Keeper of The Lost Cities: Book 9: Showdown

Chapter 42 - Keefe's POV

As expected, Foster asks for the confession first. I honestly can understand why she's so reluctant to open my journal - I think it's for the same reason I'm steadfastly refusing to read my mother's letter.

"You're going to hate me after I tell you this," I warn her.

"You say that every time you speak words to me, yet here I am." her steely gaze fixes on me, determination radiating off of her in waves. Being around her isn't as easy as it was before, but it's better than it was after I woke up from my "coma". "Tell me something I don't know. Or better yet, tell me something that's true."

I scowl (very slightly) at her. "No, you'll literally hate me after this."

"Never have, never will." Foster sighs and cocks her head at me. "Hurry up and get it over with."

"I... knewaboutElysiumandeverythingaboutit-"

"Slow down?" she has her hands out in front of her, as if pacifying my ramble. "The only word I understood was Elysium."

"I knew about Elysium, before you did."

Foster blinks at me once, twice. "There's nothing particularly-"

"I also knew where they were keeping Biana and Dex, the security measures put in place, the layout of Elysium. I knew the only way to survive there, the only way to get in and out." I look at Foster, this beautiful example of a leader, the image of perfection. "I could have told you everything you needed to know, got you in and out of Elysium without the Council being any wiser."

She does her little blinking routine again but I start talking before she can say anything. "Tristan Bronach was the alias I used in the Forbidden Cities, which in hindsight was dumb because Tam found out when Glimmer spilled everything."

She exhales and inhales deeply, quelling who knows what. "How?"

"How what?"

"I know that you knew all of this, Tam told me." she says somewhat quietly, as she gently pulls out an eyelash (first one!). "How did you know? 

I recount for her what I did for Tam and Fitz, and her emotions and face strangely and steadfastly impassive, indifferent, and something swells inside me. I don't know what it is or why it is, and so I decide to ignore that it's there. But by the time I'm done, Foster has pulled out zero lashes (I kid you not, not a single one), and her face is exactly the same as it was when I started. She has asked zero questions and made zero comments, and I would be lying if I said I wasn't concerned.

We sit in silence when I'm done soliloquizing, and I don't know if it's just me or if both of us are slightly afraid of breaking the silence. I let Foster mull over her thoughts before she finally cuts through the thick silence.

"I should be mad," she says. "That you didn't tell me any of this. You'd think the amount of time you spent in your own memories would bring up some mention, even if a tiny one. But I can't be mad at you, especially not when you're in human clothing. It's been a while."

"What does human clothing have to do with anything?"

She bats a hand at me. "It just serves as a reminder of where you went and why." her eyes flash, just slightly, so slightly that I almost miss it. "You know, your whole guise about 'protecting me' and all that. I think you also said that that 'this is the last time I'll ever talk to you' and 'PLEASE forget all about me'." she snorts and shakes her head. "It was the sappiest, stupidest thing I've ever read. And this is from a person who once read a romance novel from the 1950s for the fun of it. It was terrible."

"I meant it." I say, very, very sternly. "I honestly thought I would never see you again."

"Yet you were the one who sent for me, all those days ago." she presses her eyes closed, before she opens them again. "Do you want to know what I did with your letter?"

"What?" I'm afraid of the answer.

"I ripped it to shreds." Foster looks downright sadist as she says those words.

I am scared.

"I ripped it to shreds, and after that, I ripped the shreds to shreds. Because I could not believe why you would just pack up and leave 'cause guess what? Mommy gave me some new powers and now I'm scawed."

My eyes flare against my will. "I wasn't scared for myself. I was scared for you."

She snorts again. "Yes, because nothing is more terrifying when your mother commands you to - oh, wait, wasn't it you doing the commanding?"

"Sophie." I take her hands in mine and squeeze. "This isn't you."

"And what it is?" she asks, fury illuminating her voice. "The Moonlark? A puppet? Am I an anomaly? Regent? Team Valiant?" she sighs and laughs at the same time, her voice void of any emotion, the trembling her body's not doing coming through in her voice. "I am so many things, Keefe, but none of them at the same time."

"You're Sophie Foster," I say, meaning every word of them. "You're the girl who was lost when you first got here, but you're also the girl who everyone knows, because how can they not? You're the girl who's found her place -"

"But did I find it, or was it given to me?"

We both know the answer to this one, because if I said otherwise I would be lying. I don't know how long she's felt like this, but I slowly come to terms with what she's said because she's right. She didn't become the Moonlark, she is the Moonlark. She didn't become Regent, she is a Regent.

She lightly throws my gold journal and the letter on her seat and stands up. "I'm leaving. I'll see you... when I do."

And she leaves, just like that, no words, no glances. And I wonder if she'll leave like that again.

If she'll leave me that way again.