Chapter Text
As Mira Sorrengail bent over and tried to reach the last hazelnut that had just fallen under her bed with her hand, she realized how out of control her life had become. Her fingertips touched the hard shell, but in doing so, she pushed it a few millimeters further out of reach. Mira groaned in frustration and fixed her angry gaze on the nut, which didn’t seem to care.
Suddenly, however, her eyes caught sight of something black in the background, barely visible on the dark floorboards, lying at the edge of the wall. Mira lifted her head again and dropped to her knees beside the bed to stretch out her arm towards it. After some effort, she finally pulled out her discovery and stared at a notebook covered in a thick layer of dust. She wiped the soft leather with a tissue from her bedside table and threw the tissue into the wastebasket next to her desk before sitting back on her bed and curiously flipping open the first page.
Mira froze when she saw a neatly written name that was far too familiar to her.
Drake Cordella.
A loud knock made her flinch. Hastily, she shoved the book under her pillow. Her heart raced. Mira didn’t have time to wonder why she treated it like a dirty secret, because a frustrated Violet, followed by a serious Brennan, was already entering her room.
With a loud sigh, Violet sat down beside Mira on the bed. She snuggled up to her while massaging her own temple with one hand, as if something was giving her a headache.
“Tough day?” asked Mira sympathetically.
“Hard week,” Violet corrected. “Working at the Assembly is hell.”
“Sometimes it can be exhausting,” Brennan confirmed. He pulled the chair from the desk to the bed to sit down as well.
Her siblings had made it a habit to regularly stop by Mira’s during breaks in their meetings to let off steam, while Mira’s body was still busy processing her captivity by the Venin and her near-death. Both were more deeply embedded in her bones than she’d ever thought possible. In the first week, she’d been confined to her bed. Now, at least, she was already taking walks outside, but she still felt far from being able to soar back into the sky with Teine.
“Sometimes that’s an understatement. How are we ever supposed to win this war if we’re constantly fighting each other?” Violet replied in frustration, deep worry lines furrowing her forehead. But what really weighed on her soul remained unspoken between them in the room: How am I ever supposed to save Xaden like this?
Before anyone could respond, Violet shifted the subject with a glance at Mira: “How was your day?”
“I was just in battle with a nut,” Mira explained with feigned seriousness, then she remembered that she’d completely forgotten about it because of the notebook under her pillow. Mira made a face. “The nut won.”
Violet narrowed her eyes. “You really need to get out of this room.”
Mira looked at Brennan with a raised brow who returned her gaze unimpressed. She was currently experiencing a very unfamiliar kind of hell. She was being taken care of. Yesterday, she’d dared to set foot in the sparring room again. When Brennan discovered her there, they clashed so fiercely that Mira had to take a long nap afterwards, exhausted from their argument. No, she was anything but ready to fly with Teine again.
Violet immediately understood the silent exchange of communication between them. Her eyes slid to Brennan. “She needs to get out of this room.”
Defiantly, Brennan crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in his chair. “She’s not a prisoner,” he declared, almost offended. “Of course she can go wherever she wants. I’ll gladly carry her back up the stairs to her room.”
“That was only once, days ago, and only because I’d a cramp in my foot,” Mira protested. “If you’d given me a few minutes, I would’ve managed it all by myself.”
“You went swimming,” Brennan shouted angrily. “Apart from the fact that it’s still far too cold for that, do you know how dangerous it would be if you got a cramp in the water?”
Violet sighed loudly beside them. “Weren’t we just talking about how there’s always arguing in the Assembly? Why do you also have to put me through this all the time?”
Mira and Brennan remained silent for Violet’s sake because their sister was already struggling enough with Xaden’s transformation and her new role as Duchess of Tyrrendor, but they cast each other deadly glances.
A quarter of an hour and further discussion about Mira’s planned combat training later, Violet and Brennan had returned to their meeting, and Mira was faced with the difficult choice of either reaching for the untouched edition of Dragon-Long-Neck on her bedside table or invading Drake Cordella’s privacy. Since Violet unfortunately had terrible taste in books and Mira was naturally far too curious, she had to choose the latter.
Mira’s heart raced unusually fast as she opened Drake’s notebook again. He must have stayed in this room at Riorson House for several days as well. She pictured him writing down his thoughts in the same bed, between the dim mage lights, and still didn’t quite know how the fact that he kept a diary fit into her previous image of him. Although it really shouldn’t have surprised her, since he’d already written Venin, A Compendium.
No sooner had Mira turned the page with his name than she paused again, surprised. She didn’t know what she’d expected – perhaps notes for another compendium or situation reports from the front – but certainly not to be staring at a detailed and surprisingly well-done pencil drawing of a young woman with two braids and a friendly smile. Above it was another text:
Maddie Gordon – Loved the sea, poems and sweets
605 AU – July 634 AU
Mira swallowed hard as she fully grasped the significance of what she’d just held in her hands. Guilt overcame her because the content was definitely not meant for her eyes – yet she couldn’t resist and turned a page with trembling fingers.
On the next page, there was no drawing and name, but words whose ink was unusually firmly written on the paper. It looked as if Drake had written them by hand and without the aid of lesser magic.
Every day people die, and yet you never get used to it. In the morning, you sit together and laugh, and by evening, another place is empty forever. When everyone has to leave you, at some point you start to feel forgotten by death. Why do you feel that way when you actually want to live?
Mira didn’t notice the tears in her eyes until one ran down her cheek. She’d to close the book again because the guilt became too overwhelming, and suddenly she felt terribly connected to this annoying man.
At the end of the day, they probably all share the same fate.
*
Toward evening, after some stretching exercises in the sparring hall, Mira returned to her room and, exhausted but content, fell into her bed after a long bath. Her gaze automatically drifted to Drake’s notebook, which lay on top of Violet’s edition of Dragon-Long-Neck on her bedside table. Once again, curiosity burned in her fingers, even though she wasn’t sure if she could bear what she might see inside.
Mira reached for it once more. Malek must have reserved a particularly horrible place for her with him.
Drake’s next note was once again brief, though it was far easier to read than his reflections on the deaths of his comrades. He described how imposing the Esben Mountains looked when illuminated by the rising sun, and how it felt to finally be able to take the skies again with Sovadunn after an injury.
Beneath it there was a small pencil drawing of that mighty mountain landscape, which, unlike the drawing of Maddie Gordon, had been made with much more haste, as if he’d had less time here.
Painful longing seized Mira, and Teine’s words gently entered her mind: “Give yourself a few more days.”
“I miss you,” Mira replied softly.
“I miss you too, protector,” Teine whispered back.
Mira turned the page and came across two more names and portraits: one of a man with dark hair and crooked glasses on his nose, and another of a woman with a slightly too stern look.
Marc Sinclair – the funniest of us all
600 AU – August 634 AU
Tess Green – Hard shell, but the heartiest laugh
601 AU – August 634 AU
Underneath was another note: Hopefully you’ll finally get together at Malek’s.
A knock tore Mira’s eyes away from the book. Violet entered, but this time Mira wasn’t quick enough to slip the notebook under her pillow.
When Violet caught her at it, she tilted her head in surprise. “When did you start writing a diary?”
“Just started,” Mira replied hastily and shrugged her shoulders. “I have a lot of time at the moment.”
Violet’s eyes narrowed. “You’re a bad liar.”
Mira sighed, and it was probably the guilt in her chest that made her confess. “All right, it’s not really mine.”
Now Violet’s eyes widened in surprise, and she set down beside her. “Isn’t stealing diaries actually my hobby? Whose is it?”
“It’s still your hobby,” Mira sighed, rolling her eyes in disapproval. “It was under the bed.” She pulled the little book back out from beneath the pillow, and as she held it under Violet’s nose, she wondered inwardly how much worse her standing with Malek would become now that she was laying bare Drake’s soul even before Violet.
With a curious sparkle in her eyes, the kind Violet always showed when faced with a forbidden book, she took it from her. As she read the name on the first page, her eyes widened in astonishment. “No!” she exclaimed breathlessly, a mischievous excitement flashing across her face. She was definitely a strong contender for one of the worst places in Malek’s realm as well.
Mira watched Violet leaf through the notebook. There was something frighteningly comforting in the fact that it was now Violet who held the book in her hands, while Mira only peered over her shoulder, as if in doing so she could pass the guilt of her transgression on to her little sister.
They went through Drake’s past months page by page, reading his occasional notes on the days, when Violet suddenly came across something that brought a flush of heat to Mira’s cheeks.
Together, they stared in amazement at the drawing of the side profile of a naked woman in front of a waterfall.
Violet drew in a sharp breath, then her eyes flew to Mira. “That’s you,” she gasped.
Mira’s cheeks burned even hotter. A laugh escaped her throat, and to her annoyance she realized it sounded nervous, while she tried to ignore the strangely familiar feeling in her chest as she looked at the drawing. “That’s nonsense. It could be practically any woman – you can’t even really see her face.”
“Her hair is just as shoulder-length as yours.”
Mira frowned skeptically. “That’s not an argument.”
Thoughtfully, she looked at the drawing again and suddenly felt the urge to hide the woman’s body from Violet’s eyes out of shame. It had to be acknowledged as one of the most beautiful images in his book. Drake had created it with the same love of detail as the portraits of the deceased, yet unlike those, this drawing filled the entire page.
“March 635 AU is written there,” Violet replied. “That’s you. We know this waterfall and you bathed there.”
“We’ve all bathed there.”
“But I don’t see any drawings from us here.” Violet was already peeking a few pages ahead. “Only of you,” she replied, raising a brow. A crooked grin flickered across her face. “Looks like he’s been watching you. I can’t decide whether I should find that creepy or just be impressed by his talent.”
Mira pressed her lips together in disapproval. She could no longer contradict Violet, and she still had no idea how to sort out the feelings this drawing stirred in her. At least the fact that Drake had shamelessly spied on her while she was bathing eased her guilt somewhat for having stuck her nose into his private notebook.
“Turn the page,” Mira urged Violet, wanting to finally put this unpleasant topic behind her.
They both had to pause on the next page as well, but now because they came across a familiar name with a familiar face.
Trager Karis – Thanks to you, Cat laughed and loved again
612 AU – March 635 AU
Violet’s finger ran reverently over the pencil drawing of Trager. “That was so crap,” she whispered.
“Yes,” Mira confirmed quietly, and though she felt terrible about the memories of that day in Zehyllna, an involuntary smile flickered across her lips when, a page later, they discovered a sleeping kitten she could unmistakably identify as Broccoli.
Shortly after that, the entries in Drake’s notebook came to an end, which was probably around the time he lost it here. Violet stretched with a yawn after setting the book on the bedside table.
“That was a special bedtime reading,” she said. “Sad, but also ... refreshing.”
Once again, that broad grin spread across Violet’s lips as she rose from Mira’s bed and walked to the door. “I like him,” she declared before pressing down the latch. “Not that it matters. But I thought you should know.”
Mira suppressed the impulse to throw her pillow in Violet’s face because in the end she’d be the one to suffer when she’d have to pick it up from the floor again. “That doesn’t change the fact that I don’t like him,” she said coolly.
Violet shrugged her shoulders. “Too bad,” she said, but left her room with a wink.
Sullenly, Mira stared at the notebook after a few minutes of indecision before reaching for it again and searching the page that supposedly held her nude drawing by the waterfall. When she finally found it, that familiar feeling of recognition seized her once more.
Violet had been right. That she was the subject of the drawing was an undeniable fact. However, there was no point in looking for a reason. As she now knew, Drake was an artist, and this scene was merely a captured moment of something that had evidently pleased his eye. And who could blame him? She’d seen pure desire reflected in many faces at the sight of her naked body.
Mira deliberately tried to ignore that every page in Drake’s book seemed to hold special significance for him.
*
Days passed, and Mira gradually traded her time in bed for the sparring room again. It was towards evening, and as she stood in the kitchen with Violet and Brennan after the coffee, and Mira was about to leave to train again when she suddenly bumped into something hard and cold in the doorway. She stumbled back, but before she could fall, someone caught her by the waist.
“Hey, I’m not used to such warm welcomes from you,” a familiar voice murmured above her.
Mira stared at a broad chest in brown flight leathers with two crossed daggers. Puzzled, she looked up and met an amused smile and hazel eyes. Involuntarily, she wondered if those pretty green speckles had always been there.
His hair was tousled and rain-soaked. Mira’s eyes followed as heavy drops broke free, landing on the skin of his neck and leaving a damp trail behind. And then, when she finally realized that it was none other than Drake Cordella holding her in his arms and giving her that cheeky smile, a wave of heat – and … panic? – washed over Mira. Suddenly, she could think of nothing else but the drawing in his book.
It was only when Drake raised his brow in confusion and opened his mouth to say something again that Mira realized she was staring at him like a frightened deer.
She, Mira Sorrengail, never stared like a frightened deer.
Mira quickly freed herself from his arm around her waist, and since Drake was standing in the open doorway, she did the smartest thing she could at that moment: she fled through the first door she could find into an adjoining room – closely followed by Violet. Mira grabbed her wrist urgently and pulled her inside, closing it behind them. Only seconds later, the door flew open again, and Brennan squeezed into the small room as well.
“The Sorrengails have always been strange,” Cat’s voice came to them from outside.
Mira loudly slammed the door shut again.
“Why are we standing in the pantry?” Brennan asked, frowning.
“Because Drake saw Mira naked,” Violet explained simply.
Mira cast a sharp look at her, and Brennan looked as if he suddenly regretted his presence.
“We don’t know if he saw me naked,” Mira protested. “Besides, many men have already seen me naked.”
“And yet here we are, staring at pickled beans,” Violet replied impassively.
Mira massaged her temples. “That was so embarrassing,” she said unhappily. She, Mira Sorrengail, never ran away like a frightened deer either. “Since when am I so embarrassing?”
Violet opened her mouth.
“That was a rhetorical question. I’m not expecting an answer,” Mira interrupted her with narrowed eyes before she could say anything. “What’s he doing here?”
Violet shrugged her shoulders unhelpfully, then looked at Brennan. Mira also looked at Brennan.
Brennan swallowed at the stern looks from his sisters. “After all, his cousin has been through a dangerous battle,” he tried to explain. “So maybe he just wanted to be a good person?”
Mira looked at him as if he’d just grown dandruff. “He’s nerve-racking. Good people don’t get on your nerves.” She pushed past him and pressed her ear against the door. “It’s quiet outside. Do you think they’ve already left?“
“I hope so, because my nose is starting to itch.” Violet wiped a thick layer of dust off one of the many preserving jars with her finger and made a face. “We really need to clean up here.”
“You go out there now and get those two out of our way,” Mira demanded of Brennan.
“You’re sacrificing me?” he asked, thunderstruck.
Unimpressed, Mira and Violet stared at him.
“Okay, okay.” Brennan raised his hands in a calming gesture and pulled a dissatisfied face. “I got it.”
He opened the door a crack and peeked into the kitchen, then looked back over his shoulder at them. “They’ve gone.”
Relieved, Mira exhaled and tried to ignore the wild beating of her heart. For now, she decided, she would look for a hole to crawl into.