Page 5

But Nothing Happens

“ W here are they?” I ask as I walk through the room.

“You should know that.” Mother’s suspicious eyes follow me. She sits by the fire, meat skewers in hand like weapons. Her body is hunched and focused, her light-blond hair spilling over her shoulders.

“If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking, would I?”

She sighs. “The cupboard, to the far right.”

I walk over and open the wooden doors. The outside is adorned with intricate carvings of suns, leaves, ivy, and the radiant eye of Sakelia, the goddess of light. “Salt?”

“Black pepper and dill leaves.”

I stand on tiptoe, digging through the cupboard until I find what she needs.

I close the door and turn, but lose my balance.

I stumble, and everything slips from my hands as I hit the floor hard.

My lips and teeth smash against the oak planks.

The spices float through the air like pollen, scattering over my arms, legs, back, and neck.

“What are you doing? Oh, this is terrible!”

“I know dill leaves are expensive.” I push myself up swiftly, brushing the spices off. My jaw throbs and my knees sting. “I’ll pick it up. Sarador is not ending, is it?”

I bend down, but Mother shakes her head, rising from her chair.

“Don’t bother,” she says sharply. “I’ll get more. That was marjoram, not dill leaves.”

“Are you sure?”

She nods, lips tightly pressed, eyelids heavy with fatigue. “I’m sure.”

“Should I hold the skewers for you in the meantime?”

Meat is roasting in the open fire in the center of the room, a hole in the tree trunk that’s a neatly cut square in the floor. The fire crackles and smokes, filling the room with a cloud of steam. The skewers lean against the side; the meat will burn if no one picks them up soon.

“Please, don’t do anything else.” Mother brushes past me. Her bony shoulder bumps into mine. She pulls fresh spices from the cupboard, giving me a stern look.

“Sorry! I tripped. I’m perfectly capable of helping with the food.”

She sits down again, sprinkling peppercorns over the meat. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but you’re not.”

“You can’t be serious?”

“This meal needs to be good. You can help me in a few days when we’re cooking vegetables. How does that sound?”

She stares straight ahead, refusing to meet my angry gaze.

She watches the skewers, the meat, the sparks, and the flames, listening to the crackling fire instead of me.

Her olive-and-lemon-colored linen dress clings to her in the heat, like a second skin over her bony frame.

Her face and upper arms glow orange in the fire’s light.

“Should I get Naeva, then? She helps you every day, doesn’t she?”

“I’m already here.”

I turn. Naeva stands at the entrance, radiant like a blinding-white goddess, a bright figure emerging through the smoke.

Her eyes glow like molten gold against her pale skin, black pupils surrounded by glossy, golden-yellow irises.

Her hair is so light blond it looks white in the dim light, but I know it gleams golden when the sun touches it.

It’s richer, blonder, and more beautiful than my own.

She leans against the woven branches of the archway, offering me a slight smile. “Did you drop the spices?”

I shrug, resting against the pine table. My knees still throb from the fall.

“And she grabbed marjoram instead of dill leaves,” Mother says, not bothering to look up. I hear her shifting the skewers over the fire.

Naeva lets out a soft giggle.

“At least one of my daughters knows how to manage in the kitchen,” Mother adds. “No offense, Iszaelda, but?—”

“But what?” I dig my nails into the worn edges of the table.

“But you’re not exactly gifted at women’s work,” Naeva cuts in, her grin stretching wide, lips almost reaching her ears. Her eyes are no longer hazy; they’re brighter and more awake. “Just like Father.”

A sharp retort is on the tip of my tongue, but I hold back. I don’t want to be cruel to Naeva. She takes things to heart.

“I’ve never seen you this quiet before.” She laughs, stepping closer, slipping a thin arm around my back to gently pull me away from the table. “Come, Sarea, help me with my jewelry.”

We head toward the nearest branch, the thickest one, where we usually sit for meals. One of the three surrounding the table.

Naeva sits elegantly, crossing one leg over the other, though they’re hidden beneath her long honey-yellow dress. Flawlessly dyed with winter jasmine and yellow primroses, it’s always spotless.

I straddle the branch, leaning forward to get a clear view of her hair. “You’re wearing more jewelry than usual today,” I remark.

She’s silent at first. Then she says carefully, “I met Garalas this morning.”

I grimace involuntarily. “Right.”

“You should wear jewelry too, Iszaelda,” Mother chimes in. “It would suit you.”

“Sure.” Slowly, I pull one pearl after another from Naeva’s hair, laying them on the table’s flat surface. They glisten in the flickering light of the fire and the wall-mounted torches.

“Glad to hear you agree,” Mother adds.

I grab another pearl, carefully untangling it from the delicate strands of hair.

Before I started, Naeva’s hairstyle was smooth and glossy, flowing like velvet over her bare shoulders and down the laced back of her dress.

Now, it’s a mess, tangled like grass after a storm.

My fingers are buried deep in the middle, as if I’ve plunged my hand into a nest of thorns.

“It’s called irony,” I mutter. “I’d sooner jump from the Sun Tree. Sounds just as tragic to me.”

“Iszaelda!” Mother snaps. “Don’t talk about taking your own life!”

“I don’t mean it.”

“At dawn,” Naeva says.

I place a pearl on the table. It clinks. Several more roll off and hit the floor . Plop. Plop. Plop. Even though I’ve been so careful. “At dawn? Is someone supposed to take their life then?”

Naeva gasps, shaking her head so fiercely her jewelry jingles. “It’s Silver Day. Have you completely forgotten? You’re about to receive your ability.”

More pearls fall, rolling across the wooden floor, inching closer to Mother and the fire. But no one notices. No one sees. Only me.

“Silver Day?” Staring at my filthy nails, I rub my hands together so hard the bones ache.

How does Naeva even let me touch her light, clean hair?

My hip skirt is covered in dirt and bloodstains, smelling of roots, elderberry, and the cold of winter.

My hands and arms are sable brown, though they’re naturally much lighter than Naeva’s.

Naeva tries to turn her head but fails. “Well?”

I sigh. “I forgot about that?—”

“That you’re supposed to wear jewelry and the ceremonial dress?”

“I need to dress up.”

Naeva bursts into laughter, which reaches deep into my soul and brightens me from within. She’s pure joy. “You’re going to look beautiful, no doubt. And we’ll all be watching. Please, let me help you at dawn. Just this once, let me?—”

“Fine! You can.”

“Wonderful. Thank you!” She reaches back, placing her hand over mine. It’s cold and smooth. This time, I don’t pull away.

“I don’t even know how to put all the pieces of the outfit together.”

“Oh, Isza, I’ll?—”

A knock interrupts her.

“Who could that be?” Mother glances up from the steam, strands of hair stuck to her forehead. “Will one of you get the door? Iszaelda, maybe you could? Naeva shouldn’t overexert herself.”

I stroke Naeva’s head, stand, and leave the dining room.

Through the sitting room, into the hall.

Two figures stand beyond the curtain. The fabric flutters wildly in the wind, their shadows swaying like waves on Nimaear.

I leave the solid floor behind, leaping rhythmically from branch to branch until I reach the outer archway. I stop and pull the fabric aside.

Oh, no.

It’s them. The leadership.

“Karimni cúnie,” says Itsaera Nuleias, her copper-red hair straight and neat, framing her face as if it hasn’t been outdoors in a lunar cycle.

My mouth falls open, and I snap it shut with an audible click.

I force myself to focus, return the greeting with a respectful nod, and say the required words: “Karimni cúnie.” Good dusk .

Itsaera is one of our three leaders and one of the oldest among us. Approximately one thousand and seven-hundred sun cycles old. She watches me, her eyes like slivers of yellow glass, feline and sharp, sweeping from head to toe.

She returns my nod, but not as deeplyor for as long. She is older, much older.

“Meeli, múera dúera amin a, múera dúera isesa a, múera dúera tyava a,” I murmur, telling her I hear her, see her, feel her.

She continues, her voice almost lilting.

“Sesta es lamendar om silia a.” The sun shines over us , she says.

It barely does, especially now, but it’s a customary phrase we exchange when greeting another sun elf, at least in formal and respectful settings.

It’s not something Keelan and I would ever say to each other.

“Sesta es lamendar om silia a,” I echo.

Beside her stands Mebrindel Saeruil, with his seafoam-white hair and striking cobalt-blue eyes. He’s nearly as old as she is. The third elf in the leadership, Throlad Gareval, the eldest among us, is not here.

“Are your mother or father present?” Itsaera asks.

“Father was just outside.” My gaze flickers between the two powerful sun elves.

I don’t know who I’m supposed to look at, or if I’m even allowed to do so.

But I can’t tear my eyes away or glance toward the backyard, where everything is shrouded in shadow.

The sky behind them looms like a curtain, dark and gray as a dove’s feathers.

“We didn’t cross paths with him. It seems he’s left. May we come in?”

“Please, do.”

I lead the way to the dining room, my back to the guests. This is not good, not good at all. What do they want? It must be about me. About Garalas. I took Aeralon’s sword to fight him, but he spoke badly about Naeva; no one gets away with that. It’s a shame I lost the fight. I would’ve loved to?—

“Who was it?” Naeva calls. “We have visitors.”