Page 7 of Elex

Erix beat me to the door. As he opened it, I spied Margarite, one of the slaves assigned to the kitchen. In her hands was a tray with a covered plate and a bottle of wine.

“Can I bring this in?” she asked.

Erix stepped aside wordlessly, and she stepped into our apartment. She set the tray on the table.

“Compliments of the King’s table,” she said, with a small curtsy.

After she left, I took the cover off the tray. Underneath were oranges, strawberries, pomegranates, and a variety of other fruits and cheeses. They were obviously picked over. The wine, at least, smelled good.

I bit back my reply. The King sent us the scraps from his table. So very typical.

I took the tray to Mitera and urged her to eat. She finally sighed and took some fruit and agreed to a glass of wine.

Erix and I spent the evening in Mitera’s little room, desperately trying to one up each other with ridiculous stories to get her to smile while she picked at her pomegranates.

After one of Erix’s stories brought a small smile to her face, it sent a surge of hope through me that maybe the oldMitera would return. Erix caught my eye and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. He had seen it, too.

Finally, yawning, she sent us off to bed.

Erix and I lay in bed for a long time.

“Do you think she’ll be okay?” I asked.

I trusted my twin to tell me the truth. We’d both been lied to and mistreated enough in our lives. We would never lie to each other.

“I don’t know,” Erix said with a sigh. “She’s acting strange. She was never this sick with our sister.”

“Like you can even remember that!” I teased. I shoved his shoulder. He shoved me right back, of course.

“I remember everything,” Erix insisted, shoulder checking me back.

“Have you ever thought about it, Erix?” I asked as he folded the new clothing and hung it on the hooks. Erix was a neat freak.

“Thought about what?” he asked.

“What it will be like when we become Elusians,” I said.

His back was to me, but he froze for a moment.

“There’s no guarantee,” he said, turning to me, his back against the wall.

“We could be human,” he said. “Or with our luck…”

“Mageian,” I finished. We were both quiet for several moments as that particularly ghastly fate played out in our imaginations.

“I’m going to believe we will be Elusian,” I said firmly. “When we become Princes, we’ll have all the food and clothes we want, and we’ll go on trips to faraway places. We’ll have beautiful men swooning at our feet!” I laughed, jumping up and dancing around the room as if I had an invisible partner.

My brother and I were bothomofilofilos- we were attracted to men instead of women. It wasn’t that unusual inAlexandrian society, but there were still some people who looked down upon it.

My brother just looked at me from the bed, disdain on his face.

“And,what? Daddy dearest will make us Princes, and we’ll all live happily ever after?” he snarled. “Do you really want to spend the rest of your life kowtowing to a man who would treat a woman the way he treats Mitera?”

I stopped in my tracks, the smile fading from my face.

“I…I don’t know, I mean,” I stumbled over my words. “I hadn’t really thought about it. I just--”

“That’s your problem, Elex, you never think,” he said in exasperation. “You always pay so much attention to the here and now, you don’t plan for contingencies.”