Page 92 of The Demon Tide

“The Mages were killing everyone set against them,” Wrenfir says, outrage flashing in his spider-edged eyes. “After they murdered my sister and Vale...” He stops, his expression tightening with what looks like a furious, grief-filled rage as he shakes his head, seeming unable to continue without setting something ablaze.

“I accompanied Wrenfir, Li’ra, and Or’myr East,” Fain interjects. “I acted as their guard on the journey across the desert, a dangerous sojourn for a young woman without magic.” Bitterness creeps into his expression, his water magic stirring. “It was time for me to leave the Western Realm, as well. The religious...inflexibilitythere was gaining serious ground.”

“I saw the way Fain was treated,” Wrenfir bites out, ferocity in his tone as he looks to Fain. “I was quite young, but I knew and understood.”

And so, they all left for the East.Wrenfir must have been barely a teen at the time, I realize. This courageous family of mine. Pride swells in my chest.

“So, you crossed the entire Central Desert?” I marvel, glancing at them each in turn.

“Well, I certainly don’t remember it, as I was one,” Or’myr puts in with a slight smile, “but I’ve been told it was a dangerous trek.”

Fain gives Or’myr an amused look. “Not with a Level Five Water Mage and a youth who’s a Level Four Fire and Earth Mage.”

Li’ra, Wrenfir, and Fain exchange the knowing looks of people with a shared history.

“So, Uncle Edwin stayed to protect us.” I meet Trystan’s gaze. My brother’s expression is unreadable, but the tightness in his eyes and his tumultuous water magery relay his stormy feelings. I turn back to Fain. “And to protect me from falling into the hands of monsters.”

“You are sitting here,” Fain says, his tone weighted, “alive and on the side of the Resistance...and with a profoundly different view of things than your culture taught you to have, in large part because of Edwin Gardner.”

I nod as fresh tears glass my eyes and Or’myr pulls me into a closer embrace. An embrace I’m chastened to return. Because Rafe, Trystan, and I are the reason Or’myr never had the chance to know his kind, loving, revolutionary father.

“I’m sorry you never got to know him,” I tell Or’myr, meeting his gaze as our fire power breaks loose to lash around each other.

“I know,” he says, voice tight but kind. “It’s not your fault.”

Fain pushes back his chair, picks up his wineglass, and rises, looking around at all of us. “A toast,” he says with great import as he raises his glass. “To Edwin Gardner. Who I was blessed to know.” His voice catches as we all raise wineglasses and tea mugs.

Fain looks to me and Or’myr, emotion filling his gaze. “Edwin would have beenso happyto see you two together...to see all of us together. Your parents too...they would have been overjoyed andsogratified.”

There are tears all around as we drink to Edwin, the floral taste of my tea mingling with my tears as we pay tribute to my courageous uncle. My kind uncle. And, in the end, my completely defiant uncle.

And pay tribute, as well, to my parents, Vale and Tessla Gardner.

Who died fighting for a better world.

“Uncle Edwin...he died so that we could make it here.” I look to Trystan, my face damp with tears, but the press of the Wand against my calf a solid comfort.

I glance out the huge window we’re leaning against, the two of us sitting alone on my bedroom’s indigo window seat, the night-darkened view overlooking an impossible drop to the Vo River. My room is dark as well, all light snuffed out in case any Vu Trin fly by.

I peer down. Vothe is standing guard a story below us beside a military rune skiff on the estate’s broad terrace, the black expanse of the river spread out beyond him. And beyond that, the glowing blue line of the border wall and the mammoth Vo Mountains, the storm band above it flickering with gauzy bursts of lightning.

Trystan’s hand glides over mine and I grasp it tightly, the evening’s revelations swirling through my mind. “Why does Wrenfir have a spider and a raven tattooed across his face and neck?” I ask, meeting my brother’s steady gaze.

Trystan is silent for a moment, and I can see it flickering in his eyes—my brother’s usual reluctance to speak for another about private things. “You could ask him yourself,” he gently suggests.

“He doesn’t seem like the most approachable person—”

“Like Ariel?” There’s a hint of challenge in the words, and I feel instantly chastened as a pang of grief for Ariel twists at my heart.

“Yeah. Like Ariel.”

“In the few days I’ve known him, I’ve gleaned that he’s had a hard life.” I wait as my brother gives me a somber look. “Wrenfir grew up in extreme poverty. As a child he was sick with the Grippe and almost died from it. Then, he was almost killed by the Kelts and the Urisk during the Realm War.” Trystan pauses again, as if formulating his thoughts. “When he was about thirteen, our grandmother killed our parents, who he wasveryclose to. Then he escaped the Western Realm with Fain and Li’ra and Or’myr only to come to a place that reviled him for being Gardnerian.”

It pains me to learn all this, but the questions remain. “Why the tattoos, though?”

“He fell in with the only group that didn’t treat him as an outcast. Death Fae refugees. The spider and the raven are among their familiars.”

“Like Ariel’s birds?”

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