Chapter 2 Andar
My new master was too broken to command the power I controlled. Her pretty grey eyes betrayed her—they held too much anger to think clearly and too much fear to make hard decisions. Her weakness would be my key to freedom.
In exchange for that key, I would protect her as long as our paths overlapped. I made the vow silently, with only myself as a witness, and bowed. I couldn’t tell her out loud—she would never agree if she knew I intended to use her pain to trick her into granting my freedom.
Smoke filled the icy cavern, and my bond with the lamp simultaneously unleashed magic and constrained me to use it to fulfill her request. I tapped into the volcanic energy deep beneath the mountains that trapped us and nudged it, ever so slightly, just enough to weaken the fragile crust that carried these peaks.
As I bowed, I surrounded us with a protective shield and pinned it to the floor of the cavern.
I channeled the tectonic forces below us until they lifted us up, up through layers of basalt, andesite, and obsidian.
Icicles crashed toward us and then fell harmlessly off my shield.
I cracked rocks—and then ice—above our heads, making way for our small, protected bubble to travel through layers of mountain until we burst into the fresh air above the mighty Kahunamons.
I stepped behind her and gripped her upper arms, securing her so we both stood with my shield wrapped tighter around us.
We slid down the slope we’d emerged on, as easily as a seal sliding on ice, but we stood upright, balanced by my strength and magic.
Stones, plants, and other debris bounded off my shield.
Snow flowed behind us, splashing up like the wake behind a ship on high seas.
My master’s arms trembled, and her breathing grew ragged, as if she wasn’t experienced in flying over miles of ice-covered mountains at break-neck speed in a bubble of protective magic.
Or maybe it was a case of spending too much time under a mountain in a tiny cavern. I shook my head. I’d spent centuries in a tiny lamp, and I balanced just fine.
Gravity pulled us down the mountain, and I let us follow the natural contours of the hills—until we glided to the edge of a cliff with an abrupt drop that would have sent us catapulting for hundreds of feet into the air.
I did not think my master could handle such a propulsion of her body, so I seized my protective barrier with magic and stopped us at the edge of the cliff.
I released her upper arms but miscalculated her balance—she fell to the stone on her hands and knees, scraping the knuckles that refused to let go of my lamp.
Her ragged breath pricked some remnant of my heart I hadn’t felt in ages. Letting her fall had not been very good protection. I should have kept her upright while she caught her breath.
She staggered to her feet and glared death into my eyes. “What is wrong with you?” she hissed.
I bowed but refused to admit my regret. I was not weak. “Nothing, Master. I fulfilled your request.”
She waved a hand in the air, pointing from the ledge we stood on to the drop-off hundreds of feet below us. “This is not the foothills I requested.”
I stepped closer to her. “Are you not fae?” I pointed at the cliff we stood on and the ridgeline it joined.
“These could be called the slopes of the foothills.” I tipped my chin at the sun.
“Is light not bleeding on us? If you did not want your request to be misinterpreted, you should have spoken more plainly.”
She clenched her teeth so tight the little muscles in her jaw knotted.
A means to an end, I reminded myself. Her weakness was the key to my freedom, and I could not grow sympathy or compassion for the trouble I brought her.
I could only offer her my protection for the short time our paths intersected.
Her fingers clenched around my lamp as she muttered under her breath, “If only I had my own magic—”
She cut off as her eyes lit with an intensity that almost distracted me from my own plans. She raised the lamp toward me. “Can you restore my magic?”
I nodded. “Most likely.”
“Speak plainly,” she hissed. “What would prevent you from restoring my magic?”
I tamped down the chuckle that tried to escape me when she used my words. “I need more information. I do not know if your magic is blocked or removed.”
Vulnerability flashed across her confident anger, but it disappeared quickly. “Can you find out?”
I lifted a hand toward her forehead. “May I?”
She eyed my hand warily, but dipped her head and stepped closer to me.
I settled my hand across the top of her head and spread my mind, looking for any pulses of magic, any signs that the powers flowing in the lands around us reached for her.
My brows drew together as I studied her.
A deep well of magic and a large capacity to wield it were not what I’d expected to find tucked inside her soul.
It was rooted in her and tied off at the cavern she’d been in.
And then she had another well of power, like a spring full of life, but it was fenced off—blocked by a lattice of magic as structured as a sheet of crystalline ice.
She drew her chin up and planted her hands on her hips. “What?”
I clasped my hands behind my back. “The magic you want is not blocked nor destroyed, but it is tied to the cave you were trapped in. I obliterated the cave, but your magic remains tethered to that space.” I hesitated.
Her question had been vague enough that my answer didn’t need to include the unusual hidden source of magic as well.
“And can you break that tether?”
I nodded, slower this time. “Yes, but Master, I would—”
“And would I then have access to the magic I had before it backfired into that prison?”
Backfired into a prison? I wanted to study this more, but every second that passed made her more frantic.
“Answer my question, Slave. Will it restore my magic?”
“Yes, Master. You—”
“Stop calling me ‘Master,’” she hissed through gritted teeth.
I raised a brow. I should call her Trouble. Too bossy. Too impulsive. And yet—that frantic impulsivity could be the key to my freedom.
“I don’t like the condescension in your voice,” she ground out.
Ah. That… made sense. It wasn’t personal—I treated everyone the same way. But I needed her to not resent me if I had any hope of using her to gain my own freedom. I dipped my head in as humble a posture as I could manage. “What would you have me call you?” I asked, trying to sound contrite.
Her eyes narrowed. “Your Majesty,” she said in a clipped, icy voice.
Curious. What had she been queen of?
It didn’t matter. All that mattered now was getting her to be willing to help me. “Very well, Your Majesty. I apologize for my insolence. It has been a long time since I have had practice speaking with anyone besides myself.”
She ran her fingers across the leather fabric on her thighs, as if smoothing a dress that wasn’t there. “Perhaps I was too abrupt as well. I would like to call you something besides ‘Slave.’”
A hint of vulnerability tipped her voice up, though her posture remained as regal as ever. She needed this—needed a connection with another person. Not as a slave and master, but as a queen and a devoted subject.
And if I let her imagine a connection with me she would be easier to manipulate into freeing me.
I hated the idea of manipulating someone so obviously needing connection, but I could not see another path to my freedom.
And she’d asked for my name.
With a practiced precision, I pressed the guilt deep enough to avoid feeling it and focused on my purpose—giving her the connection she needed. I imagined her as a queen in one of the winter courts and bowed. “Andar, Your Majesty, at your service.”