Chapter 13
My feet started moving while my mind was still in chaos. I needed to get away from the whispers and the exclamations and the many watching eyes.
But I had been facing toward Zak, and when I ran, my feet took me too close to him. I was aiming for one of the walkways, planning to pass beneath the arches, cutting across the walkway to whatever lay behind the University buildings. But Zak caught sight of me as I ran.
“Aria!” he called, his voice glad, and I heard a fresh wave of murmurs behind me.
I didn’t turn, ignoring his call and urging my feet to run faster. I needed to get out of sight.
It was the only thought I could manage. Once I was alone, I could try to process the enormous, terrible news I had just received.
But running footsteps sounded behind me. When I darted through the walkway and rounded the corner of the building, I wasn’t alone.
A park spread out behind the University, softening the stone of the building with its greenery. I plunged into the closest stand of trees, finding a small clearing at its center with yet another fountain.
“Aria!” Zak sounded slightly out of breath as he followed me into the trees. “Why are you running?”
I finally came to a stop, my breath heaving as I spun to look at him.
But the words of dismay and recrimination on my lips died at the sight of his handsome face, lined with concern as he waited for my answer.
Longing rose up in me, more potent than ever now that I knew, without a doubt, that a truly insuperable barrier lay between us.
Zak’s expression changed as he took in mine, a blazing light coming into his eyes.
“You did this first,” he said in a throaty murmur. “Now it’s my turn.”
With two long strides he reached me, his strong arms seizing me around the waist and pulling me against his chest. One of his hands slid up to cradle the back of my head, tilting my face toward him as his lips came down over mine.
The fire from our last kiss sprang instantly back into being as I melted into his embrace, all thoughts driven from my mind. My hands reached up to twine around his neck, and he made a low noise in his throat, breaking off the kiss only to tilt his head and press his lips to mine again.
My knees trembled, and I clung to him, returning his kiss with equal passion, reality forgotten before the strength of our shared emotion.
But a sudden thought sprang into my mind, fully formed, and it was enough to make me break away, pushing myself free as I stumbled backward, panting and staring at him with wide eyes.
“It was you!” I said.
“What?” He sounded dazed, his eyes only slowly coming into focus.
“You were the one who got my name added to the list for the sealing ceremony.”
His gaze snapped to my face, his eyes instantly alert.
“I thought you were from a minor mage family,” I continued, “so it never occurred to me you would have the influence to do it. But you’re not a minor mage. You’re a Callinos.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Yes, I’m a Callinos. But I never meant—”
“Don’t try to claim you didn’t know I’d mistaken your identity,” I snapped, the enormity of it all once more at the front of my mind.
“All those times you talked about your family. You must have chosen your words and stories with care so as not to give yourself away. If I’d known more about mage society, I would have worked it out anyway. But I was such a fool.”
I ran a hand down my face. “You had a housekeeper and a nanny and a whole team of servants besides. How could I have thought you were from a poorer family?”
“I didn’t want to put more barriers between us.” He stepped forward and tried to take my hand, but I stepped quickly back out of his reach.
“I never lied,” he said quickly. “Everything I told you was true. But it’s also true that I didn’t clarify my family’s standing or correct your assumptions about it. I didn’t want to.”
“But how could you, Zak?” Tears sprang to my eyes.
“I was going to tell you once we started here,” he said, his earlier fire extinguished. “I didn’t expect you to hear it from someone else the moment you stepped through the gate.” He watched me, his gaze worried. “But does it matter so much? It doesn’t make a difference to me.”
“How can you say that?” I cried. “Of course it makes a difference. Don’t you know how easy you are to love, Zak?”
He sucked in a breath at the word love, his face lighting up again.
“You love me? I hoped after that last day near the market, but then you cut off all contact and wouldn’t talk about it. I was afraid—”
“Of course I’m in love with you,” I said bitterly. “And I’m going to end up with my heart ripped into shreds because there’s no possible future for us.”
He stepped toward me again, this time firmly taking my hand.
“Says who?” His voice was low and fierce. “I may be a Callinos, but I’m not royalty. There are no laws about who I have to marry.”
I gave a sour laugh. “But you’re not going to marry a commonborn.”
“Why not?” he demanded. “When you leaped into the alley with a war cry, you leaped straight into my heart as well. I’ve spent the last four years at the Academy with every other mageborn my age in the entire kingdom, and there’s not a one of them I prefer to you.”
His free hand came up to cup my face, and my treacherous body froze, unable to pull away from his gentle touch and the look in his eyes.
“Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?” he murmured.
“Or how incredible your mind is? I grew up around intelligent people, but you’re nothing like my parents.
Your mind isn’t a barrier between you and others, like it is for them—as if they’re operating on a different plane from the rest of us.
I was a deficient student as much to spite them as anything else, but you made study come alive for me.
You opened up your mind and let me into the world of wonder that you see when you learn something new. It was intoxicating.”
His voice dropped to a whisper, and he swayed toward me. “You’re intoxicating, Aria.”
I forced myself to pull from his grip and step back.
“I’m not denying that you feel something toward me.” My voice shook slightly.
Zak shook his head stubbornly. “I love you, Aria. That’s what I feel.”
I shook my head as well. “We’ve been living in a bubble this summer, Zak. But now we’re stepping out into the broader world. And I’ve already had a taste of how odd other people think it is for us to even be friends, let alone something more.”
“I don’t care about other people.”
“That’s easy to say now,” I snapped, trying to rein in the storm of emotions making me dizzy.
“But how long will your love last if your peers ostracize and snub you? Will any discipline head even accept you into their discipline with me weighing you down? They’ll see me as proof that you have poor judgment and a weak mind, however strong your power. ”
He laughed. “Three of the discipline heads are cousins, and one is my aunt. They won’t find me so easy to overlook.”
I groaned. “Do you even hear yourself? That makes it worse! What do you think my life will be like at your side?”
“Then we’ll go to my family’s country estate when we finish at the University,” he said, immediately changing tack.
“My parents never go there because it’s too far from any of their precious libraries.
We can make our own life far from the court and the center of power.
I don’t care about any of that compared to being with you.
We can remain betrothed for a year, or two—or our whole studies if that’s how long it takes for me to win over our families.
I’d marry you tomorrow if I could, but I’ll wait as long as it takes just as long as I know I’ll get to marry you at the end of it and keep you at my side forever. ”
He looked at me with hungry eyes, and I fell back another step.
“Our families.” The words came out shaky.
“What are they going to say? I’m sure you can charm my family into agreeing.
Once they know you’re serious…” I shook my head, imagining just how excited they would be about my unimaginable leap in status.
“But what about your parents? They’ll never consent to you marrying a commonborn girl without any power at all, and you clearly care what they think, or you wouldn’t be here at all. ”
“You’re forgetting why I agreed to come here in the first place.
” Zak’s voice was serious, his eyes on me.
“For most of my time at the Academy, I had no intention of acquiescing and coming to the University. I only agreed to come after I met you. If you remember, I said I was gathering my parents’ goodwill for a time in the future when I would have need of it. This is that time.”
“All the way back then?” I asked in a choked whisper, temporarily robbed of breath.
“I already told you.” He didn’t look away. “You began ensnaring me the moment you leaped into my life.”
His words were beguiling. I wanted to let myself sway toward him—to have his arms around me again as he made me forget all my objections.
But I couldn’t believe in his assurances about the future.
The divide between us was too firmly entrenched.
Who were we to defy all of Ardannian society and its entire history?
If he truly didn’t care about his own future or the contempt of his peers, surely he cared about his future children. My cheeks flushed at the thought of bringing up the subject, but I forced myself to say the words.
“Let’s say we did get married,” I whispered. “What about our future children? Don’t you care about them and how they would be viewed by their peers? Don’t you think they would resent you for making them weak?”
“Who said they’d be weak?” he asked, with more fire than the question warranted.
I stared at him. “Everyone knows that mages cultivate their bloodlines for strength. Strong mages marry other strong mages so that their children are stronger still. It’s how the great families have ensured their power through centuries.
It’s why royals can only marry other royals or members of a great family. ”
“Actually, I heard that law is being repealed,” he said quickly. “The Spoken Mage insisted on it. And look at everything else that’s happening in the kingdom because of her arrival. Times are changing. By the time our children are adults, Ardann will be a different kingdom.”
“I can’t believe it will be that different,” I whispered.
“I’ve actually been thinking about the issue of our children,” he said, making me blush again.
He didn’t seem to notice, though, continuing on with enthusiasm.
“I knew it would be one of my parents’ major objections, so I wanted to have an answer ready.
If I want my children to be more powerful than me, I would need to marry another strong mage—to combine strength with strength.
That makes sense. But the idea that if I marry a commonborn, my children would be guaranteed only weak control of power is just an assumption. No one has ever actually trialed it.”
I frowned. “I thought there had been a few disastrous marriages between a mage and a commonborn in the past, and their children ended up failing the Academy. I thought those examples are why mages are so opposed to the idea.”
“True, there have been occasional mages who married commonborns,” he said, his enthusiasm not diminished.
“But only weak mages from minor families have ever done it. It’s true their children were weak, and everyone blamed the commonborn parent.
But I’m not convinced. I think children of a mage and a commonborn will have every chance of inheriting a similar level of power to their mage parent.
They won’t get an advantage of greater strength, but neither is there any reason to think they’ll be significantly weaker.
And in our case, I have plenty of strength to give our children a good future.
” He said the words simply, without pride. Just stating a fact.
“I—” I stared at him. “But if you’re wrong, we won’t know it until it’s much too late.”
“I’m willing to take that risk, Aria,” he said.
“I don’t care about any of that. The only reason I considered the matter at all is because of my parents.
” His face softened. “I care about our future children, of course.” His voice dropped again.
“But just think how incredible they would be, Aria. With your beauty and mind and my power, I defy anyone in Ardann not to love them.”
I choked, unable to meet his eyes when he looked at me like that.
But I couldn’t trust my response. I couldn’t trust the emotions that drove both of us.
Emotions faded. I had seen enough of life to know that.
Without a sturdy foundation, a relationship built on nothing but emotion would never last. And while my status would be forever lifted by our marriage, Zak would be dragged down.
If the emotions faded, I would still be elevated, but he would be left with nothing. I couldn’t do that to him.
I took two rapid steps back, shaking my head.
“You said we would have a fresh start at the University, Aria,” he pleaded. “This is the fresh start I want. Friendship with you isn’t enough.”
“Yes, we do need a fresh start,” I said, but my voice and face didn’t offer any hope. “In the lower city, we were tutor and student. Here you’re a mage and I’m a commonborn. We’ll be in different subjects and different spheres, and we each need to keep to our own people.”
“Aria, I can’t accept that.” His voice had turned desperate. “You said you loved me.”
“I do,” I whispered. “And that’s why I’m not going to do this to you.”
He called my name again, but I was already walking away, and I didn’t look back.