Page 44 of Skyshade
It made her think about what Terra and Poppy had said. If they really didn’t kill her parents—which she wasn’t quick to believe—then who did?
It also made her think about the Wildling traitor. They hadn’t struck again, to her knowledge, but dissent was dangerous. What was their end goal? What did they want?
“You have his frown,” Astria said, knocking her out of her thoughts.
“Excuse me?”
“It’s exactly the same. Almost uncanny. Everything else, I suppose you got from...her.” Astria studied her closely, as if trying to imagine what her mother would have looked like.
Part of her wanted to forget their connection at all. Why develop a relationship with someone now, when they all didn’t have much time left? Another part, the little girl who had sat in her room and dreamt of having a place to belong, refused to let this opportunity slip by. “I don’t have any other family,” Isla admitted, and immediately felt exposed, like she had shown far too much of herself.
Astria studied her. She raised her head. “I don’t either.”
Isla didn’t know why that was a comfort, when she should have been sad that they had both lost everyone related to them. “I suppose we have each other,” Isla offered.
Astria’s suspicious gaze did not falter in the slightest. But, after awkward moments passed, she said, “Yes, well. I suppose having you is better than having nothing.”
Isla’s smile spread across her face. “And here, I was thinking you incapable of giving me a compliment.”
Another day passed without a storm. She was restless, impatient, knowing it was what she needed to find the portal. With her starstick, she brought Lynx to the Wildling newland, if only to feel a whisper of home. They tore through the familiar woods, his legs stretching happily as he leapt into trees. He had missed it, she realized. Both of them had.
Part of her wished she could feel the forest, its heartbeat, but the bracelets made everything quiet. Dead.
By the time they approached her old room, it was dark out. She left Lynx outside and portaled her way in, with the goal of retrieving some of her old knives. The ones Grim had provided were nicer than any she had ever had, but she missed their familiar feel in her fingers. Their simplicity.
She walked toward her vanity and began opening drawers. There were a few simple blades inside that she hadn’t used in years. She grabbed one of them, a simple dagger, without any markings.
And dropped it.
Its tip nearly went through her foot. She didn’t even look to see where it had landed.
Her eyes were caught on the piece of parchment before her, and the white feather atop it. It had been weeks since she had written her name on the page.
Now, there was a new line below it.
Hello Isla, it read.
The words themselves weren’t what made her stomach drop—it was the handwriting, which she knew almost as well as her own.
Aurora’s.
FEATHER
She had seen Aurora’s writing hundreds of times before. She still had scraps of it, from when they used to share books and write notes to each other in the margins, back when Aurora was disguised as Celeste.
She rushed to her secret hiding spot, and there it was, one of the last volumes they had ever read together. She flipped through the pages, looking for the curls of ink and finding them. Her spine turned to ice. It was undeniable as she compared the letters.
Her hand trembled as she took the feather, half expecting it to twist out of her grip. She wrote beneath it.
How is this possible?
She dropped the feather and waited. Silence. She could hear her own heart beating as the seconds ticked by. Just when she was about to begin wondering if she was losing her mind, the feather stood upright by itself. She watched it slide across the paper and carefully write a sentence that made her blood run cold.
All that is buried eventually rises.
The feather dropped dead on her parchment.
Isla nearly tripped as she stumbled backward. This was impossible. She had killed Aurora. She had plunged her dagger into her heart, had watched her fall into a chasm.
