Page 4

Chapter 4

Thevin

How do you tell your best friend she’s the center of so much death and destruction? Probably not like I did.

“ Fuck , I shouldn’t have started there.”

“ Can we go?” she muttered, pulling the blanket tighter over her shoulders.

Her body shook from the summer chill or the news I’d just clumsily dropped—either way, I wanted so badly to pull her into my lap and wrap my arms around her.

“ Sure ,” I said instead.

I stood and held my hands out to her. She took them and pulled herself up while Boros stretched, waiting for her command.

“ My room,” she started. “ Will you stay and talk to me there? My mother doesn’t want me to be alone, and now… I guess I know why.”

By the Baron , she didn’t know anything at all. She didn’t know what we’d face outside of this protected forest. She didn’t know about the monsters, the decimation. She didn’t know how my chest hurt from the idea that I’d get to stay with her tonight and just be near.

I helped her onto the back of Boros and jumped up myself. He turned his head to glare me, but followed Sae’s order to get back to the Fortress anyway.

I held her close to my chest, both of our heads bent low to avoid the downpour of summer rain. In the fifteen minutes it took to get back to the looming black towers, I planned out what I’d tell her. I’d need to be methodical. I’d need to let her in slowly—two things I happened to be good at.

Boros stopped at the steps that lead to the kitchens, and I hopped off before helping Sae . She ruffled his ears, telling him he could go back to the den. He swiveled his enormous head toward me.

“ He still doesn’t like me,” I said grudgingly, offering my hand, palm up for him to sniff.

He did so and huffed loudly, nudging his head at Saelyn’s side.

“ You probably smell too different. You smell like,”—she gestured to the green shield of light protecting Felgren —“out there.”

I nodded, knowing what she didn’t, but soon would.

Boros raised his head and howled. His call was answered by several lumens in the depths of the trees. He gave her one last nudge and ran off under the darkening sky.

I inched open the door to the kitchens to glance inside. I saw the cook speaking to Pompeii while several kitchen maids ran in and out with trays of food.

I closed the door again and grimaced. “ They must have moved the party into the Fortress . Pompeii is there. I’m guessing you don’t want to see him?”

She tilted her head back to the sky, her hood falling in the movement as she put her hands on her hips and sighed in a loud groan. Then , catching my eye with hers, she raised a brow. “ Blend ?”

“ Blend ,” I repeated.

She pulled her cloak from her shoulders and placed the tips of her fingers on my cheek.

Her touch was ice I wanted to melt. I wanted to take her hand and wrap it in my own, protecting her from…everything.

She paused, holding back her spell, giving me a smirk. “ Dissemulen , ” she mumbled, and I felt the same blur around me she’d projected before. We had used this spell countless times to get us out of the Fortress undetected. She’d also used it to get us back in before we were caught. She had explained it to me as a spell of non-detection. Unless we were being actively looked for, no one would really notice us. We’d blend into the bustle of the Fortress with ease.

My mouth ticked up as she used the spell on herself. Her body blurred like a faint smear of paint, but her face had always been clear to me each time. Sharper , if anything.

I pulled the door open again—just enough so that we could both slip inside. The trick was to act like you belonged. I hadn’t even the smallest lick of magic, but I had cunning. Doing what I did with my parents, it was a necessary skill. I picked up a tray of bite-sized squares of Sae’s favorite cake and headed toward the door which led to the dining room. I glanced behind me as Sae grabbed a pitcher of wine, following me out of the kitchens undetected.

Party guests littered the dining hall. They mingled and laughed, completely unaware that the daughter of the Baron slid past their smiles and chatter. We entered the foyer to find it had been made into a dance floor. Dozens of people who had come from all over Arcaynen moved around the open room in twirls of elegant gowns and quick feet.

I checked on Sae behind me as I headed towards her room. I could see her face clearly in the crowd as she moved through it in a swift gait. She kept her eyes down as much as possible, even though the party guests wouldn’t look her way unless they were looking for her.

I turned left at the Baron’s study and into the corridor that led to a few rooms on the first floor. One of them was Baron Karus’s room where Sae sometimes slept next to her mother. Another at the very end of the branching hall was the room my parents shared with me when we visited. It was a bit cramped, but we were used to occupying the same space on our assignments, so just having a roof over our heads was enough for the three of us. At least in the Fortress , I got to sleep on a couch instead of the hard ground. Every other room in the Fortress was co-habited with channelers or conduits, and because I was neither, I didn’t get my own space.

Sae moved ahead of me in the quiet hall, standing before her door and whispering, “ Redisyn mi domen .”

Saelyn was a talented channeler. Even I knew that.

She’d never been allowed to train with the others, but she’d done what she could for herself anyway. I’d always loved that about her. She had explained the spells she created like this: since she could derive magic from Felgren , she could shape it herself. She could combine words from the magical language and use them to create something new. She’d done this many times, including when she’d crafted a spell to unlock her door. One that meant, I’ve returned. Let me in. I knew there were others, but I didn’t know if she understood what that meant about her power. I doubted she knew creating her own spells was a Saelyn thing. Not a channeler thing.

We slid into her room and took a breath. She set the pitcher of wine down on her desk and fell back onto her bed, letting go of the blend spell around us and covering her face with her hands.

I set down my tray of strawberry cake and sat beside her, nudging her arm. “ Hey . Scoot over.”

She wiggled to give me some room, and I took it, folding my hands at my chest.

The ceiling of her room had been painted to mimic the sky. One side was an ode to the blooming dawn with rays of golden yellow. The other, a scene of the moon, full and silvery with speckled stars that seemed to glow if you stared at them too hard.

“ She said my father didn’t want me to know.”

I turned my head to watch her.

She wiped her eyes and continued. “ She said he wanted me to have a childhood without the burden of knowing he was out there alive somewhere.” She wiped her nose with a humorless laugh, covering her face again.

I itched to touch her. Instead , I cleared my throat. “ I don’t know a lot about your father, but I do know a lot of what you’re about to see. If we’re leaving for the Spire tomorrow, I don’t want you to go not knowing what you’ll face.”

“ Me either.”

“ I mean, I’ll be there to protect you, of course. And your mother can protect all of us, but…”

“ Tell me, Thevin .”

“ Are you sure you don’t want some cake first?”

She laughed and sat up, pulling a blanket off the back of her desk chair and mumbling, “ Incendo .”

Her fireplace burst into light, and I picked my soaking wet self up off her bed to help her lay the blanket out flat by the fire. Without a word, she retrieved a cup from her bedside table and poured some wine while I brought over the tray of cake. Each little square had been topped with a brilliant red strawberry.

“ We’ll have to share,” she said, taking one long gulp of wine before offering me the cup.

I shook my head. “ I’ve had enough for tonight.”

She heaved a sigh too heavy on the night she turned seventeen and pulled the cup close to her chest, staring into the fire.

I stole a moment and watched her face. I wished I could handle this better. I didn’t regret telling her how I felt about her—she should know the truth of my feelings. But I did regret not telling her sooner. If I had told her the moment I returned to Felgren this summer with my parents, we’d be past this awkward stage after my confession, and it would be easier to to sit with her in the dancing firelight to discuss the war that coated the rest of the isle in a blanket of fear.

I didn’t know exactly why Baron Karus waited seventeen years to tell her only child about her father’s true fate, but I could guess at why she was taking Saelyn with us to the Spire .

“ Has your mother ever spoken to you about training to become a conduit?”

Sae’s eyes flicked back to my face, resting on my mouth before glancing up to my eyes. “ No . She said someday she’d be able to start my training, but that she was too busy now to do it. I stopped asking after I turned fourteen. Why ?”

“ I don’t know for sure, but I have the feeling she was waiting until now.” I leaned back on my hands and sighed. “ We need you. She probably understands that more than I do.”

“ Need me how?”

“ People like me—the ones who cannot wield magic—we can be useful, but not to the extent of people like you. We both know you’re powerful, but I don’t think you realize the depth of it.”

She took another long drink of wine. “ Then tell me, Thevin . Tell me of this war. I am listening.”