Nightsworn | The Whispering Wall #2

Three: A Visit

When Jordan woke, the day was already well underway. The smell of food wafted through the house, creeping under his bedroom door and causing his stomach to pinch. He hadn't had any appetite in the week preceding the robbery, but now it was over he felt the consequences. He probed outward with his senses, using mostly his magic for guidance. Nika was home, but he couldn't find Yddris, which meant his tutor had left for the castle and could return with Grace at any time.

Soft footsteps sounded outside the door. Jordan sat up and made a fruitless attempt at combing his hair with his fingers just as Nika let himself in bearing a tray.

"Oh good, you're awake," the Unspoken said. "I was about to come and get you up."

"They coming back soon?"

"Yddris said he'd be back by midday," Nika replied. He put the tray down in Jordan's lap. "I'm sorry it's so thin on meat, the butchers are charging so much at the moment."

Jordan waved it off, just grateful to see sustenance of any sort. Nika's cooking was much better than Arlen's; if Jordan ever had the misfortune of eating with the assassin, he was usually presented with a nauseatingly thick porridge or a thin, tasteless potato soup. He'd rather go hungry, if he hadn't worried that he'd have his head caved in if he refused. Nika knew his way around herbs and spices well enough to make a good stew out of almost anything. The bowl was gone in a matter of minutes under Nika's vaguely incredulous gaze.

"And here I was getting worried about you being off your food," the man muttered, as Jordan gulped down scorching tea. "You don't look well, though, I have to admit."

"Slept badly," Jordan said. He directed it at his lap so he didn't have to meet Nika's eye. The Unspoken had done a lot for him, and Jordan repaid him by lying.

But it wasn't like he had much of a choice.

"Are you still having nightmares?"

Jordan nodded. That was something he didn't need to lie about. It wasn't the whole truth, but it was the case that Jordan's experience of the Nictavian dark season had left him with regular night terrors, sometimes enough to keep him awake, and other times so vivid that he woke up screaming. No one else seemed to suffer them, which only made it worse; just the soft otherworlder again, the kid who did what he was told and cried about it when he thought no one was looking. He had hoped, after his first meeting with Arlen, that time might harden him to it, but so far it showed no signs of letting up. If anything it was getting worse.

"I suppose you're still going to refuse my help with it."

Jordan set his jaw, tangling his fingers together in his lap and regretting the speed with which he'd eaten as his stomach twisted. Nika had offered many times to brew him some herbs that would help him sleep more deeply, but if Jordan's time with Arlen had given him anything – aside from nightmares – it was a healthy respect for punctuality. If he overslept and arrived late to the dead quarter, Arlen ran him twice as hard.

He also didn't want to be caught spark out if any of the Devils decided to pay a home visit.

"I despair of both of you," Nika muttered as he collected up the tray and left again, and Jordan knew that included Yddris, who consistently landed himself in Nika's bad books.

Despite Grace's imminent arrival, Jordan took his time getting up to avoid any lengthier conversations. It had been a handful of weeks since he had joined the Devils, which was too small a window for his abysmal lying skills to have improved any – and Nika was more sensitive to it than most. Jordan wasn't going to court disaster by putting himself in situations where he might slip up.

He washed in the tin tub in the courtyard. He had to break up a sheet of ice over the surface to reach it – the pump had frozen solid and was no help. He cut his knuckles in the process but barely noticed the sting. Not too far away, a demon cried out. The dark season was lifting, but what passed for daytime was still a dim, cloudy twilight that graced them for a matter of hours. Demons were still abroad in the city at all times, and even as Jordan bent to splash his face a deeper shadow passed overhead – a Marrowhawk, huge birdlike demons that lived on bones. Jordan straightened and watched the dark arrow winging across the sky until it disappeared beyond the roofline. All over his skin, magic pricked and sparked.