Page 22 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
I shot her a smile that almost felt genuine on my lips. “Aww. Your scents have merged. How very primitive.”
Emelle huffed and leaned forward to smell me now, her eyes scanning my new dress with a hint of yesterday’s suspicion returning.
“Okay, I’m getting… climbing orchids. Like the kind that covers the back of the Wild Whisperer houses. And… is that bamboo?”
My skin prickled, as if a dozen fire ants were nipping at the back of my neck. Black bamboo—from Steeler’s body pressed against mine in that alleyway, holding my arms above my head? Or simply from the grove I practiced in? Or both?
Emelle seemed to watch each of my heavy blinks.
“Ready to swap all the words we can’t tell each other face-to-face?” she asked, a certain prickly note to her usually gentle tone.
I nodded, suddenly nervous, and we drifted to opposite ends of the classroom, where others had lined up to practice as well.
Bringing my fire ant to my mouth, I whispered Emelle’s description to it. Emelle mirrored me from across the room.
Just as I was wondering what to say, all too aware of Ms. Pincette’s attention scanning each of us, my fire ant rasped, “Where were you really last night after the Branding, during the induction chant?”
Shit. That was definitely Emelle’s message, passed through the hive mind and straight into my ear. Thankfully, nobody around me would have been able to hear, considering how loud the room had gotten, but…
I caught Emelle’s stare across the distance between us.
Another lie rose up my throat, another excuse.
But then I was whispering to my fire ant, “I can’t tell you. I’m sorry. Please don’t be mad at me.”
Please don’t leave me like Quinn did.
Emelle got the message. I could tell by the way her face fell.
“I’m not mad,” she relayed through my ant, “Just worried. And so is Lander. We’ve both noticed you’ve been…off lately.”
A ball formed in the base of my throat. I had tried so hard these last few months to throw on a smile, to keep Emelle and the rest of my friends far away from any part of this mission Dyonisia had shoved me into. I couldn’t handle the thought of any of them getting exiled like Jenia had just because I couldn’t keep my mouth shut about it.
But Emelle had seen through my mask. Lander, too. And now, even though I couldn’t give them the truth, I couldn’t lie to her either.
“I don’t think you’ll need to worry for much longer, Melle,” I said, my throat thick. “I’ll be back to normal soon, I promise.”
When the Good Council caught Steeler this Sunday, to be exact. Then I’d lock away my knives and fold up these dresses for good.
Emelle didn’t answer for a long, long time. That thickness in my throat swelling, I watched my ant trace each of my fingers before she had it say, “Okay. Just promise me one thing, Rayna.”
“Anything,” I relayed back before I could think better of it.
Emelle’s shoulders seemed to deflate from across the room. “Remember that we have your back. There’s nothing you could tell us that would make us turn away from you.” My ant stopped scurrying on my palm, its mandibles flexing as it continued. “So whenever—if ever—you’re ready to share what’s going on… Lander and I will be here.And I’m willing to bet a thousand coppers the others will, too.”
The others as in Wren, Rodhi, and Gileon.
That tightness in my throat stung with tears. I would never deserve Emelle or her graciousness, that was for sure. Even if I knew I couldn’t ever take her up on her offer. Couldn’t ever involve her in the dangerous things she didn’t have to be a part of.
Still, I whispered two words into the hive mind, into the vast invisible network I’d never given much thought about until now.
“Thank you.”
Wren did almost die when Rodhi gushed about Ms. Pincette’s scent over our quick lunch break between classes.
She covered her mouth, gagged, and choked out, “I remember that lesson from last year. Ms. Pincette paired herself with Lynthia Prescott to demonstrate back then, which made a lot more sense considering Lynthia slathers herself in lavender oil like, fifteen times a day.” She shook her head, surveying Rodhi with something like awe. “Why would Ms. Pincette want to smellyou?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Rodhi said sarcastically, shoveling a bite of his quiche into his mouth. “Maybe because she’s secretly in love with me too and has to hide it behind more professional interactions?”
