Chapter 38 #2
“And why can Cyra see your light now?” Bressen asked.
“I’m not sure,” Phaedrus said. “I assume it has something to do with her being a Hand of the Gods, but I’m not sure why she would only now be noticing it.”
“Praya told me that as I became more attuned with the Nemesis I’d be able to-” I started to explain, then cut myself off with a gasp as I realized my slip.
But it was too late.
Bressen’s expression turned to one of apprehension, while Phaedrus looked at me in confusion.
“Praya?” the priest asked. “Did you just say Praya told you something? As in the syphon Praya?”
Bressen’s head snapped to Phaedrus, and the priest’s entire body went rigid as Bressen seized his mind.
“Bressen, no!” I said, throwing myself between him and Phaedrus. I grabbed his arms and tried to push him back, but he didn’t budge. “Please don’t hurt him. It’s not his fault I slipped up. You know Phaedrus. You know he won’t say anything.”
Bressen’s eyes were still on Phaedrus over my shoulder, and I turned to see the priest’s face was paralyzed in fear.
“Bressen, please,” I begged him. “Please let him go.”
“Phaedrus, nod if you can hear and understand me,” Bressen said calmly, and the priest gave a single slow nod.
“Good,” Bressen went on. “I want you to listen very carefully. Praya of Gonderil, Hand of the Creator, is alive. She didn’t go down with her ship four hundred years ago as believed.
She was living on an island far out into the Aspan Ocean, but we brought her back to the continent, and she’s currently in Solandis. Do you understand so far?”
Phaedrus nodded again.
“I want you to answer yes or no to my next questions,” Bressen said. “First, can I trust you not to tell another living soul what I just divulged?”
“Yes,” Phaedrus answered.
I waited half a second to look for a rosy hue on Phaedrus’s skin under the soft white glow wafting off him, but there was none.
“It’s the truth!” I said. “He won’t tell.”
“Swear to it,” Bressen said to Phaedrus.
“I swear,” the priest answered.
“And do you understand that for the safety of Praya and her wife,” Bressen went on, “I’ll have to kill you if you break that promise?”
I gasped, but Phaedrus only nodded again. “Yes,” he confirmed.
“And just to be absolutely certain,” Bressen said, “are you going to give me a reason to kill you?”
“No,” Phaedrus answered immediately.
Again I waited only a second before turning back to Bressen.
“He speaks the truth,” I said. “Please, release him.”
Bressen eyed the priest for another couple seconds before he relaxed, and I felt him break his hold on Phaedrus’s mind.
Phaedrus inhaled sharply as he regained control of himself, and I swung back around to face him.
“I’m sorry!” I said, putting a hand on his arm. “I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t mean to let that slip and put you in danger. Are you alright?”
Phaedrus’s jaw hung slack as he looked between me and Bressen.
“Please forgive me for that, Phaedrus,” Bressen said to him. “As you can imagine, this is very sensitive information that we can’t have getting around. I had to be sure we could trust you, especially since we just learned you’ve been keeping a fairly big secret.”
The priest nodded absently. “Praya is…here?” he asked. “Can…can I meet her?”
“Not right now,” Bressen said. “No one is supposed to know she’s here but me, Cyra, Surgeon, Serise, and Axenus. I’ll tell Samhail eventually, but I have to be sure we can trust his new wife first.”
Phaedrus’s brows shot down into a deep frown. “Samhail’s wife? When did Samhail get married?”
Bressen smiled wryly. “This afternoon.”
Phaedrus blinked, and I stepped back from him.
“It’s a long story,” I said, “and one I think we’re too tired to tell right now. You said you had something for us?”
Phaedrus shook his head to clear it.
“I do have some news,” he said. “My apologies for how long it took. There were two complications. To start, the song lyrics you provided me were fairly accurate. I was able to confirm they closely adhered to the text in the book with few deviations, except for one significant one. The last line of the song is completely different in the text.”
I angled my head in interest. “How different?”
“You noted that you and your brother thought it was a convoluted love song, and the last line of your version supports this interpretation,” Phaedrus said. He laid the paper with my version of the lyrics on the table, and Bressen picked it up to read it.
“But what’s in the text suggests something else,” Phaedrus finished.
“Then will the separate once more unite, And live in peace again until our last.” Bressen read the last two lines from the paper, then put it down and looked up. “What does the other version say?”
Phaedrus picked up another paper that held his notes and read. “Then will the separate once more unite, And their triumvirate will be the last.”
Bressen and I looked at each other in alarm.
“Whose triumvirate will be the last?” I asked Phaedrus. “What does that mean?”
Phaedrus shook his head. “I don’t know, my lady. The song is too vague to draw any definitive conclusions.”
“Do you have any idea why the last lines are different?” I asked.
Again Phaedrus shook his head. “I can’t say for sure. I can only guess that perhaps when the song was passed around, people didn’t understand the last line, so they changed it to something that made more sense, something that sounded more…optimistic.”
Yes, the line I’d learned from my mother definitely had a more hopeful message than the rather ominous-sounding one from the text.
I swallowed, and Bressen slipped an arm around my waist.
“Don’t worry just yet,” he said. “That last line isn’t inherently negative, and it could be talking about any number of triumvirates. We can’t jump to conclusions.”
Any number of triumvirates. Including the one he was a part of, which didn’t ease my mind. Regardless of how you interpreted the line, there was a good chance either he or I were in danger.
“You said there were two complications,” I noted, turning again to Phaedrus. “What was the second?”
Phaedrus pointed to a small marking that looked a bit like a butterfly. It appeared to have been drawn in the margin next to the second stanza. Bressen and I leaned over and looked into the book. The ink was slightly different here, so I guessed it was added later by someone else.
“I spent days trying to find a translation for this mark,” Phaedrus said. “It’s obviously not part of the original text or the song itself, but I have a feeling it’s significant.”
“Did you find what it means?” I asked. “It looks like a butterfly.”
Phaedrus gave a small laugh. “It is a butterfly,” he said.
My eyes met Phaedrus’s bright blue ones. “I don’t understand.”
“It’s not a word or a letter,” Phaedrus said. “It finally occurred to me after about three days when I couldn’t find a translation for it anywhere that someone had just drawn a butterfly in the margin of the book.”
“Any idea why?” Bressen asked.
Phaedrus gave a shrug. “Your guess is as good as mine, but butterflies are often symbols of change or metamorphosis. Whoever drew it here might’ve been trying to suggest something about how to interpret the song, or they might simply have been bored and needed somewhere to doodle. Unfortunately, there’s no way to know.”
I nodded slowly as I reread the second stanza of the song.
“Though it sets each eve, closing out the day,We trust its rise again upon the morn.A sacrifice for love, a bargain’s madeTo grant a gift and help a bond reform.”
I could possibly see a theme of change here, but how that change might come about or what it meant in the grand scheme eluded me.
“Go rest some more,” Bressen said as he kissed my forehead. “You still look exhausted. I have a couple more things to discuss with Phaedrus, and then I’ll be in to join you.”
I gave Bressen an anxious look, but he held up a hand.
“Phaedrus will be perfectly safe,” he said. “I promise."
I made a show of looking him over to see if his skin turned rosy, and he smiled. When it remained its normal lightly tanned hue, I nodded.
“Thank you for the work on this,” I said to Phaedrus.
He bowed his head. “Of course, my lady. I’m happy to help.”
“And rest assured, I’ll check in to be sure he hasn’t done anything to you,” I told him, eyeing Bressen.
Bressen gave me a look that proclaimed his innocence.
Phaedrus only smiled. “I trust that Lord Bressen only acts in the interests of those who depend on him.”
I rolled my eyes, but no rosy glow appeared on Phaedrus’s skin. He truly believed what he said. It was a trust Bressen had earned from the priest, and I couldn’t help but wonder what trusts and expectations – for better or worse – I was building with those who knew me.