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Katya shrugs from her corner of the hot spring, which she dominates entirely by herself. “I don’t know, the aviax have seemed very hospitable since yesterday.”
“But that’s due to all the gold Lord and Lady Kamanda brought to smooth the talks,” Adwapa says.
“And to protect his children,” Asha adds.
When I glance at them, confused, Adwapa replies: “Lord Kamanda was adamant about being the ambassador here, because this is one of the highest peaks in Otera. After all, if fighting breaks out soon—”
“Which it will,” I remind quietly.
“—his children will be safe here.”
“Wily,” Acalan says, nodding his approval. “Everything about that man is wily, even though he doesn’t overtly seem that way. It’s astounding, honestly. I mean, you should have seen the way he charmed them with the gold. Brought almost his entire fortune to woo them. Birds and money, who would have thought.” Acalan has a faraway look in his eyes now, one I’ve seen in my friends several times before.
Keita and I share a look. Acalan has finally found a passion for something other than old scrolls. It’s just unfortunate that what Lord Kamanda is looking for is the exact opposite of a slim young man with an intellectual air.
Li stares at Acalan for a moment, then raises his eyebrows dramatically. “Astounding,” he coos suggestively. “Oh, Lord Kamanda, you’re so astounding. Will you be my commander and tell me what to do? Oh, Lord Kamaaandaaa…”
Acalan turns bright red. “That’s not what I was—I mean, I don’t—”
But Li is enraptured with his new game. He pretends to swoon against Britta. “Oh, Lord Kamanda, hold me, touch me.”
And now Britta’s in on the game as well. “I’ll hold ye, I’ll touch ye.” She giggles, the sound so loud, Adwapa turns from her to Li.
“It’s finally come.” Adwapa sighs, shaking her head. “The day we’ve all feared.”
“An’ which day is that?” Britta asks, straightening.
But Adwapa turns to the rest of the group. “They’re together so often, they’re actually turning into each other. They’ve become—the same person!”
As she shakes her head again, I nod sagely. “It’s dire, but we knew it had to happen.”
Britta scowls. “Not ye too, Deka.”
But I continue, unbothered. “Li’s personality is so strong—too strong. His contagion cannot be denied.”
Rolling her eyes, Britta turns to Li, and then they promptly fall over each other, giggling like fools. “Hold me, touch me,” they coo as Acalan’s blush turns deeper and deeper red.
A hand pulls me closer. Keita’s. He grins down at me, his expression so similar to my own, my heart nearly bursts. “See, Deka,” he whispers into my ear. “Home.”
And to think that once I was a lonely girl who had no one. Now I have all these wonderful people. This wonderful family. I could fall into my worries, my fears, about what’s happening with my kelai and the battles that are about to come, but I choose instead to remain in the present.
I nod at Keita, placing a small, quiet kiss on his chest. “Yes,” I whisper. “It’s nice to be home.”
25
The hall where the aviax host the official meeting to determine whether or not they will become our allies is shaped like an open flower. The first rays of the sun are just now spilling over its gleaming gold-and-green walls, which curve up and outward into a honeycomb of interconnected, hive-like glass perches. These perches are where the aviax nobles roost, their feathers preened to diamond brilliance, their ears and necks adorned with so many jewels, they glitter like stars. At least it seems that way from my vantage point on the floor, where I’m standing with my companions, as well as White Hands, Lord Kamanda, and a few human and equus commanders, whom I only briefly met the previous night.
We’re all gazing up at the two aviax monarchs perched on a pair of delicate crystal thrones that rise so high into the air, they nearly extend past the reach of the towering glass walls.
I stare at the pair, fascinated. The king is an imposing male figure. He’s so tall, he approaches Myter’s height, and has such brilliantly colored plumage, he nearly obscures his much smaller, plainer queen. Where his feathers are shimmering shades of purple and green, hers are a plain, unremarkable gray, although her tail is a bright, iridescent purple, indicating that she may be yandau instead of female. I’m not certain, however, given how little I know of the aviax.
It would be easy to dismiss her as a silent observer of the proceedings, except for the intelligence that gleams in her eyes, sharper and more ferocious than that which inhabits the king’s. I keep a wary focus on her as their vizier—a tall, distinguished-looking fellow with cerulean plumage that matches the splendid feathers that make up his mustache and beard—speaks. His disdain for our presence is clear in the way he grandly preens and flaps about.
As he sneers down his beak at Lord Kamanda, who is, for today, wearing exquisite purple robes and holding his ceremonial golden fly whisk—the symbol of Hemaira’s highest-ranked nobility—I glance at White Hands, as I’ve been doing since we arrived. She’s remained silent, seeming for all the world like a quiet observer, except she’s wearing what I’ve termed her ambush armor, a suit of white bone so similar to her ceremonial armor, you could mistake the two, except this suit has more flexible joints, making it easier for her to move.
She’s planning something—that much she hinted to me yesterday when she said she’d be asking me for something later, only now I regret not seeking her out earlier to ask what it is. But I slept later than usual this morning, thanks to my feather-soft mattress and leftover relaxation from the hot springs.
I needed the rest—we all did—so I’ll just keep up my guard as everyone else is doing until White Hands finally reveals her plan.
