“I’ll take her from here. Come on, Ever. Let me show you your quarters.”
He leads me the way I saw the others go, through a door off the main deck. It’s a small corridor with further doors on either side. We walk past an open door, and I glance in, recognising the three who joined us on the cliff, emptying their bags and making a stack of books on a desk. It’s only a glimpse before we’re past.
They stole books?
“My quarters.” Mybrothertaps on one door on the opposite side of the hall. “And yours.” He grabs for the handle and twists, opening it up and stepping inside. It’s a narrow space, and at the far end is a wooden platform built into the room, with a mattress and bed sheets on top. It reminds me of the cell he liberated me from. Only lighter, due to the small round window, moving with the sway of the water.
A wooden chair and a table are the only other items to grace the room. “I’ll have Selina bring a change of clothes. And later you can take a bath.”
“A bath? Why didn’t you just dunk me in the ocean?”
“Trust me, you’d still need a bath. And, well, I don’t want to guess at how long it’s been since you’ve bathed. A week, maybe two?” He turns his noise up, and I hate that my chest clenches with embarrassment. He’s right.
“Is Selina the one who helped with the sea? She has power like you?” I ask.
“Notquitelike me.”
“But the others don’t. They don’t have power, because they’re Kirrian and are bound by Aslendrix’s magic?” I push on.
“Oh, okay, you want to talk?”
“I want answers.”
“And who says I’m going to give them to you?” It’s his turn to cross his arms over his chest.
“Well, I’m pretty sure you didn’t break me out to kill me. You’ve had plenty of opportunities for that. So, I’m starting small. Micah said you had an army. Are these them?” Maybe I wasn’t starting quite so small.
“Sit.” He nods at the bed, but his comment about clothes and my lack of bathing has me walking to the chair.
“You’ll realise by now that it wasn’t just Micah we had on the inside.”
“Who else?” I spit. The arrogance in his voice grates against every nerve in my body.
“Where’s the fun in that?”
They had three bags of books. “The library.” I think back to our trip, all those weeks ago. Micah just breezed right in. There were no officers to protect it, even though he said it wasn’t for everyday use. At the time, I hadn’t thought much of it. I was angry and frustrated. And didn’t know enough to question it.
“Yes. I hope you found those texts useful. Micah needed a little help in choosing the right ones for your education. But it seems you didn’t grasp the subtlety of my messages.”
All this time, I’d thought it was Micah helping me, when all along he was just a puppet, carrying out orders. My chest tightens, talons digging in deep enough to puncture and kill the last vessels of hope that this might all be some rotten joke. Some misunderstanding.
“Don’t worry, Ever. As I said before, he did like you. That’s why I did what I had to. Now. I’ll be back later.” He looks at me, mocking the sadness that must be showing on my face, and sending me spiralling headfirst into another emotion.
“You know, I’ve been lied to my entire life. I don’t know who my parents are. I didn’t know magic or Kirrasia existed until recently. And you just show up and say you’re my brother?” I lash out, my anger breaking free and overruling any of my common sense.
He just smiles at me, as if he’s won a secret game I didn’t know we were playing.
“Do you want to know my name?”
“No.” It’s a lie.
“Fenix. You,dearsister, can call me Fen.”
three
. . .
Ever
