“Oh, I haven’t…I don’t do much with metal now,” Lila evaded. “I just make hair pins occasionally.” Her gaze landed on his sword again. She’d never worked withos lucis;that was a privilege reserved for the blacksmiths who fashioned the warriors’ swords. Students never got to touch it. She wanted to ask Luc if she could have a bar of the intriguing silver substance instead of the steel, but she held her tongue.
“Then make a hair pin,” Luc coaxed.
“I—”
“You’re already here, and we both know you’ll never come again, so you might as well stay awhile.” Luc cracked a crooked smile. His silver-gray eyes gleamed, a combination of fire and ice, if such a thing could exist.
Luc would say that it could. And even though Earth had been taken from him…fromthem…perhaps he was right.
Hesitant, but weakened by his smile, Lila took the bar from him, swallowing as his fingers brushed hers, and rolled the smooth steel between her fingers.
Adrianna’s words returned to her.
You will forever chase things that are out of your reach, yet fail to grab them when they’re offered to you on a gold platter.
“All right,” she agreed. “Just one pin. Then I should go.”
They worked silently for a time,save for the high peal of metal banging metal. Lila worked herself into a rhythm, making straight, downward blows against the face of the anvil, while Luc hammered up and down his heated blade. Inevitably, Lila’s rhythm began to clash with Luc’s, her hammer striking on the heels of his, but Luc didn’t mind the discordance.
Occasionally, he paused to inspect his work, and when he did, he glanced at Lila’s small project. A brief look at her sketch, which she’d displayed on a nearby table, showed him her piece would be a straight pin, long and tapered at both ends, with a twist in the middle and a curl at the top. A simple design, like something she might have made during lessons.
“This reminds me of our group projects,” he commented. He’d stuck his unfinished sword inside the forge and was waiting for it to heat up again, having decided to let it cool completely this time in order to smooth the grain.
“Oh?” Lila took her pin out of its vise; she’d completed her twist. She set her wrench aside and inspected the pin in her palm. “I thought there was more shouting.”
“Should we have a shouting match right now, then? For old times’ sake?”
Tearing her eyes from her pin, Lila assured Luc with a smirk, “You would lose, like always.”
“No.You would be asoreloser, like always.”
“Well, I do like to win. As someone who’s won at everything, surely you can appreciate that.”
“Not everything.”
“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean?—”
“It’s fine.” Luc set his mouth in a firm line, though of course it was not.
Perhaps Lila sensed it because she added, “I never imagined the Creator would give your world to someone else. To not even give it to the angels…I don’t understand.”
“Who can understand the Creator? Didn’t we have this discussion before?”
“I suppose.” Lila creased her brow. “It’s just…this decision…” She trailed off, and the emotion faded from her face. It became as impassive as ever.
Luc retrieved his sword from the fire.
When he returned it to the anvil, Lila was staring down at her pin. She looked as if she might say something else but closed her mouth instead. She brushed past him on her way to the forge, and Luc watched her place the rounded end of her steel bar in the fire. He observed the red-hot glow build in her metal as it faded from his.
With her back turned, it was easy to imagine they were back in lessons. It was easier still for his next words to tumble out of his mouth, grasping and impulsive.
“If you don’t like this world, I’ll build a new one. I’ll build it so far away that no one will ever find it. I’ll build it so that no one can cross over there, even if they want to.” The words cut across Luc’s tongue. “No humans. No Creator. No Council. Just us.”
Lila removed her bar from the fire. When she turned, she seemed equally curious and hesitant.
“And justhowdo you propose to do that?”
“I’ll find a way. I always do.”
