Soul of the Crow: An Epic Dark Fantasy (Reapers of Veltuur Book 1), стр. 18

Hayliel sits down beside me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her hand hover over my knee, but by the time I look, she’s let it rest in her lap instead.

“There’s nothing you can do then. If a Reaper has been sent, they will find her—”

I pull the pouch of memory tree leaves from my waist.

”What is it?” Hayliel asks, and when I loosen the drawstrings and pull out the creased pieces of parchment inside, she reaches for them. She wastes no time in unfolding them, revealing the Guardian Tamzal, and the story of the War of Divinity. I am emboldened again by their stories, but more than that I am terrified of what lies ahead for us. Gem’s only problem is that she was born with a crack in her lip, and the Law of Mother’s Love says that people like her don’t deserve to live. If the imperfection was healed, she wouldn’t have to die. And the Guardians are the only ones who can heal her.

Hayliel is still turning the parchment over in her hands when I finally muster enough courage to look her in her meadow-green eyes. “I have to find a Guardian. They’re the only ones who can save her.”

“These…are pages from history books.”

“I know.”

“You don’t know if they even exist anymore.”

“I know that too. I mean, I know that I don’t know. But—” I take the pages back from Hayliel, tucking them inside the safety of pouch. Biting my lower lip, I stare across the room at Gem again.

With her tongue sticking out, she climbs into the chair before the mirror where Hayliel groomed my hair this morning. The second she sees her reflection, the triumph falls from her face. She leans forward, as far as she can without actually falling to the floor and examines the crack in her lip with curiosity. I’m not sure she’s even seen her own face before.

“She’s my sister,” I say to Hayliel, my voice nearly a whisper. When I stand from the bed, my strides are slow but assured as I make my way to Gem. “I’m scared, and I don’t really have a plan, but…I can’t just do nothing.”

There’s a knock on my door before anyone else can say anything, and the hand I was about to place on my sister’s shoulder flies over her mouth instead. I reach my other arm over the chair and around her waist, hoisting her into the air as I tuck our bodies beside the vanity and out of sight.

My chamber door swings open.

“My apologies,” I hear Borgravid’s gruff voice as he addresses Hayliel. “Have you seen the prince?”

Our existing friendship clouds my judgment. I feel the urge to ease out from our place tucked in the shadows, to tell him about Gem and the Reaper, to run to his side and ask him for help.

But then I realize how strange it is that he’s here and start to wonder why he’s looking for me. The only logical explanation I can create is of course riddled with paranoia, but it’s all I can think of: my father must’ve sent him. He probably knows I have Gem, and the Reaper is here looking for her, but she’s not in her tower, so now they’re looking for me because they know once they find me, they’ll find Gem too.

That can’t happen.

As Borgravid examines the room, I scoot Gem and myself even tighter against the side of the vanity. He might be able to see us from where he stands; I don’t know. I’m sure my feet are sticking out, or Gem’s coarse, unruly hair is, or that our two bodies are casting a shadow across the floor, or something. Any second now, Borgravid will march over to us—not because he wants to, but because he’s been commanded to—and he’ll yank Gem from my arms and drag her to the Reaper to be killed.

I clamp my mouth so tightly that my teeth hurt.

“I haven’t seen him since this morning,” Hayliel says, and I’m pretty sure only I can hear the tightness in her voice. “I think he said he had plans to soak in the baths. When he returns, I can tell him you were looking for him—”

“No. There’s no need. I will go to him. Thank you.”

Borgravid’s cape ripples like a flag in the wind as he turns, leaving the room just as abruptly as he entered.

I exhale the breath I was holding and free Gem from my lap.

Hayliel says, rushing across the room, the layers of her skirt heavy against her quickened steps, “I didn’t know what to say to him.”

Wiggling out of my lap, Gem squeals, “My turn, Cari! I hide.”

My hand flies to my mouth, hissing at her to be quiet. Anyone in the hallway outside could’ve heard her, but hopefully Borgravid was in as much of a hurry as he seemed and was already gone. When Gem shrinks away from me, I instantly feel guilty. “I’m sorry, Gem. I just can’t play right now. We need to be quiet, okay?”

Defeated but obliging, Gem bobs her head.

“What you said was perfect,” I tell Hayliel, taking the hand she offers to pull me up to my feet. “At least he’ll be one less guard I have to worry about.”

“Do you think he knows you have Gem?”

“He has to. There’s no other reason why he’d come for me. I saw him this morning stationed at the Forbidden Garden. He should’ve been there the rest of the day. I think the Reaper is already here, and I think my father knows I took Gem.”

Bringing her hands to her chest, Hayliel clasps her fingers tightly, not daring to take her eyes off the door. “It’s not safe here. If the Reaper is already here, and your father has already sent the guards for you, then the palace is about to be swarming. If you really plan on finding a Guardian, then you have to leave,