Page 40

W e rode into Rhyanaes late, tired and damp. Wildflowers waved their welcome to us in the mountain meadows, blown by storm winds. My bag had barely hit the floor in the entryway of El’s home when Crow flung open the door behind us and let himself in.

“Finally back,” he observed before striding for the kitchen, his impatience a bit obtuse considering he had only returned home yesterday.

“Missed you too,” El said, and followed him. I tagged along, partially because I was curious, but mostly because I was starving.

“So the meeting went alright?” Crow said as he foraged around the kitchen.

“Not really the outcome we hoped for,” I answered.

“But nobody else got arrested, so that’s a mild success,” El added.

“You got my message?” Crow turned and asked El. He seemed hurried, agitated under his usual casual veneer.

“Which one? You checked in every gods damned day, sometimes several times a day.” El pulled cheese and apples from a cupboard and skyr from the enchanted cold storage box.

“The last one. I need to talk to Halja,” Crow said, choosing a bottle of wine from the rack on the far side of the kitchen.

“Yes, I got that one,” El said. “Talk away.” She gestured toward me with a sweep of her hand and a shrug.

“Alone,” Crow said.

“Kicking me out of my own kitchen? And taking a bottle of my nice red at that! After all those needy messages all week asking when I’d be home, this is how you welcome me back,” El protested.

“We can talk in front of El, right? I’m just going to tell her everything when you leave anyway,” I said. I’d never spoken to Crow alone. He’d never insisted we do, and I didn’t feel keen to start now. Being on the receiving end of his direct attention, his piercing looks, still made me nervous.

He looked from me to El and back to me again. Then he set the wine on the kitchen island counter, set a glass next to it, and began opening the bottle.

“Fine,” he said, eyes on his work. “But you better listen quietly,” he added to El, before looking up at me pointedly, his head still tilted down, dark eyes half hidden under dark brows as he pulled the cork from the bottle with a faint pop.

“And remember I wanted to give you privacy for this conversation.”

El grabbed a glass for herself and set it next to the one already on the counter. Crow poured a generous portion for each of us, sighing deeply and running a hand through his hair.

“Halja, do you know who your father is?” he asked.

“What?” I blurted without a thought. It was the last thing I expected him to ask. “Why?”

“Because the answer is important,” he said, dodging my reactive question. His eyes cut into mine, and I knew he could read every thought on my mind, every shift of my face. No Sourcery trick would save me from his practiced discernment.

“That’s not an answer,” I said.

“Neither was yours,” Crow replied.

“No,” I said, sighing. “I don’t. And I’d like to know how you know that.”

“It’s my job to know things. It’s my job to know everything, actually. Especially about those closest to me. And especially about newcomers.”

“Crow, come on, enough with–” El protested, but Crow cut her off. Cool, calm, but serious.

“You agreed to listen quietly,” he said, raising a finger. “If you can’t let me work, then you need to leave.”

“If you can’t speak respectfully to me and my guests, then you need to leave,” El shot back. “This isn’t one of your interrogations, it’s Halja. She’s not a threat.”

“Halja is not a threat, but ignorance is,” Crow retorted, then turned to me. “Sorry for my blunt approach to a… challenging subject. But I––we––need to know.”

El took her glass and leaned back against the opposite counter. I could feel her eyes on me, watchful and protective.

“How long have you known the father who raised you wasn’t your real father?” he asked.

“Less than two years. I found out just before I met Eilith and Byrgir.”

“And you didn’t question why? Didn’t press for answers about who your father might be? Where he might be?”

“No. I didn’t really want to stick around for a family meeting.

Didn’t feel like I was welcome to stay and start digging into my mother’s past after my father yelled at me to get out,” I cut back, my defenses rising.

“After he said he never wanted me there in the first place. It just didn’t really feel like the time to pry, you know?

When I was packing a bag and running out the door alone. ”

“Understandable,” Crow said, but there was little sympathy in his tone. “That must have been difficult for you. Must have made you angry.”

“It did.”

“Did it make you despise yourself? Despise other fae-touched folk? Maybe want to punish them for your difficulties?”

“What are you talking about?” I snapped.

“Had you met the High Priestess before? She seems to have taken an interest in you.”

He didn’t care in the least that I was upset by his questioning. And he clearly knew something I didn’t.

“She seemed to, at the end of our meeting. And no, I’ve never met her before,” I said. “And I would never do anything to hurt anyone who wasn’t trying to hurt me first.”

He nodded, seemingly satisfied by my answers, then continued, “She knows something about you that none of us do. She knows your father isn’t your father, and she knows there’s something special about you. I think she knows who your father is. And I think whoever he is matters.”

I stiffened, uncertain how to respond.

“Your mother isn’t human, is she.” It was a statement, not a question.

“No. Not entirely at least. I know she’s fae-touched for certain.” I’d always known what she was, but I hadn’t been prepared to face it then.

Crow nodded. “Maybe she’s more than that. Have you ever asked her?” His tone was becoming softer, less interrogative as he realized I knew less than he’d suspected I might.

“No, it wasn’t really something she ever talked about. How do you know all this?” I asked.

“My informants in Avanis are getting much closer to the High Priestess and the Temple workings. One of them has been fucking one of the young Heralds for a few days. Apparently he’s eager to impress and bad with discretion.

My favorite,” Crow added with a crooked half smile that did not reach his eyes.

“The day after your meeting with Zisorah, she had a meeting with her High Deacons, her most trusted inner circle. And after that meeting, she issued an announcement to the rest of the Heralds. Told them you were special, powerful, that you weren’t what you appeared to be.

Told them to deal with you carefully, and said if you were ever interested in visiting Temple grounds that you were to be let in immediately and allowed to stay as long as you want.

And that she wanted to know the moment you were there.

“The bottom line is, they know things about you that we don’t. And I fuckin’ hate being left out of secrets, Hal,” he said. “So how about you tell me everything you know, and we find out the rest before it becomes a problem?”

I took a deep breath, processing his words.

I wished Byrgir was there, wished someone would get me out of this interrogation.

I dug for scraps of information I might remember about the High Priestess, for any connection between the two of us that I might somehow already be aware of, anyone who she might know that knew me. I had nothing.

“You know as much as I know now. The father that raised me isn’t my father. I don’t know who my real father is. And I suppose I don’t know for certain who my mother is either, underneath the woman I grew up with.” I paused again, then asked, “Why does Zisorah think I’m powerful?”

“Because you are,” El said. “I’ve never trained someone like you.

I’ve never seen someone master complex manipulations of Source like you have.

Working with you… You don’t just weave things with power, Halja.

You become that power. It flows so deeply and seamlessly with you, it’s like you’re part of it, born from Source itself.

The only person I’ve ever seen that’s anything similar to that is, well, me. ”

“And you’re fully fae,” Crow concluded.

El nodded. “But I think Halja’s power could surpass my own in a matter of years.”

They both looked at me.

“You think I’m fae.”

El nodded. “I’ve suspected it from the moment we met.”

I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the counter, and ran both hands over my face. “Why would that interest Zisorah so much?” I said to El. “I mean, she saw you, and you’re clearly fae. But she doesn’t seem concerned about you.”

“Exactly,” Crow said, his voice low. “So there must be something more about you.”

The front door creaked open and Byrgir’s footsteps sounded, muffled by the rugs in the sitting room. He stopped at the kitchen door, and at the sight of our faces.

“What is it?” he asked. “Did someone die?”

“Not yet,” Crow replied.

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic.” El waved a hand at him, then addressed Byrgir. “Crow was informed that our friend Zisorah has taken an interest in Halja. And we don’t know why.”

Byrgir crossed the kitchen to the island where we stood. As Crow filled him in on the orders the High Priestess had disseminated throughout her followers, his face darkened. I was beginning to grasp how seriously the three of them were taking this, even if El played it off.

Crow poured Byrgir a glass of wine and passed it to him as he finished his story. A sudden question sparked my mind.

“Byrgir, does Eilith know?”

“Know what? Who your father is? Or about your mother?”

“Either. Both,” I said.

“Maybe. She told me… She knew there was something special about you. She knows how strong you are, or suspected it, even then,” Byrgir said thoughtfully.

“She told you what?” I pressed, my anxiety and annoyance increasing. They had spoken about me, talked about my potential, without Eilith telling me. Not until it was too late.