Page 32 of Mischief

My grandfather stands at his shoulder now, and the whole weight of the club fills the hall at their backs.

I plant myself in the middle of all of it with my chin up and my face soaked, smaller and angrier than I've ever been in my life.

"What did you do to him?"

"He keeps his position in the club." It's my grandfather who answers, his voice all gravel and exhaustion. "For now. Prospects have been ended for a whole lot less, girl. He's breathing, and that's mercy."

His old eyes travel over me, and there's grief buried in them, and somehow that's worse than if he'd shouted.

"You're not to see him. That's the ruling. He stays clear of you, you stay clear of him. Or the nextkirkjadoesn't end withhim walking out of it on his own feet. Do you understand what I'm telling you?"

"You can't?—"

"It's already done."

Tor.

My father.

Not shaking anymore, only hollowed all the way out.

"It's decided."

Decided.

The word goes through me like a crack splitting across a frozen lake.

I look around the hall at every one of them, my father and my grandfather and the men who've taught me so many life lessons.

All of them fresh out of a room where they cut my whole life into pieces and dealt them out without asking me a single question.

And something in my chest that's been bending for twenty-five years finally gives way all at once.

I stop crying.

That's the strange part, how fast it goes.

The tears dry up in an instant, like my body understands this moment needs something harder and colder than grief.

"You fucking decided something for me, huh?"

My voice comes out low and level, steadier than any part of me feels, the flat calmness you find at the very bottom of the worst thing there is.

"All of you. In there. About my life. About whoI'mallowed to love."

I find my father's eyes and I hold them, refusing to let go until I watch him flinch back from me.

"You've spent ten years telling me you're protecting me. That you missed my whole childhood and you're making it right. Well, look around you, Daddy."

My hand shakes as I lift it toward Bodul, and I let it shake, let every man in this hall watch it shake.

"This is what your protection looks like. A good man bleeding on your floor, and your daughter learning that after all of it, after everything, she still doesn't get one single vote in her own life."

My voice doesn't break. I won't let it.

"You didn't protect me tonight. You showed me exactly how much you trust me. Which is not at all."

Nobody says a word.