Chapter 15 #2
There was no way I could get in undetected, but I had a vague enough excuse at the ready to cover myself.
I was pretty sure that if I, renowned spinster, told anyone I was looking into the history of soul bonds, no one would push back.
I’d most likely receive a pitying look and a healthy dose of awkward silence.
It wasn’t a lie. I did plan to look at the history of soul bonds as well as seeing what I could find on outreach trips. Just because no agathos woman in living memory didn’t have any agathos soul bonds surely didn’t mean I was the first one ever .
I let myself through the oak double doors into the almost stiflingly dark small library that dominated half of the second floor.
The walls, the shelves, the furniture and the floor were all the same glossy dark stained wood, and the entire space was illuminated by dim stained glass lamps that made the whole place feel both old and intimidating.
The librarian glanced at me over a pile of books on the counter, but didn’t attempt any small talk, and I happily slipped past with a stiff smile, making my way towards the back of the room.
There were only a few agathos history books accessible to us, and they were kept in a private room that I absolutely despised going into.
I wasn’t claustrophobic generally, but it was a tiny windowless space dominated by a high table and stools in the center, and I always felt like I was in some kind of book prison when I had to go in there.
I paused outside the discreet entrance and quickly opened my pocketknife inside my purse, nicking the pad of my thumb on the blade and pinching until a small amount of blood welled.
I swiped it over the piece of ancient marble embedded in the wall, then leaned against the heavy wooden door until it creaked open.
There wasn’t exactly a huge range to choose from since the Elders were superstitious about how much of that should be written down—just one oak bookshelf at the back of the small room—so I grabbed a small selection and brought them back to the table to look through.
I wasn’t exactly sure what I was looking for, but I’d felt strongly that coming here was a good idea, so presumably I’d talked to Bullet about it in my sleep, which was a strange concept.
An hour later, I’d learned nothing I didn’t already know.
A woman had four soul bonds. The woman would feel drawn to them individually in Anesidora’s own timing.
If the draw to them stopped before all four were found, it was assumed that one of their intended bonds had died in childhood, and that had historically been a traumatic realization for the woman and there would always be a gap where that bond should have been.
Likewise, if one died after the bonds had come together, the pain of loss was said to be permanent. My heart hurt for Joy Lyon’s bonded and what they were going through today.
There was nothing on the process of bonding, unsurprisingly, and just a brief mention that the cost of using Anesidora’s gifts was shared among bonded.
There was very little in the texts about agathos men and their expectations and experiences, I noted with unease.
There were far more male agathos than females, and the lack of attention they received in the texts was stark.
It felt…intentional. Like they were expendable.
Agathos women were created in Anesidora’s image, at least that’s what we were taught, and the men in the image of her lovers.
The first she took was her public consort—Valor, in my mother’s case—and the other three were her permanent lovers.
They were all gods. Did they care that Anesidora took all the spotlight? Perhaps not. My fathers had always seemed mostly content to orbit around my mother. Maybe that’s the way it was meant to be.
Three of Anesidora’s lovers were also her and her consort’s children, but I tried not to reflect too hard on that. The gods’ family tree was more bush-shaped, and I had to believe that gods didn’t reproduce the same way mortals did for my own peace of mind.
There was a curious lack of information on outreach trips in any of the books. Nothing about where they went, or how the locations were chosen, or if the men ever came back.
A disturbing amount of nothing .
I was already determined not to go, but I couldn’t help wondering what would happen if the Elders and my parents got their way.
My parents’ assurances that I’d get to travel and see the world—that an outreach trip was an opportunity —felt hollow.
They couldn’t lie, so they obviously believed what they’d told me, but I wasn’t convinced that belief was built on solid evidence.
I stacked the books I’d been going through up on the table and massaged my temples. I’d hoped to find something that made me feel less like an aberration, but I wasn’t entirely surprised that I hadn’t. I doubted that someone—some thing —like me would even be written about.
I couldn’t help but think that if another abomination like me had ever existed, the Elders would have done everything to cover her up.
We were strictly forbidden from violence against each other or humans, unless it was in their best interests.
It was a loophole I’d always found a little strange, but now I wondered if it was in place for people like me.
Maybe no other agathos in the history of our kind had been stupid or reckless enough to ask the dark goddess for help, and I truly was unique.
The regret still never came, though. I didn’t regret Riot, whatever the consequences were. He was an endless calm in a sea of chaos, yet not emotionless the way so many agathos men were.
Riot didn’t look at me and see all the things that I wasn’t , because he was only interested in the things that I was .
The sudden creaking of the heavy door almost made me scream, and I clapped my hand over my mouth just in time to prevent a furious librarian from appearing. I spun in my stool to find Chance looking across the table at me with one eyebrow raised.
“You scared me,” I breathed, dropping my hand to my chest to where my heart pounded rapidly against my ribs.
“Pay attention to your surroundings next time?” he suggested quietly, sounding like he was on the verge of laughing. It was rare I got to see any of my parents alone, and I’d forgotten how nice and calming Chance’s presence was when it was just him.
“What are you doing here?” I asked as my heart rate settled.
“Well, I do work here,” Chance replied, grinning. “Ever, the librarian, let me know you were here.”
I didn’t know Ever, but I supposed it wasn’t too surprising he’d recognized me. Everyone around Auburn knew of me. It was why I’d left.
“I thought you’d have the day off because of the memorial,” I said, leaning forward on my elbows to try to discreetly hide my reading material.
“I took a half day…” Chance’s brow furrowed as he tilted his head to examine the spines of the books I had stacked up in front of me.
It was incredibly frustrating the way agathos parents didn’t believe in privacy.
“Come on, let’s get coffee. We have a little time before we need to go back to the house and get ready. ”
I couldn’t think of a legitimate reason not to, so I nodded and hastily put the books away, holding them in front of my body to obscure the titles in the hopes Chance hadn’t got a decent look at them.
His appearance had taken me so off-guard, I’d momentarily forgotten that I was angry at all of my parents about the whole outreach thing.
I was marginally less mad at Chance than the others, but only marginally.
I followed him out of the library and through the lobby, smiling awkwardly at the few of his colleagues who were in today when he stopped to make small talk with them. Somehow, being here, I felt as small as I did when I used to visit him at work as a 10-year-old.
We settled in at a small agathos-owned cafe opposite the town hall and Chance ordered our drinks while I snagged the comfy white armchairs at the back, in front of an old fireplace that was always filled with oversized pine cones and votive candles in glass jars.
We’d had a lot of coffee dates here when I was a kid and I’d always found it a strange place—all whitewashed wood and aqua colors with shells everywhere, even though the beach was miles away.
“So,” Chance began, tugging up the legs of his slacks as he folded his lanky frame into the armchair opposite me. “How are you?”
Of all the questions he could have asked me, that one was actually difficult to answer honestly.
“Getting by,” I settled on, shooting the server a grateful smile as he dropped off our drinks. He gave me a pitying look in return, which shouldn’t have surprised me as much as it did.
I wondered if anyone had heard about the outreach trip already. Surely Verity Mae would have messaged me if word had spread?
Chance hummed quietly, taking a sip of his coffee. “We worry about you, you know. Always have, but more than usual these past six months. Milton isn’t a nice place for a young lady, and you’re there on your own.”
“Is that why you all want to send me away? Was it the Elders idea or did the suggestion come from Mother? Or Valor, perhaps?”
That was definitely not sweet, and if it had been any of my parents other than Chance here, I’d be in for a long and detailed lecture about all the ways I needed to work on my sweetness and contentment.
Since it was Chance, all I got was a disappointed look, which was a pretty effective chastisement coming from him. I wrapped my hands around my mug until the heat seeping into my fingers bordered on uncomfortable, and forced myself to swallow down the emotions I wasn’t meant to be feeling.
“I understand that the announcement at dinner took you by surprise,” Chance said patiently. “It took me by surprise too, when I found out. Your mother was not in favor of the idea at all, actually.”