Page 35

POISON

E mryn was still tired, still worried, and that worry made it difficult to rest like Cas wanted her to. She did her best, but the feeling of the bundle that woman had held was still shearing along her nerves and that too was making any form of relaxation difficult.

The First Wizard was here, and that was difficult for Emryn as well. He was too intelligent, but perhaps now that she’d been stripped of her vow, he would be kinder.

Not that he’d been cruel before. Oh Mother, her head was all jumbled, and she was having a hard time figuring out what she should do.

“Emryn, you should rest.” Cas’s voice broke through her swirling thoughts. “I know you must still be tired.”

“I am, but that thing-” she shuddered, almost knocking herself off her feet. “I can’t shake the way it felt, Cas. Like it was trying to tear every nerve from my body.”

“There is a reason for that.” Asan said as he walked into the sitting room. “If the two of you would ring for tea and sit, this is going to be a rather lengthy conversation.”

Cas guided Emryn to a seat and rang for tea. Meanwhile, Emryn was trying to make sense of the look on the First Wizard’s face. He seemed equal parts baffled and in awe as he looked down at her.

“Can you explain?” she asked, still shaking a little. “What was that thing?”

“That was a trap,” Asan sat down across the sofa from her. “Now, I am going to have to ask you to suspend your disbelief, Emryn, Cas, because some of the things I’m about to say are going to make me sound quite mad.”

“Alright.” Cas came over and sat next to Emryn, pulling her into his side. “Go on then.”

“I’ll begin with the most interesting bit and then weave it into everything else.” He raised a hand and pointed it at Emryn. “You, Highness, are dead.”

Emryn put a pair of fingers into the artery at her neck. “I seem to be quite alive, First Wizard.”

“There is an entry in the books, from around the time you would have been found by the temples. A family lost their little girl to a sudden fever. A little girl named Emryn. She was six years old when she passed away.”

“Emryn is not an uncommon name, Asan.” Cas protested.

“Let me finish the story, Cas.” Asan let his hand fall. “After the family lost their child, they buried her, as one does with the dead. However, young Emryn came back three days later, standing at their doorway with eyes like fire and flame dripping from her hands.”

“What?”

“I’m not quite done,” Asan said with a nervous smile. “The family was ill with the same fever, and the child healed the household. Every single member in the home recovered instantly. The father took what used to be his child to the temple and left her there.”

Emryn’s eyes filled with tears as the memory crashed into her head. “Papa said I belonged with them,” she whispered.

“And so you did,” Asan said calmly. “They trained you, and if I am correct, the rigid training of a healer kept you from dying to the being that lives in you alongside your bones.”

“What?”

“Do you remember the myth of the Moon Mother’s guardian birds?” he asked.

Emryn nodded.

“And do you remember what I said about the birds taking human form to be companions to the healers?”

“You said there was no evidence of that.” Cas broke in.

“So I did, but I was looking in the wrong place,” Asan replied, lifting a hand again. “As it turns out, and please, do stay with me, there are extant conversations between those that the birds were companions to and the birds themselves.”

“I’m not a bird.” Emryn protested, shooting up off the couch. “I’m not dead, I’m just a healer and-” and at that, she turned and fled, fled the assertions that were tearing holes in the blank skin where the lack of memories rested.

She didn’t want to see, didn’t want to know. She just wanted to be happy with Cas and spend her life healing the ills of the people.

“Child,” Emryn skidded to a stop in front of a huge mirror that was completely reflecting the Mother chained to her throne. “My Eyes, My Wings, My Child.”

“Mother.” Emryn went to her knees. “Mother, what am I?”

“You are her Wings.” Asan appeared in the mirror, banishing the image of the Mother. “Her last hope.”

Emryn clutched at her head, the blank gray shredding further. “I don’t want to know.” She cried. “I-”

“You are the Moon Mother’s child.” Asan said, seemingly oblivious to her distress. “Her Eyes, Her Wings.”

“Emryn-” Cas was there. He would help her as the skin over her memories shredded further. A pain in her back searing and terrible, focused like red-hot pokers over her shoulder blades.

“Release them, Emryn.” Asan said. “Let them free, become who you are meant to be.”

“What?” Emryn looked up at Asan as the pain took her over.

She saw them unfold in the mirror. Sun-bright, starlight, tearing free of her back, of her gown, throwing flecks of scarlet up the walls as they forced themselves free.

She didn’t want them. Emryn reached over her shoulder and gripped one of the wings, pulling it and screaming with the pain in her chest as she tried to tear it free.

“Emryn, stop!” That was Cas, Cas’ hands on hers, removing them from the star-feathers. “No darling, don’t do that. I need you to breathe for me.”

She tried, but the feathers were brushing her spine and something in her recoiled from the feeling.

“It’s leftovers,” Asan said and a cool hand came down on her head. “Emryn, take a deep breath and hold it.”

She did as she was told, feeling something in her head tear free. It was possibly the worst pain she had ever experienced in her life. The feeling of flesh being torn from bone.

When the pain faded, she was left shaking in Cas’ arms, half conscious and utterly confused.

“Take her to bed,” Asan’s voice said. “Let her rest and tomorrow I will explain the rest of my findings and what they mean for the pair of you.”