No doubt the participants planned to kill more of each other again today instead of focusing on the hunt that brought them here. More than a hundred people had entered this forest for the ga. She wondered how many would walk out.
Belle sighed and then turned in the direction of the tent and walked back to it.
The sky had brightened, and though she had expected her group mbers to be awake by the ti she was back, she could still hear light snoring coming from one of the tents. She did not have to look to know it was Lady Benedict, who she had noticed snored when they shared a room.
She was about to walk to the other tent she believed was hers and Evenly’s when she heard a voice, "Did you have a wonderful morning?"
She swirled around to find Evenly sitting with her back against the tree where they had made the tent, her face damp as if she had just washed it, and she was smiling faintly with swollen eyes that looked like she had not slept.
"Um, I was..." Belle searched for words to give as an excuse for her absence but then realized she had none, causing Evenly to chuckle.
"It’s fine, I know you went to et your husband," she said as she reached for the container where they stored their water and resud her ablution, which she had been doing before she noticed Belle walk back.
She had not actually slept last night since Belle slipped away from their group, and knowing that the other woman was not soone who would separate herself to go and hunt alone, Evenly had known she’d gone to her husband. And not wanting to be alone with the two hypocrites in their group, she had gone to look for a better hunting spot for them and had just returned not long ago.
She washed her feet and wiped them with a linen cloth and wore back her boots as she said to Belle, "How opposite we are. While I am trying to avoid my husband as much as I can, you are sneaking to yours. Do you need the water to wash up?"
Belle nodded her head and made her way to sit next to Evenly on the tree trunk. She took off her boots and coat before sitting down.
"Thank you," Belle said as she reached out to take the water container handed to her. However, she paused when her eyes caught sothing on Evenly’s wrist, sothing that made her stare, stunned and curious at the sa ti.
Though Belle had shared the sa room and bed with the lady, the whole ti she had worn a long-sleeved nightdress and robe when they were in the chamber. But now she had folded her shirt sleeves up to her elbow, which gave one a view of her smooth forearm—only that on her wrist where her vein was, there was a scar that looked like a cut that had healed now.
Belle was familiar with that mark. She recalled a young woman in Aragonia who had tried to take her own life; she had slit her own vein on the wrist. Rumors had quickly spread that she had wanted to end her life by making herself lose blood, people called her nas and said she would burn in hell for attempting to take her life. The scar was exactly like the one on Evenly’s wrist.
Noticing Belle looking at her wrist, Evenly frowned and looked down, only to softly gasp, realizing she had folded her sleeve, forgetting what she hid. She hurriedly pulled her hand back and pulled down her sleeve.
"Don’t finish the water so the two sleeping beauties can use it when they finally decide to wake up," Evenly mused as she cleared her throat. Though the two other won could be annoying, she wouldn’t want them not having water to wash.
Nonetheless, she couldn’t help but feel embarrassed at the thought that her wrist had been shown to another person.
Belle nodded her head and turned away to focus on washing, as it seed the other woman was uncomfortable showing her scar—just like Belle was with the one on her forehead. Perhaps she had gotten hurt and not that she had tried to take her own life?
"It was a long ti ago," ca Evenly’s words after a lengthy silence, causing Belle to turn to her with pursed lips, water dripping from her jaw as she had just washed her face and mouth.
"I wasn’t thinking straight and acted in the heat of the mont. It was after I cut myself that I realized I didn’t want to die and wanted to live..." she mused quietly, now looking down at the sa wrist where it had scarred, as the cut had been deep then.
"What made you do it? I an, cut your wrist?" Belle questioned, putting the water container aside to save the water for the others.
Evenly shrugged casually, but her voice was laced with bitterness. "It was when I lost my baby. I couldn’t forgive myself for it," she said and then laughed sadly. "Co to think of it, how could I forgive myself when the man I love doesn’t forgive for it? Everybody blad and said I was clumsy—that’s why I lost the baby. No one blad it on the stairs where I slipped and fell on my stomach. I was the fool who couldn’t do anything right. Even my own father blad . I couldn’t live with it.
"Every night, Josh would look at with resentnt and then walk out on to go to his mistresses.
"Do you have any idea what it felt like to think that you are the luckiest girl in the universe to marry soone who loves you and you love them back, only for that person to show you that you don’t know what love is and that they never really did love you all this while? They chose you because they wanted sothing that only you could give them," she said with a smile that did not reach her eyes.
Belle stared. She hated to admit it but she understood the feeling because she had been there with Jamie. She thought she loved him and he did her, but it was all a lie. She related with that, enough to know the pain that ca with it, and she reached out to place her hand on Evenly’s hand that was trembling on her lap.
"Josh only married because of my looks. He wanted a handso heir. He told himself, and when I lost his child, he showed his true colors.
"Imagine lying on a sickbed, grieving for the baby you lost, and then your husband walks into the room in a rush like he was worried about you... I thought he would hug and tell it’s all right, that we would make another baby. Instead... he hits ."
Belle’s eyes rounded as she imagined herself in that position. That would break any woman, and though she did not personally know this Josh, she already despised him. Belle gave Evenly’s hand a gentle squeeze, and she felt the lady’s hand tremble even more as she clenched it into a tight fist.
"The pain was just too much for to bear—his hate and my loss. I did not have the spirit to fight or face the reality again. I wanted to escape from it, and the easiest way was by dying... Back then, it was the most rational thing to do. I reached for the knife on the nightstand, where my maidservant had cut an apple for to eat, and then I did this to myself..."
She raised the wrist and showed it to Belle, silent tears rolling down her cheeks, but no sound ca from her lips.
"I never heard the end of it after I did it and recovered. My husband said I should have just died rather than bring disgrace upon him.
"I am at a point in life where I no longer want to care about him and what he does... but my heart keeps betraying . I told you I want to win this hunt, but it isn’t because of . I want to make him proud and make him see that I can do better—like the woman he is following now."
"He doesn’t deserve it," Belle said, feeling angry on behalf of her fellow woman who had gone through all this.
"I know. But where will I go if I don’t impress him? He is the only one I have. My parents’ house is no longer my place, I can’t turn to them. This is the only way... to win him back and stay married to him. I need, no, I have to suppress Cordelia, no matter what. I have—"
"No wonder my ears keep tingling. How fortunate for to walk in just in ti to hear you talking about ," ca the amused laughter of a woman, none other than Cordelia, accompanied by a few group mbers who looked like they had rged two teams together, Princess Zora among them.
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