Page 42 of Only Hard Problems

A mindscape was the place inside a seer’s mind, heart, and body where their magic resided. Each mindscape was unique to its seer, although mine was a round room with arched doors, pale blue flowers, and jeweled sapphsidian eyes set into the dark stone walls.

I recapped accidentally going to Zane’s library and our heated conversation. When I finished, Kyrion glowered at the hologram of Zane still hovering over the table.

“He’s actually going to follow Holloway’s orders and come after us? Arrogant bastard.” Kyrion spat out the words. “After I told him about you, I thought . . .”

“What?”

Kyrion shrugged his broad shoulders. “That Zane might do the right thing for once in his miserable life. But it looks like I was wrong, and you were right. Your being his sister isn’t going to change anything for him. Still, back at Crownpoint, I almost thought . . .” His voice trailed off, and a contemplative look creased his face.

“What?”

“That Zane was helping us escape.”

“Helpingus?” I barked out a laugh. “You almost cut his blasted leg off!”

Kyrion shrugged again. “I did, but I’ve been thinking about my fight with Zane ever since that night, and something about it just doesn’t add up. If I didn’t know better, I would almost think that . . .”

“What?” I asked in a wary voice.

Kyrion stared down at me. “That Zane let me cut him on purpose. So he would be too wounded to capture us.”

An unexpected bit of hope flared in my stomach, streaking up through my chest like a rocket zipping through the atmosphere, but I swatted it aside before it could crash into my heart.

“No.” I shook my head. “Zane wouldneverdo anything to risk his position as the new head of the Arrows. Especially not something as foolish as helping us escape from Holloway.”

But even as I said the words, a tiny needle of doubt pricked my heart. I wanted to believe it was true. I wanted to believe Zane had helped us, that he had some small concern and consideration for me, that he might actually view me as his sister.

That one day, I might finally have the loving family I’d always wanted.

But once again, I swatted aside that foolish hope. I’d learned my lesson with Nerezza the hard way when she had abandoned me as a child. Just because you were related to someone didn’t make them yourfamily. Nerezza had never cared about me, so why would Zane or the rest of the Zimmers?

“Forget about Zane,” Kyrion said in a gentle voice. “Have you made any progress on the information Asterin sent you?”

Tivona and Leandra had posted all the details of the solstice celebration attack on the private, encrypted group channel that Daichi had set up for us. Asterin had chimed in with her thoughts and shared the schematics for Jorge Rojillo’s new temperature-shielding device, although she hadn’t revealed how she had gotten the information. She also hadn’t revealed how she’d broken into Jorge’s R&D lab or what tech she’d been after, but I didn’t begrudge my friend her secrets.

The stars knew I had enough ugly secrets of my own to worry about right now.

I glanced down at the plastipapers that covered the table. “I was looking at the schematics when I fell asleep. Lord Jorge’s device seems promising, but I’m not sure what the Techwave wants with climate-control technology. Maybe they think it will keep their new hand cannons from overheating.”

“Perhaps,” Kyrion agreed. “Or perhaps they’ve shifted their focus to something else, now that Harkin Ocnus is dead.”

“Or maybe General Ocnus is planning something even worse, now that his son is dead,” I muttered.

Kyrion and I fell silent, contemplating that horrible possibility.

“Well, whatever the Techwave is up to, it can wait until you get some sleep. Why don’t you come back to bed?” Kyrion asked, a husky promise in his voice.

He stepped forward and trailed his fingers down the curve of my spine. Equal parts heat and anticipation spiked through my body at his light touch. “Give me a few minutes to shut everything down.”

Kyrion caressed my spine a moment longer, then left the workshop. I slid my chair back from the table and gathered up the loose plastipapers that featured Jorge Rojillo’s design schematics, as well as some of my own inventions. I tried to put the papers in order, but after a minute, I gave up and just shoved them all off to the side of the table, creating a haphazard pile. Maybe Zane was right. Maybe clutter did run in our family.

Our family.

My gaze skipped back over to the gossipcast that was still playing over the table. Zane continued to smile at the cameras, but my seer magic surged up, and suddenly, I was seeing a second Zane hovering in the air—my brother as he’d been in his library.

Instead of the cocky, composed, arrogant Arrow I was used to dealing with, Zane had been disheveled, exhausted, and almost heartsick, as though the Techwave attack had bothered him far more than he’d let on in front of the gossipcasters.

His raw vulnerability had surprised me.