Read Online Broken Crowns by Lauren DeStefano - Free Book Online Page B

says. “See you later.”
    â€œWe don’t have to go inside,” Basil says once we’re alone. “We could stay out here for a little longer.”
    I look at him. “We got what we wanted, didn’t we? I should be happy.”
    â€œIt’s still rather a shock to hear it. And I know that you were expecting Pen to come along.” He glances at the sky and then back to me. “I’ve spent all these months trying to decide if I’d go back, given the chance. It was foolish of me to think I’d have a choice. That any of us would.”
    â€œYou’ll get to see your parents and brother again,” I offer, trying to be optimistic. But I worry the words sound bitter. My own mother is gone, and I have no way of knowing whether my father is still alive, or if he’s being tortured by the king for his treason.
    â€œWhatever we face, we’ll get through it,” is all Basil says.
    â€œI’m not scared to go home,” I say. It’s the truth. Whatever dread I might harbor for that jet ride back home is less than the anticipation and the not knowing. “It’s Pen I’m worried about. I’ve got to go in there and tell her I’m going to leave her behind.”
    Basil has nothing to say to this. He has always had words of comfort for me in the past, no matter how bad things were, and no matter how undeserving I may have been of his patience at the time. But for this one thing there are no words of comfort.
    Tears threaten again. I ball my hands into fists and I refuse to let them free. I take a deep breath. “Best to get this over with, then,” I say, and climb the steps and push open the door.

6

    Everyone is in the lobby with questions for us. Everyone but my brother, who never leaves his room, and Pen.
    Basil offers to tell everyone what’s happened, freeing me to look for Pen so that I might speak to her alone.
    I find her upstairs on her bed, staring at one of Birdie’s old catalogs.
    â€œThese drawings are magnificent,” Pen says without looking up. She traces the outline of a plumed hat. “They could almost be images. I’m envious of the realism.”
    â€œI much prefer your drawings,” I say. “Pen?”
    She turns the page.
    â€œPen, there’s something I need to speak to you about.”
    â€œI will say I don’t understand all the plaids,” she says. “It’s all the men wear. It gets boring. Do they not see that? Back home I always thought Thomas looked more handsome in pinstripes. Well, not handsome, but, you know—acceptable.”
    I sit on the edge of her bed, and she winces. “Pen.”
    She closes the catalog and places her hands down on the cover, as though she is trying to keep something trapped within the pages. With difficulty, she says, “What is it?”
    Now it’s my turn to look at the cover of the catalog in her lap. The drawing of the woman is lifelike. She has dark lips and white teeth, and she’s wearing a coat that looks three sizes too big, with pockets big enough to smuggle melons. But in her own way she’s glamorous, without a care, much like the Piper children’s mother hiding behind the cemetery trees at Riles’s funeral. “Do you think Birdie would mind if I kept that?” I ask.
    In answer, Pen tosses it into my lap.
    â€œThank you,” I say. I trace my index finger from corner to corner. “Pen, King Ingram is sending Basil and me back to Internment alone.”
    She is very still, the way she gets some nights when Thomas looks in on her and she pretends to be sleeping. After a moment she reminds herself to breathe, as though waking from a trance, and it’s a sharp painful sound.
    â€œI knew it was going to be that,” she says.
    â€œHe means to use Basil and me as war symbols. He thinks people in Havalais and Internment will be more trusting of two young people in love. He thinks it will give