I opened my mouth, then closed it. Then I dropped my hand and turned to him.
“Where is this place?” I said.
The corners of his mouth lifted. “Let me show you.”
He led me down beautiful hallways of more gold and copper and glass ceilings, plants spilling everywhere. Other Fey passed us in the hall, dressed in inordinately complicated clothing. They cast me strange looks, and stopped to bow to Caduan as we passed.
At last, we reached the end of a hallway and stepped through a set of open glass doors, onto a balcony. The sun was bright. I had to squint. My head hurt. A breeze sent goosebumps to the surface of my skin. I was not accustomed to being so in-tuned with a body’s sensitivities. Is this how humans always felt, when they had flesh to themselves?
“This,” Caduan said, “is Ela’Dar. The One House.”
His voice changed, somewhat, when he said it. I did hear that, even if I still did not understand the nuances of what the change meant. His gaze flicked to me, watching me closely as I stepped to the railing of the balcony and looked over. A city spread out before me. It sprawled far enough to fill my vision, beautiful copper buildings intertwining with greenery. All of this was built upon the side of a mountain, the bronze of the buildings and green of the forest and slate grey of stone all pieced together, each complementing each other. There were little houses in the distance, and towering, vine-wrapped structures, and crowded roads and bridges that connected them all. In the distance, beyond the sheer drop of the slate cliffs, the calm blue-grey of the sea reached towards the horizon.
“Our world was very different,” Caduan said, quietly. “All those years ago. All of the Houses constantly fighting with each other. When the House of Obsidian and the House of Wayward Winds went to war, it nearly destroyed the Fey race. Centuries of fragmented houses. Or no houses at all.” He was watching me. I could feel it, even though I would not look at him. “I united them. The only way we can thrive is if we do so together. And we have. All those broken pieces have been brought together for this. A unified Fey kingdom.”
My head hurt. My stomach churned.
“I do not understand why this matters to me.”
If Caduan was taken aback by this response, he did not show it. “I understand if it doesn’t, now. But I thought you might like to see your home.”
My gaze snapped to him.
Home. Home. Home.
How I had craved a home. How I had longed for one. Is this place what a home was? It did not seem like what I would imagine. It seemed cold and loud and crowded. An overwhelming place to live, with a mind so cold and empty.
I looked to the city. Without my permission, memories collided. Burning cities and war. Unbearable pain. A room of white and white and white. The heartbreak of betrayal.
And then, anger.
The sudden flood of it was a relief. At last, something familiar. At last, something that filled the emptiness.
“You would never understand,” I said, through gritted teeth, “the vile things that were done to me.”
A cold silence.
“Trust me when I say that I do,” he said.
“No one came for me. For so many days.” I whirled to him. “Why? If you knew what I was, then why would you leave me?”
Pain flickered across his face.
“I tried,” he said. “I didn’t know you were alive, Aefe. And I could not find you. Not until I felt the shifts in magic. I felt you first, to the south, in Threll. And then in Ara.”
Then that pain hardened. I knew the emotion I saw there, too. An anger that reflected my own.
“They began taking us,” he said. “Shortly after that. Six fey disappeared, all while I was learning what had been done to you. I reclaimed them, but only one has survived. And what they did to you… hundreds of years of it…”
His words grew clumsy. It seemed strange, for him to speak that way. He did not seem the type to lose his grip on words, but he stopped, looked away. Then turned back to me.
“The humans thrived for so long because we allowed them to. Once, lives were only worth as much as the power of their House. But now, we are one kingdom. Every Fey life is worth it. Humans had already slaughtered hundreds of our people, long ago. They do not get to take a single life more. Not one.” A sneer formed over his nose. “I will never fail to fight for my people ever again. The world will be better off when they are gone.”
Silence. The intensity of his words seemed at odds with the gentle breeze through the leaves. Caduan looked at me, and his gaze slipped through mine like intertwining hands. Something in it, this time, made me pause. There were memories in that look. Memories that he had and I did not.
“I do not remember,” I said, quietly. “I do not remember any of it.”
His gaze softened. “I know.”
“Perhaps you are looking for Aefe. Perhaps she no longer exists.”
Another change in that stare, one that I did not have the language to understand.
“Perhaps,” he said. “But I am happy to have you here, nonetheless.”
Strange, I thought. I did not know how to describe the sensation in my chest. It was uncomfortable. Everything was uncomfortable.
“Even if I am only Reshaye?” I said.
Caduan’s hand fell over mine. This time, I did not pull away.
“Even then,” he said.
Chapter Eighty-Eight
Max
Reality slipped through my fingers like falling sand. I could only catch grains of it at a time. Sometimes, I glimpsed a fragment of a memory — something big, something important — only for it to slip away like a ghost.
Consciousness swung in and out of my grasp. I
