and Arren looked at her, with a terrible fear and vulnerability in his face. “Flell,” he said, “I—I shouldn’t have come here. But I had to see you again. So you’d know.”
Flell took his hand. “Arren, what happened? How can this be real? Are you—are you a ghost?”
He laughed a sad, hollow laugh. “Do I look like one?”
“No. Well, I’ve never seen a ghost before. But how did you survive? How did you get back here?”
Arren shook his head. “Where were you?” he asked. “I kept trying to find you, but you were never there. I really missed you. I needed you.”
There was no accusation in his voice, but his words cut her deeply. “Arren, I’m sorry. I missed you, too. I wanted to see you, but—”
“It was your father, wasn’t it?” Arren said bitterly. “He told you to stay away from me, didn’t he?”
Flell nodded. “He asked how you were, and I told him about how I visited you and how I helped you get another job, and how you were coping. He said he was glad you had me helping you, but then he asked me to stay away from you. He said people were afraid you were losing your mind, and he was frightened that you might turn violent and that I’d be hurt. I told him it was all lies. I said you’d never been like that and you never would be, but then when I saw what you did to those men . . . and afterwards, when you . . .” She bowed her head. “I told Father you believed he was trying to kill you, and he said—”
Arren grabbed her shoulder. “Flell, how could you?”
“I’m sorry,” Flell sobbed. “I didn’t know what was going to happen; I was just scared for you. You were changing; I could see you changing. You weren’t like you were before you went away. I was frightened of you. But I didn’t know—Arren, what happened to you? You did all those awful things, you killed all those people, you—”
“Flell, I didn’t,” said Arren. “I didn’t kill anyone.”
“But everyone saw you!” said Flell. “People saw you running out of the Arena, and when they went in there ten men were dead! You let that griffin out of his cage and made him kill them all. You even killed Orome, and Sefer as well! And before then you stole that chick and set fire to your own house, and you said those terrible things about my father right in front of everyone—”
“Flell, please!” said Arren. “Stop it! It’s all lies. I didn’t kill anyone, and I didn’t make that griffin do anything. How could I control that thing? It’s wild!”
“But you made it spare you in the Arena,” said Flell. “Everyone saw it. It knocked you over, and then it just left you alone. How did you do it?”
“I didn’t,” said Arren. “I didn’t do anything. Please, Flell, listen to yourself. I wouldn’t do something like that! You know me.”
“Well then, what did you do?” said Flell. “How did you get out of prison?”
“Flell, I—listen. I’ll tell you what happened. Yes, I stole that chick. I won’t lie about that. I took it out of its pen and ran away with it. But I wasn’t going to hurt it. I thought if I could look after it for long enough it would change its mind, start to like me.”
“You can’t do that,” said Flell. “It’s wrong.”
“I know. I just—I think I lost my mind for a bit. It was so long, and so—after what happened to me, I knew I would die without a griffin. I just wanted my life back.”
“Arren, you can’t. Stealing a chick wouldn’t have made you a griffiner again.”
“I know. I was going to leave the city, find somewhere else to live and take the chick with me. But I saw the griffins looking for me, and I panicked and ran back toward my house, to hide. And when I got there it was on fire. Someone must have—well, I don’t know how it happened. And then I was caught.”
“And they threw you in the Arena.”
“Yes. I asked to go there. I knew I was going to die, but I wanted to fight Dar—the black griffin. I wanted to kill him. Or at least, I thought if I died fighting, it would be better than just being executed.”
“But the black griffin didn’t kill you,” said Flell. “Why?”
“He was—he knew me,” said Arren. “He knew my name.