Children Of The Sky (The Scripts Of Neptune, Book 2)

Chapter 44

The next morning brought with it a rainstorm. Ely laid in bed awhile and listened to it, letting his mind be empty and his body be still. It was chilly when he finally got up; he'd left his window open the night before. Shutting it, he paused a minute to watch the drops chase each other down the glass, then dressed for the day and went downstairs. 

Breakfast was already long over, but one of the servants was finishing up in the kitchen and let him have some bread with jam before she ducked out the back door with her shawl over her head. Then he was alone in the quiet and the distant pattering of rain on the roof, chin in his hand, staring out the windows and finding a strange peace in the muted green light they let in. It changed the atmosphere of the room, somehow, made it softer.

His eyes were getting heavy again when Darcy walked in and stopped in the doorway, leaning on the frame and watching him. Neither of them said anything; he eventually broke her gaze and folded his arms on the little round table, resting his cheek on them. Darcy moved, crossing the kitchen and opening the door, then propping it open with a stone. The air that came in was humid and a little warmer than it had been when Ely had gotten up; it smelled of rain and pine and all manner of pleasant things. 

He'd shut his eyes by the time she came and sat across from him, but he opened them when she ran careful fingers through his hair, smoothing the crease between his brows with her thumb. "Hey," she said. "You okay?"

Ely hummed in response and closed his eyes again, smiling a bit when her thumb ran down the bridge of his nose. "I'm all right," he said, quiet and a little rough still from sleep. "Just tired. And enjoying the rain."

"Ah." Her fingers combed through his hair again, once, and then her touch was gone, and he would've been lying if he'd said he wasn't disappointed. "Did you eat anything yet? You missed breakfast by half an hour."

"Yeah." Straightening up with a yawn, Ely scrubbed his face with his fingertips and met her eyes lazily, smirking when she raised an eyebrow. "What?"

Darcy shook her head and looked away, smiling wryly at something. Rising, she went to lean on the doorway leading outside, folding her arms. She was pretty today--she was every day, but today especially so, dressed in a plain green dress, her feathery orange hair pulled back in a knot. Ely knew she knew he was watching, but she didn't bother to acknowledge it in any way.

"My birthday's in a few days," she said mildly, almost absently, and still didn't look at him. "I'll be twenty-one."

Ely thought about that a moment. "You're a year younger than me. Gods, that's weird." He laughed a little and leaned back in his chair. "Before Agnir messed everything up, you were seven years older than me."

"You were thirteen?"

"Barely."

Darcy made a strangled sound and shook her head, knocking her heel back against the doorframe. "That's awful." When Ely didn't say anything, she said, "How did you lot celebrate birthdays, then? I know your mum was Heiquin. Were there any different traditions?"

Oh, gods...that was something he had to think back to remember. Frowning, he leaned forward and set his chin on one hand. "Yeah. My mum used to say...I think the Heiquin don't really have a universal start to the new year, and birthdays are like a personal start to each person's new year. We'd always get haircuts that day, and we'd have these little candles on paper boats that we'd put in the harbor, however many represented how old you were that year. And there was cake."

Darcy's eyebrow went up; the corner of her mouth did, too. "Cake?"

"Yeah. Used to have the recipe memorized, I think."