I closed my eyes tighter as the water from Ilyan’s shower stopped, my anxiety increasing the speed of the top, the influxes of color, and the movement of the carpet. Without opening my eyes I could still see the objects moving in front of me. It was just as Ilyan had taught me while I lay dying. My magic served as my second eye, the whole room visible within my mind.
The door to the bathroom creaked open and my mind glanced away from its work to see Ilyan exit the bathroom. His blonde hair was wet and hanging down to his shoulder blades, soaking the top of his yellow, button up shirt. I returned my sight back to the objects in front of me, increasing my workload to include the carpet in the color changing cacophony. I accelerated the snowflakes that danced around my head until they were a white blur.
The distorted mass of white and color all became too much and I shut off my internal sight to sit in the blackness, the cool glass pressing against the back of my head.
Ilyan’s soft hands wrapped around my fingers, distracting the flow of my magic. His touch was gentle against my skin, his hands held tight to mine. I felt the top fall to the side and the snowflakes instantly melted back into the air as my magic disconnected from them.
I looked up at him, ready to bicker or battle or whatever he had in mind after I threw him into the shower, but instead his eyes were closed. His face was calm as he sat before me, his tall frame folded gently.
“I was thirty-two when Ovailia was born, an old man by human standards at the time. I remember running to Prague to see my parents, leaving the monastery I lived at in the middle of the night. There had been some complications with the birth, but I was told my mother was healing fine. I was still worried, which is why I didn’t wait to go to them. I ran into her room expecting healers and burning oils, but my mother was alone. She looked so fragile in her giant bed, her small frame swallowed up by blankets. She placed this tiny baby in my arms, a girl, with hair that looked like sunlight. That’s what Ovailia means, ‘light of the sun.’”
Ilyan looked at me, his face blotchy enough that I knew he had been crying in the shower. His grip tightened on my hands, keeping me close to him. He knew me well enough now that he could tell when I began to shy away from contact, but this time even I was fighting that impulse. I had never heard Ilyan open up before and I desperately wanted to know more. His voice was so soft that I leaned in to hear him better.
“She had blue eyes, like me, like my father. He was so proud.” It was weird to hear such a normal memory of Edmund; my brain almost fought the image of him as a normal, loving father to Ilyan.
“He clapped me on the back and said soon it would be my turn.” Ilyan smiled, but it was a sad smile. For the first time I wondered why he wasn’t married, why he had never bonded. I opened my mouth to ask, but thought better of it. It wasn’t my place, and besides, I really wanted to hear what he had to say.
“I held this little baby in my arms and promised to protect her. To keep her safe. I guarded her as she grew, taught her, and played with her. She could beat me in a flying race before she was ten… and then my father turned. Ovailia had always been closer to my father than I was. They had gone everywhere together, had secrets I would never understand. I didn’t know what had happened until it was too late. Until I couldn’t protect her anymore. She had seen one hundred and twenty years when she came to the small chapel in France where I lived, covered in blood and begging for help. I wasn’t even sure then that I could trust her. I am still not sure.”
I squeezed his hands, not knowing any other way to comfort him. Without thinking, I reached up to touch his face, but my hand stopped half way there and fell to my lap. Ilyan dropped my other hand and stood, turning his back to me as he dragged his hand through his hair in frustration.
“He has done it to all my siblings, Joclyn. Destroyed them. Hurt them. Ovailia was the first of many. He’s destroyed all of them, leaving me only one shattered sister that’s willing to side with me. That’s why I don’t hold out hope. Because I know what he is capable of. But, please, I don’t want to dash your hope. I never want to hurt you, never want to break your heart. If you believe, then I will believe too. Can you forgive me for dashing your hope before? For being so rude?”
I stared at him for much longer than necessary, my brain still processing this little bit of his past. For the past few months I had gotten to know Ilyan better than I had anyone else. Anyone but Ryland. I had thought I understood Ilyan, but hearing this part of his history made me realize how little I knew. There were a thousand years of him I did not know.
Even with all of that, I knew the face he had when he was truly sorry. I knew of his goodness. And I saw both of those now.
“Yes, Ilyan, of course.” His face lit up at my words.