where she collapsed, crossing his legs. Annalise’s breath hitches, still crying softly. Gabriel reaches out but his hand hovers a few centimeters from her hand, as if waiting for something before touching her. She finds herself nodding and collapsing against his body when he finally reaches for her.
“I know, mon chérie. I know,” he says, his hand rubbing her back to calm her down, but the crying seems unstoppable and inevitable, just as her father’s death was.
They stay like that, wrapped in each other’s arms, for a while, long enough that Nathan comes to find them, one layer less of clothing than he had on before. Annalise can’t stop herself from looking at his hands expecting to find them bloody, but they are wiped clean as best as they can be without running water.
“How do you feel?” Gabriel asks Nathan. “Any different?”
“I think I’m going to be sick if we don’t leave.”
Annalise’s sobs subside long enough for her to look at Nathan, really look at him. He doesn’t look any different, just a little disheveled and tired, but doesn’t she look exactly the same? She takes a moment to wipe away the tears and stands up.
Gabriel looks at them from the floor for a moment and then follows suit. “So, what happens now?”
“I don’t know,” mumbles Annalise.
“I don’t know what I’m doing or what will happen to me,” says Nathan. “I don’t even know what powers Soul had stolen before—”
“We’ll find out together,” she says. “I need to learn to control my own magic anyway.”
“Do we even have a place to go?” he asks, turning in Gabriel’s direction. Annalise looks over at him with apprehension. Maybe Gabriel wanted to continue his journey alone, maybe he was ready to bid them goodbye and good riddance.
Gabriel sighs, a weak sound of protest, and then replies, “there is a place. Maybe.”
Annalise grabs one of Nathan’s hands and one of Gabriel’s, holding them for a moment. “Thank you. Both of you.”
Before they can ask her what she’s thanking them for, she starts walking; straight ahead as good a direction as any.