The Griever's Mark (The Griever's Mark series Book 1) (10 page)

The Arcon drags two stools from outside the cell into the center of it. He takes a seat, then stares at Logan until Logan does the same. Logan’s movement is slow and awkward, and he leaves his right leg jutted out straight. The corner of his right eye tics.

The Arcon doesn’t waste any breath. “Tell me what you were doing with Count Martel. What does your master want with him?”

“Why should I tell you anything?”

The Arcon looks smugly at Logan. “My brother here tried to give me the impression that you had turned against your master. Perhaps he misread your actions.”

Logan ignores his brother’s stare. “Astarti. You protected me from the Unnamed. As you protected Korinna, by her own account.” This last he says loudly, directing it at Aronos. “Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“You must have had a reason,” challenges the Arcon.

“I didn’t have a reason. I don’t know why I did it. I just—I don’t know. Don’t you think Belos asked me the same thing?” The Arcon’s eyes narrow when I say Belos’s name, so I say it again. “Belos was...very angry.”

Logan looks at me thoughtfully, frowning slightly. I can’t see his eyes well with the torchlight behind him, but I imagine them swirling with color. “She did what she felt was right.”

The Arcon snarls, “Don’t feed her words to justify herself.”

“Then how do you explain it?”

“If she is so full of conscience, why does she serve him?”

We are all silent a moment. I, for one, am happy to stay out of this conversation. Then Logan says slowly, making my guts twist, “She is Leashed, Aron.”

The Arcon’s glare jumps from Logan to me and back again. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?”

Logan shrugs, and I almost smile. He seems to enjoy riling his brother. Logan takes a steadying breath before his next question, as though he is afraid of the answer. “Astarti, why did you let him Leash you?”

A chill runs through me. I shiver. I shake my head. I see myself curled up in the dusty courtyard, vomiting until my stomach is empty. Belos looms over me. Even here in Avydos, I feel the ghost of that violation, stirring up nausea. I feel my shame, my weakness. No. I won’t tell them. I don’t want to talk about it, don’t want to even think about it.

“Well?” insists the Arcon.

I shake my head.

Logan leans close, lowers his voice. “Did he force you?”

The Arcon snaps, “Stop making guesses. You’re leading her. You’re determined to be on her side. Leashing is almost never forced. Besides, what use would he have for her?”

“Don’t be stupid, Aron. She’s a Drifter. What use do you think?”

“A simple Drifter? When he has the Seven to serve him?”

“Who’s making guesses now? Do you know his mind so well?”

Aron’s face purples, but he doesn’t rise to Logan’s bait. Instead he sneers, “So you’re suggesting that she’s a
captive
of the Unnamed?”

“Astarti.” Logan’s voice is gentle. “You said, that night that I pulled you from the Current, you said you didn’t choose it. What did you mean?”

I am shaking, freezing. I cross my arms in front of my chest, holding tight.

“How old were you when he Leashed you?”

I can’t breathe. I will be sick. Why would he ask that question?

“Please tell me.” His eyes are intent but gentle, as though only he and I are in the room.

I look down but give him the word, because I can’t seem to refuse him. “Seven.”

I hear Logan’s sharply indrawn breath, the angry curse. The Arcon is silent, still.

Logan says furiously, “He Leashed a child. I’ve never even heard of such a thing. Who would—how could he—” He cuts himself off, remembering whom he is talking about.

I stare at my knees. I do not like this attention. I am exposed now for everyone to see. The legs of Logan’s stool scrape across the floor. I feel his nearness. Part of me wants it, but another part of me wants him, both of them, to go away. When he touches my arm, I jerk back. I do not want to be touched.

The Arcon says, though there is no conviction in his voice, “She could be lying.”

Logan ignores him. “Who are your parents? Where did he take you from?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t remember?”

“I was a baby.” My voice is flat, alien. I don’t feel like I’m controlling it.

I wish they would just ask me about Martel. I wish they would beat me. I could endure those things. This, I can’t stand.

Logan bends down and picks something up off the floor. A blanket. He pulls it around me. His hands linger on my shoulders.

I feel my eyes prickle with shame, so I do the only thing that will save me: I find my anger.

I stand from the cot, throw the blanket down. The wound in my side tears, but the pain is distant. “What do you want from me? Are you going to talk me to death?”

Logan rises, takes my arm. I jerk it free and punch him in the chest. I feel such release in it that I hit him again. He grabs my wrist. I don’t look at his eyes; I don’t want to see his disgust. I jerk free and march to the corner, as far from him as I can get.

“Leave me alone, both of you! If you want to kill me, fine! If not, get out of here!”

Both of them are still, wary.

I punch the wall, relieved by the flash of pain across my knuckles. “Go!”

The Arcon stands up. He strides from the cell, grabbing the torch from its bracket.

The cell dims as the light recedes. Logan, shadowed, stands within.

“Just go,” I whisper, and, at last, he does.

I sink to the floor, cradling my throbbing hand, the fight quickly going out of me. Already, embarrassment is edging in. How stupid I must look to him. How weak. My head falls to my knees as two sets of footsteps recede up the stairs.

Chapter 13

I DOZE ON my cot. I’m not sure how much time has passed, but I think it’s still the same day. One of my new guards—Korinna seems to have been relieved of her duties—brought me a meal and water a few hours ago. I didn’t want to eat it, didn’t want to accept anything from my captors, but I was hungry. Lamb roasted in olive oil with rosemary and thyme. Fresh white bread. Honey. My stomach is growling for more. I guess I’m not very good at pouting. Or making statements. Or killing myself with starvation.

When footsteps approach my door, they are even, so I know they aren’t Logan’s. I brace as the key clanks in the lock, as the door swings open.

When a man walks in who is not the Arcon, I blink in surprise. Broad-faced, with red-gold hair, he looks much like Arcon Aronos, though his long hair is gathered at the nape of his neck instead of cut short, and his face is more careworn despite its calm surface. He’s taller and leaner than the Arcon, built more like Logan. He wears a white Earthmaker tunic belted at the waist.

“Hello, Astarti.”

“Who are you?” I demand rudely.

He slides a torch into the bracket and walks over to my cot. I shift to the end when he sits down beside me. I am stiff, wary.

He studies me with his deep blue Earthmaker eyes. “I’m Bran. I came to see how you’re doing. Logan is worried about you.”

I don’t allow myself to react.

“After he and Aron talked to you”—the forced casualness of his voice tells me that Logan reported on my actions. I squirm inwardly—“he came to find me. He wanted to come with me now, but I told him I wanted to meet you alone first.”

I shift at that word, alone. A deeply ingrained distrust makes me tense. The guards have left, and an unknown man is in my cell. I have no weapons and can’t access the Drift, though I’ve been trying all day. I feel exposed, vulnerable. I don’t like it.

My wariness must be obvious because he says, “I won’t hurt you.”

I say acidly, just so he doesn’t think me frightened, “I’d like to see you try.”

His mouth quirks. “Logan would throw me off Mount Hypatia. He’s my brother.”

Figured as much. “Any more brothers I should know about?”

He chuckles. “Don’t worry. It’s just the three of us.”

“Your poor mother.”

He grins. “Trust me, you don’t know the half of it.”

His light tone puts me at ease. “Let me guess: Logan was the wild child?”

Bran’s red-gold eyebrows lift in mock surprise. “Whatever gave you that impression?”

I laugh, but when I hear myself I grow suddenly wary again. I can’t let him trick me into trusting him. Bran is an Earthmaker, and he might be Logan’s brother, but he is also the Arcon’s brother. “What do you want from me?”

Bran sighs and leans back to study me again. Once I’ve grown thoroughly uncomfortable, he admits, “Logan wanted to know what I thought of you.”

“Why?”

Bran looks briefly troubled. “Logan has been taught not to trust his own instincts, not to trust himself.”

That doesn’t really answer my question, but Bran’s closed expression tells me it’s all I’m going to get. “Where is Logan?”

“With our mother.”

The Prima.

I still can’t believe Logan is a Primo, a noble, which Bran, of course, must also be.

“Is he the youngest?”

Bran pretends to be offended. “Do I look so old?”

“You look older than he does.”

“All right, fine. Yes, he’s the youngest. By about thirty years.”

I swallow my surprise and assure him, “You don’t look
that
old.”

His mouth quirks again. He’s handsome, like Logan and, if I’m honest, like Aronos. He says offhandedly, “One advantage of being an Earthmaker, I guess.”

That might be true, but I know they can still die young. And be hurt.
I think of Logan limping, of the tic in the corner of his eye, telling me of pain and fatigue. “Is Logan all right? Why hasn’t his leg been Healed?”

Lines set around Bran’s mouth, and suddenly I believe that he is much older than he looks. “Logan is refusing to be Healed until you are.”

That makes me sit back. “Why would he do that?”

“Because he wants you to be Healed, of course. He is trying to use it as leverage. Foolish. Aron won’t cave to that.”

“I thought the Arcon did not have absolute power,” I say bitterly. “What about your Council?”

Bran hesitates. “They agree with Aron.”

“I bet they do.”

“But he’s not a bad man, Astarti, though that may be hard for you to believe right now. He is angry, yes. But he tries to do what’s right. To live up to our father.”

The image of Arcon Arathos’s severed head leaps into my mind again. Before I can stop them, the words escape me: “I’m sorry. About your father.”

I could never have said that to Aronos, but it feels right to say it to Bran.

Bran only looks at me. “How old are you, Astarti?”

“Seventeen. Why?”

“My father died five years ago. You were twelve. I hardly think you bear any responsibility for it.”

“Aron thinks I do.”

“Aron was very close to our father.” His voice grows bitter when he adds, “Don’t feel singled out. He blames himself, too. And Logan.”

“Why would he blame Logan?”

“Logan was there. He was badly hurt, but he survived. Our father did not.”

I remember the terrible scar on Logan’s chest. I wonder who did it. Straton? Ludos? Theron? Belos himself?

I say, “That hardly seems like Logan’s fault.”

“It’s not. But Aron has convinced him that it was. Not that Logan needed much convincing. He already felt responsible.”

I hear the subtle anger in Bran’s voice, and I realize that he truly cares for Logan. Not just with a sense of familial duty. They are friends. This makes me like him. I hesitate, then prompt, “Logan seems very...different...from other Earthmakers.”

The torchlight plays over Bran’s face as he studies me. “You’re very interested in him.”

I feel myself blush. I hope Bran can’t see it in the wavering light.

He says gently, “He’s curious about you also.”

My jaw hardens. I am letting myself grow soft, exposing myself again. I tighten things up by saying, “He just wants to know whether to agree with the Arcon or not.”

“I don’t think so.” There is a question in his eyes that makes me uncomfortable. How did this become about me again?

“Can I ask you a question, Astarti?”

I stay silent, wary, not committing.

“Why do you think Belos took you as a baby?”

The question surprises me. “I don’t know. Because I’m a Drifter? I never really thought about it.”

Bran looks thoughtful, troubled. “You know nothing of your parents?”

“No.”

“You have no mementos from them?”

I think of the Griever’s Mark. The one thing my mother left me. “No.”

“Hmm.”

Bran falls silent. He leans back against the wall, hands on his knees, fingers drumming slowly. The torchlight wavers in a breeze I can’t feel.

Finally, I demand, “What?”

“Belos is smart.”

“Yes.”

“He does things for reasons. He plans.”

I frown. “How do you know so much about him?”

“He was once one of us, remember? I was very young, but I remember him, in the beginning.”

I am surprised to hear an Earthmaker acknowledge Belos as one of their own. I also find it strange to think of Belos before he became what I know him to be.

I am about to ask Bran about the younger Belos when footsteps sound on the stairs. One set is heavy, uneven, and I am surprised by how relieved I am to hear Logan. The other set is light, almost silent. So, not the Arcon then.

When Logan and Prima Gaiana enter the cell, Bran quips, “Couldn’t stand it, could you?”

Logan grunts and limps over to us.

I snap at him, “Let them Heal you, for pity’s sake. What’s wrong with you? Do you want to ruin your leg?”

Gaiana comes to his shoulder in a flow of pale green robes. They are gathered at the shoulders in the Earthmaker style. “See, Logan? Astarti agrees with me.”

Logan crosses his arms stubbornly. “Like I said, her first.”

Gaiana mutters, “Aron is going to be furious,” but she floats over to me and motions Bran off the cot.

He practically leaps out of her way, and she settles beside me. I smell jasmine and eye the elegant fall of her wavy blonde hair. I am suddenly self-conscious of my own, unwashed appearance. My own hair feels greasy, and I know I must smell bad.