The Phoenix People

Chapter Sixteen

"Are you sure you wouldn't like some tea?" Oak asked for the hundredth time, staring worriedly into my eyes. "Princess, you look like you're going into shock."

"Okay, I'll take some tea," I finally muttered, caving.

Anna had led me from the hallway to the room in which I had first met Oak and we were now seated in his small, plain room. He shared it with his family, but luckily for me, his wife was elsewhere. I shivered to think of her wrath once she discovered about the soldier fiasco in the temple.

"Any sugar? Honey?" Oak inquired, pausing in the doorway

"A bit of both, please," I requested faintly, and he left. My head was spinning, making it difficult to focus. A halfbreed who could use magic? Could all halfbreeds perform spells? Did Audric know of this? I was sure that if he did, he would exploit it to no end. Already he had a small army of halfbreeds that he had created through the Initiative...

"I'm sorry for telling you like that," Anna apologized. "I didn't mean to give you such a shock, truly." Her voice was imploring, her eyes begging for forgiveness.

"I believe you. It's just...a lot to take in." Although, I supposed it made sense, in a way. She was half Highborn...But who was her father, who would pass down such magical genes and be able to give her such knowledge? After all, I doubted that even I could conjure what I was now realizing must have been an invisibility spell. "Anna...who is your father?"

Robin burst into the room before Anna could answer my question. She gripped the young girl in a brief, tight hug and then turned to me. Her eyes were filled with both concern and fury.

"I thought that maybe you could be an asset to the Phoenix People, but I was wrong. You're endangering my friends and my family," she spat. The she ran a hand over her face and sighed. "Gods, I'm sorry. I ran into Oak in the hallway and he told me what happened. I...I got frightened." She stared at my dress for a moment as if just noticing it was different from yesterday's. Then, she groaned. "If the soldiers find your royal dress, our temple hideout is done for! If they so much as look at the courtyard, we're done for!"

"No Highborns have ever entered the temple?"

"None that weren't already working for us. Why would they? They have far nicer temples to visit," Robin pointed out scathingly.

Anna laid her small hand on the irate woman's shoulder. "Calm down, Robin. My father can handle this." Her voice was soothing, and she blinked up at Robin hopefully.

"Last I checked, your father was on a mission, Anna," Robin countered, but her tone was not unkind, but rather, weary.

"He returned late last night, actually."

"Oh, thank the gods." Robin sank onto the bed next to me, albeit as far away as possible, and took a deep breath.

That exchange presented even more questions. Was Anna's father truly that influential in the world of Highborns? Who was this man?

I sighed, reaching up to my mangled hairdo to let my hair down and attempt to untangle it. "Anna, how can you perform magic like that, on that scale?"

Anna's lips twitched slightly in amusement. "When you meet my father, you'll understand, I promise."

I felt a bit better knowing that I would receive clarity in the relatively near future. I twisted a ringlet of hair around my finger absentmindedly as I tried to process everything that I had learned.

Robin was watching me. "Here," she said abruptly and gruffly. "Let me fix your hair."

My eyes widened at her sudden kindness as we both adjusted ourselves so she was facing the back of my head. It felt nice to have someone do my hair, but also strange that that someone was not Melody. My gaze flicked to the doorway, half expecting my former handmaiden to be standing there with some message for me to reply to or task to fulfill, but the doorway was understandably empty.

I sighed, closing my eyes. This is all far too strange for me.

Robin only took a couple of minutes to style my hair. "What did you do?" I asked curiously, raising a hand to blindly feel the back of my head.

"It's just a braid," Robin replied, "but trust me, my braids don't loosen easily." She grinned and reached behind her to tap her own impeccable brain.

I smiled softly in reply. "Thank you, Robin." The woman bit her lip and nodded. I got the sense that her fixing my hair was her way of apologizing for losing her temper. It was an apology that I wholeheartedly accepted.

Just then, Oak reentered the room, carrying a tea tray. He smiled knowingly at my hairdo and glanced at his wife. She nodded slightly and his grin widened.

I accepted the offered teacup and sipped gratefully. Lips puckering, I swallowed with effort. This tea tasted awful compared to palace tea.

Robin burst into laughter at my reaction and Anna joined her with quieter giggles. Even Oak began to chuckle and soon, I was laughing along with them. In that moment, although they were technically laughing at me, I felt like I belonged.

A knock sounded at the door and, without waiting for a response, little Dove burst into the room. "Mommy, the council's here!"