Shades of Starlight (Hiatus)

Book Two: Chapter Nine

School was as fine as always. I hailed Biana in between each session, making sure she was okay. She said she was fine, which was clearly a lie. But it didn't look like she'd been crying, so at least...

"Cass, you okay?" Sophie asked. I was leaning my back on my locker door, staring into space with my hands at my sides. A tear leaked out of my open eye and streaked down my face silently. Not blinking, I didn't say anything to her. She knew that I wasn't okay.

"Do you want to come over this afternoon?" I sighed, closing my eyes.

"I don't know, I..."

"You can ride Silveny..." Sophie wheedled.

"Fiiiiiiiiiiiine," I gave in. "I'll bring Stormy so I can draw them again." Sophie grinned.

"See you there!" She called and ran off to her next session. I rolled my eyes and headed in the other direction, hiding my excitement.

When I arrived at Havenfield, Grady was giving Verdi her weekly bath. Rude. He should've waited for me to get there before starting! I loved giving Verdi her baths. Glaring playfully, I made my way over to the T. Rex pasture

"Sorry, Cass, I know, I know," Grady said. "You're here before Sophie."

"Am I? I'm sure she'll be here soon. Anyway, I'm only here because Sophie promised I could ride Silveny," I told him. Stormy hopped off of my shoulder and scurried over to Verdi and Grady. I scooped her up before she got covered in dirty dinosaur water. She'd just gotten her bath yesterday, and I did not want to give her another one. Stormy did not like water getting on her poofy tails one bit, and looked like a drowned rat when I was done.

"Sophie! How was your first day?" Grady asked her as she leaped into the pastures.

"I lived." Grady smiled. I laughed, which Sophie looked happy about.

"Was your oh-so-special Elite level Polyglot session really that bad?" I teased.

"All I did was translate what Lady Cadence said-and I was always right, so she kept muttering about how pointless it was to teach me," she grouched. I patted her on the shoulder sympathetically as Stormy enthusiastically sniffed Sophie's ankles.

"There's something you both should probably know about," Grady started. We both turned to him, spotting the serious look on his face.

"The Council is hoping to be able to move up the celebration for Silveny's introduction to the Sanctuary. Significantly."

"How soon?" Sophie asked tentatively.

"Soon. I realize it's going to be a bit challenging for you, Sophie, but I agree with their reasoning. Our world is going to need something happy once the news of Alden's tragedy breaks," Grady continued.

"When are they going to... tell people?" I asked, blinking hard.

"This Saturday." My heart sank. So soon? That was only a few days, how could I prepare? My friends already knew something was wrong, and I wasn't even allowed to tell Keefe yet, even though I desperately wanted to.

"There'll be an announcement sent to all residences in the morning," Grady said quietly. "And the afternoon will have a planting in the Wanderling Woods."

"But Alden isn't dead!" Sophie cried.

"He almost is," I mumbled. "We can't reach him and he can't reach us. He's gone, and that's close enough to dead. People have to mourn him. Then everything moves on." Grady wiped the feathers off of his tunic and put an arm around each of us.

"I know how hard it is, but Cass's right. The Council wants us to treat it like he's passed away and let him go. That's why they want to move Silveny to the Sanctuary on the coming total eclipse." The eclipse... that was close

"The eclipse? The one in three weeks?" Sophie looked freaked out, and she was right. That was way too soon. Not even a month?

"It has to be that night," Grady explained to her. "Every time there's a total eclipse, Orem Vacker, one of the ancient members of the Vacker family, uses his incredible talent as a Flasher to put on a spectacular light show called the Celestial Festival. It's one of our world's grandest traditions, but Alden's loss will surely put a damper on the occasion, and that's the last thing the council needs. They need everyone to feel calm and happy, assured that our world is safe and stable-"

"But it's not!" Sophie burst out. "Our kidnappers are still out there!" I flinched. She was right. And the Council probably wouldn't catch them in the next three weeks. They'd been hitting dead ends on all of their leads.

"The council knows that, Sophie. And they are working on it. But in the meantime, they have to try something else to calm the unrest. Unrest leads to rebellion, and rebellion leads to tragedy." He kicked the ground. Grady had lost his daughter, Jolie, to a fire, and Sophie had told me that Grady thought the Black Swan, the rebel group that made Sophie, had killed Jolie.

"We need to make people feel comfortable again. And what better way to do that than by celebrating the creature that will reset the timeline and the girls who discovered her? Our world needs this, Sophie. More than you realize. I'll do everything I can to help, but we need to make this happen. I know that you can handle this. Now, Cass, you're going to get the flying you were looking forward to. A lot of it."

He was right. Sophie and I took turns riding Silveny all afternoon, teaching her commands like left and right, and posing for drawings in between. Silveny still wouldn't let anyone besides me or Sophie (or Stormy) anywhere near her. But the Council still expected us to whisk into the Sanctuary on Silveny's back, circle the crowd a few times, and then land in the center of the Councillors. And yes, us. I was officially going to be a part of the showcase!