Page 65 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
No. Hard stop. I squirmed in my seat, trying to stifle the warmth that my body was letting creep back in like the traitor it was.
“It… we didn’t go that far.”And we never will.
I bowed my own head at the ant in the glass, who—to my delight—dipped his antennas back immediately.
It was only when I passed the glass carefully back to Gileon that I whipped toward the empty seat beside me with a frown.
“Wait. Where’s Rodhi?”
How could I have forgotten about him? Nobody ever missed class unless they were on their literal deathbed in the sick bay, and Rodhi wouldn’t missthisclass even if he was.
Emelle’s frown mirrored mine.
“I have no idea. To be honest, when both of you were late, I started to assume maybehewas the guy you ran off with. But—”
“Ugh, no!” I shook my head so violently, our ant started prowling in agitated circles again. “I love Rodhi to pieces, but… not in that way.”
“Well, Ms. Pincette doesn’t seem to have noticed he’s gone.”
I glanced at our teacher, currently parading up and down the aisles to monitor each group’s progress. I was sure nothing got past her, least of all the boy who’d been obsessed with her for a year failing to arrive at a government-sanctioned lesson he was required to attend.
“Nuisance says Rodhi’s off on a high-stakes adventure,” Gileon piped up, his rhino beetle indeed buzzing incessantly in his ear, “battling deadly foe and winning armies to his name. Maybe Ms. Pincette is okay with us skipping class if we’re winning armies to our name.”
“I’mokaywith you bowing to your bullet ant,” came a sharp reply behind our shoulders, and Gileon jumped so high off his seat that it made a sharpcrickingsound when he came back down.
Ms. Pincette came to a towering halt over our sitting positions.
“Do you know how hard it was to find bullet ants to agree to hang out in what they perceive as see-throughcoffinsfor a day? I had to offer their colony a month’s worth of nectar. And here you three are, yapping about stomach ulcers and high-stakes adventures instead of giving your ant the respect it deserves. Now bow.”
Quicker than the whip of the sundew, all three of us bowed.
After our last class of the day, I told Emelle I was going to change and wash up before dinner while she and Gileon waited for Wren in our parlor.
I was looking forward to some stillness and silence. Ten minutes of alone time to fully process the brand hidden beneath my hair on the back of my neck and Steeler’s pearl still beaded in between my breasts.
But when I opened my door, it was to find that Dazmine had beat me here, facing me with a glare glued on her face, and—
Willa, of all creatures, perched on the palm of an upturned hand.
“What,” Dazmine began with a hiss.
“Happened?” Willa finished with a squeak.
I slammed the door behind me and toggled back and forth between their pairs of eyes: Dazmine’s slitted with cool animosity and Willa’s wide with gleaming worry.
“Since when didyoutwo start ganging up on me?”
“Since you used me as an excuse to sneak out without even telling me about it,” Willa said. “I had to find out I had stomachulcers through Barty, who heard it from Gerald, who heard it through the wall. Thankfully, Dazmine ended up filling me in.”
Dazmine flung back my glare with one of her own.
“What? You employed my help, made me listen to Mitzi and Cilia squeal like bellbirds all night, thennever came back. What was I supposed to do, just go to sleep?”
I started to say yes, but she plunged on.
“So I had to tell Willa everything to get her tolieto Emelle and Cilia for you. Then I went looking for you at three in the goddamnedmorning. And you know what I found when I got to that abandoned classroom, Rayna? Nothing but a roomful of pissed off plants that told me you’d disappeared into thin air with the very man I’d asked them to trap!”
Dazmine’s chest was heaving, her nostrils flaring, and a sudden surge of guilt wound its way around my ribs at the thought thatI’dcaused this: more panic and stress in her life after Jenia’s exile.
