“It looks real enough,” I mutter. “How are they fake?”
“A real one only lights up for its owner. These light up for anyone, so try and avoid having to use them too much.” Taron holds out his empty hand, and I’m confused. “Give me yours. Your real sigil.”
“What? Why?”
“We can’t risk you being seen with two.” The burly man shoulders past Taron and plants himself in front of me. He smells of voidroot smoke and sweat, and he’s leaning in so close, I can count the glistening beads clinging to the sides of his temples. “Be a good big sister, and do as you’re told.”
I look down at his short, chubby fingers greedily reaching towards me. There’s no use in fighting this. Any of it.
“Will I get it back?” I bend down to retrieve my shears from my boot, carefully undoing my sigil before placing it in the burly man’s palm. Unlike the fake one, it remains unresponsive to his touch.
“Hmm… I’ll try not to lose it.” The burly man gives a wicked laugh as he flicks my sigil in the air like a coin.
My hands lock around my shears, my teeth grinding together in anger.
“Right, let’s go,” Taron says, gesturing towards the watercraft, where the helmsman sits, ready to embark.
He lets me board first, ensuring I don’t run off at the last minute. “That damsel in distress routine back there,” he asks, “what was that?”
“You asked me to distract them.” I try to hide it, and it feels wrong, but a smile tugs at my lips. We just won a trial of sorts against privately trained contestants who were hand-picked for the Reckoning. I wish I could tell Elara about this.
“Yeah,distractthem,” Taron says, stomping on to the watercraft and planting himself on the woven reed seat across from me. “Not make them attempt to kill me.”
Chapter Nine
Our journey to the capital is quiet.
The watercraft glides smoothly along the waterway, tracing a line through tucked-away landscapes: farmlands that stretch like quilted patches, quiet little villages nestled among the hills and sprawling valleys painted with wildflowers.
I don’t know what I expected, but it’s all so new and bright and very different from the green forested landscapes of Stellargrove. Leaning over the side of the watercraft, I let my hand dangle in the water. I try to stroke the fish swimming into the current, some orange, some yellow, some white, but their slippery little bodies evade my touch.
At the front of the watercraft, the helmsman can’t conceal his unease. His anxiety is pungent, reeking of sulphur. It swirls around his balding head, faint wisps of murky energy, pooling against the canopy overhead.
He’s unsure about us. Which he most definitely should be.
Taron and I are each in our own bubble of thought. I try to distract myself with the scenery, but, eventually, when the silence begins to gnaw at my sanity and the clouds above transform into mocking replicas of Elara’s cheekbones, I find myself glancing at him across from me.
His head is resting in his palm, eyes tracing the expanse of heliocorn fields streaking past us – delicate golden stalks that erupt gracefully from the upturned earth, crowned with pearl-shaped white kernels.
Sunlight filters through the woven canopy on to his face, creating a dappled, shifting pattern that streaks across his pale skin. He has dark rings around his eyes, and his jaw is tight. He looks annoyed, but I can’t sense it.
Yesterday in the parlour, I at least saw the faintest threads of something coming off him, but, now, not a lick of negative energy stirs in the air around him. I wonder if he’s suppressing his emotions on purpose. If he is, he’s good at it. Almost as though it’s a normal part of his daily life.
“Where did you learn to fight like that?” I ask.
There’s a twitch in Taron’s brow. “What do you mean?”
“The way you took down Maeve and Wren. Have you received any training? Are you enrolled in an Academy?”
He smirks, which I take as a no.
“I was just giving you a compliment,” I insist.
“I don’t remember asking for one.”
Jerk.I can’t tell if I said it out loud or not, but, when his eyes meet mine, I divert my attention, deciding to explore the contents of Maeve’s bag at my feet.
What I find is nothing short of absurd: make-up, jewellery, an assortment of hair accessories. A pocket mirror. A bottle of perfume.
