Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
KAIROTH
I t had been a good night. I didn’t have those too often. Especially not in the last sixty years since I was freed from my prison.
After I’d escaped and come here to the shadow court, I’d had to start collecting shadows to strengthen my power. But with no residents on the island, it took time. I had to ally with the pixies, get them to trust me, get them to work with me. Then I’d had to find someone who would bring people to the island so I could take their shadows.
It was slow and arduous. But as days grew to months and months turned to years, I started collecting shadows and sending them out all over the world looking for books, resources, maps—anything that could give me clues about where all of our weapons were hidden.
I spent frustrating year after year poring over texts, no closer to knowing where the weapons might be. I didn’t dare leave the castle, didn’t want anyone alerted to my presence. If word got out that a god was on the loose, it could have catastrophic consequences. It would cause too much chaos, bring too many people to the island, raise too many questions. But more than anything, it would detract from my goal of getting the weapons.
Finally, finally, after years I had a breakthrough and found my first weapon: Ragar’s hammer. Then, slowly but surely I began acquiring more weapons. And tonight, I’d added to my collection, finally getting Aethira’s bow and arrow.
I’d flown back toward the castle feeling lighter than I had in months—until I spotted a lone figure sitting in one of the jungle trees.
Bellamy.
I’d hovered there far longer than I’d meant to, watching her cry and try to grab the tree, then wince and pull her hands away. She was hurt. It had awoken something in me, something feral and protective.
Which was foolish. I was not a protector. I never had been. I’d been about to lift away, to leave her to figure out this mess for herself, when she’d arched her neck and looked up, meeting my gaze.
“Need help?” I asked.
“No” was her short reply.
I lifted a brow. “It seems like you might.”
She responded with a rude gesture that made me chuckle as I floated down next to her and landed on the branch where she sat. I dropped down, letting my legs hang over.
“How does one get stuck in a tree in the middle of the jungle?” I asked. “What are you doing out here? Not trying to run away?”
She looked over at me, not moving. She had secrets. That was clear. Secrets I wanted to know. But more than that, I was starting to realize I wanted to know more about her. Just her.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll make you a deal. Five questions. I get to ask five questions, and you must give me five truthful answers. If you do, I’ll fly you back to the castle.”
Her eyes widened. She looked at the jungle ground far, far below, then back at her hands, her fingers barely visible beneath the puckered wounds and swollen skin.
“You’re in the middle of the jungle, at least an hour away from my castle. No one will be able to find you, if that’s what you’re thinking. And it will take days for your hands to heal. Days that you’ll be stuck here with no food or water.” I tilted my head. “You could jump, but you’d likely break a leg or an arm or your back.”
Her scowl deepened.
“You could wait for your friends to fall asleep, maybe enter their dreams, ask them for help, but I don’t know if they’ll be able to find you. I don’t even know if you know the way back to the castle from here.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, then her jaw locked. “I answer five questions and so do you.”
Now that was intriguing. She wanted to know about me. Likely for her own nefarious purposes, but somehow I didn’t care. Because I liked the idea of sharing parts of myself with this mysterious fierce woman.
“Okay,” I said. “I get to go first.”
She gestured.
I thought for a moment. I could ask her why she was here. I could ask her why she was knitting those sweaters. But I suspected she wouldn’t tell me. And besides, those weren’t the things I was burning to know right now. I wanted to know her.
I wanted to know what had hardened those edges, what had driven up those walls. I didn’t know why yet. Just that this woman intrigued me in a way nothing had for a long, long time.
“Did you grow up in the star court?” I asked.
She stiffened at the question. “ Kind of.”
“Now that’s not a very good answer,” I chided. “Definitely not an answer worthy of being flown back to the castle.”
She rolled her eyes. “After you escaped and destroyed my home, it wasn’t the star court anymore. A... curse of some kind was cast over the land by the frost queen. She used a magical item to warp the land, transform the few star elementals who survived your onslaught into monstrous creatures. We called it the Wilds. That was what I was born into. Not the star court.” She paused, the moonlight slashing over her pale cheeks, illuminating her thick black hair. She looked up at me, fire in her brown eyes. “Why?” She signed.
“Why what?” I asked.
“Why did you do it? Why did you destroy the star court?”
I winced at her words. I’d known what had happened to the star court, but after all these years I still hadn’t managed to face it. Blood. Screams. Carnage. I placed my hands over my ears, cradling my head and trying to push away the memories. So many people dead. And I couldn’t save them.
I felt her hand gripping my arm, and I jolted, looking down. She’d reached right through my shadows and... touched me. No fear in her eyes as the shadows slinked up her hand, tightening around her wrist. She was comforting me.
Our eyes locked for a moment, and she quickly snatched back her hand.
I cleared my throat. “I’m sorry about what happened to your home. I didn’t kill anyone on purpose. I wasn’t in my right mind when I was freed. I didn’t have control over my magic. It’s still all a haze, and I regret... Well, I regret a lot from that time.”
It was as much of the truth as I could tell her about what had happened.
She stared at me, gaze boring into me like she was trying to decipher if I was telling the truth or not. Then she gave a firm nod and looked back out at the jungle around us.
“My turn.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “You just asked a question, and I answered it. My turn again.”
Her lips thinned, which made my own twitch.
“What was it like growing up in this place you call the Wilds?”
I hadn’t known what had become of the star court, only that it had been destroyed. But she’d said the Wilds had been cursed by the frost queen. By a magical item. It must’ve come from the shadow court, but it surprised me that any item from this island would have that much power to curse a whole court.
She paused, thinking for a moment. “It was wonderful.”
“But you said everyone who survived was turned into monstrous creatures?”
The first genuine smile I’d seen from her spread across her lips.
“Maybe I like the monsters. Maybe I feel more at home with monsters than I do with anyone else.”
Her words filled me with warmth. “But you’re not a monster,” I observed.
“I was in my mother’s belly, growing, when the curse happened. I was spared. Sort of.” She raised her hands. Starlight glowed over us, and her meaning became clear.
“Your magic? That’s why you’re so powerful? This curse?”
She nodded, but the answer didn’t sit right with me. There was more to it. There had to be. Yet I didn’t sense a lie in her answer. She truly believed that’s where all this power of hers came from.
“The Wilds are a dangerous place,” she continued. “But I loved the wonder of it all. I loved the strangeness, I loved the creatures, I loved the way the world made sense. Nothing about any of this” —she gestured to the jungle around us—“ makes sense.”
“Who lived with you in the Wilds?” I asked.
Her eyes welled with tears. “My father and brothers. They protected me. Until the very end. I miss them. I miss the simple things. All of us sitting in a room together reading our own books. The games we would play.”
She was signing the words, but I could tell they weren’t for me. She stared off into the distance, reliving the memories.
“We did everything together. My brothers were my fiercest protectors. They taught me to be strong. They taught me to read. They taught me to fight. They taught me to use my magic. They taught me to love. I had a special relationship with each of them, and even though they drove me mad sometimes, they were everything to me.” She picked at a piece of wood on the branch. “ They liked to play a board game called m-a-p-o-r-a. I loved when I beat them because it didn’t happen very often...”
A flock of shadows burst from the canopies nearby and flew up into the air, and she jolted like she was realizing where she was and who she was talking to. Her eyes widened, and she cut herself off abruptly.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
She studied my face, and once again I got that distinct feeling she was looking straight through my shadows. Right at me. “For what?”
“For your loss.”
The corners of her eyes crinkled. “What would you know about loss?”
The words hit me hard, though she didn’t ask them unkindly, no sharp movements or a scowl on her face. Just an open curiosity.
“A lot, actually.” I shifted on the branch, making it wobble under us. “When I chose godhood, I left my old life behind. It wasn’t much of a life, truth be told. I was fleeing a war-torn land, looking for something better. But I did have family.” I swallowed thickly. “All of us immortals agreed that we needed to leave our old lives behind. That inviting family, people from the past, would only hinder us and our goals to build a new world.” I shoved a hand through my hair. “It never sat right with me, but I didn’t speak up. I was a coward, and eventually, my family died because of my cowardice.”
And I still blamed myself. I’d been so caught up in this new immortality that I’d left them behind. Of all the horrible things I’d done, that one filled me with the most guilt.
She studied me, peering at me with intensity in her gaze. “You’re so... human in some ways.”
“Is that a compliment, Bellamy?”
“No.” The curiosity vanished, replaced by scorn. “Just an observation.”
She was starting to open up to me, trust me. That made me bold with my next question. “Why are you using nettles to knit sweaters?”
A mischievous look gleamed in her eyes as she tilted her head and signed, “You already got your five questions.”
Ah. I’d gotten so caught up in our conversation, I hadn’t even been keeping track. “And you still have two more. Go on.” I gestured to her. “Ask them.”
She stared at me for a moment before stretching her arms overhead and yawning. “Another time. I’m tired, and I think I’m ready to go back to the castle now.”
A thrill shot through me as I scooped her up into my arms and cradled her into my chest, my shadows enveloping both of us. She was so fragile. I tightened my hold on her as I lifted up into the air.
I’d learned a little about her tonight, but instead of satiating my curiosity, it had only stoked it. She was becoming a distraction. One I couldn’t afford.