Page 24 of The Amber Sunburst

But now Eudoxia’s most vivid memory of her mother is her gravestone, and the last time she saw her mama, she was nodding silently, acknowledging that they would never see each other again.

Eudoxia hasn’t been a little bird for a long time.

6

ZENO

Zeno’s not sure how many hundreds of times he’s stood in front of this door since he was twelve years old, but he can recreate it with his eyes closed.

Dark wood with two tiny marble columns carved into the wall on each side of it. An ornate knocker, but no handle—like all of the high-security offices, the door can only be opened with the tenant’s ring.

The plaque on the door reads: Councilman Seventeen, Bios.

Zeno has been waiting here for several minutes now. Not because he’s afraid to talk to the Councilman in general—he does that all the time. More because he’s afraid of what the Councilman will say tonight.

What he’s implied already will be solidified and Zeno just can’t… he can’t let that happen.

He’s ready to wait indefinitely, desperate to avoid the confrontation that’s bound to happen—and by confrontation, he means him crying and Bios comforting him—but Bios somehow knows that he’s here because the door buzzes lightly and swings open unprompted.

“Hey, Zeno,” Bios says from his usual spot on the plush green couch in the center of his office.

“Hi, Dad,” Zeno replies, collapsing into a stack of pillows next to one of his many bookshelves. It’s only here, entirely shut away from everyone else, that Zeno can call Bios what he is: Dad.

“I’m sorry, kiddo,” Bios says, dropping next to him on the floor. “I didn’t want this to happen, I promise you. But I didn’t have a choice.”

“Okay.” He does not try very hard to hide the dejection in his voice. It’s uncharacteristically underhanded, but he isn’t really feeling like himself at the moment.

“Really, Zeno. I had no control over this.”

“It’s fine. If you say it’s not your fault, I’m sure it’s not your fault,” he mumbles.

Because he just doesn’t get it! His father holds one of the highest seats in the government. He has the power to ensure Zeno keeps his living situation the way it is. So why? Why take it from him when he knows how important it is to Zeno that it stays the same?

“The Educator came to my office today,” Bios explains, and Zeno shoots upright.

“What?”

“Lykos. The Educator. He came to my office. And he said he’s… concerned. That I’m favoring an Auxiliary. One that he knows I know is my son.”

Roommate versus no roommate versus… whatever pales in comparison to all the horrible possibilities in store for him and his father. Suspension? Branding? Exile?

Death?

“He said,” Bios continues, “that we are both valuable members of the community, and he doesn’t want to bring the hammer down. He told me if I take away all of your special privileges, even the ones you earned yourself, pair you up with a new recruit he tasked me with fetching, and stay away, he won’t feel the need to enact any… punishment.”

“You really think he’s not going to do anything else? Make you do anything else?”

“He also had me rescind all of my requests for Academy-sanctioned aid in the lower Arcs. And my request for an investigation into DNA encoding and unethical procedures in the field of experimental science within the Academy.”

“So he blackmailed you.”

Bios lets out a weak chuckle. “Yes, I suppose he did. Though I’m sure he’d prefer the Councilmen to call his negotiation techniques ‘polite requests.’”

“Oh.”

“You’re not the only one to suffer here, but I’m sorry you have to at all.”

“It’s okay.”