family.”
The answer, so flat and cruel, stopped me in my tracks.
“Why?”
“Because the world outside your cage is harder than you could ever imagine,” Malachi answered.
“Why am I still following you?”
I shouted.
I wasn’t expecting him to answer, but he did anyway. “Because you’ve never had to do anything for yourself or make a single important decision on your own. Trying to fight me and find your own way home would be too hard.”
“You’re the most arrogant person I have ever met,” I grumbled.
Apparently that was funny. Malachi burst out laughing, so hard he had to stop and lean against a tree. Gasping, he said, “You spend your time with
trainers
and
Brina
and you think
I’m
arrogant?” He shook his head in awe. “Little quetzal, they have been so very careful with you.”
“Lady Brina isn’t arrogant. She’s brilliant,” I retorted. “And I don’t know what a trainer is.”
“Your crush is cute, but your taste is deplorable,” Malachi commented. “Tell me, have you ever seen Lady Brina with blood on her hands? It tends to get in her hair, too, just like paint.” He stayed leaning against the tree, but he was no longer laughing. Instead, his voice was savage. “As for the trainers, well, a trainer’s job is to transform a free soul into a perfectly obedient slave. Taro, for example. They call him the gentleman trainer, because he can be oh-so-polite while he strips an individual of all hope and dignity.He is careful and methodical, which I’m sure is why they assigned him to you.”
“Stop! Just stop it, you
hypocrite
!” I shrieked. “You hate Midnight, and
Mistress
Jeshickah. I know that. You feel guilty about your brother and about whatever you did to save your sister. But that didn’t stop you from flattering Lady Brina when you came to the greenhouse to trade. It didn’t stop you from accepting her hospitality. If Midnight’s so evil, why are you part of it?”
Malachi’s brows lifted with surprise. “The quetzal is growing a spine, is he?”
“Stop that, too. You don’t get to ridicule me. You don’t know me. I just want to go home.”
“And … you expect me to do what about that right now?” he asked lazily. All the energy he had put into his grief and then his anger seemed to have drained away, leaving a tired resignation. He had also evaded my question.
“You said you missed your family,” I said, trying to reason with him. “Taro and Lady Brina are my family. I miss them. Why don’t you understand that?”
“I do understand,” he said quietly. “And I pity you. Come on, little bird. Walk with me a while longer, and then we’ll go our separate ways.”
I walked after him. I disagreed with many things Malachi said, but that didn’t mean following him was worse than freezing to death. Besides, he was taking me to the Azteka. I didn’t intend to stay with them, but it would beinteresting to meet the people I was supposedly related to, whose myths I had heard from Lady Brina and seen in her works.
Unsurprisingly, we didn’t talk much the rest of the way. I didn’t want to hear anything else he might say, and apparently that was fine with him. Sometimes Malachi whistled or sang softly in a language I did not know, but at other times there was nothing but the sounds of the forest and our own footsteps.
It took a long time for me to dare to nibble at the food he had given me. It was as greasy as it looked, though the berries and meat gave it enough texture to be palatable.
A fine drizzle started to fall as the afternoon wore on, which suited my mood just fine. As the snowy brush parted abruptly to reveal a beaten path, Malachi said, “We’re still a fair walk to the market, but I want some privacy for our conversation. Wait here for me.”
I didn’t say anything, but my expression must have spoken for me.
“Or don’t,” Malachi added. “You won’t get far in the time I’m gone. If you go through the woods, you know you’ll
The answer, so flat and cruel, stopped me in my tracks.
“Why?”
“Because the world outside your cage is harder than you could ever imagine,” Malachi answered.
“Why am I still following you?”
I shouted.
I wasn’t expecting him to answer, but he did anyway. “Because you’ve never had to do anything for yourself or make a single important decision on your own. Trying to fight me and find your own way home would be too hard.”
“You’re the most arrogant person I have ever met,” I grumbled.
Apparently that was funny. Malachi burst out laughing, so hard he had to stop and lean against a tree. Gasping, he said, “You spend your time with
trainers
and
Brina
and you think
I’m
arrogant?” He shook his head in awe. “Little quetzal, they have been so very careful with you.”
“Lady Brina isn’t arrogant. She’s brilliant,” I retorted. “And I don’t know what a trainer is.”
“Your crush is cute, but your taste is deplorable,” Malachi commented. “Tell me, have you ever seen Lady Brina with blood on her hands? It tends to get in her hair, too, just like paint.” He stayed leaning against the tree, but he was no longer laughing. Instead, his voice was savage. “As for the trainers, well, a trainer’s job is to transform a free soul into a perfectly obedient slave. Taro, for example. They call him the gentleman trainer, because he can be oh-so-polite while he strips an individual of all hope and dignity.He is careful and methodical, which I’m sure is why they assigned him to you.”
“Stop! Just stop it, you
hypocrite
!” I shrieked. “You hate Midnight, and
Mistress
Jeshickah. I know that. You feel guilty about your brother and about whatever you did to save your sister. But that didn’t stop you from flattering Lady Brina when you came to the greenhouse to trade. It didn’t stop you from accepting her hospitality. If Midnight’s so evil, why are you part of it?”
Malachi’s brows lifted with surprise. “The quetzal is growing a spine, is he?”
“Stop that, too. You don’t get to ridicule me. You don’t know me. I just want to go home.”
“And … you expect me to do what about that right now?” he asked lazily. All the energy he had put into his grief and then his anger seemed to have drained away, leaving a tired resignation. He had also evaded my question.
“You said you missed your family,” I said, trying to reason with him. “Taro and Lady Brina are my family. I miss them. Why don’t you understand that?”
“I do understand,” he said quietly. “And I pity you. Come on, little bird. Walk with me a while longer, and then we’ll go our separate ways.”
I walked after him. I disagreed with many things Malachi said, but that didn’t mean following him was worse than freezing to death. Besides, he was taking me to the Azteka. I didn’t intend to stay with them, but it would beinteresting to meet the people I was supposedly related to, whose myths I had heard from Lady Brina and seen in her works.
Unsurprisingly, we didn’t talk much the rest of the way. I didn’t want to hear anything else he might say, and apparently that was fine with him. Sometimes Malachi whistled or sang softly in a language I did not know, but at other times there was nothing but the sounds of the forest and our own footsteps.
It took a long time for me to dare to nibble at the food he had given me. It was as greasy as it looked, though the berries and meat gave it enough texture to be palatable.
A fine drizzle started to fall as the afternoon wore on, which suited my mood just fine. As the snowy brush parted abruptly to reveal a beaten path, Malachi said, “We’re still a fair walk to the market, but I want some privacy for our conversation. Wait here for me.”
I didn’t say anything, but my expression must have spoken for me.
“Or don’t,” Malachi added. “You won’t get far in the time I’m gone. If you go through the woods, you know you’ll
Similar Books
