Page 21 of Veradel
“See?” Vivian says as she shuts the door behind her. “All under control.”
Vivian pulls me into her bedroom and sits me in front of the most gorgeous mirror.
Framed with a simple white wood, it sits connected to a four-legged table with drawers to my left and right. On top sits little vials and round containers, brushes of all different sizes, glass bottles of pretty-colored liquids.
“What is this called?” I ask, taking in my reflection—my wind-chapped cheeks, tangled hair, and dirt-streaked skin. Unlike Diggory’s handheld mirror, this one is large enough to take in all my features at once. Dozens of unfamiliar tools and instruments are scattered on the tabletop beneath it.
Vivian smiles when our eyes connect in the mirror. “A vanity.”
A laugh bursts from my mouth. “It’s literally named after being conceited?”
“Or a makeup table,” she says, winking. “But give me an hour and you’ll see why.”
“Makeup?” I repeat.
Vivian nods and picks up a hairbrush out of the first drawer. “You’ll be obsessed with yourself almost as much as Lucan is.”
My cheeks heat. “He’s not obsessed with me.”
The words somehow die as they exit my mouth, like I don’t necessarily believe it myself, or maybe more that I wish it were true. Because I’mcertainly obsessed with him. But I have no way of knowing if this… thing between us is permanent or simply an exciting fraction of his centuries-long life for him.
I’mnot permanent, that’s for sure, not with Arad’s venom slowly inching through my organs and turning them to stone. Why would Lucan be so taken with someone he can’t have forever?
But Vivian purses her lips in amusement as she starts to brush through my knotted, wind-blown hair. “You know why you couldn’t hear all our mental voices before, only his?”
“No,” I confess.
“Lucan ordered us not to shift.”
“What? Why?”
“He didn’t want to confuse you.” Vivian snorts. “Or so he said.Ithink he just wanted to keep you all to himself, from the moment he first heard your voice.”
I blink at her, even more confused now. “But even that first moment I put on the necklace, I didn’t hear any of you. Only him.”
“Oh,” she says, beginning to play with the edges of my hair with a casual touch I’ve never experienced from a friend before, “we used to take turns patrolling, stalking around the Wall looking for a way in. Lucan just liked to take as many shifts as he could, especially around the time of the blood moon, so he was on the receiving end of your necklace the night you put it on for the first time.” She drops her voice to mutter under her breath, “And every night after.”
“So the howls?” I ask, incredulous. “Before a few months ago, it wasn’t just Lucan who haunted Xantera… but all of you on rotation?”
“Yeah.” Vivian’s laugh now is a howl in and of itself. “Could you imagine if it had been Soren on duty that night you first put on the necklace and you’d fallen in love with him instead?”
I scrunch my nose playfully, but the wordloverattles around in my brain. I’m not sure what the rules regarding that particular emotion are, but I don’t think I would have felt the same toward Soren or anyone else. The fact that it was Lucan that night, that he decided to be there every other night after, from the moment he first called me a nightmare…
Vivian’s watching my expression in the mirror as if she can see the thoughts racing across my eyes, so I give a little cough. “You and Merrick then?”
She sighs, taking the bait for a change of subject. “Definitely love him.”
“How did that… happen?” I ask, unsure how most romantic relationships even begin. Probably not with a blood-infused necklace connecting you to a deep voice that awakens your soul.
“Childhood friends, really, that experienced everything together,” Vivian tells me. “When we were kids, life was pretty carefree. We didn’t really know we lived in a ghost town that used to border something so much greater, because this was all we’d ever known. These ramshackle houses might as well have been castles, and the Wall might as well have been the edge of the world.”
Through the mirror, I watch her gather sections of my hair and begin to twine them together in a beautiful pattern I’ve never seen before. She continues talking, oblivious of my awe while her fingers work magic.
“Lucan, Merrick, Soren, and I, we all would get into so much trouble. Jumping off cliffs into the river, daring each other to see who could climb the tallest tree. But one day, after finding a ravine north of Eversnow Peak, Lucan and Soren raced off ahead, and Merrick and I made about a hundred trips back and forth trying to find them. By the time night started to approach, we realizedwewere lost. Together. Just the two of us.”
“That’s romantic,” I say earnestly.
Vivian laughs. “I didn’t think so at first. Merrick had never been more than just a friend to roughhouse with, but that night, we had to…” In the mirror, her cheeks take on a bit of pink. “Sleep next to each other.”
