Chapter 2 #2
“I know what you meant,” Nyx said. “But they’re not turning gray again any time soon.
” She didn’t honestly believe they would ever be gray again, and it was a fact she tried not to dwell on.
Why the hell had Lethe-Alihana thought creating a species whose eyes always gave away their emotions was a good idea, anyway?
She would ask them, but the half of their soul that had been in Kiev’s possession—and was now in hers—was even less talkative than the half belonging to Jevryn.
And honestly? Considering all the things that soul had borne witness to in its centuries with Kiev—some of which they had felt the need to show her in vivid detail—Nyx didn’t mind their silence.
Or the fact that, so far, they didn’t want to be carried around with her all the time.
Neither Morgen nor Evra said anything. Griff was very carefully staying out of the argument—probably at this juncture because he now felt bad about the whole eye color reveal—and Kaden never bothered to be part of an argument unless he was deciding to end said argument by means of physical violence.
That left Nyx. She held her arms out at her sides.
“What? Yes, I’m fucking sad. Am I not allowed to go places because I’m sad?
Is sadness a liability I’m unaware of? Am I negative ten strength points because of sadness?
” On some level, she felt like she was down those points—in strength, in willpower, in brain function.
But no way in hell was she admitting as much.
“Well?” she demanded when neither of them answered. They looked a little dumfounded, like they weren’t sure what to do, or how to respond to her.
Evra finally collected herself. “Very well. What is your plan?”
“We”—she drew a circle with her finger, encompassing all of them—“go to New York, where he”—she pointed at Kaden—“will use magic to figure out if Tristen is still in New York. You know, unless of course my sadness infects him.” She looked at Kaden.
“Is the sadness going to be a problem? Are you going to stagger under the weight of my negativity, unable to perform basic tracking magic due to the overwhelmingly blue color of my eyes? Are you—”
“All right, all right, we get the point,” Morgen said with a groan. “Perhaps it was rude of us to…extrapolate your possible actions based on your underlying emotional state.”
Nyx snorted. “That apology isn’t doing you any favors. The appropriate one is: ‘We’re sorry, Nyx, for bringing up the unfortunate fact that your irises are doorways into your inner feelings, which must be horribly uncomfortable for you, and which someone maybe possibly had no business telling us’.”
Griff ducked his head, the equivalent of a wince.
“It was not his fault,” Evra said. “He only confirmed what we already suspected based upon our observations of Jevryn.”
Nyx sighed. “Fine. Whatever. Are we going to New York or not?”
Evra’s brow furrowed. “Your plan, such as you have outlined it, is quite basic.”
“That’s me: Creator of Basic Plans. I’ll sort out the travel logistics, but there isn’t much strategy involved in Kaden executing a grid pattern for tracking.
” She was trying not to think about how long it would take Kaden to search a place as densely populated as New York City.
She was guessing—based both on the one memory of Tristen’s the Congregation had depicting the city, and the fact that someone would have to be absurdly wealthy to both learn about the universe beyond Dead Earth and manage to illegally procure a Shaman from it—that they would find what they were looking for in Manhattan.
But it was just that—a guess. Even if she was correct that Manhattan was where Tristen had been, it didn’t mean that was where he was now.
And with Kaden’s magic blunted in Dead Earth, she didn’t know what his range would be.
Could he analyze an entire skyscraper from the street?
How old of a trail could he find? If Tristen had left New York years ago, would there be anything to find?
These were questions she needed to ask him and so far hadn’t, because she’d been stalling, waiting for Jevryn to come back.
“I was more referring to your plan for if we actually find Veld,” Evra said.
“Oh, that.” Nyx was fully aware that “that” was going to be a problem.
She didn’t see any scenario in which Tristen was trusting towards anyone outside of Dead Earth.
The Congregation had refused to tell her under precisely what circumstances Tristen had come to Dead Earth, and if Nyx had to guess, the reason for their refusal had everything to do with Tobi being the current go-between she had access to for speaking with them.
There weren’t a lot of good reasons for a Shaman to have come to Dead Earth, and she could think of quite a few unpleasant reasons for him to have been brought here.
Especially since the Congregation had said he’d been a kid at the time.
Tobi shouldn’t have to be exposed to those reasons simply so Nyx could know them.
He’d already been through so much in his short life, and he’d finally found a little safety and stability with Ankira and Diana.
She didn’t want to do anything to interrupt that.
And frankly, when she looked at Tobi and remembered that the person she was going to New York to look for—the person upon whom all her hopes currently rested—had been nearly that young when he’d come to Earth, it made her heart hurt.
Because she had no idea if there had been anyone to provide Tristen with the safety Tobi had found.
Because she had no idea what state the exiled Shaman was currently in.
Because the only reason she even knew he existed and was going to look for him was because she needed something from him.
It left her with a bad taste in her mouth, which meant she hadn’t formulated much of a plan for how to approach him. “I’m going to play it by ear.”
“Play it by ear?” Evra echoed.
Nyx shrugged. “Everyone’s different. I could write out a nice speech to give him, if you want, but I don’t know if anything I come up with will work, because I don’t know anything about him.
” And trying to formulate something in advance without knowing that?
Without knowing who he was or what he’d been through?
It felt too much like manipulation. “Besides, it doesn’t matter if I could convince him short-term with some generic argument, because we need him for the long haul.
If he doesn’t want to help us, there is nothing we can do about it. So yeah, I’m going to play it by ear.”
“Okay,” Morgen said. “When do you want to leave?”
She supposed there wasn’t any real point in putting it off. “Three days?” It would give them all enough time to make their own individual preparations, and for Nyx to sort out the travel logistics.
“Three days it is.” Morgen sighed. “I should write my mother.”
Nyx arched her eyebrow. “My understanding is that the last time you wrote your mother before embarking on a dangerous journey, you worried her so much she sent Maruca after you.”
“Yes, well. I will express less gratitude for her many wonderful qualities this time, and perhaps she won’t worry so much.”
Kaden snorted.
“Right,” Morgen said, resigned. “She’ll worry no matter what.”
At least she cares, Nyx thought. If the expression on Evra’s face was any indication, the was having similar thoughts. Neither of their mothers were winning any parent-of-the-year awards.
“I will write Tamrin,” Evra said. She and her sister weren’t quite on speaking terms—Nyx would classify it more as being on bickering terms—but at least they were talking regularly in some capacity. “She will be delighted to learn she inherits all my weaponry in the event of my death.”
The pair of them slid off their chairs, going off to write letters and start packing.
Nyx needed to talk to her own sister. She checked in with Serenity twice a week, and brought her to Earth to play with Tobi when she could, so she would need to explain that she would be gone for a while.
Serenity would either pitch a fit—she was a good kid at heart, but Elena’s parenting hadn’t done her any favors—or she would quietly accept it and not say anything.
Nyx was actually hoping for the former reaction, because the latter would mean the news hurt more.
She went to the espresso machine, running through a mental list of all the other tasks she needed to complete, while Griff sat quietly. She could tell he had something he wanted to say, but she didn’t push him.