Page 8 of Princes of the Outlands (The Castles of the Eyrie)

Chapter 8

Valenden

“My fortune?” Valenden raised an eyebrow at the pretty bartender.

While there were hexmarks for fortunetelling, they were among the most advanced of all spells and notoriously tricky. His aunt, Mage Marna—the Baersladen’s most skilled mage—had only once successfully predicted the future. Years ago, she had warned her brother, King Aleth, of a coming drought. The kingdom had time to make preparations, yet when the drought hit, Mage Marna began to shrivel and dry out. The spell had doubled back on her, creating a shortage in her own body despite how much water she’d imbibed. She’d very nearly died, and she’d been left prematurely gray-haired.

“Not hex magic,” Winter clarified, popping the mead bottle’s cork. “This is a skill my mother taught me when I was a girl.”

“Ah, so it’s only superstition.” Valenden reclined back, smirking. “Play your games, then.”

Winter leveled him a stern look but didn’t say anything. Instead, she hunted up a tankard and poured a draught of mead into it.

“Drink this.”

He accepted it gladly. “Ah, now, this is my kind of superstition.”

She rolled her eyes. “Are you never serious, prince? Drink it. In one swallow, no more.”

He tipped the tankard back, downed the liquid in one go, and then passed it back to her. Winter dragged a lantern closer and spent some minutes examining the dregs in the bottom of his glass.

Valenden adjusted his position, trying to peer into the tankard over her shoulder. Sediment from the alcohol glazed the tankard’s bottom in a haphazard pattern that looked a little like stars in a night sky. How many mugs had he drained to the sediment, never imagining the dregs might be worth studying?

But ultimately, wet sediment didn’t hold his interest long, and he peered sidelong instead at the girl reading it. Why hadn’t he noticed Winter more for all the many nights he’d spent in The Whale? He’d been so consumed with flirtatious wenches who’d willingly perch in his lap and let him slide his hand up their skirts. And gods knew there was no shortage of girls like that, so his mind had never wandered to other types of women.

The salt-of-the-earth kind of woman.

The surprise-fortune-telling kind of woman.

The gorgeous-in-lantern-light kind with hair pulled back like a soldier’s…

When Winter glanced up and caught Valenden staring, he quickly cleared his throat. “I’ll take the rest of that bottle since it’s already been opened.”

She rolled her eyes again as she passed him the mead. “I would have thought you’d had your fill after blacking out and being assaulted.”

“There are some lessons I can learn: sword fighting, dancing. Abstinence, not so much.” He tipped back the bottle.

She continued to squint deep into his tankard as she moved it back and forth in a circle.

“Well, what does that blob at the bottom tell you?” he asked, trying to mask his curiosity with playfulness.

“The location of the dregs doesn’t matter,” Winter muttered, deep into her examination. “It’s a common misconception. Only the shapes do. I’m looking for shapes that mirror hexmarks. If a hexmark shape appears here for a spell you already possess, it will be a particular strength in your future. If the shape mimics a hexmark you don’t possess, it shall be a weakness for you going forward. A warning, perhaps.”

Valenden turned quiet. Winter’s detailed explanation of the process implied this was true magic her family believed in, not the game he was pretending it to be.

At his silence, Winter looked up questioningly. “You’ve gone pale. Don’t you want to know your future?”

“I’m not entirely certain I do.”

She gave him a softly admonishing look. “You yourself said fortune telling isn’t real magic, just a superstition.”

He grumbled as he tipped up the mead bottle again, then wiped his mouth. “Has anyone ever told you that you have a way of turning people’s words back on them?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it’s infuriating.”

A smile flickered at the corners of her mouth. “Don’t the pretty ladies who sit on your lap challenge you?”

“They don’t,” he muttered. “Their brothers, however…”

Winter adjusted her skirt so she could move closer to him to show him the tankard’s insides. Her soft ponytail brushed his neck, sending a flush throughout him. Her body radiated good health—her pink cheeks and strong hands. He felt suddenly repulsive in his bloody, mud-stained clothes.

But Winter didn’t seem to mind his haggard appearance.

“Look,” she said, tipping the tankard his way. “The dregs along that bottom portion, do you see? They have the same horseshoe shape as the persuasion hex.”

The persuasion hex—commonly known as The Charmer—gave its bearer the ability to intuitively read others and thus respond to their needs and desires.

Valenden set down the mead bottle and rolled up his shirt sleeve to his bicep. On the inner portion of his arm was a horseshoe scar.

Winter ran her fingers over the hexmark, eyes lighting up. “You already possess The Charmer. So, that means that you’re destined for a lifetime filled with merriment and often surrounded by many people.”

Valenden heard her words but was far more interested in her hand on his bicep. Her fingers were calloused from scrubbing tankards, not soft like Maira’s. And yet he found he liked the extra bit of friction.

He cleared his throat. “I’m not sure I needed magic to tell me that.”

Winter ignored him as she frowned back into the tankard. “There are more shapes. This one here. It mimics the hexmark for knowing people’s names before they tell you.”

Valenden peered at a murky shape like an apple blossom at the bottom of the glass. “I don’t have that hexmark. So, what, I’m destined to have to ask people’s names? How dire.”

Winter didn’t respond to his joking tone as she clutched the tankard between her hands. “That isn’t what it means, Val. That hex symbol discerns if someone will be close with others.”

He frowned. “That last prediction said many people would surround me.”

“Having people around you isn’t the same as being close with anyone.”

His heart thumped uncomfortably in his chest. “So what are you saying?”

Her lips flattened into a line. “That ultimately, you will be alone your entire life.”

Valenden’s mind pulled between various courses of action. His instinct was to laugh off her words with another joke. But Winter looked serious, and the truth was, her words had stung him somewhere deep. It felt like she’d confirmed something he’d already long known in his soul.

That look in her eyes wasn’t pity. It was understanding.

Gods, this girl…

Still feeling the tinges of panic, he cupped her jaw without thinking and pulled her into a kiss. Winter’s hand clamped onto his wrist, surprised, but she didn’t pull away. Her lips yielded under his. A surge of panicked desire made Valenden deepen the kiss feverishly. He fisted his hand in the back of her hair. Thrust his tongue along her teeth. Placed his other hand scandalously high on her waist, almost grazing her breast. His heart was stampeding. For some wild reason, he felt Winter was his last chance at a connection.

At not being alone.

The kiss went on for some time before they finally broke apart. Valenden was breathing heavily, eyes searching hers. He needed something from her, he realized.

Approval? Love? Something .

She cleared her throat, keeping her eyes aimed down at her lap, but her pink cheeks revealed she hadn’t exactly hated the kiss.

Valenden felt another surge of triumph. See? He wasn’t a hopeless case. He’d won over someone as even-keeled as Winter. Gods, he could see it all now. They’d keep their affair secret for a few weeks before revealing it to the public. He—the disreputable, silly, promiscuous middle son—would have a girlfriend . He’d help Winter run the tavern in the evenings. Of course, he’d have to drink less to be functional, but so be it. Maybe some of her good sense would even rub off on him…

“Winter—” he started, breathless.

She silenced him with a finger against his lips. For a moment, his hope lingered, but then he saw the serious look in her eyes. His heart sank.

“Val, the dregs don’t lie. You’ll have fun your entire life, but you’ll always be alone.”

He sputtered, “Fine, fine; I’ll get the damn name-knowing hex…”

“That won’t change anything.”

He realized, then, like feeling the wind shift directions, that there would be no secret affair. No girlfriend for him, no nights helping Winter in the tavern.

His face must have fallen because she rested a gentle hand on his cheek.

“You can sleep here tonight, prince. Give your body a chance to rest and heal.”

He scowled and turned away from her offer but then thought better of it and moved his head back to fit within her gentle palm. “Sleep with me?”

“Well, you’re on my bed, so yes.” A tiny smile flickered over her face.

Valenden laid down on her bedroll. Winter extinguished the lantern and laid down next to him, tucking one hand under her head.

Facing one another, she stroked his tangled hair until he felt himself nodding off.

The last thing he remembered—or maybe it was a dream—was Winter pressing a soft kiss to his lips again before muttering, “You aren’t the only one destined to be alone, prince.”

They spent the night lying next to one another—together and yet alone—and all Valenden could think about as sleep overcame him was calloused hands, the sweet smell of mead, and hair pulled back like a soldier’s.