Children with Stars in their Veins (Chapter 14.1)

a/n: hey, thanks for checking out Starry Veins! This is the novel I wrote for Round V of LMS, and it's still a first draft! While I don't discourage any feedback, I prefer not to receive feedback on grammar! I'm not polishing this draft up yet, so I'm not as concerned about editing. I am, of course, open to all feedback, but I ask that you keep this in consideration! Thanks <3

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[Ember]

Ember stared out the window and into the clear blue sky, bright and brilliant under the glare of the sun. If they didn’t have to worry about being caught, it probably would have been a lovely day to bring Cassius’ new dragonling out.

She wished he’d name her already. He’d been deliberating for two days now, and they couldn’t refer to her as anything besides “dragonling”, and that was only in hushed voices. They needed to call her something else.

“You’ve been quiet all morning,” Mum said. She pulled a comb gently through Ember’s damp hair, and it snagged on one of her feathery curls. “What’s got you so deep in thought?”

She couldn’t tell them what was really on her mind, so she thought of something else that had been chewing away at her. “Why’re the heirs of Glacier’s Keep and Summermount not truebloods? What happened?”

The comb, wide-toothed and delicate under her mum’s careful hand, grabbed one of her curls and yanked it in her scalp. She yelped and swatted it away with a scowl.

“Ow!”

“Sorry, I’m sorry.” Mum ran her fingers through the offended locks. When Ember glanced towards the mirror, she saw Mum frowning down her hand. “Where’d you hear such a silly thing anyway?”

She set her shoulders and clacked her teeth together, scowling. Cassius wouldn’t have lied about what he’d overheard at the Council meeting. “I’m too old for you to try lying to me anymore,” she said.

Mum gave one of her curls a tug and met her gaze in the mirror sternly. “Watch those accusations, young lady.”

“Yeah, yeah. But I know it’s true, Margaretta said so.” Mum didn’t need to know that she hadn’t heard Margaretta say so, or that Cassius wasn’t supposed to have heard. Margaretta had enough authority to convince her mum that it was all right for her to know.

Instead of a tired resignation, her mum stilled. Then she twisted a chunk of her deep auburn hair and swung the long strands over her shoulder. “Margaretta told you that?”

Before she could say so—there was no harm in agreeing, right? —the door to the main room swung open. She saw Mama’s short, dark hair swinging around her shoulders before she met her equally dark gaze.

Mama beamed when she saw them. “My two favourite girls!” she greeted, voice warm and honeylike. “Is Em’s hair cooperating today?”

She leapt from her chair before Mum could put the comb back into her hair, and ran over to Mama. She threw her arms around her waist. Mama laughed, warm and homely, and hugged her back.

“Mama,” she said, pulling away. “What happened to the trueblooded heirs of Glacier’s Keep and Summermount? Mum won’t tell me.”

“Ember,” Mum said, voice firm.

Mama’s expression had immediately folded, and her brows curled together. “Where did you hear that?”

“She says that Margaretta told her,” Mum said, in a tone that heavily implied she believed this was untrue. “Ember, honey, don’t you have a history lesson with Cassius?” she asked, voice light and careful.

If she was trying to be subtle about diverting the subject, she failed spectacularly. There’s a story. They know what happened. And now they were trying to keep it from her.

“Now I know you’re hiding something from me, and I won’t go to my history lesson until you tell me why! I know you know what happened, and you know why!”

Mama ran a hand through her drying curls and sighed. “It’s a complicated story, Ems. A complicated story for another day,” she said, in her patient, Teacher Mama voice. A flicker of anger sparked in Ember’s chest. “You need to attend your history lessons, they’re important. I promise you, once you are older, we’ll tell you everything. I’ll answer any question you want to know. Once you’re a little older.”

She wasn’t a small child! She crossed her arms over her chest, scowling. “That’s what Brother Gabriel said about sex, but if he really didn’t want me to find out, he should’ve made sure the books weren’t in Cassius’ reach!”

Mum’s mouth parted. “Eugenia!”

“Whatever!” she shouted, trying to drown out the drone of her own frustration. “I’ll find out anyway, even if you don’t tell me! I always do anyway!”

She ducked past Mama and went right for the door.

“Where are you going?” Mama called behind her as she wretched open the handle.

She did not look back over her shoulder. “To my history lesson!” she replied, with absolutely no intention of going to her history lesson. She shut the door behind her and took off down the hall with a heat in her chest and an itch across her skin like the prickle of parched grass.

As fun as passing notes back and forth with Cassius and trying to throw bits of paper into Marita’s copper mug across the room was, she wanted to be somewhere else.

Her parents were rarely patronising and didn’t keep things from her like this. Would it have been so hard to explain why Margaretta knew about the missing trueblood heirs? She didn’t even care so much about distant rulers as she did that her parents were lying, or at least, concealing the truth from her.

But did that mean she had been wrong to brush off Ori’s concerns so quickly? Yes. It meant something wasn’t right.

She slipped through the halls and ducked into dark corners as scholars passed through the halls. Everyone knew her well enough to know she was supposed to be in her lesson right now. Once she was free of the citadel, she’d be fine.

As she got all the way to the front hall and slipped out the door, she ran straight into Ashael. He reached out to catch her before she fell, and she grunted at the motion.

Ashael’s hair was dusty and he was wearing training gear. He squinted down at her. “Aren’t you supposed to be in a lesson?”

“No.” She scowled, and hoped it was scary enough that Ashael would let her go.

He did, but didn’t move to leave her alone. “You are. Did you and Cassius get into a fight?”

She tried to duck past him, and he caught her arm gently. “Let me go,” she hissed. “I’m busy.”

“Very,” he agreed. “Are you all right, Ember?” Then, softening, he said, “I’ll let you go, just tell me that you’ll be all right.”

He was honest. He wouldn’t lie or tempt her into a false sense of trust. It was smart of Isa to choose someone like him. She sighed. “Yeah, all right, I’ll be fine. I’m going to the village. To Lady Sylvania’s. I want to ask her something.”

Ashael let her go and offered her a smile. “I’m sure Cassius will understand.”

She let some of the anger through her nose. It was warm out, but her breath still fogged the air just enough to be visible. It was like letting out a puff of steam. “Thanks, Ash,” she said, and then hurried down the marble steps before someone else could spot her to drag her back to her lesson.

As she came into the village, she broke into a run, full of pent-up energy and frustration. If Mishal was here, he’d bring her out to train so she could think about her sore muscles instead. Maybe he’d take her side. Would Margaretta tell him? Probably. He was older.

word count:

1,245