Page 25 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
As soon as I got the hang of them, they became easier to throw than my crescent blade. Swifter and deadlier, these oneshit more accurately, and I relished the feeling of finally hitting my mark perfectly.
“You saw him, didn’t you?” Jagaros asked from behind me.
I didn’t flinch. I’d known he would be watching.
“How can you tell?” I threw another knife.
“Your smell,” Jagaros said simply.
“Let me guess. Black bamboo.”
I didn’t know where the edge in my voice was coming from. But with the pain in my head gone for the time being, with my mask dissolved, I was just tired of… of trying to benice. Of pretending that I might be a perfectly fine, completely whole person, rather than someone with this mess of ice shards swirling within me.
Jagaros didn’t answer. I went to retrieve my knives and slowly turned to face him.
“That day you found me on the beach…” I began, tossing the knife from hand to hand. “You advised me to tell the Good Council I was… roughhousing with you.” I’d had a cascade of bruises down my body back then—bruises I couldn’t remember getting. Lexington had claimed they’d come from Steeler’s own hands, but if Jagaros had wanted me to pretend otherwise… “What do you know?”
I’d asked him this question before, of course, but never so firmly. And he’d never done more than flick his tail and change the subject.
Now, though, the white tiger studied me with his head cocked.
“A great deal more than you, Rayna Drey,” he answered finally.
I caught my knife with one hand and pointed it at him instinctively. “Don’t be a smartass. What do you know?”
There was more to Jagaros beneath that silky black and white coat, I knew—so much more than he was willing to let on. I justdidn’t know whether that something would end up hurting me or helping me.
“Why are youreallytraining me?” I continued. “Is it just so that I can defend myself against Steeler, or is there another reason?” Tears blazed in the back of my throat, but I forced them back down. “If you knew he hurt me in the past, why would you try to cover that up?”
Jagaros eyed the tip of my blade with something like interest—and perhaps a flicker of surprise. Usually, he would threaten to eat me if I dared talk to him like that, but now he just rumbled, “Everything will come to light soon enough, Rayna Drey.”His eyes pinned me with a greenish glow. “And this time, that light will be permanent.”
Then he turned and padded into the darkness gathering beyond the grove, the jut of his shoulders alternating with each step. I stood there, frozen, my knife extended, watching him go in disbelief.
What he was doing to me was even worse than what I’d been doing to Emelle: not just keeping his own secrets, but keepingmysecrets fromme.Everything will come to light soon enough—that meant he knew about my past with Steeler and was hiding it from me, I was sure.
“Yeah, well, don’t bother coming back until I see the light!” I called out, the words bursting past my lips before I could stop them. “I wouldn’t want to be alone in the jungle with someone who might be working against me!”
Jagaros paused right on the threshold of the distant shadows, his spine stiffening as if he might say something back.
Only to slink forward again a moment later until his feline silhouette melted into nothing but night.
CHAPTER
11
Emelle side-eyed my dress the next morning on our way to History. Today, I’d chosen a longer one that would hide the various scrapes, bites, and pin-like puncture wounds from the sundew yesterday, so it swished around my calves with each step.
But I still felt self-conscious as I tried to brush off the weight of her glances. If Dazmine had noticed my knives, maybe I wasn’t being as subtle as I thought I was. Maybe Emelle had noticed, too, and was just waiting for me to broach the subject myself.
“How was the party last night?” I asked before she could change her mind and start asking questions—not just about the dresses, but about why I hadn’t come to bed until well past midnight. My hand still stung with blisters from all the knife-throwing I’d inflicted upon myself after Jagaros had left.
“Oh, let’s see.”
Emelle sighed as we weaved through the Wild Whisperer sector. Wren had been running late and told us to go on withouther, and none of us had any idea where Rodhi was, so only Gileon trailed behind us, once again deep in conversation with his rhinoceros beetle.
“I actually managed to teach Lander how to grind,” Emelle said. “Pierson Kadder got so drunk that he invited a gang of howler monkeys inside to play mini pentaball—trashed the boys’ house completely,” she added. “And then a few Element Wielder girls had a fight and ended up electrocuting the crap out of each other’s hair.”
“Wow.” I bit my lip. “That sounds… fun.”
