If that is true, there is nothing I can conceive of that will fix this. Neither Chiron nor I can compel him. I turn away from Wren, into Chiron’s warm chest. His heartbeat is steady, and his breathing is slow. If I were any other woman, not a sister of the Isle or a representative of Naedra, I could be content with this one man. Happy even. I am neither of those things.
My mind drifts back to our last meeting with the Lord and Lady Nephrys. How happy they were, the two of them. A love match, they had told us. I have no reference for what that feels like. To choose someone, unbound by the elements. The only thing I have ever chosen was my home. I had thought somewhere along the way that we had decided that we were choosing the three of us. All bound by fate, but active participants in what came from that.
I slip out of Chiron’s arms and walk quietly to the washroom. I wonder if Chiron’s mother ever lay awake at night, wondering if she would fracture under the weight of the lost Queens’ leaving. Did she, too, feel the separation like a festering wound, slowly eating away at what was once alive and growing?
I do not know the answer to any of the night’s questions. I only know that I cannot continue on this way for much longer. I open the shuttered window in the back of the room. The sky is twilight dark, and the city below it is as well, washed in deep purple hues. Vaguely, the outline of the northern peaks is visible. Soon, we will have to move on from here. Toward the trial of Sky, towards Ilyora. But I fear above all that we will not be moving together.
…
Chiron
She breathes so softly,her chest rising and falling almost imperceptibly. When she’s asleep, she isn’t worrying.
It’s nearly dawn, but it is still dark. The coals are all but ashes, and the room is chilled. The bed is chilled. I look over to the right of the room, where Wren has his back turned to us, facing into the settee. He has a small fur draped over his legs. I guess Vonetta did that. I close my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose. Her warmth curls into my side, and I squeeze her softly to it. We could all be sleeping in sanctuary right now if not for whatever is keeping him over there.
How did this all become so tenuous? Likely me. My confession. It broke open all of the things we were holding on to. Maybe the Trinity is tenuous by nature.
That night…was transcendent. We all knew it. Wren is scared. Scared of the vow, scared of our joining, maybe. He will settle down. Right now, he’s back to what he knows. The books, his late-night scribbling in his journal…the solitude. But it won’t last forever. Probably. Not if I can help it. Talking to him the other day didn’t go as planned. I became protective of Netta. Something I didn’t know was inside of me. Certainly, I didn’t ever expect it to come out against Wren in such a visceral way. Damn. I need to fix this.
I shift on the bed, facing toward Netta. Her skin is creamy and soft. There is a subtle glow where the dim light catches. I close my eyes again and let my mind follow its course.
I think about my confession about my parents and the lost Queen, Adira. I still don’t understand how they let her go. Wren, Vonetta, and me? We’ve been together on this path for such a short time. But already, I care deeply for them. I don’t know if care is the right word, even. It’s bigger than that. From the moment I saw her kneeling in front of me, fire dancing behind her jet waves of hair? I was steady. She was the most beautiful stranger I’ve ever encountered.
Wren reminds me of the busy scholars in the city; his adventures happened in his mind long before they pulled him into my world, a mystery. He’s a different kind of beautiful. A subtly chiseled nose, serious watchful eyes, and thin lips that beg to be touched. The sensation in my chest is expansive with pride in these two friends and lovers.
My lovers.
I need to fix this. Because there’s no possible outcome of this that ends the way my parents’ Trinity did.
Not if I have anything to say about it.
…
Wren
The days passin a blur of parchment. My nose burns with the scent of ink. My mind races constantly with my secret obsession. The shame of even searching…
I became a man possessed that night, watching Chiron and Vonetta in their sleep. They were so beautiful, awash in the glow of the fire. Sweat dampened skin, hair scattered like a wind swept through our chambers. And yet, I couldn’t leave the thought alone.
If the last representative of the land could just leave her Trinity without recourse, has a precedent been set for this? Our origin stories have been recorded for centuries on the Isle of Men, and they always included something about the land withdrawing its bounty if the vows are abandoned. However, my days in the familiar setting of the Athenaeum in Nerine have brought me nothing but more questions. More sleepless nights and soul-wrenching guilt.
I knew that morning that I had made a grave mistake pulling away from Netta and Chiron, in refusing to attend their event at the Nephrys estate. Worse still, when I recoiled from Vonetta’s gentle touch. Likely the worst mistake of them all.
Neither of them deserved my refusal. Neither is to blame for the sins of the reigning Trinity.
Yet I have remained apart from them.
I lie facing the back of the settee; I cannot face them. My research has turned up nothing to either prove or disprove that one of the representatives can leave without consequence. That is worse than any answer at all.
So I resolve tonight to tell them. With the sky trial looming, we can delay no longer. The silence between us is growing thick with questions and hurt.
I have often been called singular-minded, my head in tomes and my mind on my academic pursuit. But there is no question that my choice to seek out the answers to my compulsive question on my own has rifted us three. We made vows, both at our meeting during the Rite and at every trial since. No historical record can change that. I still need to know what my choices are.
But it has become clear that I can delay this no longer. No matter what their reaction is, I have to tell them what I’ve been looking for. The bonds at my shoulders grow heavier every day. Stretched thin and weightier than any chains. Tomorrow I will tell them.
Even if I cannot go, even if I cannot stay.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
