“The Council is… complicated,” her father started. “You’re aware of their basic responsibilities, but you haven’t been exposed yet to our secret.”
Her heart picked up speed. More proof she was soon to be an Elder herself, privy to things others weren’t.
“I don’t like this, Stellan.”
A new ache bloomed watching her mother this time. Almaura had hidden it so well. The worry. The terror. It crept over herface so subtly it was no wonder Lunara hadn’t picked up on it before.
“Better she hear it from us than some prettified version when she’s initiated.”
Her father lifted a lock of her hair, rubbing the strands. He was always fiddling like that.
“The Keeper is our most sacred burden, Lunara.”
“Burden?” The word confused her. How could their protector, a gift to the Evesong from the Sisters themselves, be a burden?
When she said as much, her father let his head fall back to stare at the ceiling. “Sometimes a Keeper… loses their way. It’s our responsibility to determine when they’re no longer fit to wield the stone.”
“I know that. The vote is cast and they relinquish Illamiata to the next, living the rest of their days on the Isle in reward for their service.”
Her parents gave each other a long look, her mother’s jaw clenching. “Not exactly,” she said.
“The Elder Council watches the Keeper”—her father rubbed at his forehead—“for signs their journey is at its end.”
That was… cryptic.
“Would someone please say whatever it is in plain words?”
It was her mother who finally answered. “We don’t vote to send the Keepers off to a luxurious life on the Isle. We pool our gifts and use them to reclaim Illamiata through violence. It takes all of us, and we have to agree because we vote toeliminatethem, Lunara—at great personal risk to ourselves.”
She blinked, comprehending and yet… not.
“As far as we’re concerned, Malachyr has reached his end. He’s becoming erratic, strange. He’s hard to find, and tragedies are piling up behind him.”
“You think Malachyr the Mistwarden ismurdering people?”
Hearing that name, spoken so reverently from her own lips and with such disbelief, opened a pit in Lunara’s stomach.
He’d been the Keeper longer than she’d been alive. She pictured his angular face, the way he commanded a room and was always so kind to her. She couldn’t imagine him harming anyone.
“Yes,” her father rasped, “but it isn’t his fault. Illamiata corrupts its vessel over time. The Keepers know this going in, and accept they’ll have to sacrifice their lives for the honor of once holding it. Everything they do is for the Evesong. The Elders created the story of the Isle centuries ago because fallen Keepers deserved to have their memories held in the highest esteem after their death.”
Shitting stars above. It hit Lunara all over again that Stellan had been the kindest male in all of Bordoroth. Gentle. Forgiving. Understanding. Even towards those who didn’t deserve it.
“If that’s their purpose, and they know he killed that girl…”
“They don’t know without a shadow of doubt, and that’s the problem,” her mother said. “No onesawhim. At least, no one with enough credibility.”
“So they know, but are protecting him anyway.”
“Yes.” That one word from her father’s lips said so much more than its single syllable.
He gripped her hand. “It’s complicated. Malachyr has succumbed faster than most Keepers before him. He was meant to get us through the next Occurrenceat least, but only made it a few decades. That’s alarming, and no one knows what to do with it.”
It wasn’t complicated. Not to her.
“I don’t…” Her stomach turned. “I want nothing to do with that.”
Lunara hadn’t been a total idiot, thank the Sisters.
