Page 20 of Jacinth

I turned, wondering where he had come from, only to realize he was looking through me. The blurred face and posture told me it was the boy I knew as Alisdair, sitting on a rock.

“Contemplating mortality.”

Orion grunted and eased himself down beside the other boy.

I wasn’t sure how long I had been lost in these visions, but I had the sense of time passing while I tried to piece together the puzzle the Fates were laying out for me. There had been glimpses of Niko trying to escape his ability, Jacinth alive and vibrant and fooling around with her twin, and Orion.

The burdens Orion had carried.

The big brother, molded into that form by our parents. His overdeveloped sense of responsibility reinforced in training. And then his best friend betrayed him in the most brutal way. That hadn’t happened yet, though.

“And what did you conclude?” Orion’s voice was light.

His demeanor was such that I knew this was an earlier memory. Alisdair’s shoulders tightened. Orion missed it as he looked out over the farmland below them. But I had a bird's-eye view, and the advantage of being naught but an observer.

“They are all sheep. We who are suppressed and controlled should be their lords. Look at you, Orion. You are more powerful than any of our instructors, and yet you defer to them.”

“What would you have me do?” A wary curiosity shone on Orion’s face, and I knew he was stepping carefully.

A subtle pressure, as though I were in a wind tunnel, was all the warning I had I was being moved on. As the scene before me faded to black, Alisdair’s voice echoed through the darkness.

“Take it all.”

I landed hard and groaned as the hardwood flooring absorbed none of the shock.

“No more. Give me time to rest and process.”

“Are you back with me?”

I scrambled backward at the unexpected sound of Orion’s voice and took a moment to focus on the bowed figure seated on a wooden chair across the room. With a sigh, I dragged my aching body onto a bed—huh, I was in Orion’s bedroom—and grunted.

“I’ll take that as a yes. Do you want something to eat?”

Like a child, I followed as he rose and led the way to the kitchen. The stark glare of the neon light threw shadows under my brother’s eyes, and I noted the difference between each of the iterations I had watched. This one looked worn out. Undone.

He began cracking eggs as I took the nearest stool, and it occurred to me that the rest of the house was silent. “Where’s Niko?”

Orion continued with the food preparations, as though he hadn’t heard me. Something about this felt vaguely familiar. Sometimes, when I was experiencing a moment I had seen, it could take me a minute... oh.

“You know about him now,” I said quietly.

It was a statement, not a question, and his silence was all the explanation I needed. The timeline placed us at just over twenty-four hours since I found Jacinth’s grave, which meant...

“Hey, we need to step outside. Right now.”

I rushed to the front door, eager as a ten-year-old boy, and held the thing wide so my overstressed brother wouldn’t miss the show.

It started with a donkey trotting down the street, pulling a banner that lagged in the dirt. Seconds later—and gaining fast—came a clown wearing... yep, there was the twelve-inch purple strap-on.

“I said I was sorry!” the clown shouted as the donkey let out an admonishing bray.

From the opposite direction came a human-sized fairy, who sparkled as she flew into the donkey’s path. She sneezed and a cloud of glitter erupted from her, coating the horrified faces of the arguing couple.

“Wait for it...” I whispered over my shoulder to Orion who, despite being a wet blanket ninety percent of the time, was curiously eyeing the strap-on as it swung like an oversized pendulum, as though it might bite if he got too close.

An irate wood nymph appeared out of the tree on our front lawn and stormed toward the group. She pulled back her arm and fired a book at them.

“I. Don’t. Care. There is no love blooming for me. You can all forget it. I don’t need one mate... let alone three.”

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