13. Lucina
LUCINA
Wood splinters, and there’s a heavy crash against the floor, forcing me from a deep sleep.
Gemma springs up on the couch, wide-eyed, her golden hair frizzy and tangled. Pax slowly comes to, groaning as he gathers his surroundings. Early morning light streams into my cabin–
Through the giant fucking hole where my door used to be.
“Shit,” Pax curses under his breath as the Captain casually steps over the fallen slab of wood, his boots crunching the splintered pieces.
“It’s my fault,” I say instantly, a poor attempt at an excuse, and one that falls on deaf ears. Fuck. I can only imagine what it looks like…Pax and I in bed together…
He’s so screwed.
Callan ignores me, stomping over to Pax’s side of the bed. “Get. Up,” he growls in his face, a vein protruding from his temple.
Pax scrambles to his feet, his hair disheveled and his clothes wrinkled. He doesn’t even bother with excuses; none would do him any good anyway.
“It wasn’t his fault,” I say again, and Callan whips around to face me.
“I’ll deal with you later.”
I freeze, at a complete loss for words, then Callan twists, pinning his stern stare on Pax, as he ushers him out of the cabin.
I throw the sheets back, the room swaying as I find my footing.
Chiaros, I’d had a lot of wine. “You owe me a new door!” I shout after the Captain, and his fists clench at his sides, the only evidence that he heard me.
But he doesn’t slow his pace, storming off into the dewy morning with Pax hot on his heels.
“Do you think he’ll kill him?” I ask Gemma, unable to unsee the fury in Callan’s grey eyes or the fear in Pax’s. I turn to face her when she doesn’t answer. “Surely, he won’t kill him, right?”
Gemma comes to stand beside me, both of us watching as they walk off. “Probably not,” she says, and my shoulders fall. “They’re boys, they’ll fight about it, then move on. But you…he might kill you.”
“Kill me?” That’s rich. I scoff as Gemma crawls into my bed, a blanket still draped over her shoulders. “I did nothing wrong.”
I carefully navigate my way across the splintered wood, wincing at the headache that has fully bloomed across my temples, then I freeze when Gemma starts chuckling to herself.
I stare blankly back at her.
“Sorry, sorry, it’s just—” She falls into another fit of laughter, and I roll my eyes. “I don’t even think he knocked before doing that.”
He didn’t.
“I mean, I get why he’d be mad, but what would possess a person to do something like…that?” I throw my arms out to the mess. “It’s a temper tantrum, that’s what it is.”
Gemma’s eyes flicker with mischief. “Maybe he was…jealous—” she starts, but her words are cut off by the pillow I throw at her face. The material does nothing to smother her laughter.
“Or maybe,” I grunt, pulling open the door to the armoire, “he’s just an asshole.”
“Can’t he be both?” she replies with a smile, and I scowl. “Look, I’m sorry about your door. I can have someone from my coven come by to fix it if you want.”
“Nope,” I huff, rubbing out the wrinkles in my shirt as I pull it over my head. “He broke it, he has to fix it. He can’t just storm in here like a bull and leave… someone else to clean up his mess.”
Gemma grins wider as she rolls out of bed, padding over to where I stand. She brushes her thumb over my temple, effectively melting my hangover without me needing to ask, and I sag in relief. “Thank you.”
“No, thank you,” she replies, and I cock my head in confusion. “It’s about time Callan learned some manners.”
Breakfast was painful, watching the anger ripple off the Captain and watching the guilt ripple off Pax. Neither of them dared look my way, but miraculously, by lunch, the air at their table had cleared. Callan’s disposition remained as usual—stern and tense, but Pax seemed completely unbothered.
Even with his black eye.
They’re boys, they’ll fight about it, then move on.
Gemma wasn’t kidding.
Devon took me to my lesson with the Dame, which, to no one’s surprise, went horribly. I think I might just stop going and see what happens. I’m breaking enough rules as is considering I have a godsdamn Eldral.
“What do you mean the Captain kicked your door in?” Kimber asks, throwing a heavy book down on the table.
Devon took me to the Diviner enclave and left me in the Archives with her so he could talk to Pa.
Since most of their records were left behind after the attack twenty years ago, her coven has been working to re-record them all.
Everything from ancient myths and battles to family trees and lineage, all of it has to be remembered and rewritten.
Bookshelves tower to the tall ceilings, a few skylights casting bright honeyed streams of light across the caramel parquet flooring.
Most of the shelves are filled with rows of neatly tucked away books, their leather-bound spines adorned with intricate writing, while some shelves remain empty. This is, after all, a work in progress.
Notes of cinnamon and nutmeg tangle with the smell of freshly inked parchment as I blow steam off the surface of my tea.
“Pax drunkenly slept in my bed last night,” I tell Kimber, and her green eyes flare wide.
“Nothing happened,” I assure her. “But the Captain must have seen him through the window, and instead of knocking like any normal person would, he ripped the damn thing off its hinges.”
“That’s—”
“Insane?” I finish for her, and she nods slowly. “Yeah.”
My gaze snags on the half-written novels that lay open on various desks, enchanted quills hovering above them, having been charmed with whatever piece of history a Diviner has whispered into the ink.
One moves delicately over the page, beautifully curved letters bleeding across the paper, while another moves at a maddening pace.
“What are they writing about?” I ask, moving to get a closer look. A third quill is letting thick blobs of ink drip onto the page, shedding tears over whatever tale it’s telling.
“That one is writing about the Fosse,” Kimber points to the crying quill. “Ancient creatures that the Lakelets descend from. They live their entire lives underwater, and their life’s purpose is…tragic.”
My stare catches on the quill that writes frantically, the pointed tip leaving bent indentations across the page. “And what about that one?” I ask.
Her green eyes harden in some emotion I can’t place as she watches the quill move wildly. “The Fall of the City of Light,” Kimber replies finally, moving to stand beside it. “The story of Streatham falling to Rogues.”
A soft rumble starts beneath my skin, and a cool breeze nips at the back of my neck, pulling—no, pushing me towards that harrowing story.
The story of a once glorious people, having no choice but to flee their kingdom.
The story of families being ripped apart, the story of sacrifices, and—my eyes catch on the word the quill has just scribbled across the page: Traitor.
The story of betrayal?
The word rings through me like an alarm I can’t silence. “There was a traitor?”
Kimber’s eyes flick up to mine, some sort of resignation flashing across them before she silently pulls a large book off a nearby shelf, pushing the kettle of tea aside so she can lay it open across the coffee table.
She flips through to the back of the book, and I plop down on the couch beside her.
Each page is a different family tree, and Kimber seems to know exactly which one she’s looking for.
Some are extensive with many branches, while others are sparse and short-lived. Solian children are rare, a blessing from Vita herself, so it doesn’t surprise me that some bloodlines aren’t as extensive as others.
The section Kimber flips to is lined in gold detailing, the names of the Disciple Born powerlines listed in elegant calligraphy: Feroy, Rhanes, Samora, Vitale, and Van Reenan. Kimber flips past the first few, but I slam a hand between the pages when I see Pax.
His name is right underneath… Ceres Samora.
I blink at the page. “You’re lying.”
“You didn’t know?” Kimber says with a quirked brow. “Pax is Ceres’s only child. Her husband died in the attack.”
“Gods, they’re just…”
“Nothing alike?” Kimber lifts her head from the book, and I shake my head.
Ceres is…a tightly wound woman. She reminds me a bit of Catherine—face pinched, and nose turned up at all hours of the day. Pax, on the other hand, is…fun. A child at heart. Like Jude.
If I’ve been counting the days right, he only has a week and a half left before he leaves for Orison, and Ivy will be on the campus next door. They’ll be living their dreams, knowing I’m out seeking answers and trying to figure out where I come from and where I belong.
That’s what I told them in that letter—that I’d found a dream to chase.
I let the thought of them recede like a lapping tide while Kimber flips through the other disciple-born powerlines until she comes to the last family: Van Reenan.
“The Van Reenan powerline is the closest link to Vita herself,” Kimber explains, turning the first page.
“No one knows why the Matron of Man favored Etis Van Reenan, but she bestowed upon her enough power to earn her the highest ranking of the Sol. Every Dame we’ve ever had has been a descendant of that bloodline. Until Delia.”
I set my teacup down on the matching floral saucer. “Delia’s not a Van Reenan?” I ask, and Kimber shakes her head, silently flipping to the last page of the book.
At the top are two names: Arthur and Sable Van Reenan, both with death dates underneath them. The two of them had one child, and she’s the last name on the page.
“Esme Van Reenan,” Kimber reads off the daughter’s name. “Heir of Sable Van Reenan—the former High Priestess of the Sol.” She turns the book so I can see it better, then says plainly, “She’s the traitor.”
I trace the ink with careful fingers. Esme’s birth date is forty years ago, and her death date is…the same as her mother’s. Twenty-two years ago. There’s something so lonely and haunted about Esme being the last on the page– the last in that bloodline.