Her sister’s palms began to sweat if she even suspected she was in trouble, and she’d once cried at the thought of failing an assignment. She’d never learned to lie as easily as Faron did, but she was lying now. About what? And why?
Elara sat up, her knuckles white from how hard she clenched that spoon. Faron frowned at her, wishing the gods could give her the power to see inside people’s heads. She couldn’t think of anything important enough that Perfect Elara would lie to her, to the queen, to theirparents. And it cut deeply to think that perhaps she didn’t know her sister—her best friend—as well as she thought.
Conversation flowed over dinner, topics and tones only slightly forced. Elara avoided Faron’s every attempt to catch her gaze. Somewhere between emptying her plate and helping Mama wash up, Faron made her fourth and final promise of the day. One she knew she would keep.
Whatever Elara was hiding, shewouldfind out.
And soon.
CHAPTER FOUR
ELARA
THAT NIGHT,ELARA SNUCK OUT OF HER HOUSE FOR THE SECONDtime in her life.
As she landed hard in her father’s garden, nearly rolling her ankle in the process, she wished she weren’t such a coward. The wind felt too cold on her skin. Her heart was beating too quickly. Somewhere in the neighborhood, a stray dog howled, and it sounded like a warning.
Elara was not this person. She was not the one who rebelled. Rebellion gave her anxiety.Faronhad been blessed by the gods, channeled their magic, saved the world.Elarahad gotten in trouble for not stopping her, for following her without divine protection of her own, for forcing her parents to confront the fear of losing both daughters at once. While Faron had grown into a defiant teen, Elara stayed apologetically within the lines their parents had drawn. Thrived within them, really.
Given her good reputation, maybe if she crawled back inside now, they might forgive her in five years instead of fifty.
But if she crawled back inside now, she would only ever be a hero inside these walls. The rest of the world would make her afootnote in the books written about her sister, if she were ever mentioned at all. And maybe she shouldn’t care about that, but shedid. She wanted to matter, too. Sometimes it felt as if she were drowning so deep in Faron’s shadow, no one could hear her screams.
She turned and had to clap a hand over her mouth to stifle a shriek.
Faron stood beneath the cherry tree, crowned in moonlight. She was still wearing her nightgown, a simple white cotton dress embroidered with her initials. It had been a gift from Miss Johnson, an elderly neighbor from down the road who saw the whole town as her family.
Faron spat a cherry pit into the bed of poinsettias to her left. Her eyebrows lifted.
“Who told you?” Elara demanded. “Was it Reeve?”
“If Reeve Warwick told me it was raining outside, I wouldn’t believe him until I was drenched.” Faron folded her arms. “Youtold me the second you tried to lie. You aren’t good at it. Where are you going?”
Elara considered her options and immediately gave in. “I’m going to join the Sky Battalion. Enlistment opens tomorrow.”
Faron sucked her teeth. “This? You lie to me forthis?”
“I thought—I thought you’d be mad.”
“Iammad. What was your plan here? If Mama and Papa wake up and your bed is empty, they’re not just going to call the local police. They’re going to have Aveline’s whole military looking for you. For Irie’s sake, Aveline would send the military herself!”
“I—”
“No,” said Faron, holding up a hand. “You don’t have to tell me you didn’t think this through. I know you didn’t. I’m the liar, Elara,not you. I know you hoped to be chosen as a drake pilot before anyone came looking, and I’m telling you that’s not what’s going to happen.”
Elara’s body went cold. “You don’t think I’ll be chosen as a drake pilot?”
“Of course you’ll be chosen as a drake pilot.” And the way her sister said that, as though it was such an undeniable fact that it wasn’t worth debating, made some of the tension slide from Elara’s shoulders. “Everybody loves you. Why wouldn’t a drake?”
There was something surreal about this moment, standing with her sister in the starlit garden beneath her bedroom window, trampling her father’s thyme and listening to the gods-chosen Childe Empyrean tell Elara that everyone lovedher. If it weren’t for the anxiety pulsing under her skin, she would have thought she was still asleep.
“What I’m saying,” Faron continued, “is that if you leave like this, Mama and Papa and the queen and her guards will drag you home by your braids before you ever get the chance to try. It’ll take you over half a day to make it all the way up to Highfort.”
Her sister stood between her and freedom. And she was right, damn her. Elara led Faron away from the still-open window and back into the shadows of the cherry tree. “What do you suggest, then?”
“I can cover for you, make up a story about you wanting to go to the nearest temple and pray for your friends. Something to buy you some time to sign up.”
“The Summit is being held in Port Sol, and they have a temple,” Elara said dubiously. “Why wouldn’t I just pray there?”
