Rafe looked at me and I grimaced. “He…might. The affinity only confuses the subject, it doesn’t completely wipe something away.”
“Could you implant a new memory?” Skye asked. Zephyr grunted disapprovingly, but she went on. “Have you ever tried?”
“No and no,” I said with a sigh, ignoring the bit of excitement that trickled through me at her attention. “Never tried, but I just…knowit wouldn’t work that way.”
“We call it ‘scrambling’ because it chops up the memories, making them so distorted they can’t be trusted,” Rafe explained. “I know. He’s done it to me before. For science.”
I ran a hand down my face, surprised Rafe didn’t decide to announce to everyone how he’d been in a literal coma for twenty-four hours after ourexperiment. Who knows how many years I’d lost off my life after that.
“Why did Vince want his memory of me scrambled?” Skye asked.
“Probably because he knew the Palace would never let him go otherwise,” Aiden said simply, surprising us. “Sensors don’t get to retire. Shafer is old as hell. And now he’s sensed a fully realized Tele?They’d never let him go. The Crown Princess would have moved him directly into the Palace.”
Rafe and I cringed.
That’d almost been my fate at one point in time.
Same for Zephyr, I realized, and for the first time, I understood why he and Skye fought so hard to not only hide her affinities, but his as well. Healers weren’t treated well by the Palace. Rafe knew it, even if he pretended not to, and that was why he’d encouraged me to keep that affinity a secret. Not only that, but the teleporting would undoubtedly be picked up by any of the Sensors Zephyr came in contact with.
“Am I wrong?” Aiden asked. “Rafe, your mom would have sent him on a continental tour just to sniff out any other remaining Telekinetics. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re not wrong,” Rafe sighed in resignation. “My mother…hates Telekinetics just as deeply as my grandfather did.”
Zephyr grunted. “So how is this,” he waved his hand between Skye and Rafe, “going to work?”
“I haven’t figured that out yet,” Rafe murmured. “We could continue to hide the affinities, but–”
Rafe had brought this idea up to me before, and I shook my head.
“That won’t work, Rafe,” I said. “Asking her to hide her affinities is bullshit, and absolutely no one would believe a simple air and water affinate is the Key to the shadow Prince.”
Zephyr raised an eyebrow at me, but didn’t make any smartass comments, so that was a plus.
“He’s right,” Skye said softly, and a thrill shot through my chest. “No one would believe that. Not to mention, there’s Sensors all over the Palace.”
“Yeah, except none of the Sensors can sense affinities without touching someone,” Aiden said. “That affinity is long gone.”
Rafe made eye contact with me for just a moment.
Aidenshouldhave been right. At some point in time, Sensors had been able to sense affinities from miles away. There had even been a rare secondary affinity called tracking. A Tracker could sense an affinate from hundreds orthousandsof miles away.
Thankfully, my half-ass sensing ability was just that and notsomething more. I didn’t know what I’d do with myself if I learned I could sense affinities from further away. The amount of unheard of affinities that existed just within this shaky Chain were already too much.
“Let’s go see him,” Rafe said. “The storm seems to have passed–”
“Tomorrow,” Skye blurted out, and everyone turned to look at her. She cleared her throat, her eyes darting from Rafe over to me, then to the floor. “Stay tonight. I don’t…want y’all out after that storm.”
“Of course,” Rafe agreed easily, shooting me a warning look as Zephyr’s piercing eyes glared at the two of us.
“Tomorrow,” I agreed. “Of course we’ll stay.”
Even if that meant Zephyr might try to kill me in my sleep.
Chapter 21
Aiden
“Hey, y’all ready?”Zephyr whispered loudly.
