Page 104 of The Heart Trials

I clear my throat. “You sent for me?”

The only adornment he wears is a silver ring, dull and unpolished, a duplicate of Caelus’s. He turns it now, meeting my eyes with a warm smile. It lands like a blow.

“You and the other contestants have had a difficult few days with the loss of Orrick and Lira. Lira was from your own district,” he says gently, and it feels fake.

I don’t speak. I don’t nod. I just stand there, locked between instinct and confusion. I thought I’d be dragged here and blamed for something. I thought there’d be questions or punishment.

“Did you know each other?” he asks me.

“No.” But her body lying still and bloody on the ground still lives in my head.

“Well, still, I imagine it was not easy to discover them the way my guards tell me you all did.”

I stand rigidly in place, careful not to touch anything, careful to stay near the door.

“And yet, I’m told you haven’t used your mourning Heartfiller,” he says, and my stomach curdles. “I thought we could speak in a more honest setting.” He takes a few slow steps toward one of the tables.

“You’ve endured a great deal in a short time. And grief—” He exhales and something shifts. “Grief changes everything. Even the strongest of us can lose our footing,” he adds, and I realize he means this. It might be the first true thing I’ve ever heard him say.

I don’t trust myself to speak. But my throat aches with the effort of holding in everything I wish I could say. I’ve spent too many days locked in a room too silent, haunted by everything I’ve lost and everything I don’t want to lose.

He walks deeper into his lab, touching some of the unfamiliar Heartfillers on the tables. Then he pauses, gesturing for me to follow. I do, unsure what happens if I disobey a direct request right here, alone, where no one could hear me scream.

The room opens up around us, far larger than I noticed at first. There are more tables, more colorful crystals in glass, bubbling like milk over tall flames.

“What are those?” The question slips before I can draw it back. His mouth spreads in a wide smile.

“I wondered if you were curious. I don’t usually allow anyone in here. I used to bring Caelus in as a boy. But he doesn’t have much time for games with his father these days.” He chuckles a deep belly laugh that’s as short as it is surprising, like he’s shown a part of himself he didn’t mean to. “They’re Heartfillers. Not the approved ones for the districts.” He removes one of the bubbling glass canisters from its hooks on the wall. “These I boil into liquids.” He grabs a glass bottle, like the ones on the tray in my room. “To turn into—”

“Scents?” I drift closer to one of the side tables. Scents are Heartfillers in liquid form? But Scents are freely used by the Skyborn. I skim their labels, which are written in a looping script. There are some varieties I didn’t see in my room: Mother’s Voice, Unloving, Devotion, Fearless. I step back, staring at the mirrored trays holding tiny glass vials—delicate, elegant, almost beautiful. And wrong.

More ways to twist Skyborn feelings.

More ways to have control.

More proof the highborn are in their own cage—a gilded one.

“Yes,” he says. “Not mandated, of course. Skyborn enjoy their freedoms here.”

Freedom. An odd choice of word. The Skyborn aren’t free. They don’t have a choice either. Heartfillers—in Scent form—are pushed on them at every given chance like a crutch, designed to become an itch they need to scratch. I don’t understand why he brought me here.

“I made this for you,” he says, right behind me. I jump. I didn’t even hear him move.

He holds a small box with my name on it. Its top is tied with a white ribbon, and in the bow is an oyster pearl that you can only find in the Dockers Row side of the Saltblood district, shining iridescent.

“What is it?” I ask.

“Open it.” He holds it out to me. I hesitate but take it.

Inside is a Heartfiller like none I’ve ever seen. A deep sea blue, flecked with shimmering white. It pulses softly, like breath held underwater.

“I thought something more…personal might help.” His voice is measured, warm, kind. It makes me shift on my feet. “I had it crafted with water from the stream beneath your orphanage. I thought it might bring you peace.”

I freeze. How does he know that detail about me? The stream was a sound I clung to in the dark. I used to fall asleep to it. It was mine. I’m not sure if I feel exposed or seen.

“And a few strands of your hair,” he adds. “Collected by your maid from your robes. Some say grief can cling to what we shed. I don’t know if that’s true, but the more of you the Heartfiller has, the more it can help.”

I stare at the strange Heartfiller. “This is why you called me here? To give me this?”