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“I saw you.”
I blinked and shook my head. He couldn’t mean he saw us in person. “Like … how Daithi sees things? You have visions?”
“No.”
I stared at him, waiting for him to continue. When he didn’t, I said, “You aren’t very chatty.”
“Not generally, no.” There was silence as he considered me. “You are not afraid of me? Of the training? Of what you will have to do to save our race? Of what the gods will ask of you?”
“I’ve not had much time to think about it. There have been more important things to deal with.”
It was true enough. As much as I wanted to help save the titan race, especially Zaide’s siblings, I wondered whether we would survive the witches before we could complete the mission from the gods.
He nodded and seemed to echo my thoughts. “It will not always be so easy to prioritize. At some point, it is going to be equally important. Your survival will be the survival of the titans.”
“You say that like you aren’t one.”
He quickly covered a flash of surprise by turning away from me and walking toward a bench that I hadn’t noticed. “I am half titan.”
My manners forbade me from asking what his other half was, despite my curiosity, and so I simply followed after him and asked, "So, you have the titan powers, like they used to have?"
He stood at the end of the bench and nodded. "The thread powers, yes. Every titan could once see a thread of the universe, abstract or physical, and manipulate it. That is why they were so powerful."
Zaide had mentioned something about the fabric of the universe before, which I hadn’t really understood at the time, and Baelen’s explanation didn’t really add much to my knowledge, but I hoped Baelen would have the answer that Zaide didn’t.
“And Zaide and I … Will we have it? Individually or together? How does it work since our souls are in half?” I sank onto the hard wood of the bench and stared up at him.
“I don’t know.” He stared at a spot on the bench and rubbed his thumb over it.
I sighed frustratedly. It was clear he knew something but wasn’t feeling like sharing. “Are you going to test us?”
He inclined his head slightly. “When the time is right.”
“When will that be? We need to know how to use our powers now. We’re trapped. We need to get out. There are witches about to drain our magic and take our blood to bring someone back from the dead.” He didn’t reply. Only stared. “Baelen, can you help us?”
“Why did they do this to you?” A muscle in his cheek jumped, but otherwise, his face remained stoic.
Does he think we deserve it?
I hastened to summarize. “We freed lots of demon fire because the witches were going to use it to raise someone from the dead who could stop portals opening in the human realm. But my witch was murdered, which should have killed me because I’m a familiar and I need a witch to live. So, Zaide asked the gods, your fathers, to save me, and so we were bonded to each other. But while Charlie was bonding to me as my new witch, we were captured.”
His eyes flashed red. “You are going to be killed in the place of the demon fire you freed?”
“Yes. Unless you can teach me how to save us.” I pleaded with my eyes.
“I’m sorry, human—”
“Clawdia.” I interrupted, realizing I hadn’t introduced myself.
He nodded his acknowledgment and rubbed his jaw as he considered. “I can’t be there in time to free you since I am still recovering from creating multiple portals earlier. And teaching you to use your gift, especially when we don’t know how it will manifest or what it will be, will take too long to save you.”
I stood from the bench and stepped toward him, my hands shaking as the urgency of our situation came back to me. “There must be something you can do,” I begged.
A small line between his brows formed. “I cannot come to the human realm, but I might be able to do something else.”
“What?”
He licked his lips, and I tracked the motion avidly. “I could form a temporary connection, which will allow me control of you and still have the use of my powers.”
