5
The village green was alive with scents and colors as the sun dipped below the horizon.
Lanterns bobbed overhead, strung between wagons and poles, casting golden light that danced on the faces of villagers and travelers alike.
The bonfire was now lit—an enormous, roaring blaze at the heart of the celebration—but it was the food stalls that drew Kurt’s immediate attention.
Malea walked beside him, her eyes wide with wonder at the cheerful chaos.
They had already passed a meat skewer cart, a table stacked high with fruit pastries, and a bubbling cauldron of spiced stew before she paused at a vendor selling flatbread layered with roasted vegetables and crumbly white cheese.
“This one,” she said with a little smile, glancing at him. “It smells amazing.”
“Then it’s yours,” Kurt replied, stepping forward to order, then pay the vendor.
A moment later, Kurt handed Malea a warm bundle and moved to the next stall for his own plate of grilled root vegetables drizzled in honey and pepper sauce. The scent of the sauce had been calling him for the past half hour, and he found it impossible to resist.
From there, they waded into the sea of dining tables that had been set in a clear space in front of the food stalls.
There were a mismatched collection of benches, covered crates, and upturned barrels repurposed for the night.
Lanterns glowed softly against the deepening sky.
Laughter and conversation rolled over them like a tide, but it wasn’t overwhelming. The air felt festive, not crowded.
“There,” Kurt said, pointing to a small wooden table tucked between a tall stack of crates and a low Jinn instrument cart. A pair of stools waited, unoccupied.
Malea nodded and followed him over, tucking her cloak tighter against the cooling air. They sat down, and for a moment, they just ate. The food was simple but good. Filling, fragrant, and perfectly spiced.
After a while, Kurt leaned back and said, “Do you remember the time Isolde caught you sneaking sugar crystals out of her storage cupboard?”
Malea’s laugh came instantly, low and surprised. “I thought you didn’t see that!”
“Oh, I saw it. You were covered in sugar crystals, glittering in the sunshine. You looked tasty.” He chomped down on a piece of bread as he grinned, teasing her.
She gave him a mock-scowl, then giggled, eyes twinkling. “You’re one to talk. Weren’t you the one who almost blew up the red kiln?”
Kurt groaned, dropping his head to the table with exaggerated shame. “That’s going to haunt me forever.”
“The door wouldn’t close properly for months until General Brighton finally took a battle mace to it to straighten the metal hinge,” she said, still laughing.
He lifted his head again, watching her with a quiet smile as her laughter faded, replaced by a gentle warmth in her gaze. Her cheeks were pink in the lantern light.
“I forgot how much we used to laugh,” she said softly, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear.
Kurt looked at her then—really looked—and his heart gave a thump that surprised him.
She wasn’t a child anymore. Not the clever, curious girl he remembered slipping between Isolde’s apprentices like a shadow.
She was a woman now. Her face was finer, her expression deeper, more thoughtful.
And beautiful. Not just pretty, but glowing in the way that happened when someone was entirely themselves.
“You’ve grown up,” he said quietly, not sure why he spoke it aloud.
Her smile faltered just slightly, then returned, softer. “So have you.”
Their eyes met, and something held in the space between them. Something unspoken, delicate, and new. Kurt cleared his throat and looked down at the last bit of his food.
“You know,” he said, “I always thought you’d end up working for Mistress Isolde full-time.
Not in glass, but in the other craft she taught us.
You were better than half the boys.” He wasn’t going to come out and talk about learning spycraft in the open.
Not even keeping his voice low. But he knew Malea understood his meaning.
She smiled. “I liked the gem hall. It’s quieter. And I can still observe things. Just with a different set of tools.”
“Still serving the crown,” he murmured, more to himself than her. “Even on this journey?” he asked, wanting to know if she was working a spy mission in addition to the overt purpose of her trip. Just like he was.
She nodded faintly.
They didn’t need to say more. Some truths between them didn’t require speech. Overhead, a series of small fireworks burst into the sky. Gold and blue sparks shimmered like frost as they shot skyward.
Malea gasped, leaning back slightly to watch. Her pretty face was tilted upward, the flickering light playing across her cheekbones. Kurt didn’t watch the sky. He watched her.
And for the first time in years, he wondered what it would mean to stop traveling from place to place in service to his guild and the crown. To stop for someone. To stop for her.
The fireworks burst overhead in shimmering arcs of gold, silver, and ice blue, scattering light across the festival like stardust. Malea tilted her face upward, breath caught in her throat, utterly enchanted.
But it wasn’t just the fireworks that made her feel lightheaded.
It was him. Kurt. Her old friend, now grown into a devastatingly handsome man.
Kurt sat across from her at the small table, close enough that she could feel the heat of his presence like the distant bonfire itself. She risked a glance from the corner of her eye. He wasn’t watching the sky. He was watching her.
She looked away quickly, cheeks warming.
When had he become this…man? She remembered him lanky and full of boyish swagger.
He’d always been confident, always joking with gentle humor, but now, he moved with a quiet steadiness, his body honed, his gaze sharper.
Still kind, still teasing, only, there was something more.
Something in the way he looked at her that made her stomach twist with nervous energy.
She realized she was most definitely attracted to him. But she didn’t dare believe he might feel the same. She wasn’t very experienced in matters of the heart, or even simple attraction. Instead, she decided to focus on something she actually understood.
“Our paths cross again, and we’re both heading north,” she said softly, eyes on the firelight dancing in her half-finished cup of tea. “That’s…convenient.”
“Convenient,” Kurt repeated, a smile in his voice.
“I assume you’re not just hunting obsidian,” she challenged.
He gave a quiet chuckle. “Just like you’re not only looking for pretty rocks to facet.”
She looked over at him, and for a moment, their eyes met—truth held silently between them.
“I’m not asking for details,” she said quietly.
“Neither am I,” he agreed.
“But if we happen to notice the same things…” she trailed off.
“…it’d be foolish not to compare notes,” he finished.
She nodded once. “We help each other, if we can.”
“Of course,” he said. “That’s what friends do.”
The word “friends” landed with a soft thud in her chest. Before she could respond, a group of laughing revelers stumbled to the table beside them, carrying mugs of mulled wine and armfuls of sweetcakes.
Someone spilled cider. Someone else banged the corner of their table with a hip, jostling them both. The spell broke.
Malea straightened, adjusting her cloak and gathering her things.
Kurt mirrored her actions, standing and stretching.
They tossed their trash into the collection bin and turned toward the bonfire, now crackling merrily at the center of the green.
As they neared the crowd, a familiar voice called out.
“Malea! Over here!”
Zhara Rasim waved her over from the cluster of Jinn gathered near their wagon. Mira was sitting on a blanket nearby, and Madam Rasim held a cup of something steaming.
Malea turned to Kurt, hesitating. “Would you mind? I could introduce you to them. They’re friends of Master Goldman.”
“I’d be happy to meet them,” he said easily. “Lead on.”
They reached the Rasims, and Malea gestured between them. “This is Kurt. He’s an old friend from my apprentice days at the glassmaker’s hall.”
Kurt bowed politely. “Pleasure to meet you all.”
Madam Rasim’s eyes lit up. “Are you the one who supplies the little glass bottles to the Avery ladies?”
“I am,” Kurt said with a modest smile.
“They’re beautiful,” Sali said, grinning. “Mama bought a healing tincture last month just because she wanted the bottle.”
Madam Rasim chuckled. “You have a gift. Your little bottles are just lovely.”
“Thank you,” he said, clearly pleased but also starting to edge away from the growing attention. The moment had shifted. It was a bit too bright, too crowded, too public.
“Well,” he said, nodding to Malea, “thank you for the company.”
“Thank you for dinner,” she said, and tried not to sound disappointed.
“I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Yes,” she said, then added more quietly, “be safe.”
“You too,” he said, and then, he was gone, fading into the firelit crowd with Sir Arch swooping down to meet him in a graceful glide.
Malea stood a moment longer, heart full and unsettled.
She turned back to the Rasims with a smile, accepting a cup of tea and settling beside Mira.
The fire warmed her skin, but her thoughts were far away—on a glassmaker who wasn’t just a boy anymore, and a spark between them that she hadn’t been expecting.
“He has a virkin too?” Zhara nodded to Kurt’s retreating back and the little green companion that was now seated on his shoulder.
“Sir Arch,” Malea confirmed. “He’s the one Lady Keera has been spending time with during the day while we all travel. Arch grew up at Mistress Isolde’s workshop. I guess he still lives there. Or maybe he just travels around with Kurt. I’m not really sure. But they’re friends.”
“Interesting that you both have close virkin friends,” Zhara replied, looking at Malea shrewdly.
Malea wasn’t sure what the other girls was getting at, but she felt the need to respond.
“When I lived at Mistress Isolde’s, Kurt and I, and one other younger boy, could talk to the dragons. We were able to tell the other apprentices what the dragons were saying when we all played together,” she revealed.
“You can speak with dragons?” Sali asked, her eyes wide. Malea nodded.
“I’ve heard tales of the dragon games played in Valdis Maj, but I’ve never seen it myself,” Madam Rasim put in. “You were part of those games?”
Malea nodded. “Yes, ma’am. Lady Shera is a very young snow dragon, and she lived next door.
In the evening, after our work was done for the day, she would hop over the wall and play with us.
Word got out, and some of the city folk would come and watch our games because dragons were, and still are, a novelty in Valdis Maj. ”
“They are a novelty everywhere, except Draconia, perhaps,” Madam Rasim observed knowingly.
“Have you ever been to Draconia?” Malea asked, wanting to take the spotlight off her own past, if possible.
“Not I, but my brother travels the route over the Dragon’s Teeth every summer. He speaks of the colorful dragons and their fighting partners. It is a strange land with many wonders and lots of dragons.”
“I have seen some of the colorful dragons that visit the King and Queen. The emissaries from Draconia sometimes fly over the city, but I’ve never talked to one of those dragons.
It seems so odd to have so many colors to their scales when our lands have only ever seen snow and ice dragons,” Malea admitted.
“There are many wonders in the wider world, child,” Madam Rasim told her gently.
“The dragons of Draconia are all the colors of the rainbow, and to the south, there are a whole breed of sea dragons that look quite different but are no less mighty, according to the bards’ tales.
Then, there are the rare black dragons.”
A knowing look passed between the Rasim daughters and their mother, but none of them elaborated. The conversation didn’t progress further, though Malea wished it had. What was so mysterious about black dragons? She’d seen one fly over the city a few times, so they couldn’t be that rare, could they?
They all watched the bonfire burn and drank mulled wine while the minstrels played and the villagers celebrated the opening of their festival. It had been a good day, and Malea found herself nodding off before finally calling it a night and seeking her bed in the wagon.
*
The crystal cooled in the mage Falkir’s hands with a faint hiss, its facets catching the torchlight like frozen fire.
Perfect. At last. Falkir’s breath came fast, half from the strain of channeling the magic and half from the giddy relief of seeing the flawless lattice form exactly as he’d envisioned. No clouding. No fractures.
He set it down with reverence on the padded stand. “It is done,” he murmured. “Finally…I’ve uncovered the secret.”
Heavy footsteps echoed in the corridor, then Balreal burst into the workshop, his presence filling the cramped space like a storm cloud. His sharp gaze fell on the gem.
“So. You can do it, after all.” His voice held a sneer that Falkir wanted to wipe off the man’s bovine face, but he dared not. Not yet.
“Yes, milord,” Falkir said, forcing his voice steady. “But it requires tremendous energy. Hours of preparation for each—”
“You’ll have the mine,” Balreal interrupted, already striding toward the door as if the matter were settled. “I’ve arranged workshops there. The bolts are being forged even now. You will move your operation immediately and produce as many of these diamonds as you can. The larger, the better.”
Falkir’s stomach tightened. “The size you’re asking for… Each one drains me, milord. Even with the ley lines at the mine, the power cost will be—”
Balreal turned on him, voice like a whipcrack. “I am not interested in your fatigue, Falkir. I am interested in weapons. In victory. You will go to the mine. Today. And you will deliver. The craftsmen are already there and set up, awaiting larger crystals to hone. Don’t let me down.”
Before Falkir could reply, the warlord was gone, the echo of his boots fading down the hall. For a moment, Falkir simply stared at the door, his hands trembling—not with fear, but with a dark thrill.
“Fool,” he whispered to the empty room. “You think I’m doing this for you?
Idiot. No. I’m doing this for me.” His gaze shifted to the crystal, and his lips curved in a bitter smile.
“Every bolt tipped with my diamonds will be another nail in the dragons’ coffin.
They will scream and die, and their great wings will fall from the sky. ”
He cradled the enormous gem again, feeling its cold perfection bite into his palms. “Let Balreal think himself master. It matters not. When the last dragon lies dead, all will remember the name Falkir.”