Page 87

When dinner ends, all students rise. It will be the first time the former initiates see the interior of the house dormitories—their new homes. Except for me. I linger awkwardly as the room begins to clear out, watching the other students leave.

“Clara.” Kaelis approaches, this time making it all the way to my side.

“Kaelis, Eza…” My words fade, lost. I’m not sure what to say—what I dare say around all the other students.

“It’s all right. I already got his card,” he reassures me with a whisper, as if that were what I’m afraid of and not some kind of retaliation against me. “I’ll answer whatever questions you have later.”

Fine. I can push away my inquiries until we’re alone again. After all, it shouldn’t be long—

“You should go and see your new dormitory. The Bladehaven is a sight to behold.”

Bladehaven… What a name for a dormitory. “Right, I’ll be back after.”

“No, stay there. Those will be your new chambers.” He tugs at his jacket, adjusting unseen wrinkles. Not a thread is out of place.

“Are you sure?” I tilt my head slightly, giving him a look through which I try to encapsulate the question What happened to pretending like we’re a couple?

“Of course.” His hand twitches, as if he wants to reach over and grab mine. But the prince refrains. “We’ll be wed within the year. So you should focus on getting to know your fellow house members.”

Is that really it? There are too many people for me to ask here. Is it over between us now that we’ve had the blessing of the king?

As much as I wish we could communicate with our minds alone, we can’t. I’m left staring him down, and he holds my gaze. But it doesn’t lead anywhere.

“You’re absolutely right.” I force a smile and give his hand a squeeze. “I’ll see you soon enough, of course.”

Kaelis nods, and I leave the main hall; all the way back my insides are knotting.

I manage to catch up with the pack of other students from House Swords and follow them up the staircase. My first step into the lounge of House Sword’s Bladehaven feels as though I’ve left Arcana Academy completely.

The room is sprawling, with soaring vaulted ceilings supported by columns of swords carved from stone.

Chandeliers made of curved weapons hold troughs of all-white flames.

The light makes every piece of stately black-and-white furniture cast long shadows.

Instead of heavy drapes, layers upon layers of chiffon frame the windows.

Cut in uneven lengths, they pick up the faintest breeze, giving the walls an oscillating, living feeling, as if the room itself were breathing.

In the center stands a large circular table made of a wood stained so dark it’s nearly black.

Its surface has been polished to a near-mirror finish in which I think I can almost see the reflections of students from throughout the years hunched over its surface, studying and debating.

In the back, behind the table, are three training rings.

Bookshelves dot the room, spacing off smaller sitting areas.

It isn’t just a lounge, but a sanctuary for everything that House Swords holds sacred: knowledge, action, strength, and determination.

“Clara, Alor, come with me.” Emilia leads us down one of the short hallways that jut out from the common area.

The room is shaped like a wheel, and each hall is a spoke.

The halls each end with two doors. “It’s convenient you’ve roomed together previously, you shouldn’t have any issue here.

If you need anything, you may ask me or any of your other fellow house members. ”

“You knew I’d be here?” I ask.

“The headmaster requested we furnish you a room.” Emilia nods. “I would’ve insisted anyway. You are a part of this house now. Your place should first and foremost be here with your academic family.”

I simultaneously feel welcomed and adrift. The last person I expected to make me feel like I had a place was Emilia. But she just killed a man for me.

Meanwhile, the man who had begun to represent safety—my place here in the academy—has seemingly cast me out.

“Thank you,” Alor says warmly.

Just as Emilia goes to leave, she thinks better of it. She steps to her younger sister and rests a hand on her shoulder.

“Well done.” She offers a rare encouraging smile. “Father will be proud.”

Before Alor can respond, Emilia leaves. She’s left hovering in the wake of her sister’s pride.

Basking in a glow that I can understand all too well.

“I’m proud of you” were four of the sweetest words that my mother or sister could say to me—and they were words I tried to share with Arina often.

My chest aches as if with the force of a physical blow, of a thousand rocks crushing me.

The hurt the mere thought of her brings will take years to lessen.

“You look good here,” Alor appraises, bringing me back to the present. Grief is an ever-constant companion. Lingering in it will not help.

“As do you,” I force myself to say, pushing thoughts of my sister aside.

She arches her brows, lips curving into a familiar smug grin. “ Obviously. ”

I let out a soft huff of amusement.

“I’m still looking into things, by the way. I managed to find a few leads over the break, but nothing material yet.”

“Oh?”

“We’ll see,” she cautions, clearly not wanting to get my hopes up. “Perhaps a better way to say it is a lack of leads. I should have found more information than I have. It’s as if someone intentionally scrubbed the details from the records.”

I know all too well how that feels. But the thought brings me to another time I found a lack of leads. Perhaps it’s all connected. The crown runs the mills, the pulping houses, the harvesting sites, and I always suspected them to be behind Mother’s death…

“May I ask you to look into something—someone—else?”

“Needy much?” Alor huffs, but I can tell by her tone she’s nevertheless open to my request.

“Laylis Daygar.” Daygar was the name Mother went by when she died at the Descent.

She wouldn’t be recorded anywhere as Chevalyer, not when she swore it was to be kept a secret at all costs.

Names upon names in our family, all to hide an identity that I’m only just now beginning to understand…

There was always more to us than she let on.

“Laylis Daygar,” Alor repeats, recognizing the name from Arina. “Your mother?”

I nod. “She died at the Descent in a way I always found suspicious. I’m wondering if, perhaps, her and Arina’s deaths are connected.”

“Someone really has it out for you if they are.” Alor folds her arms, her sharp gaze missing nothing. There’s an expectancy there—she wants me to elaborate why, since she already knows she’s right.

But I’m not going to say anything more than “Apparently.”

“All right, if I come across anything involving this Laylis, I’ll make a note of it, too. So don’t forget how nice I’m being.”

“I’ll be sure to repay the favor.” I mean it.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I will enjoy my room—free of your snoring.” She opens her door, and I catch a glimpse of the refuge awaiting me.

“I do not snore.” Do I?

“ Sure you don’t.” Alor enters her room, and I do the same.

The room is done in similar colors as the common area and set up much the same as my first in the dorms—but with only one bed, desk, and armoire. Of course, I check the wardrobe first. It’s full of my clothes.

He really was planning on kicking me out…

Even as he undressed me. Bathed me. “I don’t understand you,” I whisper, hoping Kaelis feels those words deep in his bones.

Why do we move a few steps closer together only to take several backward?

But I’m too tired to deal with this now. I’ll find him tomorrow.

I waste no time dressing for bed. It’s early still. But despite that, and all the things that happened today, I’m exhausted, and sleep finds me easily.

But it flees when, hours later, I’m jolted awake by the sound of my door opening.

“Ka—” I start to say, stopping when I realize I’m not in his apartments and this shadow isn’t the same height or build as the prince.

A flash of silver would usually have me on high alert.

But I’ve already recognized who it is. I’d know that dagger with its lightning-bolt hilt anywhere. “Alor? Is everything all right?”

Wordlessly, she closes the door behind herself.

She pads across the rug. It’s plush and black with swirls of mottled gray that dance like smoky tarot symbols, and as she sinks onto it, she stares at the equally intricate designs on the plaster ceiling.

I wait for her to say something, as I know she will.

“Turns out, I couldn’t sleep nearly as easily as I thought I could without your snoring,” she says begrudgingly.

“I see.” I’m fighting a smile. The last time someone creeped into my room was when Arina came after a particularly harrowing night where we weren’t sure we were going to make it back through the tunnels and into the city alive.

One of the last jobs she ever went on with me.

“You been struggling to sleep ever since I left?”

“I’m not answering that.” Alor continues not to look at me.

“May I ask you something else, then?”

Alor’s head turns as I hold out one of the extra pillows from my bed. She regards it as skeptically as if I were handing her a vial of poison. She finally snatches it and situates it under her head. “Go ahead.”

“Why do you sleep with the dagger?”

She yawns. “It’s part of Clan Tower’s training…There’s always someone out to get you. Never know when they’ll attack…”

“?‘They’?”

“Anyone else in our clan. In Clan Tower you’re either strong or dead.” She rolls onto her side. Putting her back to me signals that there’s no more to be said on the matter. I don’t pry.