Chapter 756: Fate Of The Gatekeeper

Trill was waiting for me at the kitchen table when we arrived home. Rose and came to me, hugged me.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I wish we could have been there to help."

She was the first one I'd allowed to say such a thing to me. Hit me like a slap across the face.

Sorry. She was sorry. They all were. I could feel it now, a blanket trying to smother me and, for a moment, I fought against it with all the energy inside me.

Not much left to fight with. Their need to comfort me finally won, the power of my family hugging me where once they felt like doom. Love seeping through until, at last, I shook myself and woke up.

And realized I wasn't broken, lost. Not anymore. I could handle their sympathy and sorrow. Didn't need the numb, after all.

I'd survived Liam's death.

Now I just had to survive living.

"You did everything you could," I said. Turned to Mom, Charlotte, Shenka, Gram. Meira. Sassafras with his drooping ears, Galleytrot, head low. "All of you. Thank you. But no one is to bla