Chapter XXXI. Ellery #2
Truthfully, Ellery did have an ulterior motive up North. But she’d only smuggled the winterghast hearts to Nordmere because the Council had refused to listen to her in the first place. And she was doing this for the good of the country, no matter what they might think.
For weeks, Ellery had tried so hard to play her part. But she was suddenly, thoroughly done with bullshit.
“You really think that’s a solid motive for Summer’s traitor?” she asked Hanna coolly. “Being liked?”
Hanna, too, dropped her pretenses in an instant. “That whole hero routine of yours while the country casts you as a villain—I don’t buy it. No one could keep it up that long.”
Ellery wanted to laugh, or maybe scream. “No one? Or just you?”
“I don’t see what any of this has to do with me.”
“Oh, please. Is that why you stopped bothering to win people over? Or have you always been this charming?”
Hanna blew bubble after bubble, each bursting with a jarring pop. A voice drifted in from the bathroom: Domenic, still in the shower, singing the pop song Ellery had forced him to learn.
Finally, Hanna murmured, “You know, for all that everyone loves to call me charming now, I wonder what they’ll call me when I stop trying.”
As evening turned to night, Ellery cloaked herself, then retrieved her coat with the hearts still discreetly tucked in the pockets. She intended to return before either Domenic or Hanna noticed she was gone, but just in case, she left a note on the bedside table.
Outside, a person hovered beneath the hotel awning. Ellery nearly collided with them, then lurched back, holding Iskarius.
She recognized him instantly. Julian Norwood, his lean frame wrapped in a heavy coat, his dark coils peeking beneath his hat, his intent gaze trained on the hotel doors.
Scar tissue sliced through one eyebrow and the corner of his lip, white and umber striated against his light brown skin.
Incredulous tears welled in Ellery’s eyes, that he was here of all places. It couldn’t be a coincidence.
She sheathed Iskarius and dropped her cloaking enchantment.
“Julian,” she whispered.
He uttered a shocked noise, then cleared his throat as he noticed her stares. “El. Right, well, we might as well get the gawking over with. I know the scars are—”
Ellery rushed forward and wrapped him in a hug. After a moment of surprise, he squeezed back.
These past few weeks were the longest they’d gone without speaking since they’d first become friends.
Now here they were again, not atop the mountain of Gallamere but in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by gently falling snow.
Just like Nordmere, he felt familiar and unfamiliar, a relic of a life that was no longer hers and still part of her nonetheless.
“I missed you,” he said as she pulled away.
“I missed you, too. But what are you doing this far north? And how did you know I was here?”
“You assumed I was here to see you, huh?”
“Do you really expect me to believe you wandered over to my hotel by accident?”
He chuckled. “Well, it’s not every day the Chosen Two visit Nordmere. Word traveled fast. Although I was trying to figure out how to get you down here by yourself. I never assumed you’d show up on your own. I mean … isn’t it a little past your bedtime?”
“Asshole,” she said, sniffling.
“Guilty,” he said, grinning. One corner of his lips stayed downturned, as though pulled into a permanent scowl.
“But if you wanted to talk to me … I’ve been trying to contact you since you left the academy.”
“I know. Honestly, for the first week or so, I wasn’t up for talking to anyone.
My parents paid every doctor and healer they knew a truly exorbitant amount of money to patch me up, and by the time I’d started to feel better, you were all over the news.
A Chosen One. And I … I’d almost died. I didn’t want your pity. ”
“I never pitied you,” Ellery protested. “I just wanted to know you were okay.”
“Well, I am. I swear. The scars are the only part they couldn’t fully heal.”
“I’m glad,” she said quietly. “And I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for? You saved my life.”
Ellery expected her next words to be a struggle, like they’d been so many times before. Instead, they were simple. “For that fight we had. For shutting you out for years. And for being a pretty terrible girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend, huh?” Julian arched a brow. “As I recall, you refused to label it.”
“Hence the pretty terrible part. You were my best friend. I should’ve treated you better after we crossed that line.”
“I get it. I was kind of a dick, too,” he said.
Ellery laughed in surprise, and Julian’s own grin widened.
“What, you think I can’t be self-aware? Back at the academy, I was so convinced I was destined for a powerful wand.
And I kept telling myself I’d return to the Citadel as soon as possible. Keep trying before my window closes.”
“So why didn’t you?”
“Because I heard rumors about a magician up North. They claimed to be a Winter magician. Like you.”
A Winter magician. Ellery had dared to hope she might not be the only one, but it was completely different to hear Julian confirm it with so much conviction.
She felt the same way as when she’d watched the winterghasts’ hearts turn into seeds, when she’d marveled at an impossibly grand illusion amidst a forest and realized her magic could be beautiful, when she’d first heard destiny speak.
Like she stood at the precipice of something tremendous, something extraordinary.
“Can you take me to them?” she breathed.
Julian smiled again, wider. “What do you think I came here to do? They’ve wanted to meet you for a long time.”
He gestured for her to follow, but she hesitated.
“What about Dom? He should come, too.”
His smile wavered.
“No,” he said carefully. “Not Barrow. Just you. Do you trust me?”
Ellery’s hope shattered. If there really was another Winter magician out there, they’d kept themself a secret all this time. They’d only contacted her once she arrived in Nordmere, lured here by a vision from the Dire Three. And they wanted to see her, but not Domenic.
Maybe Ellery would find Summer’s traitor on this mission after all.
“Of course I trust you,” Ellery lied, and followed her best friend into the night.