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“I found a gray hair the other day,” I whispered, entirely appalled about it. I’d plucked it out and hadn’t admitted it out loud to anyone. “I’meighteen. That should be impossible, right?”
I glanced up in time to see Chance’s lips twitch. “Not impossible, no.”
Then again, there was a strong possibility I was middle-aged now, or at least my version of it. Using my gift to heal others came at a cost to my own health, and from the whispers surrounding me in Auburn after my emergence, Hygeia weren’t known to make it to old age.
“There’s something in the air,” Chance said, frowning at the still surface of the river. “Something I can’t quite put my finger on.”
“People are angrier,” I pointed out.
“Edgier, certainly,” Chance agreed. “Even the humans can feel that we’re on the precipice ofsomething.”
“Something to do with Grace?”
Chance smiled sadly. “Almost certainly.”
Grace was the elephant in the room that none of us had really addressed in the time that Chance, Creed, and the boys had been here. Leon and Tobin had come close a couple of times before backing off, which was probably a lingering side-effect of their mom’s brainwashing. I doubted they’d have been allowed to talk about their sister at all at home after Grace left Auburn with Riot. Maybe even before then.
As for my uncles, I figured they didn’t like to talk about her for the same reason I didn’t—guilt. Except we were never going to move forward, never going to heal, if we let that wound fester.
“I regret what happened that day in Milton every waking moment,” I said, staring down, unable to meet Chance’s eye. “Grace’s soul bond, Bullet, called me and told me to follow the Basilinna’s orders because the half-baked alternative I was trying to come up with on my own would have resulted in far worse outcomes. But it never should have gotten to that point. I should have run away, should have confided in Dice, bonded with him even. I wish I had even a tenth of the backbone Grace has. The ability to stand up toeveryoneand tell them that they were wrong and I didn’t care about their opinions anyway.”
“Well, Grace wasn’t so confident at eighteen,” Chance replied wryly. “Unfortunately, it took a few more years of mistreatment by her family and community for her to get to the point where she could tell us all where to go.”
“Do you… Do you regret it? I know you weren’t necessarily in a position to stop it—”
“I regret it every day,” he interjected. “So does Creed. Don’t grant us any leniency, Mercy. We were adults. Grace was a child. We could have—shouldhave—done more to protect her. Should have left with her, bond or no bond. If I ever get the honor of seeing my daughter again, I’ll tell her the same thing. No excuses, no begging for forgiveness—that’s Grace’s to offer, if and when she sees fit.”
I nodded in agreement, finding myself quite liking that concept. I’d apologize, and offer her an explanation if she wanted one, though after her bonded got shot because of my actions, I wasn’t sure she would. But I wasn’t going to push. Ultimately, our lives had gone in such drastically different directions, I’d probably have to accept that our relationship was never going to be the same even if I hadn’t screwed everything up.
“What about Earnest and Valor?” I asked curiously. They’d made enough throwaway comments out of earshot of the boys for me to understand exactly how they felt about Aunt Faith, but I was less certain where he stood on her other bonded.
Chance snorted. “Valor is Faith’s mirror, her counterpart in every way. If I’m lucky, I’ll never see him again. Earnest is more complicated. Sometimes, I think he could have been a good, kind, empathetic parent if only the Fates had given him a different soul bond. He’s too much of an idealist, idolizing the bond at the expense of everything else. Even his children.”
I could see that. It wasn’t uncommon either, plenty of agathos were like that. Or they had been, before all the bonds were broken.
“Grace will forgive you,” I told Chance confidently. “She’s very forgiving, and her relationship with you in particular really comforted her when things were hard at home. She’ll—”
A commotion at the gate cut me off, and we both turned back to investigate, though we were too far away here to see anything.
“More new arrivals, I’m guessing.” I massaged my temples, the constant hum of anxiety around supply levels and housing all of the people who had come to us looking for help moving back to the forefront of my mind. To be an agathos was to want to help, and for the most part, I hadn’t minded that instinct recently. Not when so many peopleneededus. But without adequate resources to support them all, and fights breaking out over every scrap of food or drop of clean drinking water, sometimes it felt as though we were doing more harm than good.
“I’ll gather whoever I can, send more prayers to Demeter for food,” Chance offered, mouth set in a grim line. He and Creed had taken the lead on making prayers and offerings to the gods, and while I hadn’t been super confident that it was doing anything, it had helped give people purpose so I hadn’t objected.
“That sounds great.”
“Chance!” Harbor yelled, jogging down toward us, eyes wild. “She’s here. Faith is here. I’m not letting her in, you’re going to have to confront her at the gate.”
“She’s here?” Chance looked stricken, though we’d always known this was a possibility.
“Creed is already on the way to meet her,” Harbor added. That got Chance moving. I followed behind, torn between never wanting to see Aunt Faith again and wanting to support Chance and Creed. And maybe being just a smidge nosy.
Harbor grabbed my hand, linking our fingers together and giving me a slightly impatient look. He didn’t want me to go, but he wouldn’t stop me either.
Chance sprinted through the gate that Sterling was guarding, and Harbor pulled me aside before I could follow, guiding me around to a small gap in the fence hidden on this side by the makeshift watchtower he and the guys had erected.
I went to slip between the watchtower and the fence, nearly crushing Leon and Tobin in the process. They both looked up at me with matching expressions of guilt that made me feel like I was probably meant to be the responsible adult in this situation, but instead I gestured for them to scooch over a bit so I could see through the gap over their heads.
Through the small sliver where the fence joined, I could see Aunt Faith and Valor, standing side by side, looking very much worse for wear. I’d never seen either of them look less than perfectly put together, but both of them were in torn, dirty travel clothes, matted hair coated with dust.
