Chapter 27
Istay in the clearing for a while, trying to collect my scattered thoughts. What the hell just happened? Not only did I break Ruben’s heart, but did I also somehow give him a piece of my magic?
I was touching him, wishing he had magic, and then he somehow created a flame for the first time in his life. It can’t be a coincidence. All I can think is that somehow I gave his natural magic a boost.
My mind reels with the implications of it.
This might be an even worse development than shooting ice from my fingers. An even more dangerous facet to the Issen’s powers than mere ice. If I’m right and I can somehow boost someone’s inherent magic … if that got out, I’d be sold to the highest bidder.
A chill creeps along my spine. Not only would I not get my happy ever after, but I’d also get a life in chains. In servitude. A fate worse than death, or even being stripped of my powers.
My stomach is in knots, but hunger finally drags me to the campsite.
I know instantly that Ruben hasn’t told anyone what happened.
Everyone is just sitting around the fire like normal.
Or as normal as they can get in this group.
And I trust this group. They’re here, travelling away from safety, to help me.
They, at least, deserve to know the full extent of my powers.
Something like this could save us all, and I’m not going to be foolish enough to hide it from them.
Even Kyor, with his overwhelming arseholery, never told a soul about my Issen magic.
I can trust him still with this, if not my heart.
Benny hovers protectively near Loch, Caz sits next to Ruben, and Kyor is sitting on a log by the fire, with Elska just behind him.
The prince’s gaze finds me the moment I step into the circle of light, tracking me like I’m the only thing that matters. Heat prickles at the back of my neck and I have to force myself not to look at him.
Instead, I look solely at Ruben. Whether it was my magic that gave him the gift or not, I still don’t have the right to tell the others what happened.
Not without his permission. And yet as his eyes meet mine, it’s like he knows what I’m asking, and somehow that makes it so much worse.
He knows me so well. And loves me still.
‘Everything all right?’ Caz asks, breaking the silence as she looks at me.
‘Umm.’ The sound hums in my throat as I struggle to know how to answer.
‘Something happened,’ Ruben comments for me. ‘Something with Rose’s magic, we think.’
Kyor’s eyes snap to me as his back stiffens. ‘What? What happened, Rose?’
Well, there’s no backing out of it now.
‘Ruben,’ I ask softly. ‘Can you show them?’
Ruben nods as once again his eyes meet mine. Tired, weary eyes. I hate that I’m making him perform like a circus animal, but sometimes you need actions not words. Sometimes, seeing is believing.
‘I think it’s fading a little,’ Ruben confirms to me, ‘but it’s definitely still there.’
With the slightest hint of a smile, he lifts his palm, and a small flame ignites in the centre.
Caz gasps.
Benny frowns. ‘You said you couldn’t call fire.’
‘I can’t. Couldn’t.’
Kyor is sitting up straighter, a frown marring his forehead.
‘Since when have you been able to do that?’ Caz asks. ‘I thought … I thought it was just body heat?’
‘It was,’ Ruben confirms. ‘I started doing this just a couple of minutes ago when Rose somehow transferred some of her magic into me.’
‘When you did what?’ Kyor barks, tension clear in every line of his body. He launches to his feet and begins to pace. ‘How?’
The way he speaks it’s like he expects me to have an answer. I don’t.
‘It was just after you left,’ I say to Kyor. ‘The ice was still on the ground, and I was touching Ruben’s shoulder, wishing he could have more magic, and then the ice just … melted. It disappeared entirely, and suddenly Ruben said he felt odd. And then he just … well, he created a flame.’
I decide against telling them that he nearly set the forest on fire. Kyor probably wouldn’t love that.
‘I think I somehow took the Issen magic I’d just used and pushed it into Ruben instead. That’s why the ice vanished.’
Silence swarms around us.
‘Let me get this right …’ Benny says, scratching the back of his neck. ‘You’re saying that your magic works like energy?’
‘I am?’ I question.
‘Maybe,’ he responds. From the slowness of his speech, it’s clear he’s thinking through his explanation as he shares it with us.
‘Energy can’t be created or destroyed. Just transferred.
Magic comes from the Gods, we all know that, and when we die it returns to Mortidem to redistribute it. It’s transferred. Just like energy.’
I worry my lip with my teeth as I think aloud. ‘So what I did was redirect the Issen magic that I’d already used?’
‘Exactly,’ Benny replies. ‘Maybe if it’s lingering where it doesn’t belong, somewhere that’s not final—’
‘Like not yet with me or not yet with Mortidem,’ I continue, nodding my head as the idea becomes clearer, ‘then I can pull it out of that interim place and give a magical boost to someone else. It didn’t give Ruben ice magic, it just … elevated the power he already has.’
I’m fully aware that what I’m confessing to is not just strange …
it’s dangerous. World-altering. But being able to give Ruben firepower might be something that will save us on this arduous journey, and we won’t be able to explain away his sudden flame-abilities from our companions.
They all know his magic is nothing more than warm hugs.
This confession is huge. And the silence around the fire tightens like a noose.
For a heartbeat, I dare to glance at Kyor. He’s staring at me like he’s never seen me before, like he’s trying to reconcile the girl he loves with the weapon I’ve just revealed myself to be. The look in his eyes is equal parts awe and horror, and it twists something sharp in my chest.
‘Is anybody going to say anything?’ I finally ask.
‘Yeah. I’ll say something,’ Kyor says. He glares at everyone.
‘I want to make one thing very clear,’ he growls.
‘If a single person here breathes a single word about this outside of this group, I will put a lightning bolt through their fucking heart with such precision that they will feel their insides burn, turn to charcoal, and finally crumble to dust before they die.’
Caz grimaces. ‘Graphic, but we get the point.’
‘No.’ Kyor shakes his head. ‘I don’t think you do.
Rose, what you’ve just told us makes you the most valuable person in Morathka and beyond.
Everyone will want that. If you can transfer power to other people …
if you can take magic that you’ve already used and give that to someone?
’ He swallows. ‘My father won’t just kill you for this.
It’ll be so much worse. He’ll keep you captive …
and do whatever it takes to ensure you’re doing his bidding for the rest of his life.
He’d use Kay against you. Whatever it took to make you comply. ’
His voice doesn’t crack, but his hands do, flexing uselessly at his sides, as if he’s imagining all the ways he wouldn’t be able to reach me if his father locked me away.
For all his talk of duty and crowns, this isn’t just politics for him. It’s fear consuming him, fear for me.
I swallow hard. Is this why Korvane had anyone with ice powers killed, not because of their icy heritage, but because of the sheer terrifying power of it? Can all Issen transfer their powers to others?
And what does that mean for William? Can he do the same?
I assume if he’d known as much he would have told us when he showed us his skin, so it’s likely he doesn’t know that he runs the risk of transferring magic to someone by accident, the way I did with Ruben.
The thought is enough to make me sick. William might have control over the ice within him, but this is an entirely new level of danger he doesn’t even know about.
My mind is whirling, because Etta surely knew.
Etta knew what powers I had, and she gave me more besides. Why would she do this to me? My anger seethes at the capriciousness of the Gods, playing with our lives like they are nothing.
Still, I asked for my magic back, and she gave it to me. In spades. I can hardly complain now. Be careful what you wish for, indeed.
The group’s unease at Kyor’s comment hangs thick and suffocating, and for a moment no one breathes. Then, in silence, Ruben reaches out and takes a piece of meat from the fire.
‘You know, I think I’ve eaten better on this trip than I ever did in the slums,’ Ruben says, trying to change the subject in a typically cumbersome manner. ‘If I’d known what it was like out of the city, maybe I would have packed up life there and come here earlier. Become a nomad.’
‘If you had done so,’ Kyor begins drily, ‘there’s a fair chance you would have been ripped limb from limb by an unbonded dire wolf before you even managed to catch so much as a rabbit.
But I’m happy to leave you here if you want to try flying solo?
’ His words are sharp, but his tone is far less acerbic than it’s been for days, and there’s something almost close to gratitude glinting in his eyes.
Something has shifted between them, and whatever it is, I’m relieved. Their constant sniping was wearing on the whole group, and we have enough to deal with without their idiotic posturing being thrown into the mix.
‘Maybe on the way back,’ Ruben responds lightly with a grin.
We all smile a bit at that, though it only takes a moment before our joviality fades. Our gazes drift to Loch, still wrapped in blankets by the fire, rocking back and forth, silent and watchful.
I’ve tried not to speak about him, even when he’s looked asleep, knowing that he’d still be able to hear, but there’s no denying his presence hovers over us uncomfortably. At some point, one of us has to mention him. In the end, it’s Caz who breaks first.
‘It’s a miracle he survived,’ she whispers.
‘No, it’s not,’ Benny replies. ‘It’s skill.
He’d hear predators coming from miles off.
Follow the sound of a stream to find water.
Though he has probably spent the last few weeks in a constant state of fear.
Constantly alert. I can only imagine what that type of adrenaline would do to the body after so long. ’
‘Poor guy,’ Kyor says quietly.
‘We need to get him help,’ Caz suggests. ‘Maybe we can leave him with some priestesses in Galreck?’
She’s right. The herbs and magic I used should stop any infections worsening and hopefully clear them completely in a few days, but that’s just his body with its visible wounds. It’s a far easier thing to heal than a fractured mind.
‘We’ll see how he’s doing.’ Benny’s jaw locks. ‘It was Etta’s priestesses from Wrohelm who left him out here to die,’ he says pointedly. ‘So you’ll understand why I don’t want him anywhere near the cloaks.’
‘Perhaps they didn’t know he was still alive,’ Ruben offers. ‘The forest is pretty damn big.’
‘Right,’ Caz agrees. ‘It might not have been a deliberate omission.’
But they’re the only non-Rettlings. The rest of us know full well what the priestesses were capable of in the name of their Goddess.
The priestesses knew exactly who remained alive during the third trial, when we crossed the frozen lake filled with Issen spirits, and it wasn’t because they could see us. The fog was far too dense for that. And if they knew there, why wouldn’t they have known here?
No, they knew – and they left Loch anyway.
Maybe they left him because he was so close to death that they thought he wouldn’t make it. Maybe it was too much of a risk to get him out.
I hope so, anyway, because the other option is that they deliberately left him here to die. And that makes me feel sick. The cloaks are supposed to heal, not harm. Be saviours, not destroyers.
‘We should get some sleep,’ I say, breaking the icy tension that’s clawing at the air around us. ‘We need to be up and off early tomorrow to make up for lost time. Any sign of the Myrkr?’ I add as an aside to Kyor, only to cause a collective shudder to ripple through the group.
‘No, but we mustn’t be complacent. We need to keep watch,’ Kyor says. ‘I’ll take the first stint.’
As the rest of us agree on the order for other watches, I can’t help but wonder if there might be a time when we actually get to sleep safely through the night again.
Other than those nights curled up with Kyor, in his room by the kitchen, the last time I felt close to safe was sleeping in the slums.
So much for thinking the Goddess’s gifts would solve even my basic needs. I’m still cold, I’m still fearing for my family, and right now, a safe night’s sleep feels a long, long way away.