Page 11 of Fate of the Sun King

I blink, remembering so many things from that night with stark clarity, but I hadn’t realized that. I study Gabriel with increasing confusion.

“Or was that just a coincidence?” Nadir asks Gabriel, clearly goading him.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. If that happened, it was pure chance.”

“Hmm,” Nadir says, leaning back and folding his hands behind his head like his point has been made.

Gabriel doesn’t respond, instead looking around the room before his gaze lands on Hylene with a definite hint of admiration curving his mouth. “And you are?”

“Hylene,” she says, returning his look of interest with one of her own.

“That’s your name, but who are you?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

She winks, and it’s obvious Gabriel isn’t getting anything else out of her for now.

Finally, he returns his attention to me.

“What are you doing here, Lor? Why didn’t you stay in The Aurora, as far away from Atlas as possible?”

I wrinkle my nose because I’m going to have to tell him this part.

“Well, we kind of have to get to the Mirror.”

Gabriel lets out a long-suffering sigh and pinches the bridge of his nose like he can’t believe what the fuck his life has come to.

“Why in the heavens of Zerra do you need to get to the Mirror?”

“Because it told me I had to return once I figured out who I am,” I say, massaging the truth just enough to make it sound believable. I’m far too good at lying at this point in my life. I’ve been doing it for as long as I can remember.

“Why?”

“I don’t know. That’s what we need to find out.”

“And how do you plan to get the Mirror?”

I can see what’s written on his face. He wants to know but also doesn’t want to hear the answer.

“Don’t tell him anything else,” Nadir says now, his earlier cool slipping away. “He said he wanted to know who you are, and now he knows. That is enough.”

Nadir is right, but I harbor a strange old affection for Gabriel. He was kind of horrible to me during the Trials, but I think we understood one another by the end. At least a little. He said a tiny, infinitesimal part of him kind of liked me, and I know it’s foolish to put much stock in that, but he also didn’t run straight to Atlas today.

“Can I trust you?” I ask, ignoring Nadir, which feels better than it should.

Gabriel sighs. “I’m not sure.”

He rolls his neck, trying to ease some tension, clearly distressed about so many things.

“Don’t tell me,” he says finally, shaking his head. “I don’t want to know what your plans are. The less I know, the better.”

I nod and look around the room, catching everyone’s wary expressions as Gabriel stands.

“So?” I ask as I stand up too.

“So?” he asks.

“Was that enough? Are you going to tell Atlas I’m here?”