It had been some time since he had exited her body completely and Alira felt it as a strange hollowness that made her feel wilted and deflated. The tether between them remained, pulled tightly because Henry was beyond the boundaries of her flesh and she sagged under the weight of her own body.

Therin stared at the spirit, his eyes wide, taking in the smaller man before him. He seemed to note his shoulder length copper hair curling around his long pointed ears. Therin saw his dark eyes upturned at the corners and the semi-wicked grin that lifted his mouth, revealing pointed teeth. He blinked at the spirit and nodded once, acknowledging him.

“You already know my name,” he said finally and sat a little straighter. Henry paced the wide room, wandering to the window and leaning against the frame. He crossed his arms and glanced once at Therin before looking out into the small village square below them.

“This place is a shit hole,” he said. Then he tossed his hair and sighed. “What do you want to know?”

Therin cleared his throat and cast a glance at Alira whose face was bloodless, her lips paler than usual.

“Are you…harming Alira?”

Henry turned to face the two of them and pushed off from the window, his steps eerily silent on the floorboards as he stalked toward Alira. He slowly sat next to her on the bed, brushing the back of his ghostly hand across her pale cheek.

“No more than she does me,” he answered cryptically. He winked at her and she shook him off.

“Answer him,” she said hoarsely. The spirit rolled his eyes and leaned back on the bed, his back resting against the wall. He drew one leg up, putting his arm on his knee and shook his head.

“No, but the way we are…bound. It’s uncomfortable to be separated.”

“Why did you try to kill her?” Henry’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Therin.

“Because her mother lied to me.” He clenched the hand he had rested on his knee and gritted his teeth. “She used me.”

“That’s what witches do,” Therin said condescendingly. “I’m not sure how you didn’t notice before.”

“She was different when we were first…acquainted. She was, once, very kind to me. Loving, even.” He smiled, his pointed teeth glowing faintly.

“And how would killing Alira right that wrong?” Therin demanded.

“Because, young monk,” Henry breathed, dropping his leg from the bed and leaning forward. “Alira is Erin’s pawn, just as I was. She is part of Erin’s grand plans. When that witch bed Galvyn, she knew–” but Alira let out a strangled moan and put her hand on Henry’s arm, stopping him.

“No,” she pleaded. “Don’t.” Henry merely curled his lip in a sneer and shrugged.

“Keep your secrets, pet,” he said. He leaned back against the wall and folded his legs up onto the bed.

“No more secrets, Alira,” Therin said and a warning tone in his voice brought a slight colour to her faded cheeks. “Finish what you were saying about Galvyn.”

“My mistress doesn’t want me to,” Henry said with a grin and Alira could feel his pleasure at being a pest.

“Spirit, do not toy with me,” Therin growled and he whispered, holy magic filling his eyes again. “I compel you to answer me.”

Alira groaned as the holy magic climbed inside the hollow where Henry usually resided. It seared her, sizzling against her bones and flesh. She felt her stomach roil and her skin wash with icy sweat. With a gasp, she tipped sideways into Henry who caught her with one arm. He pulled her tightly to him and she felt the tether relax, the tightness easing a little in her chest. Green light covered them both and she closed her eyes, her head against his still, cold chest.

“You idiot,” Henry hissed. “You try that again and I’ll gut you.” He wrapped his other arm around Alira’s head and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “You’re toying with things you don’t understand.”

“Then help me understand!” Therin shouted and it was the first time Alira had heard his true anger leak through. The monkish patience turned to ash on his face as he stood.

Henry lifted Alira off him, and stood in turn. He tucked her into the bed and let her limp form stay there as he strode to meet Therin. He was several inches shorter than the monk, the top of his glowing head just reaching the other’s nose.

Henry reached a hand out and tapped that nose, winking as he did.

“You will not command me, boy.”

Therin made to grab his hand but it passed through the spirit, distorting his image as it did so. Henry grinned and Therin scowled.

“But, if Alira wishes, I may answer more questions for you.” He looked back at her and frowned a little. “If she wishes,” he reiterated.

Throughout this exchange, Alira watched the two size each other up. She felt Henry’s piqued annoyance at the young monk and she could read Therin’s frustration on his handsome face. She realised that if she did not bridge the gap between them, she would be torn apart every day that Therin was with her. If she did not foster some kind of respect between the two, she would be forever brooking their arguments, having to take sides.

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And so an offering must be made, to show Therin that she could be trusted and that Henry wasn’t a threat to himself.

“Tell him about Galvyn,” she whispered to Henry and he saw him turn with surprise on his face.

“As you wish,” he said as he grinned again. “Sit,” he said and pointed to the bed behind Therin. “I do not want you lording over me like some…” he rolled his hand around, looking for words. “Like some self-righteous messenger of a fake god.” Therin let the anger boil on his face for a moment, the indignation of being ordered to sit like a dog blistering his pride.

He sat, though, and clenched his jaw, waiting.

“Galvyn wasn’t just Erin’s lover and accomplice.” Henry paced back and forth between the beds, his booted feet silent. “She had enthralled him but she was only able to do that because he was so pure hearted. He truly had wanted to help the beautiful woman who seemed so desperate.”

Henry eyed Alira as he paced and she knew it was because he was going to say things that she herself may not have known or realised.

“When they arrived back at the cottage, after their escape with the Book,” Henry said, his voice low. “She allowed him to love her. I look back and find that perhaps she did not return the sentiment as much as I previously thought, current knowledge taken into my understanding.” He glanced at Alira and she knew that he was thinking about her mother’s fractured soul, how she had misled Henry in everything she did.

“It is unfortunate that I am…capricious by nature. I may have seen her duplicity but for my own inability to remain focused.” His musings had turned inward and Alira held her breath, interested to hear his introspection laid bare. He slowed his pacing as he spoke, coming to a stop as he thought. Finally, he shook himself and began walking again.

“In any case, I was unwilling to admit any inconsistency in her. I, too, loved her far more than I should have.”

Alira looked at Therin who seemed to be listening to the spirit with rapt attention and smiled despite herself. Henry was captivating, she could not deny. She tapped him with her mind, pointing to Therin’s unblinking, attentive stare. Henry glanced quickly at him and smiled once then let the expression drop and continued.

“I was incapable of jealousy for Galvyn. He was too…good. He made the cottage a home in every respect. His joy in taking care of her, in washing her hair when she was too big to do it comfortably…just so pure.”

“Too big?” Therin asked but he seemed to understand Henry’s meaning before the spirit answered him.

“She was with child. Alira.” Henry gestured to her small figure on the bed. Therin merely nodded, confirming something he must have already put together earlier. Alira didn’t see the dawning comprehension spread across his face so she sighed in relief.

“When you saw that file, you must have been so shocked.” Therin said as he looked past the pacing Henry to Alira.

“I didn’t know.” She was shivering now, the pull on the tether hurting. “He told me later.” Henry’s attention snapped to her and his mischievous face hardened. He sighed in annoyance and crossed his arms, facing Therin.

“Anything else? I should probably return to my prison.”

“You can answer from within her now that I’ve…met you.” He met Alira’s eyes again. “Will that make you more comfortable?” She merely nodded and continued to shiver. So Henry, his annoyance still legible across his pointed features, faded into a green mist and seeped into her skin. She gasped, as though surfacing, and the shivering stopped.

As Henry flooded her, she felt her heart race and slow, returning to a steady beat. She felt the blood flow into her cheeks and her lips no longer felt numb. Icy sweat slid down between her shoulder blades as she threw the cover off herself and stumbled to the vanity for a cup of water. Her hands trembled as she drank.

“I’m sorry,” Therin whispered, watching her. “I didn’t realise…”

“It’s fine. I’m fine,” she said and met his eyes with a flash of steely anger. “Anything else you want to ask him before I lock him away? He’s unbearably arrogant and you giving him all this attention will make him impossible for days.”

Unfair. I’m impossible anyway. She snorted at his comment and let herself recede and allowed Henry the helm. Her movements immediately changed, dropping her weight all onto one leg, a hand on the other hip as she stared at Therin.

“She watches you. She’s fascinated by you but…I can tell it isn’t a desire, really. It’s more like watching an unfamiliar creature.” Henry said with her lips. Therin merely stared back. Henry, in control of her body, sauntered to the window again and looked out at the setting sun.

“Speak, boy,” she said softly, her breath against the window pane. “She’s tired and I wish to watch her dream.”

“Tell me more about Erin and where she could have taken the book.”

“I only saw her with it when she came back. After that, she was careful with it. I look back and realise that she was very good at manipulating me. My vanity is…” He smiled with her mouth and sighed. “It’s a distraction.”

“Where could she have taken the book, do you think? Did she destroy it?”

Alira turned, Henry still at the helm, and the light caught her dark hair, still in the priestess’s braided crown, throwing a halo around her.

“She’d never have done that. It’s a critical part of her plan, I believe. I can think of a few places she’d have likely hidden it but it’s hard to pinpoint.”

“Can’t you track it? I don’t know…feel it?” Therin asked in frustration. “Since you’re bound to the witches?”

Henry crossed her arms and glared at Therin but the monk ignored the body language and continued.

“You’re just a fancy familiar, right?”

“Do I look like a pet to you? Am I just an animal given consciousness? I’m a powerful Higher Spirit. The Son of Nature! I was one of Aethra’s First!” Green light lit her eyes as Henry spoke. “I existed before they did. I flew the winds before the crazed witches wrote that book.”

“Is that a no?” Therin said with a rueful grin. “Grandstanding is unnecessary. Just say no if you can’t track it.”

Alira watched as Henry moved her body to stand before Therin, her hands on her hips. She glared at him seated on the edge of his mattress.

“You’re even dumber than you look if you seriously think I won’t transform her into a bear and rip your head off your body.”

Therin had the sense to look a little worried.

“You can do that?”

“Why don’t you try me and find out, boy?” Alira wrested the control from Henry, her body relaxing into her own posture and she took a step back.

“That’s enough, both of you,” she hissed. “If you’re just going to have a pissing contest, you’re not going to have this talk right now.”

“He started it,” Therin said petulantly and only the grin he gave her as she huffed stopped her from telling him to shut up.

Kill him in his sleep. Henry suggested. Alira ignored him and dragged the screen between the two beds.

“Wake me when they bring us our dinner. I’m going to rest.”