Page 100 of Unraveling Fate

“Do what?” he asked. “Use understatement to break the tension in the room? Once you’ve done it you have to wait a wee bit before doing it again. Rules of comedic timing, you understand.”

She grabbed his arm, not waiting to explain. The penny whistle returned, jaunty and bouncing. She let go. It stopped. Arm, music. No arm, no music.

Three people.Threepeople?

Taran. Reyna. Cyrus. Cadenza narrowed her eyes.

“Ruairi, give me your hand.” She seized his fingers before he could respond. Bagpipes blasted her.

She laughed. Was that what it was? Guardians made music? That had to be it. And Taran, for her, made the most.

Everyone looked at her.

“It’s the stress of it all,” Cyrus stage whispered to Reyna. Taran smacked him.

Cadenza’s eyes fell on Drostan, and she saw a gap in her theory. “Drostan, why can’t I hear you?”

Taran cocked an eyebrow. “He wasn’t speaking.”

Drostan dropped his eyes and returned to his armchair, fiddling with a fingernail.

“No. Why can’t I hear you? I never heard music from people. Until I came here.” She stood, facing Taran. “I heard you first and I hear you the strongest. I don’t have to touch you to hear you. I can hear you across the room, and the longer I know you the farther away I can hear you.”

“You heard me first?” He tilted his head at her, a smile growing.

Cyrus interrupted again with more commentary to Reyna. “That’s so romantic!”

Ruairi smacked him this time.

“What do I sound like?” Taran asked.

“You sound like drums. Deep ones.” She laid her palm on his cheek, bathing in his ocean. “But also bodhran.”

He laughed. “I suppose that’s appropriate.”

“Reyna, you sound like these light strings, a little like a zither. Cyrus, you’re penny whistle. Ruairi, bagpipes.” She pointed at each of them. “The only people I’ve ever heard music from are all Guardians.”

Ruairi shrugged as if this weren’t a surprise. “Spinners can always hear Guardians.”

“They can?” Taran asked. “No one ever told me.”

“We have our origin in the music, and Spinners hear that, so Spinners hear us,” Cyrus said. “Sorry little brother, there haven’t been any for so long. Mum always used it when you were a bairn to find you if you were getting into mischief—so quite often. She probably never said anything because she didn’t want you to figure out how to hide from her.”

Cadenza’s mouth dropped. It was possible for a Guardian tohidetheir song? She turned back to Drostan, who was still not looking at her. Not a gap in her theory. A deliberate omission.

“Drostan,” she asked again, voice tremulous. “Why can’t I hear you?”

Drostan heaved a sigh and dropped his face in his hands. “Because I didn’t let you hear me, Caddie.” His words fell heavy and reluctant in the space between them.

“You ‘didn’t let me’? What reason could you have for ‘not letting me’ hear your music if you didn’t know what I was until the lightning shield with Taran?Thismonth?”

Drostan’s reaction in the kitchen that night hit her with new meaning.I never meant for you to get dragged into this.

He lifted his head, tears glimmering in his eyes. “Try to understand, lass.”

“You knew!” she gasped. “All that time, Ilaria made me think I was insane, and you knew the whole time. You could’vehelpedme!” Her breath came fast and shallow, like her ribs were caught in a vise. She rubbed at her face, and the cloth from the oracle, still clutched in her fist, scratched her cheek.

Oracle. What a joke.This ratty strip of fabric was no answer. The Fates were playing her, dragging her down a pre-ordained path with no regard for what she wanted. Just like they’d played Taran, leaving him stuck with this curse. Suddenly she saw it allfrom Drostan’s eyes. Of course he didn’t want her in this world. But she’d needed help. Ignoring what she was hadn’t made it go away. It hadn’t convinced the Fates to stop swinging her around like a ragdoll.