Chapter 30

Iawoke before anyone else. I could see Sorcha sleeping and Esylle had moved, so that she was pressed against her back and had her arm around her. I didn't know how Sorcha would react to that. She was desperate for affection, but she wanted it on her terms. I had to coax her into my arms like a feral kitten so I could hold her while I explained mating in case it scared her, but it didn't take her that long to figure out that she liked it.

Sorcha let me hold her, but I hoped she didn't react badly to Esylle. Esylle was just as much Belisarus's victim as Sorcha was. I had a feeling he took her from her mother and all of us because he thought as a brilliant historian and her grandfather, he could keep her safe and prepare her better than we could.

Something went wrong, and it just kept piling up. My grandfather knew him. He said Belisarus was insanely smart, but a little cold with people. He preferred spending time with dusty books and research. Belisarus was the last person anyone suspected to be carrying on a forbidden affair and they saw an entirely different side of him when he chose banishment rather than giving up his Tark lover.

With everything we were told about babies not making it if we mixed, I would think Belisarus cherished his son and granddaughter as much as he did his wife. We weren't like humans. Banishment was worse than death for us. We needed to be around our tribes. It didn't make sense to me that the Theran who chose banishment over his lover and their child would treat his granddaughter like that, no matter who his granddaughter was.

Especially not that tiny, beautiful girl with the different colored eyes.

She liked the food that I cooked for her. I think everyone with her had just sent her to look for food and trusted her to handle it. That wasn't me. The thing was, it didn't matter what you were or where you lived. Everyone had culture. Even the people on Idric where she was raised had theirs.

She just had this brand new world open up to her when she left her yard and a lot of it was probably traumatizing. I wanted to make it better for her by showing her all the good things about Nestran and exposing her to Farkhi culture.

I bothered to find out what she ate and why. She ate eggs, milk, cheese, and anything that came from animals that they didn't have to die to make. She refused to eat anything she could turn into and that was a lot because she didn't play by the same rules as the rest of us.

In a lot of ways, apparently. We all started out as animals until the Spirus gifted us bodies and the ability to shift. We were still just animals with animal instincts until Essos gave us rational thought. We still had some animal instincts, but we weren't slaves to them.

We could eat what we chose to, but a lot of us had preferences that went along with our animals. The Farkhi had a ton of recipes she could eat, and I thought she would enjoy. I had a perfectly magnificent set of wings, so I flew around looking for some eggs that wouldn't end up birds for her.

I found my eggs and flew back to where everyone was sleeping. I could feel a ton of eyes on me in the bushes. I didn't know if I would have time to wake the five humans to protect Sorcha and Esylle. I didn't even know if they were able to wake up and fight after what they did yesterday.

I didn't think it was humans. They made a lot more noise and everyone was sleeping. They would have attacked. I walked over to the bushes, slowly with my hands up. I finally picked up the scent. The Tarks were here. They could move in water about as fast as a Farkhi could in the air. Neptis and his father, Fluvis, came out of the brush slowly with their hands up.

"Is everyone with you?" I whispered to Neptis, trying not to wake everyone.

Fluvis and Neptis both looked past my shoulder trying to find Sorcha. They looked like all the Tark. They kept their black hair closely cropped and their heavily lidded blue eyes were searching for her.

"Everyone is here. We heard the Vudos flute. We didn't know if it was safe to come. One of your spies told us she was going to Idric, and we didn't think she would be back yet. Why is she calling now?"

"Belisarus is dying and the girl and Esylle got their answers. She summoned everyone with the flute. You are the first to arrive."

"Why did he have her? Can I meet her?" Neptis asked, rubbing his hand over his hair.

"We didn't know this, but he's her grandfather. She's really the Princess Lisana, and he didn't think she would be safe in the palace. I don't know when she will wake up but come out of the bushes and meet her. I'm cooking breakfast."

"We will wait until she is awake and you can let her know we are here. We want to meet her, but we don't trust the humans you have with you," Fluvis said, going back into the bushes.

The Tarks were mostly safe underwater, and that was where they preferred to be. They were probably the most reserved out of all the tribes. The Tarks didn't believe in excess. They may have even been stricter with the rules than the humans living on Idric, but they were also a wonderful, giving people who were fierce underwater.

Neptis was my brother just as much as Oris was. We were educated together with each tribe's historians. We also grew up and played together. Fluvis was more like my dad with Neptis than Terros was with Oris. Terros picked Oris's wife and didn't care that he hated her. Fluvis and my dad told us we knew the rules about what kind of wife we'd be expected to take, and we could choose as long as they approved.

Problem was, none of us had clicked with anyone in our tribes. I hadn't grown up with anyone I felt drawn to as much as Sorcha. Oris just met her, but I could tell he was feeling it, too. I had no doubt Neptis would when he met her once he got over himself and gave himself permission.

Since he seemed to be their leader, I woke the Tall Man up and let him know that the Tarks were hiding in the forest waiting for her to wake up. Leodos wanted to know why they didn't immediately go to her like the rest of the tribes seemed to do. I got it. His family used to study us, and he put a stop to it, but they never had a chance to capture many of the Tarks. They distrusted the humans more than the rest of us. If they saw one, they disappeared deep into the sea.

Esylle woke up as the smell of the eggs and potato cakes I was making wafted in the air, but Sorcha still had not stirred. I saw her check on Sorcha, and I was worried that she hadn't woken.

I was relieved when Sorcha finally sat up with more color in her face than she did yesterday. She stood up, shaking off Esylle's concerned hands. Esylle looked upset, but I knew it wasn't because Sorcha didn't want her touching her this time. She could smell all the Tarks in the forest.

"Why are they hiding?" she asked. "I called for them and no one else from the tribes has hidden from me."

My father tried to give her a brief rundown. The Tarks could live on land or sea. They were a little possessive of the ocean. Humans brought boats in the ocean to travel, import and export goods, or throw nets for food. The Tarks viewed the boats as invading their home and stealing their food.

Most of us who lived further inland had met a stray human who was hungry and looking for food. They didn't care about us as long as we didn't chase the game they were hunting away, and they had to go home with an empty belly. Most of the Tarks hadn't really had an experience like that, but Neptis had when he was playing with Oris and me. My father was trying to explain all that, so she didn't take offense they were avoiding her. I knew they were all desperate to meet her, they were just going to need some convincing they could trust these humans.

Sorcha squared her shoulders, and she was all business now that she had recovered.

"I don't know where all the camps are. I was only told that the route I was taking would not take me near them. Do you know how soon it will take for everyone to get here? We can't stay once they get here."

"Soon, if they traveled through the night when they heard you play. I don't know where we will go that will be safe and can house all of us."

"Inanos," she told him.

My father and I hissed as we made the Farkhi gesture to ward off evil.

"How do you know that word and that place? We don't go there anymore and don't speak of it. I thought he taught you nothing," Volaris said sharply.

Was Sorcha starting to remember who she was? She kept saying Belisarus told her that he gave her a route that should avoid running into the tribes. He was right. This was no-man"s-land. We never came out here because Inanos was in this area. Oris was probably proving a point to his father about his wedding when he ran into her.

"I thought I heard Belisarus call it to me before the white light exploded. I thought I heard him say to go there. I don't know what it means. How would I know that word unless I heard it from him?"

My father was disappointed and trying not to show it. I recognized that look well.

"You can't go there. It's not safe for you."

"Why would he tell me that if it wasn't safe for me? If he took me when I was a baby to protect me, why would he send me somewhere I can be hurt?"

"You died there. You can't go back there. No one goes there anymore."

"I didn't die there. Someone else did. If the tribes haven't been there in so long, maybe the humans don't know about it and it's the only place we will be safe. I'm still upset he never told me who he was to me, but he wouldn't send me somewhere I would be hurt."

Volaris was about to argue with her when Esylle spoke.

"I don't understand why he didn't tell me who she was and just took her, but if he told Lisana to go there, we should go there."

Sorcha's eyes flashed when Esylle called her by her real name. She looked like she was about to say something, then she stood up, looking around alertly.

"They're close. Your father is with them," she told Esylle. "And I'm not used to that name. I should go meet them."

My father caught her arm as she took a step away. "Even if they are friends, you can't keep wandering off and risking yourself. You need to stay with the rest of us where you are safe. When everyone is here, we will discuss Inanos. I still think it's a bad idea."

She didn't argue with him this time. My father was going to have to learn just as much as the other tribe kings. They prayed for her to return. They made their kids pray, too, even if most of us thought she was a myth.

They got the Spirus. She was nineteen, very powerful, and very opinionated for someone who didn't have a lot of experience. Sorcha wasn't going to listen to them. She listened to someone once and found out they lied to her for her entire life.

Sorcha was going to do this her way. She was going to change everything. I'd support all of her decisions, even if it was something as crazy as hiding out in a place as cursed as Inanos.