Relief unties the knot of worry inside me, leaving me feeling absurdly emotional. “Tell Griffin I’ll be right there.”
Flynn nods. To Jocasta he says, “Jo.”
“Flynn,” she answers coolly.
He shuts the door, and she turns to me, dropping her crossed arms. “Well, that wasn’t awkward at all.”
I shake my head. “Not at all.”
“He’ll hate me now. I was awful.”
“It’ll take more than that for Flynn to hate a person he’s known nearly his whole life. Besides,” I say, thinking about how I treated Griffin for weeks, “men like a little awful. It keeps them on their toes.”
She frowns. “You think so?”
What do I know? I’m a disaster at relationships. “Don’t listen to me. Kaia would probably give better advice.”
Jocasta laughs. Then sighs. Then looks at the door.
I stop with my hand poised over the doorknob, glancing back at her. “I guess you know, too?”
Her chin notches up as she shifts her focus back to me. “Of course. All the family knows. Beta Fisa. My Gods.” She shakes her head. “Griffin wouldn’t keep something like that from us. Besides, he couldn’t have. When you disappeared, he looked like he’d been trampled by a herd of Centaurs and then sat on by a Cyclops. I’ve never seen anything like it. He was destroyed.” Her blue eyes harden as she adds, “It’s a good thing you didn’t really run away. I would have had to find you.”
It takes a direct order from Egeria, Alpha Sinta, to get Helen out of her carriage. I watch from the shaded terrace overlooking the woods. If I’d known it was going to be this much trouble to talk to Helen, I would have just let her go.
Helen leaves her infant boy with her husband and his parents. I’m not a fountain of experience in the matter, but I don’t think a woman leaves her newborn unless she thinks the child is safer without her. Once Helen finally starts toward me, she walks with her spine straight and her head high. As she should. She’s Zeta Fisa. After me, only three people separate her from the most powerful throne in the realms. And to think, I started out with seven siblings and she with four.
A team of dark horses prances, impatient. Oreste steps down from the carriage, leaving the door open and the baby inside. Preparing for a speedy escape?
I study him as Helen approaches, curious since his family intended him for me. Despite being the most influential and ancient dynasty in Sinta, Andromeda saw them as pretentious pond scum, and no amount of gold could tempt her to send me to them. What must have been a number of years later, they settled for Helen, but as Oreste seems to have guessed, he lucked out. I’m no prize.
He’s older, with a head of thick, graying hair, wide shoulders, and an athletic frame, despite being nearly fifty by now. He was in his mid-thirties when his family tried to buy me thirteen years ago. I was ten, and I was more petrified of staying in my own home than of being sent off to marry an adult Magoi in a far-off realm. They would have held off on the actual wedding for a few years. Despite what Mother likes to think, Sintans aren’t child-marrying barbarians. And I’d wanted to go. Oreste would have been my escape.
From a distance, I watch grandparents I have no doubt are ruthless and ambitious coo over Helen’s baby through the open door of the carriage. I don’t need Oreste or his family, but a familiar tightness grips my chest nevertheless. If I’d been allowed to go to them, I’d have less blood on my hands, and Eleni might still be alive.
Helen stops in front of me and offers a small curtsy. “Talia.”
I don’t curtsy back, even though in Sinta and without my publicly claiming my title, she technically outranks me. Neither of us thinks like that. Once a Fisan, always a Fisan. I wonder if her new Sintan kin offered for my younger sister Ianthe before moving on to Helen. If they did, it happened after I ran away, or else Andromeda never told me. Mother doesn’t exactly share.
“You didn’t bring the baby.” I glance over her shoulder toward the courtyard. “I wanted to see him. He’s family, after all.”
Helen pales, and I want to kick myself. Family is a curse word where we come from.
She steps to the left, blocking my view of the carriage. “My power has grown. I have Elemental Magic you would envy.”
Clearly she’s not afraid of a confrontation. It must be hormones. And I do envy Elemental Magic. I can absorb those powers and then use them until they run out, but permanently possessing a magical form of even one of the four elements would be a huge advantage—one I’m often without.
“I killed Sybaris and stole her Dragon’s Breath. Don’t threaten me.”
Helen’s face goes from white to ghastly white. “My baby is innocent.”
“Good Gods, Helen, I’m not going to hurt your son. You had nothing to do with my getting stabbed. Believe me, that was entirely my own fault. I should have taken care of a threat weeks ago, and I didn’t.” Because I’m in love, and happy, and going incredibly soft. “And your husband inadvertently telling Beta Sinta who I am wasn’t your fault, either. If I understand correctly, you were busy giving birth at the time.”
If I didn’t know her, I probably wouldn’t see the new influx of anxiety sharpening her already angular features. “Oreste has no idea who you really are. I kept your secret.”
I like Helen. I always have. She’s protective and paranoid, like me. “I know. I believe you. We were friends before.” Sort of. We never tried to kill each other. “I’d like to be friends again. I’d like our families to be friends.”