Chapter Thirty-One
These festivals were never my idea of fun. They were noisy, crowded affairs, filled with a variety of altered states that made everything too unpredictable for my liking. Especially now that night had fallen.
As I stalked toward the only vendor I had any interest in seeing tonight, the dark corners outlined silhouettes of bobbing heads, legs resting on shoulders, accompanied by the hiss of panting moans.
“Oh, my girl!”
Saura leapt off the stool just outside her wagon door. Her cascading blond curls bounced as she jaunted over, arms outstretched in welcome. She beamed that bright, beautiful smile I’d missed so much and cupped my cheeks in her heavily ringed hands. Her blue eyes glittered in the gold light that poured from the wagon’s interior.
As we embraced, I glanced over her shoulder and noticed the shelves lined with hanging herbs and crystals. Saura, a renowned scryer, attended the Festival of Night annually to offer her services. I was here both as a visiting daughter and a paying customer.
“It’s good to see you, Mother.”
“Come in. Come in.” She waved me on ahead to climb the stairs that hung off the back of the wagon and enter the cozy warmth waiting within.
“I apologize—I don’t have much time. I’ve brought you something, and—Oh, I’m sorry.”
My steps halted as a pretty woman with auburn hair stood from the mussed bed across the way. I fixed my mother with an inquisitive gaze, though I was far from curious.
“Go on and fetch us some drinks, will you, D’nita? Let me visit with my daughter,” Saura said.
Without more than a meek glance, the woman finished buttoning her shirt and swooped out the heavy wooden door. It groaned, then clicked shut. Mother didn’t so much as blush.
I cleared my throat. “As I was saying, I’ve brought something for you to look at.”
“Is this about that human you’ve been hauling around the province?”
I hadn’t seen her since Mira entered my life. Given the great lengths I’d gone to over the last nine months to keep it that way, I expected her to grow suspicious and wonder why. But what surprised me was her knowledge of Mira.
“How did you know about–”
“Sidelle, we’re seers. Does anything actually happen without us knowing about it?”
Not entirely satisfied with that explanation but unwilling to push the matter, I moved past it. “Normally, I would be inclined to agree with you, but unfortunately, I’ve been experiencing quite the learning curve over these last few months.”
“Oh?” Her light brows raised high.
I reached into the pocket of my long cloak and handed her the journal. Warm candlelight glinted off the large silver ring adorning her thumb as she grasped it. I waited, half-expecting the effects of her power to be immediate. But she only opened it and flipped through its blank pages.
“Heliac script,” she said.
I nodded.
“And what do you wish to know?”
“Can you read it?”
“Not in the context of scribed text. No.” She turned the book over in her hands, brows furrowed as she studied it closely. “But there is something here.”
“What is it?”
“Tell me why it’s important.”
I released a deep sigh and plopped into a chair beside a round table covered in crystals, crow feathers, and various books. Her beady-eyed crow, Guntram, perched on a rafter overhead. He squawked, preening his feathers, causing another to drift down, landing on the table beside the others.
With a groan, I pressed the heels of my palms against my eyes. I bore this burden for so long that the thought of unloading any of it onto my mother’s shoulders felt wrong, but if I could trust anyone’s guidance, it was hers.
“I stole it from Atreus. It’s from the year Annorah sacrificed herself,” I said, frustrated with the lack of help it supplied thus far. Only the ramblings of insignificant daily occurrences. We needed to be able to look ahead.
“I’m not blind, child. I can read that much here on the cover. Now what is it you’re not telling me?”
I slowly inhaled what felt like my last breath before the entire world changed. “When I took that from Atreus’ council chamber, I also found a manastone.”
Saura paled, and I hadn’t even gotten to the worst part.
I swallowed hard. “He has a manastone containing, at least some, of Erezos’ power. I wasn’t able to get it out of the castle.”
Her hand covered her wine-colored lips. “Have you gone to the council?”
“No.”
“Sidelle, why not?”
“Because I fear that it will ensue a war. Already, it seems the mysterious ash that Annorah and the druids had discovered on the king’s ships has resurfaced. He’s making weapons.”
She stood and walked to a small counter, her long lilac cloak brushing along the dusty floor. She picked up the pestle from the grinding stone and worked out her frustrations on the small pile of herbs within—a habit I learned from here. I always seemed to think better when my hands were busy.
“I’m sorry, I don’t see how this correlates to you not telling the council. It seems like an inevitability that our people deserve time to prepare for, does it not?” I didn’t answer.
“You’re smarter than this, Sidelle. You know you can’t take this on alone.”
“I don’t need a lecture. I have a plan. If I can just stall them longer, I might have a solution to save everyone.”
“Which is?”
“Annorah’s reincarnation walks the earth. She’s here. With me.”
Saura dropped the pestle. It clattered and rolled off the grinding stone as she braced herself against the tabletop. “The girl?”
I nodded.
“Who else knows?”
“Eurok.”
She surprised me by chuckling. She straightened, wiping her hands on her crisp, white apron.
“What?” I demanded.
“I should’ve known you’d call him the moment you sensed trouble. I bet you he came running, didn’t he?”
“It wasn’t like that. He just so happened to be assigned as council liaison.”
“Mmhmm.” She crossed her arms in a show of disbelief. “Are you two a union yet?”
“As if that makes any difference.”
She quirked a brow.
“Yes, okay.” I waved her off. “We have claimed our union with one another, but we can worry about that later.”
“It seems like you have little time left, child.”
I winced at her stoic words.
She came to stand in front of me, cupping my cheek. Her touch was gentle, a gesture of reassurance. The aroma of cedar, rosemary, and mugwort wafted toward me, and I drew a deep breath, savoring the scent of her sacred smoke bombs—her best sellers at these festivals.
I pressed her palm against my cheek. She always hoped Eurok and I would give our relationship a shot, but as usual, her timing was terrible.
“You deserve some happiness, Sidelle. He deserves some happiness.”
I tightened my lips together and forced a smile.
Dropping the matter, she loosed a sigh and put her hands on her narrow hips, returning to her work. “The gods? What do they have to say about this?”
My mother’s ability as a seer didn’t function like mine. Her abilities lay within the energy of objects—the residual essence left behind by the life or experiences of the item.
“I fear Erezos can’t answer. That, or he’s being watched.” At least that would account for his silence. “The Empress has suffered an immense loss of her own recently, and I stole that journal from Atreus, Aethier’s gift to humanity, so I don’t think I should go crawling to him for help.”
My mother pursed her lips. Then a loud, musical knock cut her train of thought short. “Come in, Eurok,” she called.
The way opened, and he squeezed through the small opening. He occupied nearly half of the space and had to bend his neck to avoid hitting his head.
“Sit down before you knock over the lavender.” She clicked her tongue against her teeth. “It’s good to see you, son.”
He gave me a soft kiss in greeting. The essence of campfire and salt lingered on his plush lips. He dropped beside me and draped an arm over the back of my chair.
Saura pecked him on the cheek and placed a cup of tea in front of him. “We were just talking about you.”
“All good things, I hope,” he said with a chuckle.
I sat back, letting them chat with each other a bit, and let myself ease at the flow of their natural conversation—a lift in the mood Eurok seemed to bring when he entered. Maybe a residual effect from the festival, but still, I needed the distraction. Tomorrow would be the culmination of everything he and Balis worked for. He deserved a night to relax.
I spent the last months tied up in never-ending concern—a constant parade of pros, cons, and effects weighing on me. Then there was the endless research. Finding ways to push Mira’s mana to bloom, all while scouring herbology records for a plant that mimics the effect of these ash weapons. Most days, I felt like an overloaded ship capsizing under the weight. But today, I looked at Eurok, ankle crossed over his knee, an easy smile on his face. Today had been… nice.
Once their chatter slowed, I placed my hand in Eurok’s. Saura was right. The idea of our limited time hurt, but he had always been my rock. He deserved to receive that kind of devotion from me as well. He squeezed my fingers. It was comforting to turn to him when I needed support, knowing he would be there for me. I could handle anything with him by my side. Even the end.
“So, Mother, what can you tell me about the journal?”
She picked it up off the counter and brought it over to the table. She sat across from Eurok and me, turning it over in her hands. As she flipped through the pages, she closed her eyes. “There’s something here, a shift of some kind.”
“A shift?”
“Almost—two different writers. It’s strange. I sense Atreus all over this journal, but there’s something else there. It feels… ancient.”
“Like a god? Is it Erezos?”
She opened one of her bright blue eyes to glare at me, as if to chastise for my interruption.
“Sorry.” I leaned back, taking a sip of tea as I waited for her to continue.
“Where do you notice this shift, Saura?” Eurok asked.
“Right about at the halfway point.”
I thrummed a finger against the tabletop. “So summer?”
“Most likely.”
He glanced between us. “What time of year was it when you performed Annorah’s sacrifice?”
My mother quirked another sly brow in my direction, surprised by how much I told him. I ignored her.
“Late June,” I answered in a whisper. “What else do you sense?”
“Not much. It seems to almost be split in half. The first bit is purely Atreus—I sense his humanity. The other exudes a heavy, brooding energy.”
Her eyes became distant, focused on something beyond the present moment, yet they shimmered like sapphires in the candlelight. This ancient, beautiful witch guided me through countless tribulations, from teaching me to take my first steps to aiding in dismantling an odious system meant to stifle us. When she broke that unseeing gaze and met my own, I knew I’d been unbearably foolish for not telling her sooner.
“That’s all I can see,” she said, quiet and regretful.
Eurok and I exchanged wary glances. He uncoiled his energy and wrapped it around me in a shield of warmth and protection, like an impenetrable wall of sunlight and safety.
I caressed it with my own in surreptitious thanks, sensing the rippling shiver against my touch. A smile spread across my face, and a glow crept throughout my soul. I truly did love him. My stomach leapt. Saura was right. Let us enjoy this small taste of happiness, even just for tonight. It was, after all, what we were fighting for.