And so he chipped away at it, one day at a time.
When Anders broke a string on his lyre at dinner, lamenting that he’d have to order replacements from Arboria because the instrument wasn’t commonly used in Pyra, Elliot spoke to one of the locals from Petratec. They had a popular troupe that often visited the Eyrie on festival days, including a band of minstrels, and with some digging Elliot was able to discover a harpist who could sell him extra strings. With Beryk’s approval, Elliot ordered the replacements Anders needed, and they arrived the next day.
Anders was so surprised by the gesture that he’d laughed and gripped Elliot by both shoulders, planting a kiss on each cheek—a popular greeting in Arboria, or so Elliot had been told. He suspected Anders was just affectionate, but Elliot was pleased all the same. Anders played twice as long and sang twice as loud that night… and Elliot worried he’d maybe gone backward in earning his fellow Riders’ affection. Luckily, no one seemed to blame him.
Elliot had managed to use the prospect of Petratec visitors to spread more goodwill—Ronyn’s older sister was one of the singers, and she accompanied the harpist to deliver the strings. Though Ronyn was technically on duty, when Elliot told him his sister would be visiting, he was able to get his patrol shift covered and eat lunch with her. Ronyn wasn’t as easily won over as Anders, but he’d offered Elliot an appraising sort of look when he’d told Ronyn the news, and after he said goodbye to his sister at the village gates, he’d given Elliot an appreciative slap on the back. A small thing, maybe, but Ronyn had reacted as badly as any of them at the news of Elliot’s betrayal, and Elliot knew it would take more than one simple gesture to earn his trust and affection. Still, it was like Sparrow had said: He couldn’t undo his mistakes or fix all the wrongs he’d done, but he could show them he was trying.
After that it was staying late to help Lysandro clean up the training yard and offering to unsaddle Fallon’s and Darius’s mounts when they returned late from a patrol and had to rush to a meeting.
Elliot even helped out the youngsters when he could, watching their lessons in bow or spear and offering an extra hand when needed. No task was beneath him, no job too petty or too insignificant. Before long he found joy not just in repaying his fellow Riders, but in being involved in everything again. He was an outsider, yes, but he wasn’t banished entirely. He was still a part of this world.
While finding ways to help most of his fellow Riders had been fairly easy, Elliot struggled with Latham. They had never been close, never joked and laughed or even sat in easy silence together. Latham had a brash and prickly nature, and when they had talked as apprentices, they’d often bickered. And things had only gotten worse between them since the attack.
Latham had been more distant and irritable than usual, and at first Elliot had thought it was just toward him. And why shouldn’t it be? The attack was Elliot’s fault, and it seemed obvious that they should all blame him. Latham and his phoenix, Xane, hadn’t been harmed during the fighting, but that didn’t mean Elliot didn’t deserve the cold shoulder.
When Elliot noticed Latham’s contemptuous treatment of Veronyka—whose true identity had been revealed soon after the battle—Elliot had assumed Latham’s disdain wasn’t so much for the battle as it was for a pair of liars in their midst.
Elliot had believed this theory true until he’d taken a good look at Xane.
The phoenix reminded him very much of Jaxon in those first few weeks after Elliot’s betrayal was made known. Xane was drooping and listless, his fire not as hot and his feathers not as bright. There was something wilting about him, like a flower dying on its stem.
Elliot didn’t have the right words for it, didn’t know the complex psyche of a creature like a phoenix, even though he was bonded to one. But what he did know was that sadness hit them particularly hard, especially sadness as it related to death. It made sense; phoenixes were immortal if not slain and could resurrect if they chose. For them, death was a distant, unknowable thing, and when they did encounter it… they did not bounce back easily.
Clarity shot through Elliot. There had been so much death and destruction during the attack, and while none of the bonded Riders had died, one of the phoenixes had. Xolanthe—sometimes called Xoe for short.
And unless Elliot was mistaken, Xane was Xolanthe’s son.
It was hard to tell of it was Latham’s bad mood infecting Xane, as it had been for Jax and Elliot, or if it was Xane’s sadness leaking into Latham.
It troubled Elliot. For while he had gotten out of his own spiraling depression—he had Sparrow to thank for that—he didn’t know how to help Latham and Xane. Their problem wasn’t as simple as temporary illness or even as uncertain as Elliot’s punishment and his sister’s whereabouts; their problem was death. Irrevocable, since Xolanthe had burned in the pyre and not come back. Final.
He’d seen the others try to cheer Latham; Anders’s lyre songs had been loud and lewd—usually Latham’s favorites—but nothing seemed to get through to him. Elliot decided to focus his efforts on Xane instead. What could a phoenix want—or need—to move on from the death of another phoenix? Xolanthe might have been Xane’s mother, but Latham had hatched her egg, and mother and son had been separated for all of Xane’s life. Was it possible he mourned Xoe because he never knew her?
It was a long shot, but it was something.
After his duties with Beryk were complete, Elliot journeyed down into the bottom of the Eyrie, where the hatchlings slept. While most of the new phoenixes were old enough to fly, they were still young and vulnerable to things like predators or getting lost out in the wilderness, and so Ersken monitored their flight and kept them inside the Eyrie after dark. They spent their days with their soon-to-be Riders, strengthening their bonds and learning to work and communicate together, and they spent their nights sleeping and eating in a group, much as the adult phoenixes did.
They huddled in little clusters, ten hatchlings in total, varying in age from nearly two months to just over two weeks. Most of them couldn’t yet make their own flames, so Ersken kept braziers burning through the night despite the warm summer weather. There was nothing a phoenix loved so much as heat.
Elliot walked among the fiery pools of light, the rustle of feathers and low, throaty chirps cutting through his echoing footsteps.
He hadn’t seen Sparrow upstairs, either out on the field while Jax flew, or inside the dining hall. He suspected she was down here somewhere, but it was Ersken he sought.
Sparrow, however, found him first.
“What did I tell you?” she whispered vehemently, her spear whipping out of nowhere to stop Elliot in his tracks. Sparrow stepped into the glow of the nearest brazier, which lit the gnarled strands of her hair in shades of red and orange, making her head look like it was on fire.
“I…,” Elliot croaked, oddly chastened by the fierceness of her face and the gleaming point of her spear.
“Told you to let them be when they’re sleeping! Told you they need rest, not—” She faltered suddenly and tilted her head to the side. The one-legged bluebird was with her again, perched on her shoulder and chirruping softly into her ear. Sparrow straightened. “Oh,” she said, lowering her spear and allowing it to hit the ground with a thunk.