Page 122 of A Sea of Fate and Starfire

I avoided the question I wanted to ask. “Any idea where Thaan would take Selena?”

Cebrinne’s gaze angled back at Pheolix. He hadn’t moved. “No more than we might have guessed before.” Something sparked behind her eyes. She rounded on her heel, hurrying back to Pheolix. “You’re no longer sworn to Thaan.”

The drone twitched as if he barely heard her, but he tracked the sound of her voice. His throat tightened. “No.”

“Was there anything he made you swear you couldn’t share? Anything you could never tell anyone?”

Pheolix’s lips parted. A veil of anger shifted behind his eyes, there and gone. He wrenched away, turning toward the palace. Toward Selena’s apartment in the western wing, determination in his steps.

As if he’d waited his entire life to walk inside.

Aren sat on Selena’s couch, Aitne crouched at his feet as she stoked healing water through his bones.

The rest of us watched as Pheolix slowly destroyed Selena’s study.

He’d started with the drawers of her little desk, pulling them out one at a time, rifling through books and papers, bringing them to the nearest set of eyes and asking what they said. At the murmured answer, he shook his head, returning to yank the drawers out completely and upend them on the floor, sending his fingers to explore the alcoves left in their absence.

We tossed each other covert glances, unwilling to say a word. Simply meeting eyes was enough. Aegir had tried to step in those first few minutes and help, though what Pheolix was searching for, we didn’t know.

“I don’t need help,” Pheolix had snapped, unseeing eyes bloodshot, swimming with moisture.

So we watched, leaning our backs into the walls, crossing our arms. Pheolix had never struck me as a prideful Naiad the way Aegir did, but the way he grasped the legs of the desk and yanked, sending it backward and sending splintered oak across the floor, I knew he wouldn’t accept pity now.

Still, something ached as I watched him.

He knelt, feeling over the broken wood, chest tight, until he grew vexed enough he thrust the office’s only window open with a slam, hurling discarded pieces of the desk—then chair, then cushion, then shelves—out to the sea below. Unwittingly, my gaze shifted to Cebrinne, watching from the corner to my right. Her faraway stare sharpened as our eyes met. I turned from the room, passing Selena’s shelves and table and couches into the hall, standing next to her dancing crane. A moment later, Cebrinne stood beside me, arms folded tight.

“I didn’t know,” she murmured, staring at the scuffed flagstones along the floor. “But I wonder if Selena did. She didn’t seem surprised.”

“Do you think it’s true?” I asked, trying to keep my voice even. My stomach cramped at the thought. Thaan, my grandfather. Thaan’s blood ran through my veins. Thaan, with anger entrenched as deeply within him as within me. As much as the possibility taunted me, I couldn’t imagine how she must have felt.

“Thaan doesn’t lie,” Cebrinne said. “He doesn’t need to. He knows the truth is much more effective. Nothing wounds the soul like a truth we cannot change.” Her eyes narrowed, and she shook her head, raven locks sifting from her shoulders. “It changes nothing for me. I always hated him, and I always will. But Selena…it would have mattered to her. He would have mocked her, haunted her with that knowledge. He can wither to dust on Darkness’s shelves for all I care. I only want my sister free of him.”

I hesitated, tapping my heel against cool stone. Then reached for her hand. The motion felt awkward, clumsy. But I didn’t let go. “Do you know what Pheolix is searching for?”

“No,” she sighed. “Since we were children, we kept no secrets. Whatever she left for him, she’s left everyone in the dark, even me.”

“We’ll figure it out. We’ll find her. I promise.”

Hours passed. The rain thinned to a drizzle outside, which gave way to night. Pheolix’s fingers passed over every ridge, every corner, every hollow, until there was nothing left in the room except him.

Diara shifted almost nervously over her feet. “Pheolix? Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

“No,” he answered, sliding down the wall until he hit the floor. He passed a dusty hand over his mouth, then wiped at his eyes.

She chewed a split lip, wincing as she glanced at me. Our meal tray from the kitchens, cod on a bed of wilted lemongrass, winter figs and stone berries, was only half eaten beside me. We’d picked at it together, our appetites drained from the day. “What are you looking for?”

His palms slid over the floor at his sides, where stone intersected with sand and worn-away grout. Time had etched dirt into the grooves, and he traced the crossroads of mortar as if his fingertips were a fine-toothed comb.

To be finally freed after twenty-six years, only to lose his mate in the same day. Cold anger ripened through my chest as Pheolix shifted onto his knees, feeling along the floor for Mihauna-knew-what. I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t think of what. Every possible word felt like poison in my own mouth.

Aegir exhaled, the sound summoning my attention. “We need to talk about Selena. Thaan is in motion, even if we can’t see his steps. Tearing apart her study won’t help find either of them. This solves nothing. We need action.”

Pheolix grew cold, frozen over the floor. But burning metal radiated from his body as he tilted his head up toward Aegir’s voice, a dark savagery in his eyes. “You think I’m solving nothing?”

But the Videre was right, even if I hated that he’d aimed his words at Pheolix, the only one of us to attempt any progress in hours. We needed a strategy. More than training Naiads on Evenstar.

“You speak of action?” I said with a sudden snap, stalking from the room a second time.