Page 100 of Serpent and Shadow

He completely forgotten about the kid.

Maybe he’d wanted to forget.

“Your magic is… strange,” a voice said tentatively.

Caelum tensed, his eyes flashing open. He didn’t move otherwise, and kept his gaze focused on the ceiling, his shoulders and abdomen taut.

“You’re obviously upset about something,” the same voice continued. “It gets really chaotic when you’re agitated. Like a kind of red and blue storm over your head. I’ve never seen anything like it. Not even here, I mean. In your world.”

The last sentence sounded almost nervous.

Bones finally turned his head.

He stared at the boy sitting cross-legged near him, only a few feet away from the wall where Bones was chained. He could reach out, touch his bare foot, if he wanted.

How the fuck had he gotten so close without him realizing?

Caelum got lost looking at the delicate features of the young mage’s face. He could see her in it, but not. The features there more echoed with hers somehow, present in tiny details which somehow didn’t add up to him looking like her, not exactly. He had black hair, a deeper black than hers, like his never saw sunlight. He had paler skin, blue eyes instead of green, a different forehead and chin, a fuller mouth, a rounder face.

But something of her still lived there, in the sharpness of the corners of his mouth. The high cheekbones. The sharp jaw. Something in the hands, too, the way they wrapped around his knees where he sat. The boy’s hands were already bigger, though, and longer-fingered.

And he was skinny, like he’d recently grown a foot without gaining a pound.

Caelum had known what he looked like, of course, but he’d only seen him up close once before the last twelve hours. Also, that first time, the boy had been smaller, younger, and asleep. He was still of that age where every year that passed meant absurdly dramatic changes.

“Arcturus,” Caelum muttered. He rubbed his face with his hand, and tried to stop staring at that familiar-but-not-familiar face. “What are you doing? Why are you awake?”

The boy let out a half-humorous grunt, and that was familiar.

“You know who I am?”

Caelum scowled. “Of course I know who you fucking are. You should sleep.”

“I can’t sleep.”

“Well, you should try,” Caelum countered.

“Why are you chained to the wall?” the boy asked. “Aren’t you the one who kidnapped me? I saw you blowing up walls at my school. That was you, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

The kid flinched, but not in fear. From his wide-eyed expression, he was more surprised that Caelum had been honest.

As he continued to stare, Caelum could almost see him thinking.

Something about the sheer transparency of his face was heartbreaking.

“Why are you chained to the wall?” the kid asked, his voice subdued. He swallowed, staring at Caelum’s face, as if wanting to ask something but not sure how. “I saw what that woman did to you. Is that why? Are you still in pain? I could tell it hurt.”

Caelum exhaled, closing his eyes.

Fuck every harpy and monster under the sun-baked earth, how had he become a babysitter, on top of everything else? He could feel himself avoiding looking at the kid, avoiding staring into his eyes. He could feel himself avoiding the fact that they’d likely put him in here for a very specific set of reasons.

They wanted him to grow attached. They wanted him to feel responsibility for the kid.

They also wanted to remind him he was responsible.

His father would want him to remember he’d done this.