Page 16 of Iridian

“I do,” Madeline said, but at this point I wasn’t even surprised. “I do believe her, not only because the story makes sense, but because hearing it now, I can connect the times I found David’s behaviors strange but didn’t even realize it. I know that man.” Madeline drank her whiskey slowly where she sat on the recliner—the white one. The same as the one she’d had to throw away last time becauseI’dmade it dirty when I’d sat on it.

“We all know that man,” said the Redfire. “We all know what he’s capable of. The question remains, would he dare?”

I almost laughed. If she thought David Hill was afraid of anything, she was fucking delusional.

“He would,” Madeline said. “He’s smart enough. Powerful enough. Arrogant enough to convince himself that he will win.”

“Why—you don’t think he will?” asked the Blackfire—Ferid was his name if I remembered correctly.

“You do?” the Bluefire guy asked him in turn.

“I don’t have an opinion about it yet, nor do I know enough to make an assumption, at least not an accurate one. What I do know is that if it were me wearing his shoes, I would have done anything in my power—and I meananything—to keep this a secret until I knew that I was absolutely one hundred percent ready,” Ferid said.

“He’s right, George,” said the Redfire, shaking her head at the Bluefire. “He’s right—I wouldn’t have let word get out if I wasn’t ready, either.”

“Except he didn’t simplydecideto let the word get out, did he?” This from the Greenfire, and she looked right at me.

Shivers rushed down my back.

“You broke the screen of the Regah chamber, did you not, girl?” she asked me.

My nails dug into my palms. I was most probably bleeding, but I didn’t even feel it. All I felt was their eyes on me. The weight of their attention. The cruelness of my fate. The knowledge that my life ended right here, today, by these very people.

“Rosabel, answer the question,” Madeline said.

“I…” My voice was so dry. I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want tohelpthese people, but the truth was that I wouldn’t be helpingthem.The truth was that, as much as I hated it, they were the only ones who could put a stop to Hill’s absurd plans of bringing back the Delaetus Army.

And wasn’t that just fucking comical?

Because Ihadto help them. Taland lived in this world. Taland would no doubt try to stop Hill—and you know what, I’d ratherthesepeople did. Taylor lived in this world, too, and so did Poppy and Cassie, every other person who had done absolutelynothingto deserve the fate that Hill would bring upon the world if he really took over.

Tears slid down my cheeks so fast I hardly noticed them. For that moment when all of these things crossed my mind, I felt like I wasn’t me at all.

How cruel was life. How very cruel.

My hands shook when I raised them to wipe the tears. “I broke that screen, yes. Hill tried to stop me. The Devil held us all motionless in the air from his side of the Regah chamber, and Hillswamin the air to get to me. Both he and the Devilknew that they wouldn’t make it, so the Devil let us go at the last second. Hill reached me when I had already finished the spell. Grabbed me by the head, tried to pull it off my shoulders.” My hands were on my neck now, too, like I thought maybe Hill was still here trying to pull my head off for real. “My magic released before he could hurt me.”

Silence in the room, another eternal moment.

“He didn’t want his secret out and he hoped to keep the Devil silent before he told us, but he couldn’t. He sent his guards to the Devil’s cell in the Tomb to try to stop him, but they didn’t get to him in time. He told us everything in front of him, too, and Hill confirmed it. Hill hoped to kill us all before we left the Regah chamber—but again, he couldn’t get to me in time. We made it out.”

“Because of you,” said the Redfire. “Because you broke the screen.”

“With the bracelet that you claim is an anchor.” The Greenfire woman raised a red brow as she looked down at me even though she was sitting on the couch across from me. “A Mud anchor.”

“It seems to have behaved the way an anchor does,” said Madeline before I could answer.

“Colors,” said the Mud councilman. “You really made magic withcolors.”

“I did.” And he’d had no idea it could be done—it was plain to see. These women and men who held themselves above all others hadn’t bothered to try to figure out if something like an anchor for the Mud even existed. I doubted they’d cared much to learn anything at all about the people they had labeled with that name, with thatfate.

I realized this was exactly what Taland had been talking about when he spoke about our elders leavingusin the dark, blinding us to the real world.

And I wondered, hadtheybeen left in the dark, too, by their parents?

“So, it really exists,” the man said.

“Of course, it exists,” said the Greenfire. “And you’re going to use it, Nicholas. As soon as we find it.”

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