"no! where were you?" he asked again. his chest was heaving and i could see that he hadn't caught his breath from whatever previous activity he had been doing. "one moment i could feel our bond strong and as annoying as ever. then the next moment it disappeared, vanished. i couldn't feel you anymore." kael's blue eyes searched mine and i could see the worry and panic that he, for once, was unable to hide from me. the swordbrother exterior was gone and replaced by a normal, unsure young man. my eyes softened in response and i reached up to cup his face.

"i'm fine," i tried to reassure him. "hemi found someone to heal me; we entered a shielded chamber deep within the city so she could heal me without being hindered by the mists." i was about to say more but kael still held a death grip on my wrist and in one smooth motion he pulled me into him and wrapped his arms around me and buried his face into my hair.

shocked, i stood absolutely still and felt the wild beating of his heart and the deep breaths he was taking to try and calm down. sure signs i thought caused by suffering the after effects of being out of boundaries of our bond. gently i placed my cheek against his chest and rested my hand against his beating heart, taking in his familiar scent. it was the same scent that had chased away my nightmares at the way station. a wall that i had built up against kael crumbled in that moment and i felt a stirring of attraction. i turned my face up to look along kael's strong jaw and he pulled back to stare deeply into my eyes.

we stood like that for a moment and then kael, realizing what he was doing, stumbled back from me awkwardly. it was one of the few times in which i had known kael that he had appeared ungraceful. i pressed my lips together to try and hide a smile.

this time it was my turn to look over kael. "are you all right? did you suffer this time from the bond?"

kael straightened his shoulders and shook his head at me in the negative. "no, there was no pain. it was worse, far worse. a complete and utter sense of loss and hopelessness overcame me." he stepped back and leaned against the balustrade, grabbing his head in frustration. "i felt as if my world had suddenly come to an end, and that i had failed. the feeling was so intense. i felt as if a giant hole had opened up and swallowed me and all i felt was numbness, nothing. no hope." kael looked up from the ground and i saw fear, true fear deep inside. he looked at me eyes pleading. "it stripped me of all of my swordbrother senses. i'm nothing without my senses. i rushed to the house to look for you but you weren't there. no one knew where you went."

"xiven knew what happened," i answered thoughtfully. "he wasn't injured as much as i was but maybe he went in search of a healer too?"

kael shook his head. "xiven has run away. his room was in shambles and his clothes are missing."

"why would he do that?" i stuttered.

"because he tried to kill you?"

"no, i don't believe that. it was an accident, we were sparring and he got carried away. what i can't figure out was how he was able to access so much power here within the mists." i chewed on my lip to ponder the thought before my eyes opened and i blurted out the information i had found out about fanny and her inventions. kael listened wide-eyed and angry throughout the whole conversation.

"so she thinks she has the name of the man who ordered this machine?" kael started to pace. "how do you know that she is telling the truth? she could be lying to you to throw you off the scent and then escape while we are here discussing this." he turned to me and grabbed my arm, pulling me down the stairs after him. "show me where this house is; i will make her talk. if she knows anything she will tell me." kael was taking the steps two at a time and i stumbled when we reached the street level again. violently, i shook my arm out of his grasp.

"no!" i stood firm feet planted.

"what do you mean, 'no'?" kael turned and looked at me in confusion. "this could be the answer we were looking for in finding tenya!"

"no, not like this." deep down i trusted fanny, she spoke truth. i could tell that when she found out the man had twisted and misused her plans for the invention it hurt her deeply. i wasn't about to punish her more by having kael torture her into telling us information she doesn't know. "i believe her, kael. i trust that she will find out everything she can and help us if she is truly able."

"you are crazy if you think she is going to help you. you can't trust strangers." kael was angry and truthfully i couldn't blame him.

"i trusted you, kael! you were a stranger and you helped me escape the raven's prison. so does that mean i shouldn't have trusted you either?"

kael froze and he looked down at the ground. the wind from the various windmills in skyfell blew his hair wildly in all directions and also blew away his whispered words so that they were barely audible. "no, you shouldn't have."

i turned my back on kael and started to walk up the stairway that led to the jesai's home. spinning once more on kael i shot out, "she saved me. she could have let me die or kept me prisoner deep underground but she didn't. she saved my life. i will give her the benefit of the doubt."

kael looked up from the bottom of the stairway to stare into my green eyes. "i hope you're right, thalia. joss' sister's life depends on it."

a cold chill spread through my bones and a flicker of doubt flooded my body. shaking my head, i pushed all negative emotions and feelings away and found my inner strength. "i know i'm right. fanny will come through."

just then a flurry of activity came from the streets as joss, mona, nero and a large amount of servants came carrying crates of bread, fruits and other odds and ends. we had to move out of the way quickly or be trampled by the caravan of goods.

"joss!" i called out and he turned to me. "what's going on?"

joss grinned his dazzling boyish smile at me. "don't tell me that you've forgotten already?" his carefree manner and the fact that there was a huge bustle of activity told me that he hadn't been home all morning and more than likely didn't know about the fight between me and xiven, or his disappearance.

i opened my mouth to explain what had occurred but joss interrupted me.

"tonight's our engagement celebration!"

chapter 24

i felt as if i had been punched in the stomach. where had the time gone? somewhere deep inside i had secretly hoped to be farther along in our search and possibly had even found his sister by now so that we could drop the whole charade of being engaged and go back to the way things were. but a week had passed and here we were on the day that i had been dreading.

grabbing joss' sleeve i pulled him aside. "joss, are you seriously still thinking of going through with this? we are supposed to be faking so we can find your sister."

the mask of joy fell from joss' face and a sterner, more serious one replaced it. "thalia, we are, don't doubt that. but if you could see what this is doing to my parents you would understand. they need this. they need a moment, no matter how brief, to forget their grief and find happiness. even if it is a lie."

joss' face looked pained and that's when i realized how much of his hurt he was hiding from me, his family, everyone. he was doing it to spare his family pain, by pretending to be the same old carefree joss that they knew and loved.