“I don’t know. Because real estate is irrelevant to me? Because I’m an idiot? It’s not like I was trying to hide it from her, you know.”
“I’m not the expert in relationships or anything,” Kellan says, “but even I know that sometimes you need to share stuff with the other person. Just because it means zilch to you doesn’t mean it wouldn’t mean something to her.”
“Oh yes,” Jonah groans. “For being so crappy in relationships, you certainly make sure you do everything so blindingly brilliant when it comes to Chloe, don’t you?”
Something loud sounds.
“Kel, wait. Please, just don’t . . .”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t do anything stupid tonight.”
Silence before, “You can’t have it both ways, Jonah. I get to choose how to deal with my shit, and you know what? It’s none of your business. So back off.”
More silence.
“So don’t tell her anything, and it’ll be fine,” Kellan says.
Silence.
“I’m sure you got off on telling her that, right?” Kellan snaps. “Even though I specifically asked you not to?”
Silence.
“That’s great, J, just . . .” Footsteps sound, then, “You know what? No. Don’t forget it. Go screw yourself instead.”
My hand goes to the doorknob. I can’t let them go on like this. Just as I’m about to turn the handle, Jonah says, “What did you expect me to do? Lie?”
My hand drops back to my side. A bark of laughter precedes a stretch of silence. Kellan eventually says, “Since you’re so good at talking for me, you can do it.”
I hate how they do this, talking half in their minds, half out loud.
Jonah matches Kellan’s tone perfectly. “Don’t take out your anger with me on her.”
“Yeah, but you can, right? No—don’t answer that. She knows I’m not pissed off at her.”
The door slams. My head throbs, stronger than before. I take two more ibuprofen, and then an extra third, just in case. And I can’t help but wonder if this is only the beginning. My emotions are already spinning out of control again.
I think I need to go visit Kopano and see about some shields.
“I’m sorry,” I say to Etienne Miscanthus, positive I must’ve misheard what he’s just told me. “Did you just say Kleeshawnall Rushfire is dead?”
My Council buddy nods gravely. The word rings through my mind like a series of loud church bells. I stare at the other Creator’s seat, so close to mine, and notice, for the first time this afternoon, that there is nothing there. Not his collection of tiny coffee cups, let alone his favorite bleeding happy face one, not the blanket on the back of his chair, not the perpetually sharpened four pencils (never pens; pens are for lesser beings who have no spines, he’d claimed), nor the plaque that bears his name.
Nothing but an empty wood desk.
“As a doornail, I’m afraid,” Etienne offers. He turns in his seat to fully face me, despite two Magicals in the center of the assembly room arguing with great heat over hurricane strengths while others attempt to talk over them. “Isn’t that an odd turn of phrase, though? A dead doornail. And how intriguing that it pops up on both of our home planes. Must’ve been started by a Magical.”
Etienne is fifteen years older than me and less stuffy than ninety percent of the Council, which is probably why I gravitated toward him early on. He’s got an interesting face; while I wouldn’t categorize him as handsome by any means, he is starkly compelling with extremely pale, brown skin framed by hair even blacker than Jonah’s. And his eyes, well, they’re out of this world: vivid violet, a color never found on the Human plane. It doesn’t matter that his nose is long and large and that his mouth is much too small for his face. Those eyes are perhaps the most stunning I’ve ever seen.
For the life of me, I can’t remember what color Rushfire’s were. And it makes me sad, which I don’t really understand, considering he barely spoke to me and tolerated my questions even less. “How did it happen?”
“Well, peaches,” Etienne says in that fabulous, sophisticated Elvin accent of his that sounds different than any on the Human plane, “if I remember correctly, he was two hundred and three.”
As Etienne is a Storyteller, I don’t doubt his facts. Even still—“Exactly when did he . . .” It’s hard to even say. “Go?”
Etienne strokes his smooth chin, assessing me with those jewel-like eyes of his. “I can’t believe you haven’t heard already.”
Old insecurities of being left in the dark far too often rear their ugly heads. I thought, as an adult, I’d be past them, but I guess not. “Tell me?”
He leans closer. “The mighty, yet crotchety Kleeshawnall Rushfire left our existence to explore the great unknown a mere few hours after creating the portal which allowed his successor to be saved.”