Memory's Wake Omnibus: The Complete Illustrated YA Fantasy Series by Selina Fenech Page A

red velvet. She was clean and asleep, a towel tucked under her still damp hair. The undercurrent of anxiety in Memory eased seeing Eloryn safe and still with her. If she knew Roen wasn’t somewhere being bawled out by Brannon again it would be even better.
    Isabeth moved as though to help Memory undress for her bath, looked her up and down and backed away. Memory sighed in relief when Isabeth left the room; she would have felt even more self conscious without privacy. Stepping behind the screen she pulled two t-shirts, worn short over long, off as one piece. She winced when she lifted her arms over her head, and looked down at a spot that had been hurting her. A multi-colored bruise covered half of her ribcage. Even worse, an old, large and twisted scar marked the middle of her chest. Nasty, she thought, wondering how she got it. Do you even know what trouble they are in? Brannon’s words bothered her. I don’t even know myself. Could whoever did this to me follow me here? Pulling down her pants, she forgot her shoes and wobbled about trying to extract them from the tight jeans. Peeling off a striped sock, she discovered blood around her toes. Well, that could have happened anytime, she thought, considering their chase through forest, cave and tunnel and the many hazards to toes they held.
    Feeling cold and exposed in the open room, she quickly stripped off her underwear and stepped into the tub. The warm water came up to her shoulders when she sat down. It smelled of milk and honey, and soap suds made it almost opaque white. Memory breathed the syrupy steam and let the warmth seep into her. Finding a cloth hanging over one side, she washed it over her skin, soaking away the filth. She began seeking and removing clips from her hair. Feeling mud caked on the back of her head, she leaned back and dunked her hair into the water, massaging her fingers through. She closed her eyes and smiled.

     
    This was the most content she’d ever felt, she thought wryly. She lay back in the warm water, letting the aches and tiredness seep out of her. She felt she could just sit in there for hours, until she remembered she wasn’t alone in the room. She was in a house full of strangers where she wasn’t welcome. She sighed and lifted her head back out of the water.
    Her lazily opening eyes snapped wide with horror. Simple confusion blurred with possible nightmare. The white bath water had turned a sickening black. She screamed, she couldn’t help herself. Eloryn woke with a start. Memory splashed about, trying to pull herself from the tub. She managed to slip over the side and fall onto the floor behind the bath just before Roen, Isabeth and Brannon ran into the room.
    She cowered behind the bath while they stared at the water and then at her. Isabeth rushed across and draped a blanket over her.
    Memory stuttered, “The water, it just turned black. I don’t know what happened.”
    Isabeth wiped some dripping water from Memory’s shoulder and showed her the color. “Your hair has a dye in it, that’s all. It’s washed out in the tub.”
    Memory couldn’t help but feel ashamed at the tone in which Isabeth told her this, as if she was a simple child. Her panic felt laughable. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know it was dyed.”
    “You two, out!” Isabeth snapped at her husband and son. Roen, who had been averting his eyes, moved quickly to hide a spreading grin. Brannon followed along at a slower pace, a war of glances shared between him and his wife.
    Isabeth started drying Memory off, and she was too taken aback to protest. “How could you not know, child? It’s your own hair.”
    Memory started to talk, but Eloryn shook her head at her. This wasn’t missed by Isabeth, who briskly finished drying Memory and dropped a billowing chemise down over Memory’s head, leaving her to find her own way through the expanse of fabric into the arm holes.
    “I know it’s not a noble thing to pry but I got barely a word out of this one,”