Staring up at her bare roof, they lay on the bed.

She heard a crow caw from outside her window.

***

It was midnight by the time they had finished talking. They walked out of Bethan’s room to find her three roommates lounging on the couch watching a movie, the screen from the television the only source of light.

They all waved goodbye to Kellan and stared at him as he shut the door behind him.

‘Did he make you feel better?’ Agatha asked. Sweetness laced her voice. Bethan nodded but remained silent.

She sat between Agatha and Circe. Elnora sat on the floor.

‘We heard you crying and asked him to come over,’ Agatha said. She raised a brow in confusion.

She cocked her head to one side. ‘Why?’

‘He just understands you in a way we can’t,’ Agatha told her.

Elnora turned away.

‘I feel like I’m reliving Dana’s death all over again.’

And it was true. Bethan felt that way the first night she came back to the apartment after Dana died. All three of her friends stood around her, hovering, like they were right then.

They embraced her. ‘This time, I’ll remember everything.’

Elnora shuddered.

‘It’s an unsettling thought, Dana’s death; I know it was an accident. I am certain of it. But Lenovik—Lenovik was killed in cold blood. And the murderer is still out there.’

‘They’ll find whoever did it,’ Circe reassured.

‘I hope so,’ Agatha murmured.

They fell asleep together.

The caw of the crow outside echoed in their apartment.

part three:

spring

chapter twenty-one

chapter twenty-one

kellan finch

spring had officially sprung in malia, but the cold winds from the winter lingered in the first weeks of spring.

Two weeks since the funeral, they had a few days left of the leave they took from the search. The fact they went on leave pissed his mother off so much, she threatened him again. He didn’t really care that much; they weren’t going to find it with how Bethan was.

In the meantime, he tried to read anything and everything he could about the Antiphonus.

There wasn’t much. It was useless to continue the search without the Antiphonus.

The Rennigans were a peculiar family, an unsettling one. During his leave, he spent time seeing the sights of Malia. He went to various landmarks, eager to explore, such as Mermaid Harbour and Atlantissa Beach, where he didn’t see any mermaids.

He noticed that the Rennigans owned every important building and urban space. Elnora didn’t flaunt her wealth like he thought she would; he wondered what the point of democracy in Krete was if every public space was owned not by the government but by families like the Rennigans.

The Rennigans’ streams of wealth were not the only thing that concerned him lately. Bethan—

Every time he was alone with his thoughts, Bethan consumed them. Consumed him.