Page 75 of Burn of the Everflame

He was silent for a long time, then he sighed, his eyes returning to me. “Cake and wine, huh?”

I forced a small smile. “Mud cake and rain wine. Just like we made when we were little.”

His lip twitched up, and it felt like the sweetest victory. “What was it like out there?”

“Awful. Every last second. What was it like with Mother and the Guardians?”

“Awful. Every last second.” He looked away. “I had no idea how much she’d kept from me. How much you . . .”

He didn’t finish. He didn’t have to. I knew.

How much you both had kept from me.

Keeping secrets from my brother was among my greatest regrets. He was the one person in my life who had always been honest with me, and the shame I carried for not doing the same was immense.

“The Kindred spoke to me on the island,” I said. “Ophiucae is one of them. He’s Omnos—the tenth Kindred they never told anyone about. He tried to kill all the mortals, so they locked him up, and I accidentally set him free. Now I have to convince him not to kill all the Descended, too.”

Teller blinked. “How are you going to do that?”

I touched my chest with a mock look of outrage. “Are you saying you doubt my powers of persuasion?”

His blank look was not a vote of confidence.

“What if you can’t?” he asked.

“Then I have to kill him.”

Teller frowned. “How do you kill a Kindred?”

I set aside the blade I’d taken from Doriel and reached into the shadows of my cloak to pull out Sorrow’s Edge. “With this.”

He leaned forward to study it. “I thought Mother said she stabbed him with a godstone blade, and it didn’t kill him.” He looked up at me, brows knitting lower. “The Ignios King stabbed you with godstone. That didn’t work, either.”

My fingers traced the golden filigree that spanned the sword’s glittering black blade. As I did, a voice filled my head, whispering ancient words I could not understand.

“This sword is different. Their mother made it with magic from their home world. She was going to use it to kill him, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it.”

“And you think you can?” He was trying hard to look like he wasn’t planning his own funeral already.

“Honestly?” I pushed out a heavy exhale. “I don’t know.” I buried my face in my hand. “Maybe not.”

There was something freeing about admitting the truth. Terrifying, too.

After a beat of silence, I heard the soft pat of footsteps, then wood creaking as Teller perched on the arm of my chair. He squeezed my shoulder in that firm yet gentle way our Father had always done. The memory of it had hot tears burning at my eyes when Teller let out an abrupt, unexpected snort.

“I can’t believe our mother fucked a Kindred.”

“Teller!” I gaped up at him, shocked. And a little impressed.

His mouth slid into a smile. There it was—buried underneath the anger and pain, a gleam of the brother I knew. The knowledge that he was still him gave me hope that somewhere inside, I was still me, too.

“You think Father would be jealous?” he asked.

“Jealous? Tel, he’d never stop bragging that he stole a pretty woman from a Kindred.” He laughed, and I shook my head. “Remember when our lives used to be boring?”

“You were never boring. I was boring.” His attention lifted to my Crown. “You were always meant to do something big.”

His words rumbled in my thoughts, a distant thunder.