Chapter 190: Do you know what it does

It was long and curved and white as bone, and a bow was taking form in her hand. Its string was a single silver line that gleamed like a razor.

Her other hand drew back. A white arrow appeared between her fingers, and the point of it was aimed at his chest.

Leon did not move.

He told himself that he was not afraid. He had stood in front of ten S-ranks that morning, and had laughed at them.

He had before a man who had split the sky open above his head. He was level twenty, and the strongest person in the world, and a woman with tea on her sleeve could not frighten him.

But he could not take his eyes off the arrow.

There was nothing special about it, if he looked at it with reason, like it was just a plain white arrow. And yet every instinct he had was pressing against the inside of his skull and screaming at him to run.

"Iris..." he said carefully.

"Do not move."

"I am not moving."

"Do not call anything, either. The shield, or your wings, or whatever else you have. I will know." She said it without anger, as if she were telling him where the salt was. "I would rather not find out what happens if you try."

"Where did you..."

"I said do not move."

He closed his mouth. He had been in the middle of a hundred dangerous rooms in the past year, and he knew the difference between a person who was bluffing and one who was not.

Her eyes were red from crying, and her hand was perfectly steady. There was nothing in her face that suggested she had ever been surprised by this weapon, or that she had ever been afraid of it.

She had held it before, he realized. Many times.

He thought of the dozens of evenings he had sat across from her at this same table, eating her bread.

He had watched her hands while she cooked, and washed dishes, and folded laundry. They had been ordinary hands, and he had never once looked at them as though they could be dangerous.

He had been so careful to keep his own secret that he had never thought to wonder about hers.

Iris’s hand was perfectly steady, and her voice, when it came, was quiet and calm and not the voice of the woman who had screamed at him five minutes earlier.

"You are not the only one hiding a secret, Leon."

Leon did not move.

He had been told not to, and for once he found that he had no wish to argue. The white arrow stayed aimed at the center of his chest, and the silver string did not tremble at all.

"Secret," he said slowly.

"Yes."

"You are saying that this is the secret."

"I am saying that you are not the only person in this kitchen who has been lying," Iris said. "Be quiet for a moment. I am thinking."

He closed his mouth. Somewhere behind his eyes, the cold that had started at the back of his neck was spreading down his spine, and he did not understand it.

He had been hit by a falling tower and had walked away laughing. He had been shot at, burned, frozen, and crushed. None of those things had made him feel like this.

It was not pain that he was afraid of. He knew pain, and he knew how much of it he could take. This was something else.

It felt as though he were standing at the edge of a very high place in the dark, and he could not see the bottom, and some old part of him that had no name was shouting that it was a long way down.

’Medusa,’ he said silently.

There was no answer.

’Medusa.’

’I am here.’ Her voice was small and strained, and she sounded like someone speaking from the far end of a long hallway.

He kept his face still. It was harder than he had expected.

’Can... Aegis block that arrow?’ he asked.

’Yeah, it sure can, don’t underestimate the power of Aegis.’ she said, scoffing with pride.

Her voice suddenly turned serious, and she continued.

’But no matter what... don’t let that attack hit you.’

Leon’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t argue with her. He could also sense the danger from that arrow despite not knowing what it was, so he knew something terrible was bound to happen if he allowed it touch him.

"You are talking to something," Iris said, breaking him out of his thoughts.

He blinked. "What?"

"Your eyes went somewhere else. You are talking to something in your head." she said. "Tell it to stay quiet."

"Okay..."

"Good." The arrow did not move. "I do not want anyone to be brave tonight."

"I am not feeling brave."

"That is also good."

For a while neither of them spoke. The kitchen was strangely bright. The white light of the bow had turned the plates on the shelf into little moons, and it made her dark hair look almost silver. Her face was very pale, and there was a faint shine on her cheeks where the tears had dried.

She looked tired. Leon had not noticed that before, because he had spent a week sitting across from her and looking at everything but her face. There were shadows under her eyes. She looked like someone who had been awake for years.

"Do you know what this is?" she asked.

"No."

"Do you know what it does?"

"No."

"Then you should be more frightened than you are," Iris said. "Most people are."

"Most people?"

"The ones who see it." She said it flatly. "There are not many of them."

A cold thread ran through Leon’s stomach. He did not ask what had happened to the others. He suspected that he already knew, and he did not like how little he wanted to hear the answer.