Page 155 of Flame and Sparrow

“I saw Zachar near the tower,” I told Mairu. “Trying to tend to his appointed task, I assumed; Dravyn said these past weeks have seen more cracks in the barrier than ever before.”

“Yes. All the more reason you shouldn’t have been anywhere near that place on your own,” she said. “I thought we were past such foolishness.”

“We were,” I said, tersely, “until I realized how much Dravyn had been keeping from me this whole time.” I tried to temper my voice into a more rational tone as I added, “I don’t like being in the dark—and it feels as though everyone I’ve ever spoken to has been doing their best to keep me there. So you’ll have to forgive me for wanting to go find some things outon my own.”

She shook her head but said nothing.

I finally gave in to Zell’s insistent nudging and hoisted myself onto his back once more, gritting my teeth at the bite of pain that went through my arm when I put weight on it.

I could sense the selakir’s anxious desire to run again, and I was tempted to let him take off at full speed—however rude it might have been—but I restrained him and let Mairu keep an easy pace alongside us.

“Dravyn should have told you sooner,” she said, shaking her head again. “I could have told you, too, but…”

I focused on better situating my hands on the reins and muttered, “But none of us fully trust one another, do we?”

“The mistrust seems to have rooted itself deeply between our kind, unfortunately.”

As though I needed the reminder.

“Do you remember what I told you about my magic?” she asked moments later, effortlessly demonstrating that magic by letting the dark skin of her cheeks transform into hard golden scales. “Change is perhaps the greatest power I possess…but unfortunately I’ve found it’s often messy, too, ripping things out by their roots.”

“And painful.”

“Painful as shit,” she agreed with a forlorn, sharp and partially-dragon-toothed smile.

I lifted my gaze, scanning the sky, some foolish part of me hoping to see wings of fire emerging from the brightness, as I asked, “You said he still hasn’t returned…but where did he go?”

“Back to the kingdom he once called home, to check on what remains of the family he left behind.”

Images of the memorials he’d shown me fell into my mind, and my heart sank into my stomach. However angry I was, however shattered my trust, I still didn’t like the idea of him going home and facing his broken family alone, for some reason.

“Is something wrong in his old kingdom?” I asked.

“Hopefully not.” Her tone was not reassuring.

I frowned, staring expectantly until she elaborated.

“Tensions are rising between the courts, as you know. When this happens, some of them fight dirty. Sometimes they target the things others care about, rather than dealing with one another directly. So Dravyn has had me and Valas watching over you during every moment when he can’t do it himself, and he’s been slipping back to check on his old life in the mortal realm occasionally, too.”

“They would attack a mortal kingdom over such things? Really?”

“Many of the ‘natural disasters’ the realm of Avalinth deals with are actually the side effects of one god getting frustrated or furious with another.” She shrugged. “It gets very dramatic at times. The Moraki don’t intervene unless things get completely out-of-control.”

Thissounded more like the gods I’d once believed in—the ones introduced to me by my father and sister’s fiery, impassioned speeches.

If only they had all proven to be so recklessly callous and unfairly cruel.

I continued to watch the sky as I trotted on, wondering what it looked like back in my old home. What it might look like if whatever was happening on the Edgelands escalated.

How had my sister broken through the barrier between realms? What sort of lasting damage had she done? Could I fix it, somehow? Or was my presence here only going to make things worse?

I was causing tension between the courts that needed to be working together on solving the threats they faced—which was bad enough—but as we drew closer to the God of Fire’s territory, an even more unsettling thought occurred to me.

“Dravyn said the attacks at the Edgelands’ barrier have gotten more volatile lately, starting around the time I came back from my visit home…could something about my return have triggered the escalation?” It sounded absurd when I said it out loud, I thought.

I wanted her to tell me it was absurd, too.

But she only said, “I wish I knew.”

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