“Tarian is not here to make this call, and we don’t know you,” Lennox said with a vicious note in his voice that Daisy had never heard. She shivered.
“Ah.” Eldric brought his hands closer to his chest. The quill seeped blue ink into his shirt. “Protective of her…or of what she is?”
They didn’t answer, so Daisy said, “Does it matter? They’re protective. They want assurance you aren’t going to kill me. Or, like, magically bug me in some way.”
“Magically…what?” Eldric said.
“Track me or mess with whatever I am or hinder what I can do,” she elaborated.
“He wouldn’t do that,” Niall said. “It’s against his order’s rules.”
“Neither would I—orcouldI—kill the crystal chalice.” Eldric frowned at them. “But if it pleases you…”
It took them ten minutes to make a deal. If Eldric tried to do anything but help her, they would be summoned.
“Now, then.” Eldric studied her after the others had stepped outside. They’d wisely chosen not to be locked in what was apparently an iron chamber. A smile ghosted his lips. “I am eternal, yet…I never thought I would see one of you. Come in, come in.”
He motioned her farther into the chaos. She wasn’t usually a stickler for cleanliness, and didn’t need to be terribly organized to get things done, but the mess made her skin crawl. Mostly because she worried something might creep out from under some of the dusty piles and literally crawl on her.
“It is nearly impossible to find one of you, you understand?” He zigzagged through the space, somehow not stepping on a single scroll.
Paper crinkled under her foot.
“Oops. Sorry—” Stepping away led to more crinkling.
“Your lifespans are so short. A blink, really. And that is if you aren’t killed off earlier than normal, which many are for one reason or another. When Tarianthiel—I will call him Tarian, since you and he, and he and I, are so familiar with one another—set out to find you, I thought he was wasting his time. Without a sanctioned pass from the Celestials, who would never grant one for this in the current turmoil, he only had moments at a time. He had a whole world to search, over several billion humans, with nothing but stolen moments. Never, I thought. Yet in only four thrushes—three?” He paused. “Six?” He put a finger to his chin while shaking his head. “I’ve lost track of time.Anyway, he was able to manage it. I knew he was special. Not just because of his power, mind you. He is a favorite of the gods.”
“They have a funny way of showing it.”
He stopped at the largest desk of all, way in the back of the chaotic room. This one, miraculously, was spotless. Only a single scroll lay on the polished surface. The two chairs in front of it, however, were covered.
He affixed half-moon spectacles atop his nose as he looked at her. “We must never be quick to judge the gods, youngelara. Oftentimes, their plans are dense and complicated, but they always serve a purpose. The hardest trials reap the greatest enlightenment.”
She couldn’t contain her look of skepticism. “Cool.”
He studied her. “A nonbeliever. I do so love those. I hope I shall be there for your revelation. Assuming, of course, you have the mind power to grasp it.”
Was he calling her stupid?
“How did you know what I was?” she asked.
“Human? Because the chalice has to be human?—”
“No, the chalice. You saw me before Tarian found me in that hallway.”
“Oh.” He gave her a pronounced frown. “Once the crystal chalice is formed, the magic shines.”
“But no one else here can see it.”
“Oh,” he said again, waving her away. “My order can see magic the wielder is trying to hide.”
“But I’m…not trying to hide it. I mean, I don’t know how.”
“You clearly do, since you clearly are.”
“You don’t seem to have the mind power to grasp what I am telling you,” she said, and his frown became a scowl. She barely stopped herself from smiling. “I don’t know that I am hiding it. I must be doing it unconsciously. How can I learn to do it consciously?”
He busied himself with the scrolls at the side of his desk. “Let us see. Now, how much do you know about the crystal chalice magic?”
