Page 97 of The Amber Sunburst

She lets go of him without ceremony once they’ve reached the far end of the shelf and squats to search for books.

Okay, he’s probably reading into things.

“What do you think of this one?” she asks, handing Zeno a hefty book with a blue and orange cover.

“Cool,” he says. She’s stacking more in his hands before he can say anything more. They spend a few minutes in comfortable silence, Zeno holding the books she’s picking out, before he says, “It’s good of you to do this.”

He knows Eudoxia. Knows that she is struggling to balance her anger and tremendous love for Arete. Knows that she cares infinitely for Arete, even when she can’t bring herself to speak to her.

Eudoxia sighs. “I don’t know what to do with her,” she finally says. “I can’t be what she needs me to be. That’s why this happened in the first place. I didn’t listen to her. I left her fuming and sad and I’ve always known she’s too smart and…” Eudoxia trails off, covering her mouth with her hand.

“Not everything is your fault, you know,” Zeno says. It comes out a little too fast, from somewhere under his ribs. He can’t bear to hear her putting herself down when all she’s ever done is try and try and try her very best.

“I know…” she starts, but once her eyes meet his, she stops talking. She’s looking at him so intently, and he can’t tell if he wants to shy away or jump in headfirst. He leans his head against the shelf and watches her too.

He opens his mouth to say… well, anything. Maybe I love you, maybe I want you, maybe I wish you saw yourself the way I see you, maybe all of those things.

But in that split second before he has the chance to say a word, she startles out of their staring match and points at a book further down the shelf.

“That one looks good.”

His hand twitches with the urge to gently tip her chin and pull her back so this doesn’t have to end, but the last thing he’d want is to overstep.

“Yeah,” he responds, sounding dejected despite his best efforts not to. It’s just, he feels like something was stolen from him.

But Eudoxia’s been stealing things from him—his reason, his heart, his mind—since they first met, and he’ll let her have it all until there’s nothing left.

25

OPHELIA

Ophelia drops her head onto the floor of Eudoxia’s room with a groan. She hears Arete's little footsteps coming over, then feels her pat her hair

It’s only been two weeks since The Incident, as she’s been calling it, but it didn’t take them long to reconcile. Ophelia knows that she should have drawn it out more, but she really does love that girl. There’s nothing she could do to make Ophelia mad at her for more than a day.

Also, Eudoxia won’t even look at Arete right now, which has made her terribly lonely. It wouldn’t be fair for Ophelia to ignore her too.

Part of her quick forgiveness might also be because she’s been feeling settled since her first trip to the Library. Like she found something she didn’t even know she was missing. It’s probably because she’s finally leaving this wretched place.

“This is your last one, right?” Arete asks, sitting cross-legged next to her on the floor.

“Yes, thank the Forms.”

“Let me see it.” Arete scooches closer to her and scans the notebook in her lap. “In darkest hours you enter through hearts and souls and minds,” Arete begins to read aloud. Ophelia cringes. She’s never been one for writing, but the Mothers will kill her if she doesn’t get these done tonight. “You make a man forget his tongue and leave his life behind. There is no loving once you’re there—no valor, humor, blades. Just the instinct to survive, damn those who cry and cave.”

When Arete doesn’t say anything about the poem Ophelia glares, which makes Arete laugh. “I think it’s good! Just replace the word ‘enter’ with… ‘permeate’. And ‘loving’ in the third sentence with ‘honor’ or something.”

Ophelia looks back at her poem, then to Arete. “Huh. That’s actually not bad,” she says, quickly scratching in the edits with her pen. “Are you really ten years old? Where do you get these words?”

Arete shrugs. “I dunno. Books?” Then she jumps to sit on the bed and asks, “What’s the answer, then?”

Ophelia gasps dramatically. “I mustn’t tell you that, oh young one! What if you tell your sister? We simply cannot have her cheating in the Trials.”

“So it’s for the Trials?” Arete looks ten times more curious now.

“Yes, it’s for the Trials,” Ophelia says, rolling her eyes. “But I can’t tell you anything, really. I’ll get in lots of trouble. And you know what happens to people who get in trouble.” She makes rumbling noises in her throat and takes a big step toward Arete, wiggling her fingers. “The tickle monster comes!”

Arete screams with laughter when Ophelia picks her up from the bed. She loves the sound, even more so since she’s heard its opposite.