“Then, t-to truly pr-prove my point, I ignited the ent-t-tire village! No one there will sp-peak ill of me again.”

Sinistrina finishes her tale with a triumphant raised fist.

“How… wonderful for you, dear.” Nefaria’s hands clasp a mug of cold tea that hasn’t moved to her lips during Sinistrina’s entire story. “I’m sure the twins are simply in awe.”

This is an overstatement. Tehra and Hari have been counting down the days until they finally got to meet their wicked, shadowborn siblings, and this meeting isn’t exactly what they’d hoped. The venue is fantastic: a greenery-covered stone temple in the middle of the Jungle Region, hidden in shadows and protected by a host of rabid animals, most notably a massive murder of crows. It’s not as comfortable as the castle Terha’s building, but it’s got a lot of character, and the chamber where they all recline is sufficient with its direstone pillars, pitchers of wine, kettles of tea, kegs of rum, and a cauldron of a strange, foul-smelling liquid. The place was well equipped for the first reunion of the void spawn since their discovery of the twins. Hari just wishes his actual siblings were as impressive as the temple. Malevelo’s cool enough, a dark robe shrouding his body, dark eyebrows casting shadows over his gleaming eyes. He’s got a good nose and chin too. Rather villainous, Hari decides.

Sinistrina, however, is trying too hard. Glitzy black jewels adorn so much of her costume she looks like she’s covered in the rocks that dot the Volcanic Region, and she’s teetering on heels at least four inches high. Yes, Hari’s not above wearing elevated shoes himself, but only adding an inch or two, and only until he really reaches his growth spurt. It’s not fair that Terha got hers first, but he’s been told girls can get theirs earlier, so he has faith.

“Anyway,” Nefaria continues after a moment of awkward silence. “Why don’t one of you two share something interesting about yourselves?”

Hari doesn’t know what to make of the young woman dressed in clothing dowdy enough to make her look closer to thirty than her actual nineteen. She’s neatly enough kept—not half as disheveled as Sinistrina—but she has an ugly smile that twists across her face whenever someone mentions causing misery to the world. So she’s not as lame as his other older sister, but she isn’t exactly cool like Mal. She looks more like a nasty politician than a vicious void fiend. Hari almost feels embarrassed at the effort he put into his own look. He’d emphasized so hard how important this first impression would be to Terha and had even convinced her to wear some jet pearls around her throat and wear her glistening black sword at her waist. The one he’d won for her when he’d ransacked Kali’s Isle. The one she rarely used, except for ceremonial purposes. That one.

Anyway. She looked reasonably good—intimidating, even. The first impression had meant more to her than she’d let on, but that sentiment didn’t seem shared by their older sisters.

“Alright,” Terha started, taking a sip from her onyx chalice. “Our first foray into the world of villainy involved burning our hometown. Much of the inhabitants had gathered to witness a foolish display, the lack of talent demonstrated by the village’s youth.”

“By some of the village’s youth,” Hari corrects. “Some of us were quite good.”

“Quite.” Terha takes another sip. “It was simply a ruse, of course, to ensure as many people would be there in person. Our family specifically.”

“Adora specifically specifically.”

Terha’s lips pinch together, probably at the mention of their cursed older sister.

“Of course,” she said. “Those pathetic mortals who refused the sway of Noirela’s allure, its promises of great power in exchange for the honor of raising its children.”

“I underst-stand entirely.” Sinistrina sways back and forth in her cushioned chair, gripping an empty clay pot that had once held three drinks worth of her unpleasant, foaming beverage. “C-c-cannot understand how you t-two managed to wait until you were t-teenagers. Had to d-d-d—” She stops for a moment, shaking her head. “Had to escape much earlier.”

“Blew up the entire homestead, did you not?” Mal asks, his voice maintaining the same polite tone he used with all of the siblings. It’s a little belittling, but he is in his forties, and much older than the rest of them.

“Yup.” She grins and crosses her arms. “Six y...years old. After that, I was raised b-b-by the pack.”

“How wonderful.” Mal almost interrupts her with this, sharp tone implying he’s not interested in hearing about Sinistrina’s pack.

The chamber lapses into an uncomfortable silence again, only punctuated by the sound of flies buzzing and frogs chirping.

“Such a shame that not all of our parents could see the light,” Nefaria says finally. “Or rather, the darkness. Mother and I have started upon a new scheme in the Celestial City. Now that I’ve graduated, I’m going to take on some temporary work at a few locations, gather some intel regarding the Celestial Directors. We’re hoping to land me in a position that will ensure I can sap them of their god-like powers.” Her fingers hover over a silver tray of snacks before landing on a cracker, which she slips into her pocket. The wildlife in the room isn’t quite loud enough to drown out the sound of something animal crunching on the treat.

Hari shudders, and one corner of Terha’s lips twitch up. There’s something just off about Nefaria.

“Talk more about that,” Mal says, sensing, perhaps, that Nefaria might be able to rescue them from the awkwardness that keeps silencing the room. It’s not really the twins’ faults. They’re good at spreading evil and chaos across the islands, which they’ve been rapidly taking over, but they’re still fourteen and learning quite a bit about how to converse appropriately with elders. Hari interrupts a lot and Terha is needlessly cryptic, but by the end of the evening, they’ve all come to understand each other a bit more.

“Write to me,” Nefaria says, a hand on Terha’s shoulder as the twins finally head out the following morning. “I would love to hear about your progress on taking over the Southern Islands Region. I’m so happy to see the two of you are more competent than… Well, let’s just say, Mal and I discovered Sinistra many years after he first reached out to me.”

Hari strains his ears to hear this, a little put out that Nefaria isn’t disclosing this with him. He knows Terha will tell him everything after, but it’s not really fair that Nefaria is playing favorites already.

“I was ten, still so young, but my mother, crow bless her, had already been looking far and wide for the other children of Noirela.” The two continue towards the door, Hari lurking just a few steps behind, pretending to be interested in the archways leading to the temple. “Mal and I, well, we wasted no time jumping directly into various plots but it’s a little hard with a twenty-three-year age gap. He was so excited, the next year, when Noirela’s servants found a sister five years my senior.”

“And it was… Sinistrina.” Both women take a sneaky shot at their older sister, who was hungover and limping towards the broom she’d flown in on. According to her, she’d had it since she was six and refused to update her method of transportation.

“Well, I assure you, Hari and I are far more competent.” Terha’s voice holds a note of mirth, even if it’s probably one only Hari notices.

“Mmm, are you sure?” Nefaria drops her voice, but Hari can still hear her. “He seems a tad… flashy. Not very well restrained. I worry—”

“Perfectly capable, I assure you.” Terha’s voice has not dropped, but Nefaria backs off.

“Wonderful. I trust the island snatching will go well then.” Nefaria’s smile is a disconcerting simper, and she reaches a hand back into her pocket. It looks like she’s grasping for something, but the hand doesn’t reappear. Hari can swear he hears a muffled squeaking noise.

“Hari, come.” Terha holds out her arms as they reach their horses. “I wish to return to the boat in a timely fashion.”

Hari picks up his pace, passing by an almost surprised-looking Nefaria. Her eyebrows are both raised, her lips parted slightly, probably not realizing how close Hari had been to her. But before he can even really say anything, the look passes, changing back to her smirk.

“Farewell, sister, brother,” she calls as they saddle up. “I look forward to our next reunion.”

~~~

Darkos wished he’d had a snack to munch on while listening to Hari’s latest tale. He could just picture fourteen-year-old Hari, a few inches shorter than Terha but trying to make up for it, decked out in some over-the-top pirate costume while dealing with Sinitrina’s antics and Fairy’s mechanizations. Almost made him wish he could have been invited to one of these little shindigs.

“Did you ever go to the Second Mountainous Region?” Darkos asked, casual as a thunderstorm. “Just curious.”

Hari slowly slid a glance at Darkos, who had his hands buried in his pockets, facing straight forward, step not faltering. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh. Just. Ya know. Fought some void spawns up there.” Darkos hadn’t planned out this line of thought very well. He’d just wanted to know if Hari had ever actually been in his hometown.

“Malevo wasn’t killed in the mountains, though.” Hari drew out the sentence. “He was killed in the jungle. Unless you and Geela went through all three cults and destroyed them personally.”

Darkos laughed a bit, a nervous sweat on the back of his neck. He’d have really rather Hari kept asking questions about him and Geela, not about his actual childhood. Made him worry about his family, about Hari finding out too much.

“I mean, yeah, we took out the other two too.” He snuck a glance at Hari. The void spawn’s eyes were narrowed and an eyebrow was inching upwards.

“Darkos.”

“Hmm?”

“Tell me something about where you grew up.” Hari’s lips had pursed in a contemplative look Darkos didn’t like one bit.

“That’s kinda open-ended,” he said. “You sure you don’t want to—”

“Darkos.”

“Yes?”

Hari’s lips finally gave way to a smirk. “You’ve revealed too much, and I had yet to even ask a question!” He tossed his hair back as Darkos’s footsteps grew more sullen. “How did you end up in the Second Mountainous Region?”

Darkos bit his lip, trying to think of how to answer this. Hari had given him quite the verbose response to Darkos's question ‘describe the first time you met the other void spawn.’ Darkos couldn’t just respond to Hari's with ‘oh, my parents moved there,’ or he'd risk Hari ending the game. But if he talked too much about his parents, he'd risk hearing Hari mock them for ages. He wouldn't let it go for the whole rest of the trip. Plus who knows if this could paint a target on them if Hari ever got out of here.

No, he needed another strategy.

“Didn’t Nefaria ever tell you this?” Darkos asked. “I mean, I know she told Mal.”

Hari’s posture stiffened. “Nefaria,” he started, voice crisp, “enjoys being selective about what she shares. It’s a tactic she has employed to great success.”

Darkos nodded. “I’m sure Berta appreciated it. She got quite the meal.”

Hari’s face turned even more bitter. “Darkos, you are really pushing it. But that’s besides the point. I demand to know! How did you, a void spawn, end up in the very shadow of Noirela without it ever noticing?”

“That’s the million coin question,” Darkos said. “I already told you I don’t—”

“Just give me the rundown of how you got there!” Hari’s cape—a new addition to his costume as of today—swished angrily behind him.

Darkos tucked his chin, glaring glumly at the ornate, gossamer cloak. He really didn’t want Hari coming down hard on his parents.

“Well…” he started. “Lotta that happened before I was born. Actually, I was born only a few months before we even arrived in Sunnyville. My parents had taken a bit of a vacation on their way there.”

“Imagine having time for a vacation.” Hari’s voice held a nasty sniff.

“Weren’t you complaining about not going on enough camping trips just a few evenings ago?” Darkos asked. “That was the last one they ever took after joining the cult so I think they deserved it.”

“The life of a mortal is so weary.” Hari sighed, as if envying said life. “Just making your way, scrounging for money, and then dying. How very bittersweet.” Then his eyes snapped back to Darkos. “You’re not off the hook, though. I want to know why they went there. Pilgrims? Searching for a purpose or something meaningless like that?”

Darkos swallowed hard. He could do this. “Fairy told them to go.”

“Fairy?” Hari’s brow furrowed. “Nefaria told your parents to move to Sunnyville? She was, what, ten at the time? Your parents must truly be stupid. Nefaria is wily but she couldn’t possibly be that convincing.”

“Hari, do you want the damn story or not?” Darkos was bristling now. “I didn’t interrupt one minute of your stupid little family reunion story so I’d appreciate the same level of respect here.”

Hari’s lip curled in a sneer but he waved a hand, as if to let Darkos go on.

“Eve Elle, the head of the Realm Studies department told them where to go.” This was where he had to try to focus more of the story on Eve and Fairy than on his parents. “The two of them had probably been working together for some time.” He scowled, as if deep in thought. “Actually, at the time this happened, I bet Mal would have only even known about Nefaria. According to your story, the two of you hadn’t crossed his radar for a few more years and even Sinistrina was AWOL. That must be why she didn’t tell you.”

Hari’s cheeks flushed. “She still should have. Later. Once we’d met. You’re telling me that she knew where the sixth child was—the sixth—and only ever told Malevo?”

“Well, she didn’t know I was the sixth at the time. But…” he stopped for a second, a dramatic pause just long enough to make it look like he hadn’t been mentally prepping this whole statement. “Yeah. I guess she did hide that from you. I mean, I wouldn’t be surprised if she told Terha—”

Darkos stopped then, not because Hari said anything, but because the air suddenly got a lot colder as the void spawn turned to glare down at Darkos. Hari wasn’t even taller than Darkos, yet he managed to glare down on him.

“Never imply that Terha would have held a secret from me.” Hari’s voice was icy in a way that chilled Darkos to his abstract core. “She would never have.”

Darkos swallowed hard, debating what to do here. Could Hari make life worse for him? His brother was about to deliver him to their abyssal parent, so Darkos kinda doubted it.

It was time to cut deep.

“So you knew that, say, Nefaria had been stealing power from Sinistrina?” It was a stretch of his memory, trying to recall exactly the words that had been in the first letter Darkos had ever read containing the twins’ names. “Terha and Mal both knew, but Nefaria didn’t seem to think you did.” He shrugged, trying to look casual even though he was shaking just a little bit under Hari’s gaze. “I suppose if you were really good at keeping secrets, maybe Nefaria just never found out that Terha told you.”

But Darkos was pretty sure that Hari couldn’t keep a secret. Not one like this. Sure, he could hide that he and Terha had swapped places because in doing so, he’d feel like a genius. But hiding from his sister something his other sister was doing? No. He’d find a way to let it slip, which is almost definitely why neither Nefaria nor Terha would have told him.

Right?

“Nefaria was doing what?”

Darkos fist-pumped mentally and a bit physically. “Oh, you know, the whole cosmic block Nefaria had put between Celeste and her followers? I dunno, maybe you just never wondered why the goddess of the sunset and sunrise wasn’t protecting her people.”

Hari’s face shifted through a spectrum of hurt, confusion, pondering, and miffiness as Darkos spoke. It was kinda funny but Darkos also felt kinda bad, the way he usually did whenever Hari learned Terha hadn’t been fully honest with him.

“I have been far too busy trying to pull together ruling a nation to think about what Nefaria was doing with one city,” he finally said, drawing himself upright. “As was Terha, I’m sure. Were this important, she’d have told me.” He was definitely talking more to himself than to Darkos, though. “We’re a team, her and I. She’d have told me. Especially if she knew about you, which makes Nefaria the dirty secret keeper. Not Terha. Never Terha.”

Darkos wasn’t sure about this. Normally he’d have thought, oh, of course, Terha told Hari that Darkos was a void spawn. She wouldn’t have put Hari up against Geela without giving Hari as much information on what he was facing as possible. But Hari hadn’t been the one against Geela. Terha had. And Darkos hadn’t ever met her, but he got the impression that, while caring deeply for her brother, Terha knew his weaknesses. Weaknesses like, say, having slightly loose lips. There could be any number of reasons as to why Terha might not have told Hari.

None of this for sure meant that Terha did know. They hadn’t found any letters between the sisters talking about Darkos, but they also hadn’t found every letter between the two. It didn’t really change anything because both were, hopefully, dead.

All that really mattered was that Hari was upset and rattled. Darkos had thrown him off his rhythm. He’d identified a weak point that he could snipe in with.

As the two turned back to walking, Darkos let a happy smile rest on his face. Look at him, being all sneaky and manipulative. Geela would be proud. He just hoped she’d either catch up with him soon, or he might not be around to tell her about his little schemes.