Oberon's Children by Hal Emerson

Author:Hal Emerson [Emerson, Hal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Coming of Age, Fairies, fantasy, Fiction, magic, Orphans
Amazon: B00MOY6BQ2
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve: Iron and Fire

It started with Tristan, as I should have known it would.

None of us knew how long we’d been in the Bower, though Brandel and Gwenel’s best guess at that point put us close to three years. Three years undergoing the same routine over and over again, having the same rules drilled into us by constant repetition.

Three years – and in all of that time Tristan and I had never been friends, not even close. Most of the others either adored him or feared him – and even he and Faolan had established an uneasy truce. But neither he nor I had any interest in even attempting the everyday niceties the others used with each other. That spark I’d seen when he’d returned from his punishment for running away, that promise, that small remnant of the contemptuous rebel he’d been – it only flared up when he looked at me. And if it was anything like the instinctive rush of anger I felt when I so much as heard his voice, I understood it all too well.

I never forgave him for putting us all at risk.

He never forgave me for trying to make him stay.

I can’t have been the only one who saw through him, saw through him to his core and understood who he was, but I knew for certain I was the only one who really cared. At least one of the others must have known as well – maybe Pinur Fe, who treated us all with the same kind of directionless amiability that covered up those eyes that saw too much – that understood too much about all of us.

But maybe not. Maybe I really was the only one who knew he was rotten through and through, the only one who saw the way his smile never touched his eyes when he was beaming at Igrin or Celin or any of the others. The only one who saw his true smile, the one that he tried to hide when the others were beaten or punished and he got to watch.

The one I hated because I understood it.

It started getting worse as that third year began. Darkness began to follow him like a cloud, a sense of menace like a physical force, and every move he made, every word he uttered, felt wrong, felt dangerous. He remained, as ever, the cruel leader of the others, but even they seemed to sense his turning nature, and soon only Igrin kept to his side during meals and at work. She still smiled and bounced her beautiful golden locks, but I knew that her demeanor was forced from the way her shoulders rose when Tristan turned toward her, his black hair covering his eyes.

His laugh became biting – like the feel of cold wind scraping against your cheeks. When one of us was hurt or chastised by the Ilyn, he started watching openly, not even trying to hide his eagerness. He would grin as the punishment occurred, or

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