Page 30 of The Tenth Muse

Her other wing swept down, brushing over the thin sheet, warming my body both from the additional downy layer along with the first flares of belonging igniting within me.

With her wings out of view, I noticed a few scythes standing in the corner, disappointed none were Reaper. A thickly muscled reaper with a trimmed beard, sleek lines razored down his cheek, stared at us. Well not us, his eyes were pinned to Luna, tracking her every movement. “What’s going on with them?”

Luna glanced over her shoulder and huffed out a laugh. “Oh, Silas? He hasn’t let me out of his sight since you saved us. Same with Hex next to him.”

“I’d expect nothing less from my compara.” Eros said, gaze softening toward Hex, who drew a palm up over their heart.

My eyes widened. “You found them already?”

“Well, we’ve felt their presence but couldn’t get to them,” Luna said.

Her sister took my hand in hers. “Now thanks to you, we can.”

“Felt their presence?” I sat up a little higher. “How?”

My aunt pointed to my chest, then reached forward, tapping against my breastbone.“Feel that? That steady rhythm, the one deep within your soul.”

Rap, rap, rap.

Rap, rap, rap.

My feathers ruffled at my shoulders, a chill streaking down my spine, zinging through my tail that wrapped protectively around my torso. “I thought that connected the splendors.”

“It does connect splendors, but not to each other.” My aunt cocked her head, gaze narrowing like I should have known this all long. “Did no one ever explain it to you?”

“That rapping just beneath your breastbone? That beat belongs to them.” She pressed her other fingers against the bone, pity sweeping over her expression. “Your compara. The onewho can hear the true songs of your heart, the one that would recognize your thoughts, your soul, anywhere.”

eleven

. . .

“Reaper?”I screeched as loud as I could once the glass door slid back up from the floor. I shuffled across the room and down the narrow hallway.

The door to the bedroom slid away and I stepped over the threshold. The bed was perfectly made. Room empty. There was no sign that Reaper was here or had been back since we’d left for the training room yesterday. Could they truly have been gone for almost a full day?

I wandered to the row of frosted glass windows, tracing a hand over it until it completely disappeared, exposing me to the balcony. If you could even call it that. It was more like a large courtyard, paved paths snaking in different directions, as large as Reaper’s living quarters. And at the center of it all was a thick trunked fig tree, its ribboned roots tethered to the rich moss-covered ground.

I staggered toward it, past benches and an oversized black clawfoot tub. My hand traced the rough bark, its familiar pulse thrumming beneath my fingertips. It wasn’t painted or glossy, and my hands didn’t slip as I climbed the roots wrapped around its trunk. I reached and clutched a thick branch with my hand,swinging my tail feathers to propel me as I scaled higher and higher. My heart raced, and while my body was still weakened, every divot I’d created over a lifetime, every well-worn branch and pointed leaf was in its rightful place.

My tree.

“Lyric?” A voice called from inside the bedroom before frosted glass slipped away and I peered between the leaves to find Reaper stepping out onto the paved path. “I just went to the infirmary and was told you’d left.”

Their chest heaved, slight swells rising and falling, sweat dripping down their exposed arms and tapered sides. They sighed in frustration, plopping down on the bench, nails scraping into their scalp as they drew back their hood. One side was wavy, midnight strands kissed with blue, the other was shaved close to their head with long horizontal bars of skin showing. Leaning back against the bench, they caught their breath.

“Where have you gone?”

Just as they were about to stand and leave, I reached my tail for a lower branch and swung down, crouching atop a branch.

Reaper’s gaze snapped up to me and they quickly strode over. “There you are.”

How did you do this?

I palmed a plump fig before plucking it from the tree and bringing it to my nose, sniffing it and savoring the sweet scent. I’d almost forgotten it after so many moon cycles of painted glittered fruit, those hollow beauties lacking any true depth or nourishment.

“When the Emperor had it torn down, it died,” Reaper ran their hand over the bark, staring at the trunk as if looking into the memory before bringing their attention back up to me. “I shepherded its essence here.”

I crept lower and then sat down on the branch, my legs and tail dangling over the edge. “But that was before we knew each other.”

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