A Sparrow Stole My Place as Heir novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: Thessaly's Hour

At first light, my father brought Thessaly to the Dawn gate himself.

He did it in front of every lesser god who came to watch the sun rise, and there were more of them than I had ever seen.

She walked behind him with her hair down and her hands empty.

Last night she had gone to him on her knees and told him all of it.

He had not slept, and it showed in his beard.

"My son," he said to me, in a voice that carried to the back of the crowd. "Your sister has told me what the nine did to you, in a life I cannot remember. I cannot undo it. I will not judge it."

He stopped, and his mouth worked.

"I should have judged a good deal earlier," he said. "She is yours to answer for."

I had the Atlas open under my arm.

I had thought about this moment for two weeks, and I had thought it would feel like winning.

Thessaly lifted her head.

"I locked the door," she said.

Her voice was thin, but it reached the gate.

"I locked it, and I told the others you needed to cool. I stood by while Father gave your mother's cradle and key to a bird because he sang like her."

"You did," I said.

"You never cried for her." Her chin shook. "That is what I told myself the whole time. Thirteen years of you walking past her rooms and I never saw you cry."

"I cried every night for a year," I said. "I did it in the Well of Hours, where no one would come. You never once looked for me there."

The crowd was silent.

She stared at me, and I watched it land on her.

"Then it was my fault that I didn't know," she whispered.

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