The Majors, Rebuild and Reunite (Book 3)

Chapter 6: Outburst

*Another reminder that everything in this chapter is spoken in elvish unless it's specified Grimmish*

~Scott~

I sat in my bed, painstakingly watching the clock hung over the mirror tick down...

Ten minutes before the meeting...

Seven minutes...

Five minutes. I should probably start heading down to the throne room.

I tore my eyes away from the clock, landing on my reflection for just a moment. I didn't see anything wrong (at least, anything wrong that I could fix), so I hurried out the door, my pace quick.

The blue velvet carpet beneath my feet practically silenced my footsteps. The hall was empty, surprisingly, although I heard little shuffles and clatters from other rooms I passed.

I'm not sure why I was terrified. I had gone to plenty of meetings before, before all of this...with my parents and without. So why was this time different?

My head snapped up as the deadened clatter of footsteps met my ears, masked by the jingle of my earrings, as the right twitched. The hall from which it was coming from blended into my own, the people to whom the footsteps belonged coming into sight.

Phoenix strode forward, several feet behind as servants trailed alongside her, adjusting the collar of the dress she wore, layered across her collarbone. It looked remarkably similar to mother's, pale blue with long, draping sleeves that encapsulated her wrists, gold bangles just barely peeking through. Pinned to the sinched ribbons laced up her torso and chest was a silver moon, the mark of Ithile. 

Was I surprised to visit the temple with my siblings only to find that Phoenix's patron was the goddess of the moon? Definitely. Most definitely. It had crossed my mind once or twice who Erin's could have been, though she never got to choose...Ithile was never in the picture. 

My hand wandered up to the pair of golden antlers carved into my own pin, thumb gliding along one of the prongs branching from it. 

"I'm fine—" Phoenix exclaimed rigidly, batting one of the servants off as they tried to fix a few strands of her dark hair, braided tightly and pinned up by the crown of her head. "Leave." She added a bit softer a moment later as the same servant seemed to flinch backwards. 

The group of elven women that had been surrounding her previously, near immediately left, sliding through a door out of the hall. 

With a small, exasperated huff Phoenix sped up slightly to walk along beside me, jaw stiff as she stared straight ahead.

"Nervous?" I asked, letting my hands relax slightly, having before been clenched tightly.

"Mm." She mumbled, eyes darting in my direction for a moment before her gaze returned to the hallway before us. "A little."

I swept my cloak around my legs, the hem brushing my heels as we walked. "I am too." I replied, the tension seeming to lift slightly from the air. 

Her lips curved in the smallest of smiles as she looked up at me, her expression relaxing. "Well then, we can try not to get murdered by father together—" She said with an anxious laugh. 

"Hah..." 

"Just got to uh...y'know, only speak when spoken to. That sort of stuff." Phoenix shrugged, although she didn't seem too confident. "Should be easy. Totally easy—" She continued with a light bob of her head, a couple of her piercings rattling along her ear. A strange silver one caught my eye that I swear she hadn't been wearing before, at least, she hadn't a few days previously. It was in the shape of a star, an amber gemstone set in the center.