“The steward’s staying at the cookhouse for the night,” she said, clearly determined to continue being helpful. She pointed over Veronyka’s shoulder, where Beryk was delivering the wagon to the hostler at the attached inn. Elliot had already disappeared to visit his sister and the relatives she was staying with. “Want me to get you into his rooms? I know the servant passages.”
“No,” Veronyka said sharply, afraid Sparrow would run off and get them into more trouble. She didn’t need to accost the man while he ate, or barge into his private room, as Sparrow suggested. The steward said he was leaving at dawn, and Veronyka would just have to be there when he did. She wouldn’t let him leave this village without getting some answers. “I’ll just wait out here until morning.”
To Veronyka’s surprise, Sparrow stayed with her.
When the market closed and the sun began to set, Sparrow begged a free dinner for both of them at the cookhouse back door. The endless tendrils of smoke issuing from the domed roof reminded Veronyka unpleasantly of Xephyra’s pyre, and just like that, the memories pressed in on her, sudden and suffocating. The dark, malignant glint in Val’s eyes, the dense smell of boiling vegetables, and the choked sound of Xephyra’s last labored breaths. The stillness of her body and how quickly it had gone up in flames.
Thinking of her bondmate was like being punched in the stomach, and Veronyka took a great shuddering breath. She couldn’t afford to go to pieces every time Xephyra popped into her mind. Val thought Veronyka was incapable of moving forward—incapable of surviving—without her help, and Veronyka refused to prove her sister right.
She knew what she had to do, even if it felt like betrayal to do so. Veronyka swallowed, her throat thick. Mere hours ago, Xephyra had been a source of strength, a part of her very being. Now her bondmate was a source of despair. How could Veronyka move forward if she carried the weight of the dead with her?
Veronyka closed her eyes and steadied her breath. She could never forget Xephyra, not truly, but she could make her memory harder to find. She’d learned the technique from Val, or rather, because of ?Val. It was hard to keep secrets from a sister like her, but Veronyka had figured out a few tricks.
There was a way of walling things off in her mind—hiding them from conscious thought, so that people like Val, who had shadow magic, couldn’t easily find them. Veronyka had never tried to hide things from herself, but it was worth a shot.
She visualized an empty, dusty corner of her mind—far in the back, out of sight, and easily forgotten. There she would hide Xephyra away.
Just for now, she told herself, hating the cold necessity of it and the way it reminded her of Val. Just for now.
Carefully, like a collector with her most delicate and prized possessions, Veronyka gathered every fond memory and happy feeling she had of her bondmate: Xephyra’s hatching, her first wobbly flight, and the comforting warmth of her feathers. Veronyka experienced each moment of joy one last time, then put them inside that dark corner. She thought of it like a mental safe house, tucked away and concealed, but not truly gone. Xephyra was still a part of her. She always would be.
As her bondmate slowly disappeared from her thoughts, the weight in Veronyka’s chest lifted. Instead of a chasm left behind after a catastrophe, her mind was an empty field. Soothing. Peaceful—no matter the turmoil just below the surface.
Later, when she had her life sorted out, she could take the time to properly grieve for Xephyra.
“You gonna go with them if they let you?” Sparrow asked, several hours after dinner. “Become a famous warrior, like Avalkyra Ashfire?” She was playing with a moth, catching and releasing it over and over again, while murmuring encouragement and cooing words of praise. Insects were nearly impossible to communicate with, their minds too small and foreign for most animages to grasp—usually. It wouldn’t have surprised Veronyka to know Sparrow had managed to make contact with some of them.
Veronyka smiled. “I hope so. What will you do?” She didn’t know anything about the girl, where she came from or where she was going. Maybe Sparrow didn’t know either.
“We haven’t been to Runnet in a while,” she said with a sigh, letting her moth friend fly away. “Maybe we’ll go there next.” Her sparrow cheeped his assent, making it clear who the “we” was in that sentence.
Sparrow was soon snoring, but Veronyka only dozed lightly, afraid to miss the steward’s departure. She saw the fishermen leave for their boats and smelled the baker’s first bread. Elliot returned just before dawn, shoulders hunched against the cold—or maybe it was the idea of leaving his family that dragged him down.
When the wagon rolled out of the stable yard into the golden morning sunshine, Veronyka was waiting by the gate.
“Excuse me,” she said, startling Beryk as he shuffled through some papers. Elliot was just out of earshot, adjusting the wagon’s canvas cover, though he frowned at her in recognition.
“Yes?” the steward asked. While Elliot seemed to remember her, Beryk’s expression was vaguely polite.
Veronyka swallowed. “I heard—I know that you’re . . . phoenixaeres,” she said, keeping her voice low.
Beryk had leaned in to hear her, but he straightened abruptly when she spoke in Pyraean. “I’m sorry, lass,” he said sharply, “but I don’t speak ancient Pyraean.”
“Please,” Veronyka said, stepping in front of him as he moved to walk away. He glanced at her, and she must have truly looked pathetic, because he stopped. “I want to go with you. I’m an animage, and—”
“You must be confused. I manage a country estate, and this here is my assistant.”
“Your underwing?” Veronyka asked stubbornly.
Beryk smiled tightly, and when Elliot wandered over, he waved for the boy to get onto the wagon. “Listen, lass, and listen closely,” he said in a rapid whisper. “Whatever you think you heard, you’d best forget it. For your own sake. Even if I were recruiting—which I’m not—and even if that recruitment were for animages—which it isn’t—I’m afraid you’d not fit our requirements.”
“Because I’m not a boy?” Veronyka asked.
The man wore a heavy, regretful expression, as if this weren’t the first time he’d had to reject a girl and he didn’t enjoy it. “I know it seems unfair, but he has his reasons.”
He, this commander that Beryk had mentioned the previous day. Before Veronyka could argue further, he gave her arm a bracing pat, then hopped onto the wagon.
She watched them go, a riot of emotions inside her chest. She was disappointed, yes, but he’d basically admitted that he was a Rider. The existence of even one Phoenix Rider on Pyrmont was cause for celebration.
“What’d he say?”
Veronyka jumped, surprised to find Sparrow standing right next to her. She’d been lurking in the shadows outside the inn, but once Beryk left, she had sidled up to Veronyka on silent feet.
“It’s like you said; they only want boys,” Veronyka muttered, still trying to understand their exchange and what it meant. Were the Phoenix Riders of the future going to be men alone?
Sparrow shrugged. “Then be a boy.”
Veronyka’s breath caught, and she looked up at Sparrow in surprise.
Be a boy.
It was simple. It was brilliant.
It was exactly what Veronyka would do.