Page 73 of By the Orchid and the Owl
Terrin gave a savage grin. He was a pirate, too, I reminded myself.Hadbeen at least. I’d grown up hearing stories of pirates with fangs who dug into the exiled offerings each year and drained them until they were nothing but empty sacks of skin, yet here one was, grinning at me as he snapped his fingers.
Instantly, the water beneath us jumped and plopped with boils as big as my head. Steam billowed upward, swaddling us in its scorching mist. Emelle shrieked.
“Is that better?” Terrin asked casually.
“Show off,” I muttered. I wouldn’t be able to do anything more than maybe convince a fish to jump on him… but it would have to be a particularly stupid fish.
“See you ladies at the dance,” was Terrin’s only reply.
Apparently, Emelle and I weren’t particularly special when it came to the snow formal. Since every Element Wielder was allowed to invite as many people as they wanted, the invitations spread like wildfire, until it seemed that the entireInstitutewas going.
“I just don’t understand what we’re supposed to wear,” Emelle said that night in the bathing chambers while we were getting ready for bed.
Wren, beside us, stopped brushing her teeth long enough to mumble through her foaming toothpaste, “seem sir from card eeh ah.”
Emelle stopped with a comb halfway to her hair. “What?”
Wren spit into the washing bin and tried again.
“Seamster from Cardina. The closest village on the other side of that ridge behind campus. He comes every wet season to sell us new clothes—along with some other villagers with all their goodies. You know, since our stuff is bound to break or rip over the years we’re here, President Gleekle lets them come to campus once a year to basically screw us over with their inflated prices.” She resumed brushing her teeth. “But it would be the best time to get a new dress for the formal, I’d imagine.”
Her tone was careful… and rather stiff.
“Didn’t you go to the formal last year?” I asked, watching her in the mirror.
Wren scoffed. “No. Not that I was invited, anyway, but it sounds horrible.”
Coen, I thought into the void, right then and there.
To my surprise, he answered a heartbeat later.Yes?
Can you have Terrin invite Wren to the formal?I didn’t let a single part of my expression twitch on my face, lest Wren sense some scheming going on.
Like, romantically?Coen asked.You want me to play matchmaker?
No, no, no. I mean—just make sure they can come. Rodhi and Gileon, too.
Coen snickered.Rodhi’s already got about twenty-five different invitations, but I’ll make sure Terrin gets ahold of Wren and Gileon in time.
Thank you.
Any other demands at this late hour?he asked.Or can I finally go to sleep?
Hey, you’re the one in my head. You didn’t have to answer.
A pause. I vaguely heard Emelle telling Wren she thought she’d look beautiful in cobalt or scarlet. Then Coen admitted,I didn’t mean to be in your head.
What?
I was dozing off. My mind must have drifted to you.
I didn’t know how to respond to that. Through all his coy words and teasing smiles, things likethiswould slip through every once in a while—and make me wonder why I hadn’t given myself fully to him yet. It was just that… Jenia’s words would slither into my ears every time I thought I was close:Why’re you holed up in his room every weekend, then, if not to sleep your way to the top?It would make me pull back, panting and scrambling up with some kind of excuse to hurry away. I knew that I shouldn’t let someone else’s disdain affect me so much, and if everyone already thought I was sleeping with him, what was the point ofnot?
But something… something superstitious lurked in me, begging me to be careful. Begging me to wait, to see if this thing between us was all just a joke or a trick.
It’s not, came Coen’s sleepy reply in my head,but I respect your caution.
Goodnight, you, I said quickly, before he could hear any other mortifying, perpetually spiraling thoughts.
