Frostbite

Chapter Thirty

Kea's words sent a jolt through Eira. He knew her true name. She supposed he must have put two and two together and worked out the missing Frost was in fact the Frost who had revealed herself to him two nights ago. She had wondered if he would, been scared that he would. She could only hope he would prove trustworthy with the knowledge of her identity. "How?" she asked, though she knew she hadn't been particularly thorough in hiding herself, and there was no use in trying to deny it.

Kea slid his eyes to his half drunk tea, avoiding meeting her eyes. "It wasn't as if it was very difficult. I had all the pieces, so it was only a matter of putting them into place."

Eira didn't say a word. She just listened, on-edge.

"I suspected something from the beginning. It was hard not to, honestly. You were never especially subtle," he continued. "I didn't think you were a Frost at first, but I could tell that there was something off. You always looked over your shoulder, as if you were being followed, you know. That and I couldn't work out just why our leader was so interested in you. It was only that night with those two drunks that began to suspect you as a Frost. With what you did, and how they reacted, it seemed apparent to me that you'd scared them with your abilities. That's how people always act when they're faced with one—they shrink back, they run, or sometimes even fall to their knees in submission. I've seen it many times firsthand. So when that happened with you, it made me curious. I wanted to know exactly what had happened. So I acted on it and tracked them down while you met with our leader. They were spouting a stream of nonsense, as you would expect, but I did manage one coherent word out of them: Frost. They were convinced you were going to hunt them down and kill them for it. And when they realised what I was doing, they started fighting back. Then they broke a couple of my ribs before I could get back at them. I let them be—scared out of their minds—as I was satisfied with the answers I got."

Eira had thought he'd suspected something that night, but had disregarded it. Perhaps she'd been foolish to do so. She felt a little sheepish at how easily he'd figured her out. "And how did you figure out my identity from that?"

"I'm just getting to that part," he replied, drinking from his teacup. "You're an impatient listener."

"Considering it's about me, I'd rather know the outcome as soon as possible."

He sighed deeply, but resumed: "The next night, when we were on that failure of a mission, I thought I would mention some things about Frosts in passing to see how you would react. I thought, at best, I'd get a look of recognition. I didn't except you to react like you did, how quickly you defended Frosts who abandoned their posts and especially what happened when I mentioned that Frost who ran away, Gwen Haley. I knew, from that, that you two were probably close enough for it to scar. I began to get an idea of who you were from that. But that wasn't what made me sure. It was two days later, on the day of that headline. When I read it out to you, the guilt was written all over your face. It was guilt I'd seen before— of having killed."

Eira swallowed. She should have known. Should have known how obvious she'd acted. But there had been so much on her mind that she hadn't focused on keeping her cover intact.

"And that night, when the scouts came back, you looked at Morgan like you'd just met with a ghost. I had had my suspicions about her as well, but I hadn't been sure if I was right. But then I heard you say: Gwen. It was quiet, barely audible, but I was still close enough to catch it. Luckily for you, I don't think anyone else was. Anyway, after that night, I got as many newspapers as I could from the last few weeks, reading over every article about Eira Lowry. I looked at the sketches they had, inaccurate though they may have been, I could see the resemblance. I knew then, for sure, who you were. For my own curiosity, I went to the library and checked up your family records. Your mother's name—that's what you've been going by."