The assassination attempt was the last straw.
I wanted to get into bed, crawl under my blanket, cover my head with the pillow, and never come out.
"Get some rest," Ravel said. "We'll talk more tomorrow." He turned to my father. "You can rest assured that your house is well protected. No one is getting within a hundred-foot perimeter."
"Thank you." My father offered him his hand. "For this and for earlier. You might have saved the lives of both of my children."
Ravel shook it. "That's what I'm here for."
My mother was next, wringing her hands as she approached him. "As much as I love having my children here, maybe they should return to the Citadel where they can be better protected."
Ravel gifted her with one of his rare smiles and put his hand on her shoulder. "Dylon is a rider, and Kailin is about to become one. Danger will follow them wherever they are. I know it's not easy to accept, but you should remember that your son is nearly immortal and your daughter soon will be as well. Contrary to the rumors, we don't lose riders often."
I was glad he hadn't told her about the dangers he suspected in the Citadel.
My mother swallowed hard. "I'll try."
"Be alert," Ravel told me. "If anything seems suspicious, tell Onyx, and he will communicate it to me."
I nodded.
"Well," Dylon said after Ravel left. "Now I know why Gran's cooking was especially tasty today. It might have been our last meal."
"Don't joke about that," I said, but I understood his impulse to make light of the situation.
When the world tilted off its axis, sometimes dark humor was the only way to cope.
7
ALAR
"In the quiet spaces between heartbeats, truth softly whispers."
—From 'Meditations on Intimacy'
By Scholar Lyann Westmore
Kailin's room was even smaller than our quarters at the Citadel, but every surface told a story. Sketches were tacked to the walls, and shelves were overflowing with books. In front of them were figurines that someone had lovingly carved from wood.
Her father, perhaps?
The quilt on her bed was hand-stitched, probably by her grandmother, and the wooden desk looked handmade, probably another of her father's creations. Everything was well-lived,inviting, and functional, but with attention to aesthetics, which was important to Kailin's artistic sensibilities.
This room had been a sanctuary for a sixteen-year-old girl who'd needed to heal from the trauma of the attack on her village, from having been forced to kill to defend her people. After having been forged in steel and fire, this place had provided the safety Kailin had needed to become who she was today—a woman who bore the title of the Hero of Elucia but was too modest to believe she deserved it.
When the door opened, and she walked in, dressed in a set of pink pajamas that seemed too big on her slight frame, I forced a smile. The color suited her, making her look younger than her twenty-one years, but the dark circles under her eyes worried me.
I patted the spot on the bed beside me.
"I need to put these away first." She opened the wardrobe door and pulled out a hanger. "I bet your closet in the palace is bigger than my room."
There was a defensive undertone in her voice, and I wondered whether it had anything to do with the meager contents of her wardrobe.
"It is, and my bed is bigger and much more comfortable than yours, but I would still rather sleep here with you than alone in the palace, and not just because I get to hold you in my arms. I like your room much more than mine because it tells the story of your life. This is where you became who you are."
"In part." She closed the wardrobe doors and sat down on the bed next to me. "When we first left the village and moved here, I hardly ever left this room." She pulled her knees to her chest. "I spent time at that window, sketching the mountains and trying not to think about anything." She leaned her head against my shoulder. "The bed is going to be a tight fit for two people."
That was Kailin's way of signaling that she was done talking about the past, and I was fine with that.
