Reeve stared at her for a long time, and she was afraid of what he would say because his eyes had gone dark and his jaw was clenched. “You must be very angry.”
Celeste blinked. Angry? She felt around inside herself, but she couldn’t find ire, not now. “Delphine was always angry enough for the both of us. I’m just…” Celeste supposed she was many things, wretched amongst them, but none felt right to say. “I just wish things could have been different. But you know, you must also wonder sometimes what it would have been like.”
He tipped his head like he didn’t understand.
“If your parents were alive, I mean, your life would have been different too.”
“Oh, they’re alive.”
“They are?” Celeste was suddenly struck with curiosity, sitting up straight. “You mean your father wasn’t…wasn’t a soldier who was run through on a battlefield defending some great honor?” When he shook his head, her eyes only narrowed, more intrigue chasing away the sorrow. “Your mother didn’t die giving birth to you or something equally tragic and noble like that?”
“Nope. They gave me away.”
His words were so simply said, presented with no ill will, that Celeste could only stare at him, hoping he would go on.
“They thought I was possessed.”
She stared harder.
“I wasn’t!” He held up his hands as if she were accusing him herself. “I could just do arcana from the very beginning. I mean, that’s what I’m told. Doesn’t usually happen, I guess, and babies don’t really have self control, so I…did things.”
Celeste felt a grin play at her lips. “You mean there was a little version of you swinging around a glowing stick, Abyss-bent on defeating evil?”
Reeve chuckled awkwardly. “Well, not exactly. See, my parents ran a dairy south of Bendcrest, and when I came along anddid things, they took me to the Temple of Valcord to have me exorcised. I don’t remember any of it, I couldn’t even walk yet, Father Theodore just told me when I was old enough to understand. He explained to my parents that I wasn’t possessed by a demon or anything, that it was actually a blessing, but they decided not to take me back home. They already had four sons, so they didn’t really need another.”
“Oh, Reeve.” Celeste touched her chest, the amusement falling away along with the imagined vision of toddler Reeve whacking his own shadow. “I’m sorry.”
But he looked unbothered. “Apparently, I caused a lot of problems. I even blew up a whole barn. Still feel pretty bad about all the cows. There was apparently very little left of them after, not even enough to eat.”
Celeste grit her teeth. “And this Father Theodore, hetoldyou all that? Even the exploding cows part?”
“Honesty is a Valcordian virtue.”
“Right.” She fiddled with the deep neck of her chemise. “So, you’ve never tried to find them?”
“No, and I don’t think I’m supposed to. I was meant for the temple, Valcord just had a kind of strange way of getting me there. Though lately…” He didn’t seem like he was going to finish the thought, but he had gone somber, staring out across the worship chamber at the reliefs carved into the pillars, chipped and dented. Then he shook his head. “But that’s easy for me to believe because I wasn’t mistreated. The priests and priestesses, they were good to me, not like what happened to you. People that should have taken care of you were cruel, and you deserved…”
Celeste was shaking her head, and his voice trailed off. No oneshould havedone anything—she wasn’tdeserving, not now, and not then, but she swallowed those words down.
Instead, Celeste bit her lip. “I am sorry about the cows,” she said.
“And I’m sorry about the…everything.”
Her eyes fell to the books still sitting between the two, and she grabbed up one from the pile. “Would you like to hear the story of Alphonse and Alise and the Everdarque?”
He grinned. “I think I would.”
CHAPTER 21
WHEN THE CONJURED BIRD FLIES
Aruckus woke Celeste from her decidedly comfy spot on the sofa. A scarlet feather floated through the air just before her much too serenely for the noise being made, a wailing screech met with a gurgly hiss, and she sat straight up.
“Oh, Crickets, stop that!” Celeste hopped off the couch as Reeve roused beside her. She had been leaning on his shoulder, and it had been the nicest leaning she’d ever done, but of course it was upended by the chaos of Plum wanting to tear Zak’s wings to pieces.
Geezer’s bird swooped toward Celeste, and a piece of folded parchment dropped from its crooked beak. Before the page could land, Plum swooped behind and caught it, darting right back for the bird at a frightening speed.
“Plum!” she shouted, and the wyvern stopped short just before it plucked out his nemesis’s tail feathers.
