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She recognized the way his hands trembled with a need to move. A distraction of thoughts. An outlet. After all, it had only been a year since their father’s departure.
“Perhaps.”
While she had every reason to obsess over revenge and making the triplets suffer, a rippling grief washed over her whenever she attempted to peer into her future beyond a few days. The prospect of pushing forward on the never-ending journey, without the possibility of ever seeing Father again, left her feeling utterly depleted and short of breath.
Finnian grew still beside her.
Naia eyed her little brother from the side as she swirled her ankles in the water.
His solemn expression was impossible for her to ignore. While revenge and vengeance were things that did not interest her, the same could not be said for Finnian.
“You made me a promise,” she reminded him.
“I know,” he said.
A promise Naia felt the constant need to remind him of as the centuries waned on.
In Finnian’s two hundredth year, he met Arran—a demigod who lived in the village and plucked fish from the sky for the kitchens to serve. Because of the soiled blood in his veins, most deities turned their noses up at him.
Arran’s curls sprung in all directions, and he wore a tunic several sizes too big for his lanky figure, but he had a smile that molded the sweetest dimples in his cheeks and a contagious laugh. It made all the sense in the world to Naia he’d caught her younger brother’s eye. For those buried in darkness often sought sprinkles of light.
A day Naia was assigned to scrub the kitchens, she found them joined behind the butcher block.
She let out a squeal. Stumbled over the mopping bucket as she fumbled to give them privacy, whilst stammering apologies.
Later, Finnian found her propped on the bridge railing over the River of Souls.
As he approached, his mouth spread into a grin with a piece of licorice between his teeth. “Sorry, Sister, I assumed Mother would make you clean the fish block outside the kitchens first.”
She rolled her eyes and smacked him hard on the arm. “Do not be coy with me.”
He shook with laughter.
It was pleasant to see a brief glimpse of happiness in him. She could tell Arran meant a great deal to him. And as joyful as she was to see him experience love, it only reminded her of the bleak hollowness residing beneath her bones and blood. A dried yearning to experience such things for herself.
Three weeks later, Naia and Finnian returned from a morning roaming their father’s favorite abandoned cove when they came upon Arran’s mother weeping in the courtyard of the palace grounds.
“Please, I beg for his forgiveness! However he offended you! Please, just give me back my boy!”
Guards escorted out a bin and passed it along to his mother—a lesser deity. Her mournful sobs echoed through the courtyard.
Finnian stormed over to the bin before Naia could grab onto him. He kicked it over and fish guts and severed body parts strung out.
Naia’s stomach heaved at the sight of Arran’s detached head rolling across the cobblestone.
For offending Malik in some juvenile way, their brother had chopped Arran into bits and stuffed the pieces inside a bin with fish remains.
The next morning, Naia sat in the great hall, chewing on her fingernails. Her breakfast untouched on her plate, debating whether or not she should force down Finnian’s bedchamber door to check up on him. He refused to let anyone in.
“A god with sullied blood is not worthy of my art.” Malik sat in his high seat a few down from Naia, cleaning his butchering knife with a dishcloth.
Vex and Astrid cackled at his side, sipping on their chalices of wine, when Finnian stormed through the doors.
With a crazed look in his eyes, he vanished into a shimmering plume of smoke and reappeared in front of the table across from Malik.
Naia quickly stood up with the intention of getting to Finnian before he acted rashly, but something caught hold of her wrist—or someone.
She whipped her head around and the breath perished in her lungs.
