Chapter 16 #3
“You don’t know this story?” I ask, surprised.
They do live in a completely different region of the continent, and they allegedly don’t leave it often.
I know nothing of their customs, what they study, what they even know of the rest of the world.
So it makes sense they may not know a lot of stories I grew up hearing either.
I’m about to tell it, but Daegan cuts in with a sigh.
“Someone else thought they could break the curse by killing the witch who cast it. Their theory was proven wrong. Obviously.”
Maethrel nods in acknowledgement. “My grandmother. Ethmarel.”
I whip my head to him. “I had a feeling. Or at least, I had hoped.”
“Your blood might work,” Daegan says.
“Perhaps,” Maethrel responds in that irksome way.
“But who cuts it?” I ask, glancing around at our small party. “The one born from ember… a dragon?”
Raef raises his eyebrow in approval, looking hopeful.
Maethrel doesn’t look like he’s in agreement.
“If you know all these answers, why won’t you just tell us?”
His eyes flutter shut for a moment, and for the first time, I see sorrow and sadness in his expression, even with his eyes shut. “My most powerful magic is seer magic. I have seen the outcomes. Some things I can tell you, and some, you have to discover on your own. Otherwise, all is lost.”
“So you’re saying we have a chance?” I ask, hope flowing through my veins again.
“There’s always a chance,” Maethrel says simply.
Well, that doesn’t feel as encouraging.
“Do you even want the curse broken?” Raef asks. “You seem pretty cozy in your creepy little forest.”
“You mean my creepy little forest that almost took you out.” Maethrel’s eyes snap open, and there’s a viciousness in the depths of them that I hadn’t seen before as he shoots daggers at Raef, and suddenly, I’m terrified of him.
He’s holding back his power, but I somehow saw a glimpse of it in his eyes, and I think it’s darker and more powerful than any of us realize. It feels… ancient.
Raef shrugs, not all that affected by the switch in demeanor. I don’t know if he’s unwise in underestimating it or he simply doesn’t care.
Maethrel relaxes again, glancing at Daegan.
“I’ve lost things to it, just like everyone else.
” There’s a sorrow in the words. He terrifies me, but I also feel a twinge of sympathy for him at the look in his eyes.
How old must he be if he’s the grandchild of Ethmarel?
A couple hundred years old, maybe. He doesn’t physically appear much older than any of us, but it’s hard to tell with witches.
It’s the same with the elves, the dragon shifters, and the Dothronites, just to name a few.
Some lifespans are a few hundred years, some a little less.
Once elves reach maturity around eighteen to twenty years, they start aging extremely slowly and can live about four hundred years.
I think the dragon shifters, from what I’ve read, have maybe half of that lifespan.
“Well, can we just cut you and take your blood now, then? It won’t hurt. Too much.” Raef says.
Maethrel gives him a sarcastic grin. “And what will you cut me with?”
“One born from ember…” I mumble aloud, my eyes not focusing on anything in this room. It’s completely still, besides the blurry flickering of the fire in my peripheral, the popping of it filling my ears.
I shift my gaze back into focus, meeting Maethrel’s eyes. He knows I know.
“Emberstone.”
A slow nod from him.
“Made of embers…” Raef says, absently nodding to my question.
“Emberstones are incredibly rare though. Aren’t they made in the Eternal Pit…
above the veil where no one has been in a thousand years?
I’ve never even seen one, I don’t believe…
” I murmur, slowly losing hope again. But then I realize…
I’m sharing space with two dragon shifters.
Ones with many secrets. If anyone knows where an emberstone can be found, it’s them. I whip my gaze toward them.
Raef and Daegan are sharing a weighted look. A whole conversation seems to be passing between them.
Maethrel unstoppers an empty glass vial and sets it on the table in front of him.
I suddenly feel like I’m the only odd one out in the room, and everyone knows something I don’t. I despise the feeling.
Maethrel glances at Daegan, then holds his wrist out with a dramatic fashion, his white sleeve dangling beneath his arm.
I furrow my eyebrows in confusion.
Then suddenly, as Daegan reaches for his eyebrow and pulls out the pointy onyx stud there, it all makes sense, and I feel like a fool.
The very first day I met him, as he straddled me with his knife to my throat, the strange, shiny black stone stood out to me as something peculiar. I close my eyes and shake my head.
When I hear him approach the table, I lift my lids, my eyes landing on him as he kneels beside the witch.
“This may hurt a little, it’s not the sharpest cutting tool.”
I look away.
“There,” Daegan says. I take that as my cue.
Returning my gaze to them, I find Maethrel letting his blood drip into the flask. That alone isn’t easy for me to watch, but I force myself anyway. I have a feeling I’m going to be seeing a lot more bloody, violent things on this journey.
He wraps a shimmering white material over the cut on his hand, then rips the end.
“May I?” Daegan asks. Maethrel’s closed-mouth grin widens nearly to his ears as he nods.
Daegan doesn’t notice it. He’s unrolling some for himself, then rips the end and approaches me, kneeling beside me. “Hand,” he says to me.
“What?” I say in confusion.
“Give me your hand.”
I freeze for a moment, not processing, then I feel like a fool for remembering the deep cut Maethrel left in my palm. I hold it out to him slowly, hesitantly.
He takes my hand, flips it palm up and rests it on his knee. Heat creeps up my neck and into my cheeks as he wraps it with speed and ease. It’s not incredibly gentle, but I wouldn’t expect that from him anyway. “There.”
“Thank you…”
He gives a curt nod, avoiding my gaze, then I watch him retreat to the other side of the table, standing with his arms crossed once more.
“So,” Maethrel says with mischief in his eyes as he holds up the flask filled with his very valuable witch blood. “Who gets to safekeep it?”
We all glance at each other, silent.
Way to throw a firebomb into our very new, hesitant alliance, Maethrel.
Or whatever this thing is. Reluctant enemies accidentally finding themselves on the same path.
Raef clears his throat. “I’ll hold it.”
I whip my head to my right. “No. I will.”
He raises his eyebrows.
“I’m the one who got us here. You would be completely in the dark still if it weren’t for me.”
“We used our impeccable intuition, knew you were up to something, eavesdropped to get information, then followed you here. It wasn’t like it was an invitation,” Raef says. “And you never would have gotten that blood if it weren’t for us.”
“I’ve been chasing this since I was fourteen,” I retort, getting angry. “How do I know you guys won’t take that blood and leave me behind here and now? You got what you wanted from me.”
Daegan cuts in, stepping closer to me with his arms crossed and his jaw tight. “Who are you working with?”
“What?”
“You’re not doing this alone…”
“Yes I am.” It sounds pathetic coming out. I didn’t mean to sound so vulnerable, but I’m breaking under his intensity.
He eyes me suspiciously.
“How do we know you’re even trying to break the curse? Maybe Daddy put you up to this, and you’re tracking the items down so they can be destroyed, leaving the curse in place for eternity.”
I pull my head back in shock. “I would never…”
“What’s in it for you?” he asks. It seems we’re the only two in the room with the heated exchange.
I shake my head, averting my gaze. “Nothing.”
He doesn’t respond. For a few moments, the only sound in the room is the crackling of the fire again.
“It goes to her,” Maethrel says, offering the glass to me.
I reach for it slowly. It’s not a victory I want to rub in their faces, but I don’t argue.
I can feel Daegan’s disapproval, see it out of the corner of my eye.
I tuck it into the inner pocket of my cloak.
“Is there anything else you can enlighten us with today?” Raef finally speaks. “We should definitely be going soon, before the night catches us.”
“No. You may go.”
We all rise and make our way to the front entrance. It feels weird to be leaving now, after so many secrets and revelations were exposed in this small, warm cottage.
“Thank you,” I say to Maethrel. I almost reach out to hug him, but I stop myself. He would probably think it strange. But I’ve grown sort of fond of him in this short time, even though he still scares me. And irks me.
“One more thing,” Maethrel says, stopping us. “You will meet two friends unlike either of your kinds very soon on your journey. Trust them. Let them join you.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. That’s a very bold demand to make, asking us to blindly trust a couple strangers with such a big secret when we haven’t even met them yet. “We’ll see.” That’s the best I can give him right now.
He doesn’t look surprised as he nods at us with a smile. “And trust each other,” he says with a smooth, lilting voice.
An interesting choice of parting words. They feel ominous, laced with a warning.
I follow Raef outside into the dark woods and Daegan follows behind. We make it all the way down the lined path and onto the barely-there trail when Daegan says, “What the fuck?”
We both spin and look at him. His face is scrunched in confusion as he feels different pouches and straps.
“My favorite dagger. I must have left it in there when I was laying you down. I’ll be right back.”
“Want us to go with you?”
The ghost of a smile lights his face as he lifts an eyebrow at me, already turning to walk back toward the cottage. “I’ll be fine.”
“Don’t be long,” Raef calls after him.
We watch as Maethrel opens the door nearly the moment he knocks, then he guides him inside and gently closes it.
“That was… weird,” I comment.