Page 78 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
“You didn’t know about that? You didn’t know that he used his weird obsession with fungus to murder one of your instructors and was planning on doing the same to your classmate? Well, guess what? Jenia Leakedid. She wasinon it. So maybe it’s a good thing she’s in prison, huh?”
With that, Steeler stomped toward the cottage door, wrenched it open, and slammed it shut again behind him.
In the ringing silence that followed, Dazmine’s shoulders sagged.
“Prison?” she whispered.
Terrin turned toward her, something keen and inquisitive in the way he observed the pinch of her eyebrows.
He jerked his head at the kitchen table.
“Why don’t you sit down like a good human, and I can tell you everything?”
For a moment, it looked as if Dazmine was contemplating being a verybadhuman. She glanced at the knife block behind Felicity, then at Terrin’s throat. Terrin responded by blowing her a kiss of smoke.
Finally, Dazmine gritted her teeth and stomped over to the table.
Five minutes later, with steaming bowls of chickpea stew in front of everyone—save for Steeler, who still hadn’t returned—Terrin and Garvis told us everything about the exiled ones. How they weren’t thrown out to sea like we’d always been told, but hauled up to Bascite Mountain and experimented on. Tortured. Locked away alongside the original five members of the Sorronian Good Council. The information sounded vaguely familiar, as if it had been uprooted from a dream in the frigid foundation of my mind.
When they were done explaining, Dazmine was silent for a long time.
Terrin tracked the way she gnawed on her lip, deep in thought.
Finally, Dazmine looked up, not at Terrin, but at me.
“I will never forgive Jenia for what she tried to do… but nobody deserves torture. Not her, and certainly not all the other exiled ones that have been brought up there over the last five centuries.”
I nodded. The shock of re-learning what my previous classmates had planned to do to me tasted acrid in my mouth, like I’d swallowed a memory too fast. But Dazmine was right—nobody deserved what loomed over the island at the top of Bascite Mountain.
Apparently satisfied that I understood her sentiment, Dazmine swung her gaze back to Terrin, and they clashed like blades. One expression dry and unforgiving, the other glinting with sparks.
“I want to help,” she said. “I want to help break everyone out of that prison.”
Garvis and I exchanged surprised glances. Terrin’s mouth slashed into his widest grin yet.
“Welcome to the pirate side, Temperton.”
When Garvis suggested we take our Mind Manipulating lesson outside, I didn’t hesitate before agreeing.
Mostly, I wanted to escape the tension bursting in the cottage now that I was sure Dazmine and Terrin weren’t going to slit each other’s throats. But a quiet, sly part of me also wanted tocatch a glimpse of Steeler—to see where he’d stomped off to. To find out if his mood had calmed.
Only, Steeler wasn’t outside at all. There wasn’t even a distant figure on the beach to indicate he’d gone on a long walk. He must have used his power to leave this part of the island entirely.
Which made that quiet, sly part of me wilt with the smallest sliver of disappointment.
The view was beautiful, though. The faintest beginnings of a sunset were just barely skimming over the water, turning the foamy shoreline a murky pink. Seagulls picked their way across the rocks, yelling at each other over who had claimed which crustacean, but not in an unpleasant way. The soft pulse of an ocean breeze swished fresh, salty air across my face.
After Garvis and I were both sitting cross-legged next to the dark imprint of the tideline, I smiled at him.
“So Steeler told me you made an entire lesson plan for me today. Do I finally get to learn how to control people?”
Not that I wanted to control anyone, necessarily. But if Lexington ever told me to choke myself again, it would be nice to throw a little of his own Mind Manipulating games back at him.
Garvis only shook his head.
“Not quite. I’m afraid that controlling somebody else’s actions is usually a fifth-year thing. But even so, we’ll be skipping several months of normal Mind Manipulating lessons to start working on one I’m hoping would benefit you the most right now.”
The sound of the sea beating against the island seemed to pick up speed.
