‘And there are pastries,’ a woman adds, her accent also from the Eastern Isles. ‘Good pastries.’
I remain where I am, still undecided about what I’m going to do. Zara made it very clear that I shouldn’t go into this thinking I can trust people, but Jonas’s comment about alliances is still fixed in my mind. He implied he was willing to work with me, but implied doesn’t mean agreed. And even if we do work together, it’s still just the two of us. As impressive as his power is, it’s not going to inflict damage the way a flame-wielder could.
Which is why, despite the hammering in my chest, I turn back and take the last few steps towards the kitchen, where a group of five – four men and one woman – are sitting around a table. Just like they said, there is a platter of pastries between them, and my eyes feel as though they’re bugging from my head at the sight of the glazed delicacies. The sugar is so thick it’s practically sparkling, and I’m not even sure what all the fruits on top are. They don’t make things like this in the slums.
‘Come and join us,’ the woman says as she pushes the platter towards me. ‘Don’t worry. You won’t find any fans of Zara and the Rowell crew in here.’
‘She killed one of us yesterday.’ The one who speaks looks like the youngest. I know he has to be at least eighteen to even be here, but he looks younger than Kay. His sandy-blond hair is tousled, his olive cheeks pale, and his eyes torn with grief. ‘Suan. Zara decided she was anotherrunt.’ His voice is bitter, and I don’t blamehim.
An enemy of my enemy though … I approach the group with a little less trepidation. ‘I’m so sorry.’ I take a seat at the end of the bench, a short way away from the only female of the group. ‘May Mortidem hold her gifts with grace.’
‘Thank you. We appreciate that.’ The one who speaks this time isn’t the biggest; that position is held by the boulder of a man at the end of the table who hasn’t so much as glanced at me as he’s too busy shovelling food into his mouth, but he has an air of distinction about him. His skin is dark, his curly black hair cropped close to his head, and he sits with an impressively straight posture as he stretches out a hand to me. ‘Benny.’
‘Rose,’ I respond, taking his hand briefly.
‘Llinos.’ The brunette woman introduces herself next, pronouncing the first sound of her name with a liquid noise somewhere between a ‘c’ and an ‘l.’
‘Sorry, did you say Clinos?’ Better to ask now than still be pronouncing it wrong in a week’s time.
‘Llinos,’ she repeats with that same c-l combination. ‘Don’t worry. You’ll get the hang of it.’ She winks at me, freckles scattering across olive skin as her hazel eyes gleam with mischief.
‘Coulter,’ the youngest one names himself.
The fourth man at the table is much older than the others, with grey hair and skin a remarkably similar colour, but as he merely nods at me and mumbles inaudibly, I’m none the wiser as to his name. As for the boulder man, who looks a good decade older than the rest of them, he doesn’t even bother acknowledging me. A friendly sort, then.
‘It was definitely an unwelcome start to this thing,’ Llinos says, presumably talking about what happened with Suan. ‘I was hoping I could get through this entire Retterheld without having to kill anybody. But I guess that was wishful thinking.’
‘There was one Retterheld five hundred years ago, where everyone made it through to the start of the Ofur – the final challenge. They all just worked together.’
‘I heard about that one too,’ I add. ‘I was kind of hoping it would be like that this time, but that was wishful thinking. If I didn’t have a target on my back before, I definitely have one now.’
‘It’s safe to say you made quite an impression.’ Benny’s response isn’t exactly comforting, though his smile is soft and genuine. ‘Nice trick, by the way. What was that you threw to start the fire? Looked like some kind of glass orb. Magic-infused, I take it?’ His question is casual, but a ripple offear fills me. I was hoping to fool the others into thinking I had at leastsomemagic for at least the first trial.
‘Who said I threw anything?’ I try to appear relaxed despite the prickling down the back of my neck.
‘Benny’s gift is sight-related,’ Llinos explains. ‘He can slow down what he sees and take in all the details. You won’t get anything past him. Super annoying when we played hide-and-seek as kids.’
‘Wow, I’ve never heard of anything like that before.’
‘It’s not exactly common.’ Benny shrugs. ‘Has more advantages than you’d imagine. Though it’s not as visually impressive as some. Right, Jai?’
Jai, I discover, is the name of the mountain of a man at the end of the table.
‘Go on, show her,’ Benny cajoles. ‘Just keep it under control. Maybe use the hearth.’
Jai’s face is twisted in a scowl, and he looks like he wants to throw Benny across the kitchen rather than do what he says, but a moment later, he lets out a slight grunt and the bricks around the fireplace begin to glow – softly at first, and then brighter and brighter until I can feel the heat radiating from them. In moments, the heat is almost as strong as that from the fire bead.
‘Isn’t he amazing?’ Coulter says in wonder.
‘Okay, buddy, that’ll do.’ Benny taps Jai on the arm, and with another grunt, the man stops, and the bricks cease to glow, though the ripples of heat remain.
‘Loch, here, is our bat ears,’ Benny continues with a nod to the man whose name I missed earlier. ‘Which is how we knew you were out there on the stairs. And Coulter can do pretty much the same as Jai, but he heats liquids, not solids.’
As I try to memorise the powers and names and link them to the faces, one overwhelming thought takes hold. ‘You’re not nervous telling me your powers?’
Benny shakes his head. ‘We’re chill. And I saw how you were with Zara. You didn’t want to fight her; you wanted her to back the fuck off. I respect that. Besides, you already saw what Llin can do.’
I’m utterly confused. ‘I did?’
