“I’m sure Opal won’t be happy to see me,” Hale said drily.
“True. If you weren’t all stiff and haughty and nasty—”
“I wasn’t there to be her friend. I had my orders from the Council.”
“That’s enough, boys.” I glanced around at the buildings. Factories mixed with businesses and homes—typical Sitian hodgepodge. “I’d like to keep as low a profile as possible. Let’s find an inn for the night and visit your in-laws in the morning.”
Leif perked up. “I know the perfect place.”
We stopped at the Second Chance Inn. I gave Leif a questioning look over the name of the place.
“Second-best chef in town works here,” he said.
Figures.
“Who’s the best?” Hale asked.
“Guy named Ian, who owns a tavern called the Pig Pen. We’ll go tomorrow. Wait until you taste his beef stew. After a mouthful, you’ll never be able to eat another’s stew again because the rest will taste like crap in comparison.”
I ignored my brother as I helped the stable lad with the horses. The stalls were clean and the air smelled of fresh hay. Happy that they would be well cared for, I joined Leif and Hale in the inn’s common room. We rented two rooms, one for me and Leif and the other for Hale.
The next morning, we left Hale to make inquiries about the recent prison break from Wirral as we took a circuitous route to Opal’s glass factory.
“It’s a nice place,” Leif said. “She has four kilns on the ground floor and upstairs are the living quarters. Of course, it gets superhot in the warmer seasons, but they don’t seem to mind the heat. I guess it’s because she’d worked in a glass factory almost all her life and he grew up in the Avibian Plains.”
Leif continued to prattle on while I kept an eye out for anyone following us. No visible sign of anyone. When we reached the factory, the outer door was unlocked. Inside a young woman sat behind a desk in a receiving area that had been a storefront at one point in time. “Can I— Oh, Leif. Nice to see you again. Go on back.” She waved us toward a door behind her that said Employees Only. Fancy.
Leif opened the door and the roar of the kilns slammed into me. He pointed to a thick gray foam coating the inside of the door. “Soundproofing.”
Heat pressed on us as we entered. Workers sat at gaffer’s benches, some gathered molten slugs of glass, and another cracked a vase off a blowpipe and into an annealing oven. I smiled, remembering Opal’s lessons on how to blow glass. That knowledge had saved my life and allowed me to leave the fire world.
I didn’t recognize any of the workers, who glanced at us but didn’t stop shaping the glass even when Leif said hello to a few.
A shriek pierced the kilns’ roar. Leif and I grabbed our weapons, but a small girl with blond corkscrew curls dashed from between the equipment. Opal was hot on her adopted daughter’s heels.
“Come on, Reema. You’ll be late for school,” she yelled as Reema hid behind Leif.
“Uncle Leif, protect me!” she cried.
“After you ditched me with an empty pie pan? No way.” He sidestepped, exposing her.
She shrieked again and clutched my legs. “Aunt Yelena, don’t let them take me away, please!” Reema implored with her big blue eyes.
Who could resist that? Not me. I picked her up. Technically, I wasn’t her aunt by blood or marriage, but Opal insisted I was family. And Valek, too.
“Oh, for sand’s sake,” Opal said. “It’s just school, Reema. You’ll be home in time for dinner.”
Reema smoothed her beautiful face into an innocent expression. “We have company. It would be rude of me to leave now.”
What a con artist. I laughed.
Opal frowned. “Don’t encourage her.”
Devlen joined us. “There she is!” Most of his long black hair had escaped a leather tie and his shirt was rumpled. He nodded at us. “Come on.” He took his daughter from my arms.
She shrieked. “No, Daddy, I want to stay and visit.”
“We’ll be in town for a couple days,” I said. “If you go to school, I’ll finish the story about the curious Valmur tonight.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
She pouted, but no longer assaulted our eardrums with that high-pitched squeal. Devlen carried her off.
“Let me down. I wanna walk,” she said.
“So you can run off again? I think not,” Devlen replied in a tired voice.
Opal gestured to her office. “Come in and let’s have a proper hello.”
We entered the room, and the kilns’ noise and heat dulled. More of the gray foam had been sprayed on the glass walls, but a strip had been left clean. Probably so she could see the factory floor.
“I told you she was a scamp,” Leif said, giving Opal a hug.
“And I never disagreed with you. Hello, Yelena.” She hugged me next. “Nice to see you.”
“What? No nice to see me?” Leif plopped into one of the chairs.
“Talk about a scamp,” I said.
Opal laughed. After all of Opal’s troubles, it was wonderful to hear the lighthearted sound and see the spark of amusement in her dark brown eyes. Her golden-brown hair had been pinned up in a knot, but strands hung down in a haphazard fashion.
“I’m sorry we came at a bad time,” I said.
“Oh no. Don’t worry. This is just our morning routine. Reema runs and hides and we search for her, drag her out from whatever hiding spot she’s found and carry her to school. You actually helped by intercepting her.”