Page 156 of The Mortal Trials

Hurt caves his chest and shoulders before his eyes flick to mine, burning with an emotion so intense, I can’t properly name it.

I start across the room, knee joint grating as I round the counter and head straight for the fireplace.

Chair legs rake against the tile. Talons scoring stone. “No!” he barks. In two strides, Cillian reaches me and wrenches the garments away. “Do you have any idea what will happen to us if these are damaged?” he hisses, clutching the delicate, shimmering robes against his stomach.

“How could you?” I ask, my voice cracking. Was he too young to remember how it felt to watch the woman who used to say we were her world rescind those words?

None of the three of us reached our mother’s waist the day she shucked off everything precious our father had given her before he died.

She slid the thin bangles from her wrists, the rings from her fingers, and the dangling gold bars from her ears. One piece at a time, she sat them on the wooden table just inside the open front door. Weak sunlight spilled over the burnished tile under our little feet as she walked out of our home and lives, leaving us behind like we were another thing from which she had to free herself.

Cillian had cried out for her.

She didn’t pause or even look back. She just kept walking.

I started after her, determined to stop her.

It was Carina who stopped us. She crouched and pulled us both in for a hug. She told us to let our mother go and not waste our tears on someone who didn’t deserve them.

“Stop looking at me like that!” Cillian shouts.

Abuela flinches, wringing her hands as she starts around the counter. My hand raises and her feet take root again. “I will look at you any way I please, Cillian.” My vision blurs.

He curses. “Gods, Cal. I don’t want to be an acolyte. I’m mending these for one!”

Since when does he even know one well enough to forge such a bargain?

My eyes narrow. I swear to all the gods that if the robes belong to our mother, if he somehow found her or she wormed her way to him, hoping to make amends after all these years…

“It’s not her, if that’s what you’re thinking. I wouldn’t help her for all the coin in the world!” he harshly snaps. “Which is why I’m caring for these garments – for coin. So stop looking at me like I’ve betrayed you.”

Dread settles into my belly.

Acolytes don’t pay others to mend their clothes. They do their own mending. And they certainly don’t help those in need, though they easily could. They think every sliver of copper, silver, and gold belongs only to their god. So why would one offer to pay my brother?

To sink their claws into him, that’s why.

His shoulders sink and he sighs, sensing my distrust. “She’s a new devotee. Her home burned and her family died in the fire. She had no place else to go, but she hasn’t taken the pledge yet. She can still leave.”

I tilt my head and give him a flat look.

He can’t actually believe that.

Acolytes never let anyone slight the deity they serve. They’ll stab this girl in the back the moment she turns to walk away. And if she has no family or friends, only soft-hearted Cillian will even notice she’s gone.

“Three of her fingers are broken. I saw her struggling to thread a needle while I was delivering a statue to the temple. I threaded it for her, but she couldn’t work the needle and hold the cloth. She asked if I would help in exchange for the coins she’s rationed.”

I open my mouth to tell him how stupid even speaking with her was when he puts a hand up.

“I know what you’re thinking, and that you don’t approve. But I don’t see how helping someone who needs it and earning a little extra coin is a bad thing. I’m saving as much as I can, but my wage isn’t enough.”

“Enough for what? What do you need?” I ask, flinging my hands out, hoping I can find a way to provide it so he can return the robes and tell the devotee to toss the coin she would’ve given my brother to a god who won’t even notice it fall. Or better yet, keep it and try to escape before anyone realizes she’s considering leaving.

He grips the garments tighter to his chest.

My commission provides what we need.

I glance at the plate of molded crumbs.