you, and when we do explain it, you look like you think we’re crazy. Everyone who speaks to you notices that. No one is that good a liar.”
Moon turned away abruptly and sat down against the wall, folding his arms. He had expected to have the conversation, but not that it was going to be about him. Balm followed and sat on her heels in front of him. He said, reluctantly, “It could have been me. Everything Rift did. When I was alone, I was just looking for a place to live. If I’d been hurt, trapped, and been found by someone like Ardan, who was kind to me… Even if he wanted to use me, I might have gone along with it, just to belong somewhere.” He waved a hand in frustration. “That’s exactly what happened with Stone. I crossed the Three Worlds for the first person who asked me.”
“The first Raksura who asked you,” Balm corrected, unconvinced. “Back at the colony tree, you told me what I should do. Now I’m telling you. This solitary is not like you. Thinking of him that way is a mistake.” She sat back. “He’s even changed his name. No one calls a child ‘Rift.’”
Stone had said much the same thing about Sorrow, the warrior whom Moon had thought of as his mother. But a warrior who changed her name to Sorrow because her court had been destroyed and she was left alone with four small Arbora and a fledgling consort to care for was understandable. A warrior who left his court and called himself “Rift”… “I know. I know I can’t trust him.”
Balm watched him. “Do you trust us?”
Moon couldn’t answer. Maybe he didn’t trust them. Maybe he was pretending they were his family, going through the motions, but deep in his heart he didn’t really believe it. It would explain a lot, he told himself. Like why you keep acting like an idiot.
Balm shook her head regretfully. “Sometimes it doesn’t seem like it. Did you think we would have let that noisy little Emerald Twilight queen touch you?”
It had never even crossed his mind that they might defend him. From a Fell or a predator or some other common enemy, but not from a Raksuran queen, even one from a strange court. It was an uncomfortable insight.
His inability to answer told Balm all she needed to know. She sighed and squeezed his knee sympathetically, then pushed to her feet and walked away.
Chime passed her in the doorway, and Moon hunched his shoulders, feeling beleaguered. “Don’t say she’s right. I know she’s right.”
“That wasn’t what I was going to say.” Chime sat down, settling uneasily on the cracked tiles. “She is right, though.”
Moon rubbed his forehead; the tension and the long night underground had given him a headache. “What were you going to say?”
“Nothing. I just… I don’t want to worry Flower. Especially now, when she’s trying to talk to Stone.”
Moon squelched a surge of guilt at the mention of Stone. “Worry her about what?”
Chime sighed. “I keep having these… odd feelings.”
“Odd how?”
Chime made a vague gesture. “Like I can feel water moving, and… cold and weight and rock. I’m twitchy, like I can just catch glimpses of things that flick away before I can focus on them. The feelings come and go, in bursts—which is good, because otherwise I’d go out of my head.”
That definitely sounded odd. “When did it start?”
“Since just before dawn, when we landed on this creature.” Chime shrugged, obviously uncomfortable with the whole idea that he might have some sort of heightened awareness of the leviathan. “I know. If it’s a coincidence, it’s a strange one.”
“Is it a mentor thing? I mean, are you…” Knowing how badly Chime felt about his involuntary change to warrior, Moon hesitated to suggest that Chime might be getting his abilities back. If he wasn’t, if it was just his imagination… Hope was painful.
But Chime shook his head. “No, it can’t be. Augury isn’t like this. This is different.”
“Then you should talk to Flower.”
“I know.” Chime slumped. “I’m tired of strange things happening to me. I just got used to being able to fly, and to hunting, and all the other things I’m supposed to do now. I know this is the only way you’ve ever seen me, but to me it still feels like it just happened.”
“No, I know what you mean.” Moon felt like he was reliving his past at regular intervals, whether he liked it or not.