Chapter 28 #2
I feel a great foreboding about this ancient force, and I could not keep myself from speaking to you of that. Whatever you plan with this, tread very carefully, sister.
So many rely on you.
Many hugs and kisses (from another),
Tempest
What were all the other sheets?
I flipped over Tempest’s letter. There was nothing from Andie, but Basilia had chimed in.
Still pissed.
Queen Basilia
So I was meant to call her queen now?
I grinned, then read on.
Hey Syera,
Kind of strange to meet like this. I’m Rooke—fellow Magus. Tempest likely hasn’t mentioned me while saving the world, but we’re cousins. I’m the child of your uncle. I mean, of course. He was your mother’s only sibling.
But yeah. Nice to meet you. Let’s hang out sometime when the war is done and your mate is dead. Is that okay to say? Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.
Tempest mentioned that you’d asked about divination journeys.
I’m a divination affinity. Pretty strong, if I say so myself.
Which feels awkward, but there it is. This is the kind of thing that is intuitive, but takes grunt.
Here’s exactly what I do, and I’ve included descriptions from some of our other divination affinities who have mastered the journey, too, in the hopes that one of our recounts will spark understanding for you.
Be safe,
Rooke
I read through the rest of the letter, then tucked the letter behind a drawer in the dresser opposite me. I sat on the bed to let the content whirl in my brain.
I could certainly see that the magic was intuitive, which was a bonus. I didn’t have months or years to practice a divination journey technique.
But the power thing may prove to be an issue.
Only one way to find out.
“Hey, Syera. Is there any food?” Axel popped his head in.
I looked up. “Food. Of course. You didn’t have breakfast. Let’s find you some.”
The larder room off the dining area was filled to the brim.
I rolled my eyes at the overkill. Bread would have sufficed. “Go for it.”
Since knowing Axel, I had learned to respect the Luther appetite. How much did a full-grown Luther eat?
I left him to it, then paused in the doorway of the larder. “Axel, please don’t leave this house. Eat what you need, but don’t leave the house, okay? I need to do something.”
This was the best chance I’d have to complete a divination journey. I’d need to put out serious power, not a tiny amount that would go unnoticed by Carmine.
If I didn’t have enough power, I could know in the next five minutes.
I strode back to the room and left the door open a crack.
I sat cross-legged on the bed, then closed my eyes. All of the divination journey recounts spoke of the preparation needed for the journey—fucking herbs in a bath and whatnot.
I didn’t have time for that shit.
Drawing my powers in, I held them at my center until a familiar lull claimed me. I allowed my Magus power to drift outward where it wished, then did the same with my smoke.
Centered.
At peace.
I reached into my cloak and drew out the tiara, my eyes still closed. Then I washed my divination magic over the object. The affinity rubbed against the blue gem, then wrapped around the delicate metal of the tiara.
Enter the ancestry of what you seek, Rooke had described in her letter.
That may seem cryptic for most people, but that comment made inherent sense to my type of Magus power.
On every being and object and patch of land was a history.
Everything, everywhere carried these signatures—which were like layers resting over every object, person, and other living thing.
For those at peace with their past, the layer hugged them like the softest blanket, fortifying them through every storm.
For those of us in turmoil with their past, the blanket flapped in the wind, trying to tear away. From those people—for me, when it came to my mating with Carmine and the murder of my family—the past became a battle, a tug of war to keep the blanket and all the strength that it could provide.
This tiara possessed a past. And that past was way beyond a flapping blanket. More like a frayed, hole-ridden, moldy excuse of a blanket.
I assessed the layer and worked through the feelings from most recent to oldest. When I reached the oldest piece of past, which was also the most intact, I began to sink in.
I’d liked Rooke’s description the most. She’d spoken of how a topical poison entered the bloodstream through the pores of the skin.
I imagined the tiara’s past to have pores before adding my own spin, imagining that my Magus power was more like my smoke.
My Magus affinity drifted into the past of the tiara, and I saturated the layer of history there. This was the part where Rooke and the others had mentioned a softening and pliability of the past.
I frowned as the past in the tiara remained blocked to me.
It wasn’t allowing me entry.
I pushed more power toward the tiara, seeing how the layer had congealed to the delicate metal. Half afraid of destroying this record of history entirely, I started to pry up the parts where the spiritual past had welded itself to the physical tiara.
Mother be.
I had to go about this in my own way—just like all the other divination affinities in the letter.
Releasing more power, I surrounded the history of the tiara entirely in my Magus magic, then yanked hard. I could feel the consequence of doing so.
I’d have one chance to journey here. I’d ripped the past in several places while prying it loose. Both of these were because my strength was lacking.
I had just enough power to fob my way through this. Not enough to access a full and complete past, and not enough to restore the past into the tiara after.
One chance.
I kept my breaths even while cradling the tiara’s story, and then I inhaled the past into my body and mind.