The Return to Irithara (Children of the Sun Book 2)

“So you knew about all of this stuff and you never told me?” Nira asked her father, folding her arms over her chest.

It was the next day, and he already looked much better. He was still much too thin, but at least he didn’t look like he had nothing to live for anymore. He smiled more often, and he carried himself a little differently. As if a huge weight had left his shoulders.

Nira doubted it was her presence that had done this, though, at least not only that. No doubt it had something to do with whatever arrangement he’d had with Irif. Nira already had a few ideas as to what that entailed, but she’d been too afraid to ask.

They were sitting in the huge garden behind the palace, drinking tea of all things. The garden was just like she remembered it—since flowers bloomed only during the summer it usually consisted of many types of pine trees. Still, it was very nice to look at, even if most of the garden was just green. It was even unusually warm outside today, so as long as they sat in direct sunlight, they didn’t even need coats.

Nira had kept hers on anyway, though. She’d been given new clothes almost immediately—a pair of ridiculously comfortable jeans, a really fluffy sweater, leather boots, and a black coat. The coat was very similar to the one she’d worn during her first month back in Irithara, but this one was much warmer. It was clear that every single one of these items cost more than what an average Iritharian made in a month, but Nira couldn’t really bring herself to care about that.

What she did care about, though, was that by wearing these clothes, she’d distanced herself from Enoria a little more once again.

“I only learned about the Eternals a year or so before you went to Enoria,” Nira’s father replied, drinking his tea. Nira had a sneaking suspicion there was something other than tea in his cup with how at ease and talkative he suddenly was, but she didn’t say anything. It was good seeing her father content. And, like many Iritharians, he’d always enjoyed drinking, especially mead, so if he really had put some in his tea, it wouldn’t surprise her. “And how could I tell you, anyway? What would I say?”

Nira looked down at her cup of tea. He was right, of course, what had he been supposed to say? ‘By the way, your mother is actually this homicidal entity from before the dawn of civilization, love you’?

“And besides, what would me telling you give you? It would just make your life more difficult.”

“How come?” Nira asked, her eyebrows forming a frown. Her father blinked at her in confusion, as if he had no idea what Nira didn’t understand.

“Don’t you ever look at the people around you and wonder if there is more to them than meets the eye?”

Nira stared at him, suddenly feeling very disturbed because, no, she hadn’t thought of that before. “No, but now I sure will.”

Her father grimaced guiltily. “Sorry, Nira, I didn’t mean to—”

“No, no, it’s fine,” she quickly stopped him, brushing a hand through her hair and sighing. Irif had said that there weren’t many Eternals left in Irithara, which wasn’t surprising. According to their mythology, Relioth had murdered quite a lot of them, so she doubted she’d meet some randomly on the streets. However, the same couldn’t be said for Enoria.

“I’m so sorry you got mixed up in this mess,” he suddenly said, his shoulders slumping. “When I found out just why your mother changed so much one day, I just…I couldn’t let you suffer the same fate.”

So her father had wanted to get Nira out of the country even before Kaleth had shown up? That was news to her. Nira had assumed it had been Kaleth’s idea to begin with. Nira decided to leave that for later, though. There was another bit of information in what her father had just said that surprised her much more. “Wait, so Irif hasn’t always been my mother?”

He smiled sadly. “No, she took control of Sidaira after your grandma died. The day Sid became queen.”

If Nira remembered correctly that had happened when she was six or so. Sudden dull pain assaulted her heart when she realized that those few years were the only ones she’d been around her actual mother and not Irif, and Nira could barely remember anything.

Nira’s sadness quickly turned into anger. She’d more or less accepted that Irif was her mother, but finding out that it hadn’t always been this way made it so much worse. Irif had taken her real mother away from her and pretended to be her for years.

What had happened to her mother? What happened to someone possessed by an Eternal?

“Maybe we can figure out how to force Irif out of Mom,” Nira said as she tried to come up with something. Maybe Yorin knew something that would help. Her anger lessened when she remembered him. She had asked about him, but no one wanted to tell her what was happening to him. They wouldn’t let her find him, either, so she’d resigned herself to waiting. It didn’t make her feel less guilty for causing this, though.

Her father smiled at her once again, but this time it was a teary, defeated smile instead of a simple sad one. He blinked the tears away and shook his head.

“Irif told me…she told me the moment an Eternal makes someone their host, the host’s consciousness dies. So your mother is….”

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Nira said, putting down her teacup with more force than necessary. She’d half expected it to break, but thankfully it didn’t. “She could have been lying.”

“I don’t think so,” he replied, sighing sadly. “I can usually tell by now.”

Nira bit her lip. He sounded pretty certain, but she’d still ask Yorin at least. Once he recovered, of course. Gods, all of this was so messed up.

“Did you…like it in Enoria?”

Nira blinked at the random question, but she decided to humor her father. He most likely just didn’t want to talk about Irif or his wife, which was fair.

“Yeah. It was really nice.” She paused for a minute, not really sure what to say exactly. Thinking about Enoria only made her miss it more, but there was no avoiding it if her father wanted to know about it. “I mean, the summers were horrible, but otherwise, there’s just this atmosphere….”

“Freedom?” her father suggested when Nira struggled to find a word to describe it.

“Yeah, freedom.” Which was ridiculous. The actual free countries were west, in Artex. Enoria was conservative, racist, and xenophobic. But compared to Irithara where people sometimes disappeared just for criticizing the government, freedom was everywhere.

“I wanted to go there with you, you know,” her father said, smiling softly. What Nira wouldn’t give for him to smile happily during this conversation for once. “That was the original plan. Kaleth was supposed to get both of us to Enoria, and we would start a new life there, protected by the Enorian government.”

Nira frowned. Kaleth hadn’t mentioned any of this to her when he’d told her about how she’d gotten to the Federation. “What happened?”

“Irif noticed something was up, so I stayed behind to distract her while you left the country.” He heaved a heavy sigh. “I’m just glad that at least you liked it there, even if I couldn’t help you settle into your new life.”

Nira smiled fondly at that. “I probably would have had some problems with getting used to Enoria, but I got some help with that almost as soon as I started going to college.”

Her father smiled with a hint of teeth, happiness finally sparkling in his eye. “Did you meet someone there?”

Nira blushed slightly. “Yeah. His name’s Nef. He’s a genius. And a complete idiot.” As she said this, even though she was still smiling, terrible sadness gnawed at her heart. She couldn’t help it, she just missed Nef so much. And she couldn’t even try to call him. Even though she was quite sure there were many phones around that she could use, she was too afraid to call him—Irif could have her people trace it.

Nira wasn’t sure what Irif would gain by figuring out where Nef was, but knowing him, he was probably still very much involved in this Eternal mess.

“I used to know someone a bit like that,” her father said softly, looking very nostalgic. Nira wondered what that was about because that didn’t sound like her mother. “You miss him, don’t you?”

Nira nodded, sighing.

“Then why don’t you go back to Enoria? I’m sure there is a way to cross the border safely. You’ve already told Irif everything you wanted—”

“She said that your arrangement is on hold as long as I stay here, so I can’t leave,” Nira said firmly, scowling at her father for suggesting this. How could she leave him to this fate a second time? How could he want her to do this?

“Sweetheart—”

“No, I won’t be selfish this time. What is this arrangement exactly? It’s why you don’t have an eye, isn’t it?” Nira had only then realized she’d gotten up and was now gripping the edges of the table tightly. Her father was looking down, clearly not in the mood to talk about this, but Nira didn’t care at the moment.

“Yes….” He paused for a few seconds, looking just as defeated as he had yesterday. “As long as I let her take her anger out on me, she won’t go to Enoria to find you and bring you back here. That’s the arrangement.”

Nira just stood there, staring down at him because she wasn’t sure what to say. She’d thought her father had done an incredible thing for her by getting her to Enoria, but this? How much was he willing to sacrifice for her?

She didn’t deserve a father this great and selfless.

“Sweetheart, please, listen to me,” he said, and suddenly Nira felt incredibly tired. She slumped in her chair as he continued. “It’s been years. I’m used to it by now. It’s not that bad. In fact, I think Irif is getting tired of me. You can be happy in Enoria, away from this war.”

Nira let out a humorless laugh. “I can’t be happy when I know what’s gonna happen to you if I leave. And there’s no escaping this war. It will come to Enoria, sooner or later.”

“You don’t know that.”

“You’re right, I don’t. But I do know that if I go back, you’re coming with me.”

Her father stared at her with his mouth opened slightly, clearly surprised by how serious she was being. “Nira…. That might not be possible. Irif can find us easily, I’m sure.”

“Well, then I’m staying here. I’m not leaving you here again. I can’t.”

She couldn’t look at him at this point. She kept staring into her now cold tea.

“Okay, sweetie,” he muttered, sounding very relieved even though he was clearly trying to hide it. So he’d been pretending the entire time? That only made the situation worse. At least he was safe as long as she stayed here, which only made her more sure of her decision.

They sat in silence for a bit, neither of them knowing how to break it. Just as Nira was about to try to start the conversation up again, though, Irif’s voice spoke in her mind. And by the look on his face, her father could hear it too.

As per our agreement, I let Yorin live. He’s in one of the nice cells with a view. I’m sure Hidarion knows where those are.

Nira looked at her father with a concerned frown. Had Irif locked him up at some point? Actually, that wouldn’t be that shocking nor terrible, so it was completely possible. Still, Nira couldn’t think about this now. She had to go see how Yorin was doing.

“Do you want to go see him immediately?” her father asked, already getting up as Nira nodded. “Okay, follow me.”

He didn’t seem very enthusiastic, but that was to be expected. He probably felt bad about arresting Yorin as well.

They walked through the many corridors of the palace, heading farther and farther down until they reached the dungeon.

Nira tried to ignore her discomfort at being here. Thankfully, it was dark enough that she could pretend there was no one in the cells as they passed them. She only focused on walking as fast as possible as she followed her father. Her new boots made a little too much noise on the stone floor for her liking, but she did her best to ignore that too, as well as the eyes of the prison guards around them.

Finally, once they reached the end of the corridor, there was a relatively spacious cell with a very small window, but a window nonetheless, which meant that Nira could see the full extent of Yorin’s injuries.

One of his eyes was swollen shut, his whole face was covered in bruises, one of his legs was clearly broken, and his whole chest was wrapped up in bandages. Had they been breaking his ribs?

A wave of nausea hit Nira when she noticed Yorin’s right hand. It was wrapped up as well, but it was still clear he was missing two fingers. Oh, gods, she was going to be sick.

“Nira?” he croaked, looking up at her, his open eye brimming with tears. “I’m…I’m so sorry. I told her.”

Nira exchanged a look with her father, who seemed very uncomfortable, but unsurprised.

She swallowed, blinking back tears. “What did you tell her?” she asked gently.

“I….” Yorin looked down at his cuffed hands. “I told her how to make your people into Eternals.”