5. Chapter Five Bahira
Chapter Five: Bahira
A breeze blows in through the open doorway, the humidity of the spring day likely making my thick curly brown hair a frizzy mess. Standing behind the old wooden table that holds memories of all my experiments—both successful and failed—I place two small glass bottles containing the dead leaves of the pirang tree in front of me. Squatting down until I’m at eye level, I reach blindly to the left for the container of water that Hadrik, a mage that sits on my father’s council, infused with his raw magic. Of course, I nearly knock it over and have to hold my breath as I watch it wobble from side to side, liquid sloshing, before settling back down. Shit, that was close.
Councilman Hadrik is my father’s oldest friend and one of the biggest supporters of my research outside of my family. While everyone in the kingdom agrees that magic is declining, no one else seems to be actively working towards finding out why. It’s like there is a sense of complacency because it has been happening for so long.
I’ve always had a curious mind, constantly putting my nose in a book or looking down the eyepiece of a magnifier—the magnified instrument used for my experiments—trying to find the answers to questions that plagued me. My curiosity has led to a better understanding of nearly everything in the world around me, with the exception of one—what is happening to our magic and how to stop it.
Grabbing my tray of hourglasses, I flip them over to begin a countdown while I lift the infused water and pour it into one of the bottles of dead leaves. The hourglass tray is something I custom made for myself to keep track of elapsed time during my experiments. Between two planks of wood are ten hourglasses, each one a different measurement of time starting with one minute and continuing up to ten.
A soft, light green glow emanates from the bottle of decayed foliage, briefly blinding me before winking out. The oval-shaped leaves in the bottle turn vibrant green, growing in size while roots and new buds sprout. Hadriks’ more powerful magic works to help bring life and new growth back into the remnants of the plant within a minute. As I expected.
In our kingdom, mages come into their magic at around eight years of age and participate in a Flame Ceremony to demonstrate how strong their prospective magic is. During the ceremony, a drop of their blood is given to the Cauldron of Vires, and a flame rises in response, the size of it indicating how powerful the child’s magic has the potential to be. In centuries past, it wasn’t uncommon to see a flame more than six feet tall, but magic seems to have been in more abundance then. Over the past many decades, the magic manifesting in both young and old mages has been weakening, and recently—for the first time in our history—a mage was born without magic. A fact that I am, unfortunately, very intimate with.
Sighing, I reach for the container on my right filled with the water infused by one of the younger mages. The wielder is a twelve year old girl named Alba who has just mastered infusing her magic into an element like water. This task is something that used to be learned within weeks of turning eight and starting your training. Now, along with the magic being less powerful, it takes much longer for children to learn to wield their magic in what were previously simple ways.
When the one minute hourglass finishes, I pour the infused water into the second bottle of pirang leaves. I expect at least a small amount of magic light to emit from the bottle, but nothing more than a minuscule spark of blue—the color of Alba’s magic—twinkles before my eyes. I watch as the leaves slowly rehydrate and expand, turning from a dull, dead brown to a light green, but do not sprout roots or grow buds.
Then after five minutes have passed, the leaves at the top of the bottle holding Alba’s magic begin to shrivel back down to brown. I stand up tall as I stretch out my back before untying my apron. I turn to the faucet in the basin built into a black stone countertop, wetting my hands before sliding them down my face. A ragged breath leaves me as frustration at our kingdom’s predicament, at my own predicament, weighs heavily on my mind.
When it was revealed that I had no magic, I made them do the test again. Five times. Five drops of blood. Each with the same result: no flame growing over the cauldron—not even a tiny spark of light. I allowed myself to wallow in sadness for a long time—not even wanting to be around anyone casting magic. Which proved quite difficult considering I am the only one who doesn’t have any, a fact I wish I had an explanation for. Eventually, I decided that maybe this perceived weakness was actually a test.
I am inquisitive by nature, always trying to dig deeper and see things from every perspective. Who better to try and figure out why our magic was draining, why mages were weakening, than the person with no magic to speak of? With each year that passed, I spent more and more time reading, researching, and experimenting on everything and anything that might give me a clue as to why it was happening. Something is making it so mage magic is growing weaker overall, and I intend to be the one to find out why it’s happening and fix it. I have to. Because figuring that out is the only way to find my own magic.
Footsteps outside the threshold of my workshop draw my attention. My gaze lifts, a small smile curving my lips when Daje—one of my oldest friends—walks in. He smiles back at me, his blue eyes piercing in the sunlight streaming through the windows.
“Working hard, Bahira?” he asks, his voice teasing. I smile faintly in response, though my shoulders tense imperceptibly. Lately, Daje has made passing remarks about how I need to “relax about the magic stuff.” What he doesn’t understand, what a lot of the people around me don’t understand, is that I can’t just stop. If I forgo my research, I will be a princess of the Mage Kingdom—a realm known for its skill in wielding raw magic—who is magicless. That is something I just can’t accept.
“Clearly,” I joke, my hand motioning to the two glass jars. A knot forms in my throat when I see the jar that contained Alba’s magic has already reverted the rest of the leaves back to a shriveled brown, the magic within the bottle depleted quickly. Meanwhile, the jar containing the leaves of Councilman Hadrik has stopped blooming new roots but remains alive and vibrant in color. I know the difference is significant, I just haven’t figured out how yet.
Daje takes a step forward until his hip is leaning against the edge of the table. He reaches out and tucks a wayward strand of curly hair behind my ear, his gaze lingering on it before bouncing to mine. The movement is intimate—too much so—forcing me to avert my gaze and clear my throat.
“To what do I owe this visit? Are you finally here to help me for once?”
Daje smirks, taking my slight rejection with ease, as he straightens back up and clasps his hands behind him. The movement makes his broad chest strain against his light blue tunic, and I really can see why women obsess over him. His dark brown hair is cut close to his head, his clean-shaven jawline sharp despite the more oval shape of his face. It’s his eyes that make him such a popular commodity though—the light blue of them stark against his tanned skin. He’s also one of the only men that I have to physically look up to; as a taller woman, most of the men my age are at eye level or below.
“I’m afraid not. I was sent to retrieve you by your father,” he says casually, walking over to the small desk that I share with our friend Haylee. My body turns as I follow him with my eyes and process what he’s said, my hands flattening out on the wooden table in front of me.
“Is something wrong? Is it Nox?” The words come out of me so quickly that they are almost incomprehensible.
Daje shakes his head as he looks at me, his features easing when he takes in my panicked expression. “Your father didn’t say, but he didn’t appear overly concerned.”
I blow out a breath at that and nod my head, following Daje out of the workshop. Three stone steps lead away from the little room built into the wide trunk of an albero tree. While I’ve never been to any of the other kingdoms, I can’t imagine that they are as beautiful as this one. Even in the daytime, sunlight only reaches the ground through the small gaps within the dense treetops, creating a near-permanent sort of twilight. Nestled deeply within the forest, many of our dwellings and shops are built into the ancient albero trees themselves. Their massive trunks are so large and tall that as many as two stories can be built into them without disrupting its own growth and life, though mages do infuse some magic into the tree to help.
Separate from the albero trees, pirang and banya trees grow in abundance. Their wild, intertwining limbs and thick canopies provide the forest with not only shade and protection from the elements, but they also shield attacks from other kingdoms. Not that attacks could happen, with the Spell that was cast two-hundred years ago still in place. The Spell sent beings back to their own kingdoms and ensured that they couldn’t leave unless they gave up their magic, a process that I had read was extremely painful and resulted in loss of life within a week. In the mortals’ case, crossing borders meant giving up decades of their lives until they, too, were days away from death.
There is one exception to the consequences of the Spell that no other kingdom is aware of. It’s a tightly guarded secret, one that my ancestors decided should be kept during the aftermath of the Spell’s casting. Mages can walk through the magical borders without repercussion. It isn’t exactly known how or why that is the case—perhaps it’s because of the queen of Void Magic who originally cast it—but this loophole has been kept quiet for two centuries. Despite our ability to walk into the other realms without consequence, it’s very rare for any mage to actually leave. It has become apparent over time that even if the Spell weren’t in place, we are not exactly welcome in other kingdoms. Past foreign rulers felt that the mage queen, Lucia, made a horrible mistake and was too hurried in her decision to end the war happening at the time. They blamed all mages and made sure it was known that we were not wanted in their lands. So our people remain content here—surrounded by the trees and the safety they provide. If I’m being honest, it sounds utterly boring to find fulfillment in just merely existing, but I suppose I’m a bit of an anomaly that way.
Daje and I continue on the trail of moss-covered gray stones that weave through the forest and straight to the palace—though palace is too fancy a word for the warm and loving place Nox and I grew up in. I drink in the greenery around us, an abundance of color and fragrance everywhere I look. Flowers in every shade and variety grow around homes and even on top of them. Wild gardens and fruit bushes dot the land in each direction. The people here relish being surrounded by so much vegetation, by so much life.
After a few minutes, we finally reach the white stone steps that lead up to the palace. Nodding to the guards as we pass, we take the numerous steps two at a time—playfully racing each other until we reach the top. Built squarely in the middle of four of the largest albero trees in the kingdom, the three-story estate somehow manages to camouflage into the dense forest around it. A wrap-around balcony lines both the lower and upper levels, the structure made from a combination of white and black stones and wood. Each floor has arching windows every few feet, allowing what sunlight shines through the forest to pour into the palace. Green vines with small white flowers wrap around each of the balcony beams, adding not only to structural stability but the efficacy of concealment as well. Small spelled flames in glass orbs hang every few feet all around the palace, illuminating the structure with a buttery glow.
I push the large wooden double doors of the palace open, the mage sigil of an albero tree under the stars carved delicately into them. Our sandals scuff slightly on the black stone floors as we walk, and I realize I never asked Daje where I was supposed to meet my father.
“He is in the council room.” Daje’s voice echoes faintly off of all the stone that not only lines the floor but makes up the walls as well.
“How did you know what I was thinking?” I gape, turning to look at where he walks beside me.
“Ah, that is a secret I’ll never tell,” he taunts with a wink. When I narrow my eyes at him, he laughs heartily until we’re a few steps away from the council room. “The secret is that you said it out loud.”
I roll my eyes in response, bumping him with my shoulder as I step forward to open the door, but Daje does it first. I plaster on a small smile as I pass him, but a part of me wishes he wasn’t so chivalrous . I’ll never be the type of woman that preens over such acts, but Daje—despite being my oldest friend—believes I might find those things attractive. And for all that I care about him, I just can’t make myself feel for him in the same way he so obviously feels for me. Even if he’s never actually confessed those feelings.
Inside the council room, a long wooden table sits in the middle, the natural edge of it curving like the waves of the ocean. Around it are twelve chairs—one at the head of the table where my father sits, five on either side of him where the council members sit, and one at the end where my mother sits when she attends meetings. Two massive chandeliers of glowing flame are evenly spaced above, casting the room with enough light to make out the intricate details carved into the wood.
My father’s gray eyes meet mine, a copycat to the color of my own. A symbol of the pure mage blood flowing through our veins, which makes the fact that I was born with zero magic even more gutting. When my older brother Nox dropped his blood into the Cauldron of Vires, the flame that grew was the largest our realm had seen in at least two centuries. He not only has an abundance of magic, but he can wield it more easily without growing as tired as the other mages his age, and even some that are older.
My hopes were high when it was time for my own ceremony two years later, and I couldn’t wait to join Nox in all the different magic classes of the mage schools. There was a small part of me that thought maybe I’d have even more magic than him. Not because I thought it was a competition, but because I’ve always felt like I was different. Like I was made for more. I suppose the gods had a good laugh at that. I’m the princess of the Mage Kingdom who comes from two powerful parents, yet I am also the first mage in history to be born without magic.
I’ll never forget the look on my father’s face when not even a spark grew from the cauldron after my blood dropped in. He wasn’t upset or even angry, as I worried he might be. It was pity that filled the depths of his gaze as he realized his daughter was magicless. When the crowd gaped in confusion after my fifth attempt at drawing any sort of ember, my parents and brother hugged me tightly and promised it would be okay.
As king and queen, they created a special curriculum for me to continue my studies like normal. As if I were normal. And I quickly realized that if I couldn’t wield magic, then I would sharpen every other possible tool at my disposal. While the mage children my age played with their magic and learned summoning and infusing, I spent my time reading as much as possible about all topics and sparring with our instructor, Dilan. Being a princess didn’t stop other kids from bullying me about being magicless, though. So I hardened myself until I no longer cared about the opinions of others that weren’t close to me. I became formidable in every other way that I could. As I got older, and the jabs became harsher, I refused to let it affect me.
Then the offers for marriage started flowing in. I overheard my father talking with my mother about how unusual it was to have so many non-nobility ask to wed a princess, and I knew it was because they viewed me as less for what I lacked. It was even brought up in the council by some of the older members that perhaps I should be “encouraged” to marry the strongest magic wielder of eligible age, though my father quickly and furiously shut that down.
It’s not that I don’t want to marry eventually or that I even care if I marry someone who is of nobility or not. I simply want to have the freedom to focus on what I view as my most important task—finding my magic and fixing it as a whole for the kingdom. I want my freedom to explore while also knowing I have somewhere to anchor a home to. I want to be challenged and forced to look at things from new perspectives without my intelligence being questioned. I crave someone who doesn’t want to dull all my jagged edges, but instead sharpens them with their own. Not in competition, but in mutual understanding and respect. There is nothing wrong with settling down, but I was never made to settle. Certainly not with anyone who can’t let me be who I am supposed to be.
Shaking my head lightly to clear my thoughts, I walk to my father’s right, leaning in to kiss the top of his head. His long black hair is tied back, stark against the light gray color of his tunic.
“How is my darling daughter today?” my father asks, his eyes coltish as he takes me in.
“I’m well, where is everyone else? Is Nox okay?” I inquire with a gesture to the empty seats around the table.
“Yes, your brother is fine. I received a letter from him this morning.” I relax my shoulders at my father’s response, nearly sighing in relief. “This isn’t a council issue,” he says, his lips sliding into a teasing smile. “I called you here because I received another offer for your hand in marriage.” My loud, irritated groan fills the space as he laughs. Daje stands on the opposite side of the table from me, chuckling as well, though I notice it doesn’t quite hold his usual levity.
“Please tell me that I did not leave in the middle of my experiments only to find out that some random man in the capital thinks himself my savior for being willing to marry me. Oh look at the poor magicless princess; surely she must need a man to save her from her own existence .” My hands gesture wildly as I continue my mocking of whichever idiot assumes I want to be tied down simply because the magic in my blood is somehow blocked.
“I thought you might react this way, but I still had to tell you nonetheless.”
“You couldn’t possibly wait for our dinner tonight?” I snark, my hands resting on my hips.
My father’s smile widens as he shrugs. “I was bored and needed some entertainment.”
I scoff and flip him my middle finger, which he heartily laughs at. We eventually fall into chatting about the man who asked for my hand as well as the updates with Nox. Daje, as the son of—and advisor to—one of my father’s oldest and most-trusted council members, is able to listen to the details that not many outside these walls know of. To them, Nox is out exploring our kingdom, enjoying some freedom before he steps into the role of heir apparent. But the truth of his absence is much more frightening. I’ve only seen my brother a handful of times in recent years because of the mission he is on for my father—for our kingdom.
When the council members start to filter in for their daily meeting, I give my father a hug and leave, Daje quick on my heels. “So what would it take for a marriage proposal to be accepted by the incomparable Bahira?” he asks in a joking tone, but I’ve known Daje for far too long to not hear the genuine interest hidden there.
Shit, I knew this was coming. My shoulders tense, knowing that he would propose to me this very moment if he thought there was a chance I’d say yes. So I deflect the only way I can that won’t hurt his feelings—with sarcasm.
“Hmm, well obviously I’m looking for someone wealthy,” I start, a forced dreamy look in my eyes. Despite the underlying seriousness lining his features, he can’t help the small curve of his lips. “And of course, I need someone super powerful, like the most powerful.” Daje rolls his eyes.
“Be serious, Bahira,” he grumbles. “This is, what, your twelfth marriage offer this year alone? I’m just curious why you haven’t accepted any of them.”
I sigh. Daje is many things: funny, altruistic, an exceptional swordsman, but a talented liar he is not. He wants to know the things that would make me agree to his proposal. My heart cracks a little at the thought.
“I don’t want someone to marry me because they think they’re doing me a favor. Most of the men proposing are ones that never would have normally if I could render magic,” I answer, keeping my gaze forward.
He scoffs, hands clasping behind his back as we pass some guards and walk up the stone steps to the third floor, where my bedroom is.
“Since when has someone’s station in the kingdom mattered to you?” he grills me, causing frustration to prickle my skin. “Because they aren’t the most powerful mages, you automatically refuse them?” He keeps his face neutral when I peer at him, but I don’t miss the judgment in his tone.
“Don’t twist my words, Daje. What I am saying is that I want someone to choose me because they love me as I am. Not in spite of me being magicless, and not out of some sense of imaginary duty to the kingdom.”
We reach the top of the stairs and round the corner in silence before stopping in front of my bedroom door. Purple and green vines wrap along the arched door frame, a blue petalum flower—the fragrance subtle and sweet—permanently bloomed in the center at the very top. When I was born, my father knew this room would be mine so he spelled the lush, long flat petals of the flower to stay open and redolent. I turn the handle to the door, intent on ending this conversation, when Daje stops me with a gentle hand on my shoulder.
“Bahira, you know there are men in this kingdom that care for you as you are. Ones that don’t give a shit about you not having magic,” he says, voice low and gravelly, but I hear the words he isn’t speaking— I’m right here .
Daje would be a fine partner, one that would care for me and treat me well. It probably makes me an idiot, but I can’t force myself to long for him the way he does for me. I wish I could, it would make things so much simpler, but he doesn’t challenge me in any way—he doesn’t stoke the fires of curiosity and discovery. On paper, we should fit together perfectly in some respects, but in spirit, we couldn’t be more opposite. He’s a good, kind man, and that’s enough for most. Unfortunately, I’m not most.
When I don’t respond, he removes his hand with a small sigh. “Just… think about it, Bahira.”
I look at him over my shoulder and smile faintly, not wanting to hurt his feelings but unable to give him hope for something more—unable to be what he wants me to be. He waits for a few seconds before turning and walking back down the hallway to the stairs. Exhaling, I enter the rest of the way into my room, gently shutting the door behind me. Leaning against it, I survey my personal space with a contented sigh. It might be my favorite spot in this realm—excluding the library. In the center of the room, a large circular emerald green rug covers the dark wood floors. They contrast with the creams and whites of the stacked stone walls. Potted plants of all varieties local to our kingdom fill each corner with little pieces of life. Across from me, a wall with three windows and a set of glass doors, which lead to the veranda, let the trickling daylight in.
There are still a few hours before the sun goes down and I’m to have family dinner, so I quickly get undressed and start a bath, the water steaming hot by the time the tub is filled. While soaking, I reminisce on my experiment from earlier. I’ve tried infusing water with many different strengths of raw magic. My hands are calloused from the many flowers and leaves I’ve plucked to see how they interact with the magic-infused water. One hundred and sixty two attempts to break this damn curse, disease—whatever this is—in our kingdom to free up our magic and return it to what it used to be. And each try has been a failure.
Cursing under my breath, I finish washing and drain the tub, reaching for a towel hanging on the wall next to me. I wrap the soft blue cotton around me and lean against the counter while I wait for the mirror to defog. My fingers drum on the glittering gray stone as I think about what I could possibly test next. The potency of Hadrik’s older magic gives new life to the plants, whereas the younger mage’s magic only temporarily feeds it. I have even tried combining mage magics in the past with no discernable difference in the outcome, but maybe I need to switch up the medium. Maybe water isn’t working as the correct conduit for the raw magic.
When the mirror clears, I stare at my gray eyes and blow out a breath. I know I’m reaching a point where others might tell me to give up, but I’ve always been a stubborn woman. My father likes to joke that I was born with enough moxie to lead two kingdoms. I just know—a feeling that can’t be explained—that I was made to do this. Why else would I be cursed with no magic of my own?