Page 102 of Unraveling Fate

19 Sep 2019

No Italy. No Canon. No answers. I don’t know what to plan for anymore.

Anineteen-foot larch pole flipped end over end and landed flat in the field. Polite applause rose from the crowd around Cadenza in the bleachers while a volunteer shoveled dirt into the unexpected hole the Games Commission had found at the side of the athletics field that morning. He patted the grass back over the dirt. Good as new, as if it had never been.

Cadenza wanted to run over and punch him.

Another pole went flying.

“Huh.” Reyna tilted her head at the burly, kilt-clad athletes on the field. “So, throwing telephone poles around is what passed for entertainment?”

“Caber,” Cyrus clarified. “It’s called a caber.”

Cadenza waited, but he didn’t add a joke. Cyrus and Ruairi hadn’t known Canon, but they mourned the lost chance at a new Crown. Even wearing his Pride kilt, with its rainbow colors sewninto the pleats, hadn’t cheered Cyrus, and Ruairi had barely spoken all morning.

She clapped with the crowd as athletes rotated through events on the field, but all she saw was Canon’s face at the club last night, unmasked and vulnerable.

He’s gone.

Ruairi’s words had haunted her all night, even with Taran’s arms around her, and his rhythm washing her soul.

Gone.

She twisted the festival program in her hands. Drostan had explained that some part of Canon lingered in the cave. People had told her the same thing about her father after he died. That part of him was “out there” in some nebulous fashion. What good did “out there” do her? He wasn’there.

Canon’s last words to her stuck in her head like a song.

I’ll never be enough.

How much had she contributed to that belief? When she rejected his proposal, when she thought he’d betrayed them—had she helped fuel the desperation that led him to Thomas and the cave? Or did her actions have nothing to do with it? Perhaps this end had been woven for Canon by the Fates.

Both possibilities made her want to vomit.

The round of caber tossing finished, and they left the bleachers. They’d wandered through the games all morning, unable to leave behind the grim mood of last night. The scent of fried dough and sugar rolled over them as they passed the food trucks, the smell laying heavy and sticky on Cadenza’s skin. Pipe bands marched on the tattoo field, and dancers leaped over swords. She marveled at how they carried on with their day, oblivious to the crushing pain hanging over her group of friends.

The drone of the pipes buzzed along the soles of her feet, mixing with the usual hum of the ground. The music twirled up her legs and into her chest, but she kept it under control.

“At least I’m not blowing things up so much anymore.” She tried to sound encouraged.

Reyna took too long to answer. “Yeah, that’s good, right?”

Ruairi made a non-committal grunt, and Cyrus didn’t speak, leading them into a large canvas tent featuring demonstrations and informational displays on the various regions of Scotland. The tent was bursting at the seams with people. When a group bumped into Ruairi, a low grumble rolled through his chest.

“So sorry,” Reyna apologized on his behalf and smacked his arm. “Behave, dude. They’re just normal humans.”

Cadenza sighed, rubbing the piece of cloth from the oracle in her pocket. Everyone’s nerves were as frayed as the fabric. More threads came loose and tangled around her fingers as she thought it.

She stopped to read a poster on the Shetland Islands. Someone sniggered next to her. A guy in too-tight jeans, an oversized belt buckle, and a red baseball cap had an arm around a woman whose bangs still lived in 1992. He laugh-snorted, pointing to the poster.

“Hey, look. It’sShitland.”

Cadenza rolled her eyes—Tuolumne County strikes again—but Ruairi stepped close behind the man.

“It’sShetland,” he said over the joker’s shoulder.

The man turned and took a swig of his beer. He thrust out his chest belligerently. “Shetland, Shitland. Same difference.”

Cyrus smiled next to his brother, teeth glinting and too pointed to be entirely normal. “Then I suppose it doesn’t matter whether I kick your arse, or I kick your ass.”