The Beasts We Bury (The Broken Citadel #1)

17. Prospective Seconde Mancella Amaryllis Cliff

17

P ROSPECTIVE S ECONDE M ANCELLA A MARYLLIS C LIFF

|2 DAYS UNTIL THE ASSURANCE|

When dawn wakes me, a weird breeze tickles my face, everything smells like rain, and there’s something warm and solid at my back.

When the warm, solid thing shifts, my eyes fly open.

That is a person.

In my bed.

Why is there a person in my bed?

Obligingly, my brain fills me in with helpful reminders of my own brazen comments from the night before. They float through my mind like toy boats on a lake, bobbing mockingly along the edge of my consciousness.

… And the bed is plenty big enough.

You can get under the blankets, you know.

I need… solace.

I stifle a melodramatic gasp as the thoughts drop anchor. I said those things! To Silver ! What possessed me?!

I throw the blanket over my head, suddenly extremely conscious of the flaming blush that paints my cheeks, the tangled, still-damp mess that is my hair, and the sour taste in my mouth that indicates possible morning breath.

I am conscious in an entirely different way of Silver’s body pressed against mine, his pine-smoke scent wrapped around me, and the enveloping warmth of our shared space. It’s all… really nice, actually.

This is too much to process. No one should be expected to process this many perplexing realities before noon.

“You awake?” Silver asks.

“Uh. No?”

There’s some blanket rustling, and I think he’s just propped himself up on one elbow. “So you just dove for cover in your sleep, then?” he asks.

“Yes,” I tell him. “I’m a chronic sleep-diver. It’s a very serious ailment. Incurable.”

I expect him to shoot back some sly remark, or perhaps whip the blankets off me to prove I’m lying, but he just gets out of the bed, inviting a rush of crisp morning air into our formerly cozy cocoon.

“Take your time,” he says.

His footsteps head toward the door, and I hear it open and shut behind him.

I stick my head out of the cocoon, frowning after him.

What was that about?

Did he not enjoy waking up next to me as much as I enjoyed waking up next to him? My stomach sinks at the thought.

After staring at the door long enough to determine that he’s not walking back through it, I comb my fingers through my hair, doing my best to tamp down the mess into something vaguely presentable.

Then I swallow my nerves and emerge onto the mossy deck.

Only to find it empty.

Did he… leave? He seemed off, but I didn’t think he’d abandon me in the middle of the woods without so much as a goodbye.

“I’m up here,” Silver says, and I crane my neck toward his voice.

He’s in the crow’s nest, silhouetted against the bright morning sunrise, looking down at me with an expression I can’t read in such obscured light.

I put a hand over my eyes. “Am I supposed to follow you?” I ask.

He shrugs against the sunshine. “You’re welcome to try.”

Um, all right, then.

I eye the rope ladder, which is as covered with vines as the rest of the ship, but opt to make a jump for the overhanging branches instead. It takes a few tries to pull myself up, and I can hear Silver snicker at my efforts, but eventually I’m able to scramble into the tree and start climbing.

Twigs scrape at my skin, sap rubs off on my fingers, and I run across more than one bug that crawls into my clothing as I’m evaluating my path. Even so, I stubbornly keep pushing until I’m on the edge of a branch that hangs at eye level with the crow’s nest, giving Silver a triumphant smile.

He smirks at me with his chin propped on folded arms.

“Not bad,” he says. “But now what?”

There’s still about a three-foot gap between us, and no other branches are even remotely close by. Hearing the playful tone back in his voice again encourages me, though.

So I don’t look down. I look at him. And that’s all I need to look at.

“I’m gonna jump,” I tell him.

His smile drops. “No, you’re not.”

“I am,” I say. “And you’re going to catch me.”

He glances nervously at the deck below, then makes a hasty retreat to the other side of the crow’s nest, hands raised to show that he’s not ready.

“Mance, seriously,” he says. “Don’t.”

“Count of three,” I tell him, pulling my legs up onto the branch. “One…”

My heart is pounding, but I’ve come this far, and I want to make it. It’s probably foolish, and in mere seconds I might really regret it, but I’m sick of being told what I can and can’t do.

I let go with my hands and balance on my feet, but the branch is narrow and my stance is wobbly.

“ Mance!” Silver’s voice is desperate now.

“Two…,” I continue stubbornly. My foot starts to slip.

“I said don’t —” Silver starts again.

“Three!” I yell over him, because at this point it’s either jump or fall.

I launch myself at the railing and for all his protests, Silver throws himself forward immediately. I’ve barely started clawing the edge before he’s on me, hands gripping, arms straining, expression tense as he hauls me over.

We collapse, panting onto the floor of the crow’s nest, leaning against its sides. My adrenaline seems to kick in after the fact and my animals are going nuts in my chest. But there’s an undeniable thrill to it as well. I feel more alive than I have in years.

“Why would you do that?” Silver asks. He sounds a little mad, but mostly incredulous. “You could have died!”

“You weren’t gonna let me fall,” I say between breaths. “I trust you.”

Silver closes his eyes and leans his head back like my words cause him physical pain. “Do me a favor,” he says. “Trust me a little less.”

I laugh, but he doesn’t, and the sound soon dies on my lips.

“What’s with you this morning?” I ask. I thought we were past the weirdness.

“Nothing,” he says, voice barely a whisper.

“Something,” I push.

His eyes open and slide to mine but after a beat they skate away. “I’ve just… been thinking,” he tells me. “I climb when I think. Always have. I didn’t actually expect you to—”

“What were you thinking about?” I ask, because I don’t want to talk about my stunt anymore. I want to talk about whatever’s weird and fix it.

He pulls on the sleeve of his ridiculous shirt. “Next steps, I guess. I had… an idea.”

I fold my legs under me, getting settled. “What is it?”

“Well…” His words fall off, like he can’t even say them. I narrow my eyes and he flashes an apologetic smile. Then he takes something out of his pocket and it catches the sun, momentarily blinding me.

The bracelet.

I hold up a hand against the glare and sit up straighter. “I didn’t realize you still had that.”

He twirls it around his fingers, like he’s considering what to reply, but finally something passes over his face and he continues in a voice that’s more confident.

“I’ve just been thinking. If it can keep your animals out, it can probably keep them in, right?” he asks.

“That’s what he said,” I confirm. “Why?”

“Well, right now it’s got a keyhole, and I assume your dad has the key, but what if…” He starts talking faster. “What if you used his own weapon against him? Locked your animals in and then welded the bracelet shut so he couldn’t open it? If you did that, then he’d never be able to force you to summon again. He could never make your animals fight. He couldn’t use you as this standing threat to other realms. He probably wouldn’t even make you kill anymore, because what would be the point? You wouldn’t have to be his tool any longer. You could just be… you.”

It takes a couple minutes for me to process that idea. I gape at him, turning it over and over in my mind.

Willingly cut off my access to my own magic?

Be a normal girl?

Could that… really be possible?

Ever since I entered the Broken Citadel, I’ve wanted nothing more than to escape its clutches. My father’s clutches. I don’t even know what it would be like to not have to fight him at every turn. But still…

“I… I don’t know,” I say.

As my animals stir within me, reacting to my nervousness, I feel a pang thinking about never seeing them again. Never walking with them or running my hands through their fur. Never getting to express my feelings through their growls, chirps, hisses, snarls, or yips.

“I think it could help with the conflict,” Silver says. “With the Grasslands, I mean. Clearly, taking the sword won’t delay things for much longer. But taking his biggest weapon away might.”

I bristle at being called a weapon.

And yet I can’t deny that’s what I am.

“Maybe,” I say. “But it’s a big decision. I just want to think it through.”

Silver spins the bracelet on the tip of his finger and then stops it in place. “Tell you what. We won’t weld it right away. Just put it on and see how it feels for a day. And then we’ll go from there. If you don’t like it, we’ll think of something else. Together.”

His words are kind, and yet there’s something in his pushiness that makes me still and look at him sideways. His choppy hair obscures most of his eyes, but his gaze doesn’t meet mine. Is he hiding something?

I shake off the feeling. Silver isn’t like that. I’m too used to dealing with my father’s manipulations and it’s making me see subterfuge where there isn’t any.

What he’s offering is a way to get my freedom and autonomy back, to stop the endless cycle of death, to prevent whatever is brewing with the Grasslands Realm. His goals are the same as mine.

And after everything he did for me yesterday, I want to show him that he’s someone I trust, even if it’s scary. I just leaped out of a tree knowing that he’d catch me. I can do this, too.

It’s like he said. We’re in this together.

Without thinking any more about it, I pluck the bracelet from Silver’s fingers and wrap it around my wrist.

His hand darts forward to stop me, then freezes in midair, and he opens his mouth, perhaps to tell me to wait and think it through.

But I know my choice.

Determined and, yes, perhaps still a little reckless, I snap the bracelet shut.