INTERLUDE 9A: INESCAPABLE
“The whole of Wisdom is refracted through its fragments and thus can it be inferred from a single splinter. Incompletion. It is what you have found, and what you seek, though you know it not. Allow me then to tempt you! To lead you deeper. Were the whole of Wisdom to be unveiled before your eyes at once, you would not see it for what it was. There is more grandeur in a single shadow than a thousand halls filled with light.”
– from ‘The Book of Lithiguil’, 13:208-214
When am I?
* * *
“And so it is with heavy hearts we lay to rest the fallen. Those whose passing we cannot bear shall break us in the passage, and if we cannot let go, all that is shattered within shall be pulled thither, move on with them in spirit, the breathing forms we leave behind becoming mere husks of men, given to the darkness.”
It was a windy day, not summer or autumn but somewhere in between. When the breeze came up off the sea, it was warm, filled with memory.
Summer.
Life.
When it came down the mountains it was cold. A promise of winter’s chill to come.
A promise of death.
A few leaves had already fallen, and they seemed to crowd about the open grave, like well-wishers gathering to pay their respects.
Thank you, Illodin, the boy thought.
The god displayed more mourning than the people. Sure, a handful had turned up. Mum and Dad had had a few friends. There were neighbours, too, random people who’d only ever said ‘hi’ or ‘afternoon’ to his parents, as far as he knew. But none of them brought their kids. None of them cared. When it came to certain families, a single elder had shown up, wearing a foul expression.
Each sombre grimace melted without fail into a twisted smile when regarding him, his sister, his brother. He and his sister were the youngest here, Kas the next youngest.
He’d never felt so alone. He wanted to ask Kas why they all kept insisting on smiling that way, why they were all so cruel, but his brother was too far away. He couldn’t whisper his question.
He looked down at Jaid’s right hand, squeezed tightly in his left fist.
He looked down at the other side. Empty hand, equally clenched.
‘Inseperble,’ that was what she’d called it as she took his hand when they left their house. She was always a little ahead of him when it came to the big words.
“Inseberble,” she’d insisted, like he was mad to have never heard of the word. “It means… hmm… we can’t be seberaded.”
“Se-per-aded,” he’d corrected her savagely.
“Imseperble, then!” she’d flared in response, only squeezing his hand tighter.
When they’d arrived at the shrine, they stayed behind Kas, following him to the grave, where Mortiforn’s men and the other ‘mourners’ were waiting for them. Finally stopping, Kas ushered them into place and went to stand between them, but Jaroan looked down guiltily at his sister’s hand, unwilling to so-easily betray her, break the vow of inseperblity. Even though he knew what that would mean. What it always meant.
So Kas had grunted, and moved to Jaid’s side, taking her free hand in his own.
If their big brother was the head – Jaroan was the tail. The least. Last. He was too far away to ask his questions. Mum and Dad were gone. There was no one else to answer.
He would wait, and he would forget. The questions would enter the deepest part of his soul, far beneath the matte, unreflective surface.
Why are they smiling at me?
* * *
“So do not give in to it! We do not invite the darkness. The Shadow cannot cross that threshold without our permit. As that which is illuminated falls, so too does the light it eclipsed, shedding radiance upon the new. It is with such lightened burdens that we must rise up again, and we must allow ourselves to feel that lightness. For there is no eternal sorrow in the light, no darkness to stain death’s sanctity. We commend the souls of Kabel and Ninadra Mortenn, true husband and wife, to you, O Enduring One. In the hand of Mortiforn let them meet once more, and pass together beneath the arch of his arm, beyond the Door.”
It was strange. Everyone seemed to be acting as though their parents were gone, but that couldn’t have been further from the truth, could it? Kas held her hand, and her body had done its share of weird things – she’d quivered, she’d cried… but that wasn’t how she wanted to be seen. It wasn’t how she felt. She tried a few times to tell Kas to stand on the other side, to hold Jar’s hand rather than hers – but he didn’t understand. He thought she was fighting something, fighting the horrible sensation in the centre of her chest. He’d never understood her before, and he didn’t understand her now. The horrible sensation – that was what was normal now. But there was no fighting it. It was only a kind of… a kind of waiting. A sense of anticipation so great that as it built on itself, hour by hour, day by day, she felt as though she were being filled up only to burst.
But she wouldn’t burst into tears, not again. Or if she did, it wouldn’t be tears of sorrow. It’d be tears of joy, when she saw them again.
They weren’t gone. The narrow-faced minster – the Mortiforn man – he understood. They were only resting.
She looked down at the turned earth before her, then immediately looked back up again at the priest.
Resting in the ground.
The scent of Mum’s hair came to her nostrils, the sound of her voice to Jaid’s ears. Her bones remembered the way Dad held her, when he lifted her up despite her being too big, too old…
Stupid body, she thought, screwing up her face against the tears that came burning down around her eyeballs. Stupid traitor. Not upset. I’m not. They’re resting. We’re imseperble.
She looked at Jaroan. He was staring at someone, and she followed his gaze – her twin’s angry eyes were fixed on Mrs. Sawdan.
Right away she realised why he was so upset with their neighbour. He hated her sympathetic smile. Why did she look sad, when they weren’t really gone?
She bit her lip now, and the tears of joy came.
She squeezed her twin’s hand.
He understands me. He understands us. Deep down, he does.
Imseperble.
* * *
“Kas, look, a raven.”
“Crow,” his sister immediately corrected him.
Kas was walking ahead of them, but despite his distracted demeanour he did turn to look –
Just a moment too late. The bird had already disappeared into the trees.
“It was a raven,” Jaroan said indignantly.
“Crow,” Jaid repeated, tone-perfect.
Gods, she had a way of speaking to him that instantly set him grinding his teeth. She didn’t have to be correcting him; she could just be offering him something, but the gloating undercurrent of her voice, her word choice, it would all add up and make him want to refuse her, deny her, out of sheer instinctive spite. She’d find a way to make him sound like an idiot, always. It was never so simple as asking him if he wanted a cup of water. It was an insinuation that he owed her a favour for doing it, or that he’d already somehow exasperated her before the first time she asked. As though she possessed some inherent superiority. As though she always wanted to sigh at him.
“What’s the difference, anyway?” he muttered, scowling as he trudged on in his brother’s footprints. The grass was long and wet, the evening dimness augmented by curtains of drizzle – sticking to Kas’s indentations helped keep his pants dry around the ankles.
“They sound completely different,” she sniffed.
“But it hasn’t even made any noises!”
Or did it? he wondered, suddenly doubting himself.
“The shape of the tail, too – they’re not even close.”
Ah – so she is lying.
“You’re not even close! It’s almost dark, you barely saw it – how in Twelve Hells –“
“Jar,” Kas said reprovingly.
“How in Celestium,” he grinned at Kas as their older brother swivelled now mid-step, glancing at him, “could you pick out its tail-feathers –“
“Jaroaaaaan… if you’re so sure it’s not a crow, why did you say you didn’t think there was a difference?”
She sounded so sweet, but sometimes he could’ve just murdered her.
“I didn’t say I didn’t think there was a difference, did I?” he sneered. “I said I don’t know what the difference is –“
“But what’s the difference between that, and not thinking there’s a diff-“
Kas had stopped, and they both nearly walked into his back.
They were almost there.
“Come on now,” Kas said quietly, not casting a glance back at them this time.
He didn’t need to.
Guiltily, Jaroan swallowed down his combative thoughts, entering the accustomed mode of thought for this place. Within a heartbeat he was someone else entirely. Patient and calm. He walked beside his sister the final yards, the quibbling gone from his mind.
Unfortunately, the argument with Jaid was the distraction he’d needed to stay sane. This clean, calm part of his young soul that he’d just accessed knew only suffering. The tiff was merely a way of staving off the truth, holding at bay the future rushing down at them.
They were going to get kicked out.
Xantaire had cried so hard that hearing her weeping through the wall had set Jaid sobbing, and, as much as he was loath to admit it, even to himself, he’d done his own share of shedding tears under the covers where no one could see him. Thinking about being ‘evicted’ couldn’t be endured; nor could it be avoided. It was an ever-present peril, like waiting on the block for the blade to fall. Like drinking poison and waiting for its fatal effects.
His mind tried to retreat, tried to flee back to the sibling rivalry, the frustration with his sister’s attitude that was his anchor in this stormy sea. But there was no purchase – he couldn’t do it. The seabed was still too loose. He couldn’t be angry here. Only sad.
The names – the gravestones were there. Realities graven in grey rock. Inescapable.
They didn’t remember Mum and Dad like Kas did, of course. That in itself made him feel guilty, made him want to retreat.
What’s come over him lately, anyway?
He found his distraction, regarding Kastyr as Kastyr stared down at the graves.
The way their brother had spoken to the Gentlemen – they’d listened through the wall, and it sounded as though he was doing it again. Getting mixed up in something illegal. Something like he’d used to do back in the old days, before… before they died and it all changed. Kas had hardly been eating this past week, and he’d been coming down here to their graves with alarming regularity. Was he coming to say sorry? Sorry for something he was about to do?
But Jaid didn’t seem to want to discuss it. The one time Jaroan tried mentioning it to her, she responded with some trite sentence to the effect of ‘shut up, it’s none of our business’. He wasn’t going to get any assistance there.
So he’d watched, and waited. He convinced himself that it was okay, that whatever Kas was planning to do, it was necessary. There was always a silver lining. He liked having something to lord it over Kas with. If their brother used his shady underworld contacts to help them get Peltos the money – well, where was the harm in that, really? And Jaroan could use it as ammunition against his brother, guilt him into giving him some leeway when he acted up.
He wouldn’t squander it on swearing. Jaroan would wait till he broke something, or lost something important.
“What’s wrong, Kas?” Jaid asked.
Jaroan heard the timidness in her voice, cast her a surprised look. She was right, though. He hadn’t said hi to their parents yet. He always did that when they arrived.
Kas turned back to face them, and his smile was tight, pained; his brow was furrowed in confusion. “I just thought… I wondered…”
Their brother fell back into silence, but his eyes looked engaged – he was clearly thinking about something important. Listening to his thoughts with every ounce of his attention.
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“Wondered what, Kas?” their sister said softly.
She’s scared, Jaroan realised. She’s scared about what he’s doing. That’s why it’s ‘none of our business’. That’s –
“Yune,” Kas breathed, then whipped about, wild-eyed. “Run!” he barked, stepping in front of the two of them. “Off with ya!”
Jaroan peered around Kas to the one side, Jaid to the other. The graveyard wasn’t a still space: the rain still fell, and the blades of grass and leaves were stirred by the constant cool breeze – but it was serene, a dimness of stones and the shadows of trees.
It was obvious within a moment that neither of them could see anything, and after they glanced at each other Jaroan snapped: “What? What is it?”
But the response was a heated snarl, brooking no refusal.
“Go home – now.”
The sound – that awful yawning pit of otherness in their brother’s voice…
The twins looked at each other again, sharing in this new terror.
They ran, holding hands, and they didn’t look back. Jaid was tugging him along as usual, outpacing him slightly, and Jaroan pretended it was a game. It was a game, and when Kas returned, he would explain everything.
Mud and grass gave way to wooden fencing. They climbed, as agile as squirrels, and vaulted over, into the street.
Blood pounded in his ears. The fright, the terror, the uncertainty of it all – it was fun.
It was only when they arrived back that he realised why it felt so wrong – when Jaid raised her fist to knock on the door then looked at him anxiously before letting her knuckles rap against the wood. It was their first time going back to Mud Lane from the shrine of Yune without him. They knew the way, of course, but it was dangerous. Kas wouldn’t let them walk that far alone, not with night drawing in.
Jaroan lifted his hand, gave the secret knock. Xantaire let them in within seconds.
And when Kas did arrive he explained nothing to any of them; he just winked, even to Xantaire. He was smiling away at himself, sitting in silence with a book open in his lap, never turning the leaves, staring transfixed at the middle of the page.
Jaroan watched him until he fell asleep, dwelling on it over and over:
What is he hiding? Why are we being left out? What is he going to do? How dangerous is it? When will he tell us?
Why is he smiling?
* * *
The moment they were shut away inside the bedroom, Jaid pressed her ear to the crack of the door, doing her best to listen. She had the tips of unbraided lengths of hair in the corner of her mouth but she didn’t chew, focusing her attention on the sounds in the main room. Jaroan crowded her, doing the same, but she’d picked the prime spot where the gap between the door and the frame was widest.
“Whoop whoop! Shingalingaling.” Clack-clack. “Whoooo-oooop!”
Of all the times for the boy to start vocalising.
“Shush, Xas!” Jaroan snapped, pressing the side of his head so tight against the jamb it looked like he was going to crack a bone.
“Chu-ush, Xas… Chu-ush, Xas…” Xastur’s voice rose and fell in a sing-song as he repeated the words, smushing two of his toys together.
“Xastur, please!” Jaroan pleaded.
“Pweeeeee-eeeeze!”
“Give it up, Jaroan,” Jaid whispered. “Xassy’ll quiet down in a minute. Listen.”
Kas was pleading with the Gentlemen. The words were indistinct, but the tenor of the conversation wasn’t lost in transit. She could tell things were going badly.
More than anything else, she was listening out for the voice of the magister and when it came through, it was strong, stern, just like she’d expected. Backing Kas up. Making everything alright.
“Whoop whoop! Tingaling!”
Em was awesome. She hoped her and Kas would get married someday. Quite what the magister saw in Jaid’s brother, she wasn’t quite certain – she was clearly out of his league. Whatever he’d done, she hoped he’d be able to keep it up long enough for him to get the ring on her finger. (Long enough for Jaid to properly enjoy her bridesmaid dress.)
It wasn’t just that Emrelet was pretty – which she was, definitely – but her presence here was very reassuring. Jaid knew that Em would make sure everything was alright. The Gentlemen would leave, and they’d have their house back.
Then another female voice. Not Xantaire. Whoever it was, she sounded like a toad – a fat toad from one of the stories Mum and Dad read her when she was little.
“Are there Gentlewomen?” she breathed in wonder.
Jar snorted, but then caught himself, reining in the attitude before replying delicately: “A second magister, I think.”
It seemed Em and the stranger were at odds. The beautiful magister was saying something in the tone Kas often used with Jaroan – Jaid could imagine her wagging her finger at the toad.
“Do you think they’re going to cast spells at each other?” she pondered.
Jaroan wriggled a bit. “I don’t know whether I want them to or not!”
“I know!”
“What a croak on her! She sounds like –“
“Like one of them toads!”
“Yeah!”
“What’s that?”
“Wait – they’re… they’re coming, get back!”
The twins were sitting next to Xastur on the quilt, one on either side of the kid, when Xantaire swung open the door. They were holding swiftly-clutched up toys, leaning in as if to merely continue a game they’d been playing all along – yet Jaid noticed as Jaroan quickly pivoted, trying to get a glimpse through the doorway –
Orstrum and Morsus blocked his view as they entered, she could tell, and sighed ruefully. She would’ve given a slice of bread to get his report afterwards about what he’d been able to see.
The door was closed again, the two men heading for Kas’s bed and sitting back against the wall.
“What in Twelve –“ Jar began.
“Don’t you dare, young man,” Xan grunted, sitting down heavily almost on top of him, forcing him to scurry out of her way. “How’s it going, pal?” she asked her son, stroking his cheek.
“Tingaling!” he replied without looking – Xas was busy tapping a flat, horse-shaped piece of wood against another painted in a different shade.
“Seriously, that’s all?” Jaid asked. She felt herself blushing, but she had to say it. “What’s happening? Are we being ev… ev…”
She stumbled on the word.
“Evicted,” Jaroan said, his voice hard. No gloating.
He was helping her out.
She nodded at him, and he responded in kind.
“I don’t know what’s happening, Jaid,” Orstrum said in a kindly voice, then looked to Jaroan, “but it’s happening. Whatever comes, it comes. We’ll get through it.”
“Your brother, he will fix it,” Morsus said with all the fervour of a fanatic. “Do not be afraid, children! Tonight you will be happy!”
I don’t believe you, Jaid thought. Either of you. You’re wrong! We’re going to be evicted! We’re going to live in the mud and there’s no way I can – I can face it – my books…
She felt her lower lip going, heard the high-pitched noise coming from her nose.
Then Xantaire reached over, put her hand on Jaid’s. “You going to hold it together another five minutes?”
Jaid stared at her and nodded, pressing her lips together firmly.
Five minutes… Five minutes…
“Have we got any books in here?” Jaroan asked suddenly.
Now Jaid smiled. Her brother had the right idea.
Then her eyes widened as she recalled where she’d last seen it, and she turned, twisting, peering down under the bed.
“You’ve got Tales From The Dark Side V: Everyone’s Got A Skeleton, remember!” she gargled, blood instantly rushing to her head, chest constricted by the hard oak of the bed-frame. “I know I’ve seen it around here.” She hurled some of Jaroan’s junk across the floor. “That’s the good one, where Blighty gets taken to the necromancer’s pyramid!”
“Hey!” Jar roared. “He goes? He actually goes? Are you kidding me?”
“Ohhhhhh…” She sighed, rolling to look at him, gulping air. “You didn’t get that far?”
“No I didn’t – and now I won’t – damn it, Jaid! I’ve been reading that for –“
“Three weeks! Three weeks, and you haven’t even got to the pyramid bit yet? Are you kidding me?”
“Don’t say that to me!”
“You said it first…”
“You’re the one who just spoiled the whole book for me –“
“Whole book! It happens in the first fifty pages –“
“No way! No way!”
The confrontation in the main room forgotten, Jaid gave back as good as she got. It was the only way she knew.
“Guys!” Xantaire hissed.
They both turned to look at her. At some point Xantaire had gotten up and moved to the door, pressing her ear against the crack just like they’d been doing earlier.
Her face was pale.
And before Jaid could open her mouth, the main room howled.
She couldn’t explain it – it was as though she stood upon a precipice, braids being whipped left and right by a storm-wind. But she was inside her apartment. The storm in the main room – it was armed with a hail of books and she heard them clattering off the walls.
To her they were almost holy objects. They probably weren’t worth much to the highborn – magic made replication cheap – but they were worth something. Despite this, Kas had never succumbed to selling Mum and Dad’s collection, even when they were scraping every last penny. To listen to them being dishonoured in this way – it made her grimace, made her ball her fists.
But the anger was buried beneath concern.
“Kas?” she breathed.
Xantaire had stood up and braced herself against the door, as if to hold it shut in case something tried to get in – Morsus moved to help her when she beckoned him with a savage thrust of her chin.
Some thing – what if Em’s enemy was a sorceress? What if there were demons out there? She clearly wasn’t something good and wholesome, like a druid or enchanter. She was something noisy. Something dark.
Jaid shrank into herself in terror. She let Orstrum pull her into a hug as he gathered her and Xastur into his arms, his great-grandson only looking mildly bemused at the tremendous din – but Jaroan sidled out of his grip and went slowly towards the door.
When he got there, he joined his meagre weight to Xan’s and Morsus’s, sitting with his back against the base of the door, wedging himself in place with his feet out flat in front of him.
She admired his bravery. He had to understand what this could be. She could see it in his eyes, the extra-pallor of his face.
He understands.
Please, gods, let him live. I don’t care if we get evicted. Let Kas live. If we all have to live in the drop, I don’t care, just let him live!
Then the noise fell away, just as suddenly as it had started up.
“I hear his voice!” Jar moaned.
“It’s okay,” Xantaire said, turning and leaning heavily against the wall. “Praise be to Yune, and all the rest of them.”
It didn’t matter what Xan said – didn’t matter that Orstrum’s hug was as warm and reassuring as ever – Jaid couldn’t stop trembling.
It was almost funny, looking back. When later she thought back upon the evening, this wasn’t even close to the worst bit. Sitting here for a few minutes, thinking he might be dead? That was child’s play.
No. He was smiling when he opened the door, but it wasn’t a smile to reassure her, to help her or Jaroan come to terms with the fear, the nausea rolling over her – it was an easy smile; it was the casualness with which he finally entered the bedroom. He left with the two magisters, and other than a quick glance he exchanged with Xantaire when he thought Jaid wasn’t looking, Kas didn’t give a single outward sign of dismay.
That one glance, though. The fear – Kas felt it too.
What in Celestium is he doing? she asked herself.
The anxiety was compounded, folding in on itself, again and again until the terror had her paralysed. She sat there and watched while he prepared to leave.
Where are you going, Kas? Please, no. Don’t go. Em – Em, don’t take him, please…
But the door closed behind them, leaving her frozen in the detritus-wasteland of a broken home.
That was the worst bit.
Lying in bed, hours later, drunk on the scents of fey wine and thoughts of Kas’s new status, she could almost forget. But it was worse than the prospect of being evicted. At least if they got kicked out, they’d be together.
As much as she tried to reassure herself, tried to look on the bright side, Jaid instinctively recognised what was happening. Her soul knew it. It was one of those aches that could get better or get worse but no matter what, it would never fully heal.
He went out, and he was out for so long, she thought he was never coming back.
And when he came back, he was no longer him. He was someone else.
This…
This was separation.
* * *
The scents of smoke and sweat were overpowering – fear was on the air, and Jaroan partook of it, breathing it in, breathing it out. Jaid’s hand was in his, and her fingers were hard, immovable, digging into the backs of his knuckles.
He accepted the pain. He gripped her back in return at least as hard.
As they followed the other residents of Mud Lane into the Spannerwalk and reached the first corner, he looked back at the bullish heads of the demons, their cruel horns, their black spikes.
“We have to talk to him, you know.” He spoke quietly-enough that Xantaire and the others next to them wouldn’t hear over the sounds of splashing feet, the crying, muttering.
“We do?” Jaid squeaked.
“Those are demons, Jaid.”
“Yeah, but…”
He waited. The crowd ushered them around the bend, weaving up towards the next corner.
“Yeah,” she finished.
He felt the tears welling up in his eyes again at her acceptance of this evil. Before, he might’ve been wrong. She might’ve had her usual counterarguments. But she accepted it. She accepted it.
“He said he would be fey!” Jaroan whispered.
Jaid looked guiltily around at the others, but he already knew no one was paying them any attention.
“That was bad enough – to lose him to this… this new identity. Now what? Is he going to be using them for everything now?”
“But the wings!”
“It was an excuse!” he snapped. “Think about it! Where are the fey, Jaid? Where are all the fairies and gnomes and –“
“Gnomes aren’t fey,” she sniffed, “not really…”
“Oh, shut up! You know what I mean!”
“I thought you’d think demons were cool…”
That was a lie. He released her hand, walking on in seething silence.
He’d tried putting a brave face on it – tried doing everything exactly like Jaid told him to. It was easy to forget the darkness, the danger, in the daytime, when he could remind himself that Kas had awesome powers, that they were going to be rich… The whole concept of Feychilde was just perfect, to him. But just because their brother had said he was rejecting the notion of being some dark sorcerer, that didn’t mean he hadn’t changed. He had. He was starting to think of himself as Feychilde. Running away from reality, from Jaroan, from Jaid. From everything.
Maybe that was what he had to do, to become this champion, to put it on like he put on the robe, smile while he put his life on the line. Maybe it was unavoidable. And he saved people – there was no doubting it. Jaroan had seen it now with his own eyes. There was no going back – there was no coming back. For any of them.
But it didn’t change the fact that Jar couldn’t take it anymore. Kas was doing it all the time – running away.
Morsus dies, and how does he respond? He runs.
He takes them shopping – shopping, like they wanted or needed to go shopping – and as soon as he sees his obligation’s done with, he runs away again.
Em. Jaroan had liked her at first, but that was before he knew what was really going on – what was going to happen to his brother. Now? Sure, she was nice, but he’d cooled on her. It wasn’t like she’d shown back up with Kas to help save Mud Lane, either – she’d brought him into this world, and now she wasn’t even backing him up. It was wrong.
She took him away from us. Jaroan listened to the night’s screams, the panicked voices of the crowds. She took him away from us and our world fell apart.
He didn’t mention any of this to his sister. She idolised the magister almost as much as she did Lovebright.
If she won’t talk to him, I will, he resolved, looking down at his slop-covered feet and trudging onwards with the others. I’ll do it. I’ll tell him he’s stopped thinking about us. We’re no longer a priority to him. We’re just baggage. We’re just annoying little hangers-on, dragging him down when he wants to fly…
When Kas arrived back to the remnants of Mud Lane that night, their brother looked so upset that every one of the words he’d prepared dropped like leaden stones from his tongue, unspoken.
Jaid asked what was wrong, and Kas answered. Em was hurt. She was hurt, and it was bad.
And Jaroan never thought about voicing those thoughts again.
* * *
She sat staring at the page, doing a Jaroan. She was getting no further with the book.
She wanted to throw it at the wall. She wanted to put out all the candles and cry.
Where is he? she asked herself for the millionth time.
She flicked her gaze over to her twin. He was only pretending to be asleep. Only someone awake could be so tense, so inherently angry.
She kicked him, and then he kicked her.
She laughed, and he almost laughed back.
That was something, at least.
“Do you want a battle?” she asked.
Jaroan shook his head, keeping his eyes shut, trying to reclaim his brooding state of mind.
“Come onnnnnn.”
“Don’t – do – that.”
He kicked her again, more roughly this time, and when she squeaked he sat bolt upright.
“Look – I’m sorry. I’m sorry, okay? But I don’t want a battle. I don’t want anything. I feel sick.”
“You ate too much potato –“
“Shut up!”
“Okay!” She dropped the book in her lap, wrung her hands together. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry too. It’s just – he – it was so long ago, that he s-sent the…”
“Don’t you say it!” He came up on his knees on the bed, scowling. “He’s not dead!”
“He’s not dead.” She repeated her twin’s words, tasting their foulness, testing their weight for truth and finding it lacking. “He’s not dead…”
She shut her eyes, remembering him waking her up with a unicorn.
“I’ll be fine, Jaid. I promise. I came through the Incursion, and it won’t be worse than that.”
Both of them leapt up when they heard the knocking at the door. Xantaire got there first, ripping open the locks to let Em in.
Em, who’d been forced to stay behind, Jaid knew.
“What news?” Xan asked even as she was swinging the door open.
But the platinum-haired magister was half-smiling, half-frowning.
“You mean zat – he hasn’t returned? But zey all came back! It is all I know!”
Em whirled, not even crossing the threshold of the apartment before she was arrowing off into the sky again.
Jaid shrank down into a seat, chewing at her hair and staring at the door as Xantaire slowly closed it again, fastening the bolts…
“It’s okay,” Xan said reassuringly once she saw their faces. “It’ll be okay! You know him. What did you say he said to you, hun?”
“I – I’ll be fine, Jaid. I…” She licked her lips. “I promise.”
“So there you have it.” She looked down at them critically. “Come on now, it’s time you were getting ready for bed! Past time!”
Jaid didn’t believe it, really didn’t believe it this time.
“No!” she sobbed. “They – she said they came back!”
She whirled, flinging the bedroom door shut behind her, and Jaroan didn’t have it in him to try to calm her. He just sat dejected on Kas’s bed, staring at the covers.
When Feychilde came home, something in her changed.
It wasn’t him that was different – it was her.
She began to believe in him.
* * *