Moonlark Turned Evil

20: Changing World

It had been Keefe who planted the idea of using rubber bullets into her head.

Everyone had gone swimming except for the two of them—she didn't know Keefe's reason, but she had no interest in swimming at 5AM in the morning. She pulled out her gun to polish it. Despite firearms being a human invention, Keefe seemed to know a lot about them.

"My mother was interested in them for a while," he explained. "I studied with her."

He watched her methodically clean her pistol with a cloth. "How do you feel when you kill people with those?" He gestured towards the bullets scattered on the table.

"What makes you think I kill people?" Sophie asked lightly, loading the bullets into her gun.

Keefe gave her a look that was half, I kinda assumed and half You use guns.

Sophie relented. "Fine, yes, I kill people."

"So how do you feel when you kill those people? You're Dame Alina's killer, right?"

She gave him an amused look. "There's literally no way to hide things from you, is there?" She turned the gun over in her hands, resting her finger on the trigger. "I don't really feel anything," she said truthfully.

She aimed and fired at the wall in front of her, bending the wind to stop the bullet in mid-air and then bringing it back to her. The empty cartridge fell to the floor.

"Those are real bullets?" Keefe looked slightly scared.

"How else am I supposed to kill people?"

"Are there any bullets that don't harm people?"

She opened her mouth to call him soft and promptly closed it. "One kind. Rubber bullets. They hurt like crazy when they hit you, but other than that they do no damage. No one really uses them anymore."

"Do you have any?"

Sophie shrugged, snapping her fingers. Three bullets dropped into her outstretched palm. She offered them to Keefe.

He made no move to take them, though he did seem interested.

She teleported them back to her room after letting him take a close look. "What got you so interested?"

Keefe gave her a small smirk. "Foster, Foster, I never reveal my secrets."

"Let me guess: you want me to stop killing people?"

"How'd you know?" he whined.

They both laughed.

"Why don't you use rubber bullets?"

Sophie shrugged again. "I mean, partly because the Neverseen's commander wants me to kill. And mostly because I never gave it a second thought. Everything dies at some point. Does it matter if my target died because of a bullet I fired through their chest?"

"I think that's a cold way to look at things," Keefe said, readying himself for a lengthy argument—which never came, because the door swung open and Biana walked through, soaking wet.

The gun disappeared into the folds of Sophie's skirt as the Vanisher wiped off her sandy feet.

"Ales has started using rubber bullets?"

"Unfortunately."

"I believed Ales would be of more use to me."

"You mean us, Vespera."

"Just a slip of the tongue, Gisela."

The two women stared each other down across the table in the empty senior council room.

"Should we send Fayn?"

"He would be more than suitable. However . . ." Gisela tapped her nails on the table. "I think it might be interesting to see how things play out. We should leave Ales' disposal to the side for now and think of how we can use this situation to our advantage."

"You're referring to the new information."

"Yes. It seems the Elys are finally going to make their move."

Sophie woke up to quiet pandemonium.

She knew something was wrong the instant she opened her eyes. It was the kind of sixth sense you build up when you belong to an organization that could be attacked at any moment. Your brain just whispers, something is very wrong.

And right now, even in the silence, her brain was yelling warnings.

She hurriedly threw on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt.

Biana was on the couch, scrolling on the screen of her Imparter with a desperate look on her face. Dex and Fitz were on either side of her, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever it was she was reading.

"What's wrong?" Sophie asked.

All eyes flew to her.

"Foster finally decides to wake up," Keefe joked, without humor.

She leaned over Biana's shoulder.

. . . mysterious organization currently unnamed. Over one hundred people are still missing, and a death count has yet to be properly tallied. Reports say that the attackers used unfamiliar special abilities that involved chanting and drawing symbols.

Eternalia will be rebuilt as soon as the culprits have been dealt with.

Sophie's eyes widened.

Chanting and symbols . . .

Queen Ilith had finally made her move. And it had been even flashier than expected.

But Eternalia?

It would have been bad enough if it was any elvin city, but she attacked Eternalia?

'I'm sure the next week will be very memorable,' she recalled Gisela saying over the Imparter.

Had she known?

It made Sophie sick to think she hadn't done anything to stop it. A week would have been enough to make some kind of plan. It wasn't her fault, since Gisela hadn't given her the information, but still . . .

Her Imparter, lying on the kitchen counter, rang loudly. She ran over the answer it.

"It's Mr. Forkle," she said, unsurprised.

Answering, she sat on the couch. Everyone crowded around her.

"Miss Foster," Forkle said curtly.

"Mr. Forkle," she returned, equally short.

"It seems you've heard of the attack."

"Was it the Neverseen?" Dex demanded.

"No, it was not the Neverseen," Mr. Forkle answered. "Some research has made it clear that there is another group, called the Elys. It appears they want to participate in our war."

"War?" Fitz asked. "There is no war."

Sophie almost snorted. Yeah right.

Mr. Forkle looked at them gravely. "There is now, Mr. Vacker. As of now, the Council, the Black Swan, the Neverseen, and the Elys are at war."