Page 45 of Flame and Sparrow

However, when she left and came back some time later, leaving plates of food and pitchers of drink with me, there were sheets of paper tucked underneath one of the plates; I found a few sticks of graphite wrapped in one of the cloth napkins as well.

Rieta left again with only a few more words, including a blunt warning to eat slowly and drink even slower to give my mortal body a better chance at properly acclimating.

It had been an act to call for it, but I trulywashungry now that the possibility of food had presented itself.

Of course, I was also suspicious.

I picked at some sort of flaky pastry, breathing in the tart and fruity scent wafting from it, wondering if eating it would actually help me acclimate…and at what cost? I didn’t want to admit I was exhausted, but the odd heaviness in the air persisted even here. I was more aware of it now that I was standing still—though it wasn’t quite as crushing as it had been back in the garden of the gods.

Frowning, I reached for the paper and pencil, ready to recreate the lines and diagrams in my mind—as I so often did—to make me forget about the uncomfortable pit growing in my stomach.

I knew I couldn’t go forever without eating the food of this realm.

But I was going to put it off for as long as I could.

Chapter14

Days went by,I think; I was finding it difficult to mark the passing of time because my sun never moved.

There were certain hours when it seemed to grow dimmer, but nothing that I would call ‘night.’ These brighter and dimmer periods didn’t appear to follow any set pattern, either, which was one of the worst kinds of torture I could personally imagine.

Before long I began to wonder if this was another test. If the God of Fire was trying to see if I could stay sane despite having no structure to ground myself within—something I’d never been good at.

I didn’t like it; if I was going to be faced with trials, I at least wanted to know I was facing them.

There were worse explanations for what was happening, though. Maybe they’d already figured me out, for example, and I was being punished? Maybe I was dead, and the hell I’d been assigned to was personalized, reflecting the fears of my individual damned soul…

No.

That couldn’t be it. I chose to believe I was being tested, and I tried to fight my way through it by staying busy.

There was no kitchen in the house, but I was still determined to cook, to find out how the different ingredients I gathered from the yard worked in different recipes, to take notes like I had back home.

Shortly after arriving, I constructed a primitive oven with rocks and slabs of stone I dug up from the yard, and I managed to set fire to it after a bit of experimenting with leaves and twigs and friction.

Rieta was unimpressed by my invention.

When I told her Ilikedto cook, that I actually preferred it to having all my food brought to me on a silver platter, she informed me I was being ungrateful and difficult, and the God of Fire would hear about it.

At which point I informedherthat I would love the opportunity to tell him about it myself, if his godly ass could be bothered to come pay me a visit.

She’d glared in response to this—though her lips had twitched a bit, as if she’d wanted to say more on the subject—and she hadn’t returned for what must have been several days afterward.

Frustration festered in her absence; I felt like I was breaking the rules of a game, only I had never been told the rules. Or even the actual name of the game.

Yet I persisted, still determined to win.

I went for long strolls around the inner perimeter of the golden fence, paper in hand, taking notes and making sketches. Soon I had created a small book full of diagrams and charts. The house and its yard and everything in it were all accounted for with utmost precision, so I could determine if anything changed or otherwise seemed amiss or worth the risk of exploring.

Once I ran out of immediate surroundings to diagram, I went back to the beginning of my time in this realm, trying to picture the things I’d seen when I first arrived. The view from the hilltop, the garden and the gods within it, the path I’d walked to get to my boring little house…

I usually kept all these notes tucked away in a drawer, but one night—or was it day?—I fell asleep at the table with my latest sketch underneath me, and I woke to the sound of the paper rustling in Rieta’s hands as she looked it over.

“This is the Garden of Elestra,” she said, eyes wide with intrigue.

“Yes.” I did my best to feign casualness. “I passed through there when I first arrived.”

“So detailed,” she murmured.

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