“I’m sorry.” Isobel glanced between them all. “I don’t know much about the Gifted religion.”
“Yeah, Icon kid and all that.” Sophia cocked her head, watching as Theodore pulled out his phone, angling his screen away from Maya. “Soul Keepers are like chapel assistants. Glorified cleaners and librarians, really.”
The girl was stunning. Her skin was golden with a rich olive undertone, her hair cut into a shining dark bob, her features regal and full of grace, just like her mother. Her lips were naturally full, flushed with a pink colour that matched the second-hand shirt her brother was wearing. The boy was also beautiful, with a wary, shy gaze and oversized spectacles that hung down his nose. He pushed them up nervously as Isobel looked at him, but they immediately drooped down again, teetering on the tip of his nose. He had the same curious, narrow stare as his sister and mother.
“I was the one who suggested the chain,” Maya said.
“What chain?” Isobel peeked at what Theodore was doing with his phone.
He was texting Kalen.
Theodore: Need help.
Theodore: Isobel is awake.
Theodore: Annoying Guardian lady saw her eyes.
“That one.” Maya gestured to Isobel’s arm, which was still tucked against her chest, held there protectively by Theodore’s free hand.
She wiggled it out of his grip, frowning at the delicate, gold chain wrapped around her wrist. She had been too distracted and disorientated to notice it before. It was looped several times, the other end disappearing into the blanket, reappearing to lead up to Theodore’s wrist, where it circled in a firm grip. She didn’t recognise it instantly, but the longer she stared, the more peculiar it seemed. Almost like it was glowing slightly from within. And then she realised what it was. It was the chain that had appeared when Sato kissed her.
“By the time they found you, you had already been out there for something like six hours,” Maya explained. “They thought you wouldn’t survive, so I was called to bless your body when you passed.”
“Out where?” she asked, barely above a whisper.
“The hiking trail,” Theodore supplied, dropping his phone.
Kalen took her back to the trail. How much did they know? Eve’s involvement was fairly obvious by the fact that it had all happened inside her house, and several people had seen her greet Isobel at the door. But did they know why? And where was Eve now?
She stared down at her wounds again, frowning even harder. She was full of stitches, which meant Kalen hadn’t taken her body back in time. Or maybe he had, but her wounds had been too serious.
Maya spoke up again. “Your father arrived with your possessions, and I was there when the nurses searched your bag. I saw the chain and knew what it was immediately.”
“They’ve been visiting every day,” Theodore whispered against the shell of her ear. “Waiting for you to wake up. Sticking their noses into everything.”
“And now you have woken up.” Maya smiled. She looked like she was waiting for Isobel to thank her.
“What is it, then?” Isobel held up the chain, deciding to act dumb. Her voice cracked again, and she winced, prompting Theodore to reach for a pitcher of water set beside the bed. He pushed a cup into her hand, and she thanked him with a strained smile, sipping the cool liquid.
“It’s a soul artefact.” It was Sophia—the daughter—who spoke, looking a little bored, or maybe she was just uncomfortable. She seemed to be standing protectively in front of her little brother and shooting Theodore the occasional wary look. “Like from the stories, back when bonding was more common.”
At Isobel’s baffled expression, the other girl rolled her eyes. “So the gods chose to bind people together, right? Well, they used to bestow gifts on bonded couples to show their blessing. Glowing halos, crowns of flowers, matching wedding cloaks, love birds following them around, red strings and golden chains tying them together.” She waved her fingers toward the chain, her blue-painted nails flicking dismissively. Either she didn’t believe what she was saying, or she wasn’t sure that Isobel was worthy of the god-given gift.
“Well …” Isobel swallowed. “Okay then. What made you think this was a … soul artefact?”
“A chain of exquisite design long enough to wrap all the way around two people lit within by a subtle glow?” Maya returned dryly, before pulling a folded piece of paper from her pocket. It was a photocopied image from a book. “Because of Aphelina,” she explained. “In the older texts, she’s called The Celestial Enchantress.”
The woman in the picture was nothing short of radiant. Her appearance hinted at so many different lineages it was impossible to tell which race she belonged to. It should have been confusing or overwhelming, but … it made sense, somehow. It was as if she had been assembled with the ideals of beauty from each individual race, turning her into a tapestry of humanity so complicated it somehow became simple. She was beauty. Her eyes were deep and expressive, a gradient of colour that ran from rich brown to pale gold. Her hair was lustrous, floating around her like a cloud. It was inky black and auburn closer to her skull, but soft pastel shot through with bright white along the ends. Her skin had beautiful patches of ivory and oak, light and dark. Even her full and shapely lips seemed to shift from a soft rose to a warmer peach, to a deeper berry. Her face was a balance of symmetry that exuded a calm, harmonious nature in every line, slope, and curve … but the most shocking detail about her was the chain.
Despite the extremes of her appearance, she only wore a thin linen dress, the chain looping around and around her like a living, cognisant thing, appearing to glow softly from within.
“Is that one of the Gifted gods?” Isobel asked, handing the picture back. She didn’t comment on the similarities of the chain, even though something hard and fearful lodged in the back of her throat. They were talking about gods, now?
“One of them, yes.” Maya folded the paper and tucked it back into her pocket. “Aphelina inspires both the mortals and the gods toward aesthetic expression. In layman’s terms, you could say that she’s the goddess of love and beauty. She is always the most liberal with her gifts, though I haven’t heard of her bestowing any in some time—”
The door flew open, Kalen striding into the room without a knock, Niko right behind him. They both stopped short when they saw Isobel sitting up in Theodore’s lap. Kalen’s gaze flicked down to her arms before settling on her face again, his huge chest swelling as he sucked in a breath.