Page 110 of Spark of the Everflame

Teller and I froze in unison. Our eyes met for a heartbeat before shifting to our father.

“What do you mean, when she returns?” I asked.

“When she comes home,” he said simply, as if that were answer enough. He rose from the table, decanter in hand, and turned his back to us as he fussed with various items in the kitchen.

Teller and I glanced at each other again. He raised his eyebrows, eyes widening in wordless inquiry. I shook my head in silent response.

“Do you know where she is?” My words came out excruciatingly slow, each one halting and unsure.

We had not discussed her whereabouts so directly in months, not since those first horrible days after she’d disappeared. We’d only hinted at it in the vaguest of terms.

Herabsence.

Ourtime apart.

Since she’s beenaway.

Acknowledging that she was gone forever might make it real, so we’d simply talked around it instead.

“What a ridiculous question,” he said. Again his tone was matter-of-fact, final, like nothing further needed to be said.

I gradually rose to my feet.

“Father, if you know—”

BOOM.

A deafening crack split the air. The walls of our home rattled, the liquid in our glasses rippling outward.

“What in the Undying Fire was that?” Teller muttered.

BOOM.BOOM.

The three of us jolted and crouched low. A frame dislodged from its nail on the wall and crashed to the floor, while bits of plaster shook free from the ceiling. Years of training had all three of us grabbing for weapons.

The sound had been distant, yet deafeningly loud.

“Thunder?” Teller guessed. “I didn’t see storm clouds earlier, but maybe...”

Father shook his head, his brows forming a deep crease. “I’ve heard that sound before. That was an explosion.”

My stomach dropped. “As in... a bomb?”

He rose and walked to the kitchen window, eyes squinting as he searched the darkness. After a moment, he nodded and extended a finger. “There.”

Teller and I scrambled to his side, craning our necks to see.

BOOM.

We jumped again. Teller gripped my arm and pulled me close.

Far in the distance, a billowing swirl of flame leapt into the air. Puffy clouds of smoke glowed from the light of the fires below, an orange smear against the ink-dark sky.

Father frowned. “Looks like it’s in Lumnos City. Must be some kind of accident. Maybe a storage facility caught fire.”

“Or a rebel attack on the palace,” Teller added.

The air felt impossible to breathe, too weighty to pull into my lungs.

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