Gods & Thieves ✔

42. Moon and Draught

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It's long past midnight when our dinner is over.

True to her promises, Ma hands me an old, dusty mattress that smells of the basement and lavender, and I give my pajamas to Loretto, secretly praying that Mentor puts them on right after the shower and does not come out of the bathroom in faer favorite nakedness, which is unacceptable in this house.

And knowing that Loretto loves long showers, I'm now going to talk to Cale.

The moonlight glides across the wooden walls of the second-floor hallway as I walk along it, and the sudden silence after the dinner chatter reawakens my anxiety.

I love my house with all its shabby walls, but the feeling that I'm a stranger here now begins to gnash inside me again, like a rusty nail against glass. When I get to the door of Cale's room, when I'm about to knock, I hesitate, remembering the convincing words that I've been rehearsing for several days.

Yet, without waiting for my determination, the door swings open.

"Come in," my brother says, stern, like an officer on duty, and without warning pulls me into the room.

With my stomach full after dinner, I feel like a lazy, anxious barrel, so my body doesn't even have time to instinctively resist when I find myself inside.

The room is stuffy and dark. Only one lamp is lit. In the two months of my absence, nothing has changed here, although I note to myself that there're a few dirty mugs on the table, and a pile of unwashed socks on the bed...Too many everyday things scattered around. It's unusual for Cale lately, because he spends the night with his fiancée most of the time. She has a spacious house where she lives alone with her father--who also shares Cale's rebellious endeavors, so there, he is like a star on top of a Christmas tree.

He and his fiancée definitely quarreled, since all the things are here," I realize, gloomy. This is bad, because a brother who is dissatisfied will be hot-tempered and more categorical than I need him to be when I start arguing with him.

And Cale was obviously standing guard at the door, waiting for me to come up, since he'd opened right away. It turns out he's also nervous today.

And of course, he's not alone in the room. Kofi is also here, wearily picking at a hangnail on his thumb and not even looking up at me when I enter.

Seconds drag on in anticipation.

Kofi doesn't look at me, but Cale is boring his eyes into me with an expectant look, it seems, calculating something in his mind again. Surely this is my chance--I need to blurt out everything at once about the Empress, her spies who know all the secrets of the rebels, the Trials in which we have a chance to prevail only if Tayen wins...But all my rehearsed speeches disappear from my head.

I'm face to face with my older brother, whose expression now is hard as a brick. He's also taller than me. Wider in the shoulders. Looks like a wardrobe--if you drop one, it will crush you.

With horror snaking down my spine, I suddenly realize that I won't be able to argue. Cale always waves his fists to protect me in fights, but what happens if those fists fly at me? I can't even imagine, this has never happened. But I came to argue! For Cale, an argument is equal to a fight, a fight means fists, fists mean someone's broken jaw--otherwise victory, the one that's above all for him, does not count.

And since no jaw except mine is going to say arguments that Cale doesn't like today...I run my tongue over my teeth, anxious. My teeth begin to ache, as if I have already been punched.

My enthusiasm, collected bit by bit on the way here, crumbles, and once again I regret that I did not leave this problem to Loretto. How coward and selfish of me.