Page 114 of While the Dark Remains
Lilja is more than a little annoyed that I get to come to Daeros. “She meddled in yourmind, Father!” she says, over and over. “She ought to be punished, not rewarded.”
But Father replies that if I had the gall—and the power—to manipulate the Prism Master, I can’t be trusted to be left alone. And I can tell he’s at least a little bit impressed, even though Idoearn myself another lecture.
So I travel with Lilja and our parents in one of Lilja’s horseless carriages, rushing swift and silent over the long miles to Daeros, and it is only Brandr who is left behind.
My first glimpse of the mountain takes my breath away, the sun shining on rock and ice, the Sea of Bones crafted in shades of shifting blue beside it. The name is too grim, I think, for such ancient beauty.
We are received in the great hall, the entire back wall made of glass, sunlight refracting so blindingly off the ice it makes my eyes tear. The king of Daeros greets us along with four of his sons, and I can’t help staring at them. I am not used to unmagical people, with their dark hair proclaiming they have no power at all.
One of the sons, though, has strands of white mixed into his hair, and magic burns bright beneath his skin. I’m fascinated by him—I’ve never heard of a half Iljaria before. He catches me staring, blue eyes fixed on mine, and I duck behind my mother, embarrassed.
The king gives us a tour of the Collection he keeps in the great hall, which I’m horrified to find is made up of children kept in glass and metal cages. He explains how one is a brilliant singer, how anothercan swallow fire, and another is an impressive shot with bow and arrow, even blindfolded.
My belly churns; I’m afraid I’m going to be sick, but neither my parents nor Lilja say even a word against it. I’m relieved when the tour is over and we’re all shown to the guest wing.
After that, Lilja and I are made to keep mostly to the room we share. Even Lilja is deemed too young to attend any of the king’s grand dinners, which annoys her to no end.
“It’s becauseyou’rehere,” she snaps at me. “I’d be allowed to go if not foryou.”
I hold my tongue so I don’t say something rude. I hate that I worship the very ground she walks on, and all I am to her is an annoyance.
She spends most days tinkering with her inventions, occasionally acquiescing to play at Lords and Ladies with me. But even that isn’t much fun. She gets mad if I move my carved wooden game pieces with my mind instead of my hands. She thinks my power is wicked.
“The Bronze God ended up mutilated,” she tells me what seems like a thousand times, shoving her silver spectacles up onto her nose. “If he would have bound his power up inside of him instead of letting it consume him, maybe he wouldn’t even now be in misery and torment.”
“But I’m not wicked,” I say, very quietly, because sometimes I’m not actually sure.
“You used your power to get what you wanted, at the expense of Father, and me. What else would you call it?”
I chew on my lip and fall silent.
There are times when Lilja is called for, to show her inventions to the king, and I’m left alone in our room, staring moodily out the window and wondering why, exactly, I wanted to come. Brandr will never forgive me.
We’re in Daeros for a week before at last I’m summoned from my room along with Lilja. She’s to give a demonstration of her wings to the king, and I’m to be allowed to watch. According to Lilja, he’s already purchased several of her inventions and is considering the wings as well.
We troop out onto the tundra as the sun is beginning its slow descent west. The days are not yet growing shorter, but I still feel a pulse of sorrow—I have never loved the darkness. Wind swirls across the snow and I command my coat to be warmer, and it obeys.
My parents are here, of course, with the king and a few of his sons, including the magical one with the black-and-white hair. There’s a cut on his cheek, barely scabbed over, and I can’t help but wonder how a prince could have received such a wound.
Attendants bring Lilja the wings, and she shows them to the king, explaining how she built them, how she infused them with her magic. She straps them onto her back, fastening the leather straps across her chest, and then steps to the edge of the cliff, the Sea of Bones stretching into deep-blue darkness below her. Wind whips her skirt about her knees.
Lilja smiles, proud and brilliant.
She jumps.
For an instant the wings spark silver and I hold my breath, ready for her to soar up into the air.
But the next moment she’s falling, spiraling down into the dark.
“Lilja!” I scream, rushing to the edge.
But she falls, falls, falls.
I try. Lord of Time and Lady of Death, I try to save her.
But the wind and the snow and the ice don’t listen. The sun doesn’t hear me. The wings do not obey.
And so I watch in horror as my sister falls into the Sea of Bones and her body breaks upon the ice.
