Castien knew he should be more interested in what she wrote about him and Finn and the Order, but he found himself returning to her most vulnerable pages again and again. It had been years since he read something that could evoke such strong emotions in him. He purposefully avoided books of poetry, fiction, and the like to keep his mind clear and hisGift unobstructed. He worked tirelessly to suppress any and all emotions. His feet had been firmly rooted in logic and evidence–until the journal.
Wren’s words threw him into a sea of anger, fear, depression, and grief. All of which had an undercurrent of fragile hope she placed in her brother. Castien did not know how she got out of bed after Heron’s death, much less concocted a plan to get her to the academy to find his killer.
Castien traced one of the earlier entries with his eyes. Her pain was so raw, so potent. He felt it in the back of his throat like bile. The agony she endured…he could not fathom how she survived. Her entries were rarely explicit when it came to detailing exact events, but Castien had gathered enough to know that she was deeply wounded. Every entry was a silent, unanswered plea for help. He wanted to answer it, though he was not yet sure how.
Tangled up in the near-constant affliction Wren suffered through, there was a peculiar secret she was keeping. Her Gift was not storytelling. Her Gift–or Curse, as she termed it–was empathy. Or so Castien had gathered. She wrote of the burden of feeling other’s emotions several times, and he had deduced that she viewed such a powerful Gift as a Curse.
What he couldn’t understand was why she was hiding it. If she were to make known the ability, she would move up the ranks in society quickly. Her Gift would be in high demand. She might even be able to avoid the marriage she feared by building up her personal wealth through hiring out use of the Gift.
She must have an undisclosed reason for not telling anyone but Heron of her Gift. Castien wanted to find out. Now that he had tasted of Wren's mind, he was ravenous for more. In spite of the emotions her words elicited, Castien’s Gift was writing in the air at a breakneck pace to account for all of the information he had just ingested. His vision swam with gold ink, so much sothat he had to blink several times and focus to force it away so he could read just her script.
His entire being, down to his marrow, craved more. Reading the journal made him desire things he had never considered before, things he should not want, but he couldn’t help but long for. And his nature was not often denied. Despite all of the caution his Gift was trying to display for him, for the very first time, Castien’s yearning outweighed logic. He wanted to bring her into the Order. To help her find her brother’s killer. To let her know she didn’t have to endure all of this alone. To hold–
His bedroom door flew open, hitting the wall behind it. He slammed the journal shut and looked up to find a disheveled Finn panting in the flickering firelight. Aside from Finn’s evident exertion, the two cousins looked rather alike. Their shirts were rolled at the sleeves, buttons undone around the neck, and their jackets discarded.
“What’s wrong?” Castien asked and pushed himself up from where he’d been sitting on a rug by the fire. Finn shut the door behind him, his chest heaving.
“They found another body,” Finn said in between breaths. “Inside the Wall.”
Castien’s blood ran cold. He looked down at the journal, his vision swimming. How had he failed? He was born to solve problems, his Gift proved that. Now, after all that he had learned, he lost Wren because he was too slow.
“Not her,” Finn rasped. Relief showered Castien like a thunderstorm. “It was Kelda. I know very little. I was playing cards in the parlor at House of Onyxim when a first-year ran in blubbering. Said the professors and some guards were combing the grounds for suspects. Everyone is to stay in their rooms until they’re told they can leave. I ran here so that you would know before they arrived.”
Kelda? Castien willed his racing heart and thoughts to slow. He looked back at his wall of postulation, shadowy as it was, and tried to place her up there. She was a second-year student and a member of the Order. Castien had attended Adira’s Ball with her last semester, on his father’s orders. Kelda was the daughter of a clan leader on Stonemouth that Castien’s father wanted a connection to. Castien knew little else about the woman. They both had attended together out of duty alone.
“Was she connected to Heron?” Castien asked when he drew a blank. Beyond both of them being associated with the Order, there was no string to tie their names.
“I never saw them together, and no one mentioned a connection when I was asking around at the beginning of the investigation. It doesn’t add up,” Finn gave his answer as his breathing started to slow.
Castien crossed the room to his window and drew aside the curtain that Heathford had closed some time ago. Lanterns and torches created pinpricks of light in the distance. He doubted they would discover the murderer by search party. The culprit was likely already in bed, pretending to be asleep. This was a person calculating enough to kill not one, but two high-ranking students, the second murder having been committed while trapped on the island. All without being seen.
“This was planned,” Castien murmured his thoughts aloud as he stared into the inky night. “Probably over the course of several moons.”
“Do you think they intend to kill again?”
Castien clenched the curtain in his hand. “Yes.” He let go and turned back to Finn, who was tugging on the roots of his hair. “Which is why we must discern the pattern before there’s another victim. I need all of the information you can gather. Use your Gift to put the investigators at ease when they come toquestion you and turn their inquiries on themselves. Everyone is a suspect.”
“I know I am not the strategist amongst us, but I will point out the only tie I see.” He met Castien’s gaze, worry shining in his indigo eyes. “Do you think someone is coming after the Order?”
Castien heaved a weary sigh. “It is possible, but that doesn’t feel like the only explanation. There’s more out there, I can sense it.”
“I’ll see what I can find. I’m going to go to my room to try to minimize any suspicion on my end.”
Castien donned the mantle of his role as High Inquisitor.
“I will send Heathford out to alert the Order as well. No one should question him leaving. Tomorrow’s meeting will be postponed until it’s safe to meet again.”
Finn nodded. “I’ll tell him for you on my way out.” He gestured to the journal still in Castien’s hands. “Did you learn anything of value?”
The words he held were more precious than any jewel mined from Shadow Cove or any treasure pulled up from the Tides. He’d never share them with anyone, not even Finn.
“Time will tell,” Castien answered.
Finn raised his brows at the cryptic reply.
“I will be on my way then. Send for me if necessary. I anticipate a long night leading into an even longer day.”
“I believe your prediction will be correct. Thank you, Finn.”
