THIRTEEN #2
“You have to be kidding,” she scoffed, frustration razor-sharp. “You’re happy to test it without me, but not explain how?”
Silas tilted his head, quirking his lips. “It’s a fascinating tale, one I won’t share today. It’s clearly an excellent resource for testing the tether between us.”
Amelia huffed, muttering, “you’re infuriating.”
He chuckled softly. “So I’ve been told. By you. Many times.”
“Yes, well.” She picked up her pen and pointed it at him. “Next time? You tell me before you try anything like that again, or I swear I’ll find a way to make you feel something truly awful.”
His humour swelled, smile widening. “Duly noted.”
Silas woke to a chill that had him wanting to crawl deeper into his bed. No more than a minute later, a swift knock had him sitting up quickly. His first thought was of Amelia. Whipping his blanket away, he padded quickly to the door, throwing it open.
His disappointment was visceral, discovering one of the staff standing primly in a handsome suit, holding a silver tray with a folded sheet of paper out to him.
“Message for you, sir,” he said.
“Thanks.” Silas took the paper with a grateful smile, closing the door again. Shaking it open, he found an elegant scrawl that he recognized as his mothers’. His heart raced as he read.
Silas,
I once worked with a mage in the city by the name of Fabian Eros. He claimed to have had a vision on a past pair bonded couple and how they broke their connection. If you truly want to find a way to sever your bond with Amelia, begin there.
Veralind
Silas read the words thrice, confused. Veralind had seemed insistent on ignoring them since their supper, and now she was trying to help? It was puzzling, but as he had suspected, his mother knew things that neither Silas nor any easily accessible book would know.
Dressing quickly, layering his clothes for a frosty morning, he shoved the note into his pocket.
He fixed a holster around his waist, one of a matching pair that they had crafted in his lab the day before.
Silas carefully fitted his blade into the holster, throwing the side of his cloak over it to keep it covered.
They had agreed to keep them on their person unless conducting a test, for safety and secrecy.
Silas entered the hallway and knocked softly on Amelia’s door.
He heard her shifting around, before calling for him to enter. Silas pushed open both doors, finding her buttoning up the dark winter cloak given to her. Amelia looked up, fingers pausing at the buttons.
She looked a little sheepish in the thick cloak. “It’s freezing in here.”
Silas spied the dark, cold fireplace and frowned. “You let your fire burn out.”
Amelia looked at him with exasperation. “Finley, as you’ve pointed out many times, I come from warmer lands. I’m not used to dragging myself out of bed in the middle of the night to feed a fire.”
Silas scoffed, walking to the fireplace.
Next to it were baskets filled with wood runed with fire magic.
“That’s not necessary. You simply place the denser logs onto the fire before you sleep.
They’ll burn low and slow all night, leaving enough embers to restart the fire with kindling in the morning. ”
Her arms fell to her sides. “Oh.”
He sent her a humoured look. “My my, this is a rare day.”
Amelia lifted a brow, daring him to continue.
“To actually teach you something is a rarity, indeed.”
She rolled her eyes, turning away. He watched her wind a scarf around her neck before taking sections of her hair to easily braid a thick rope down the centre of her back. His heart thumped. Silas could watch her complete mundane tasks all day.
“What’s on the agenda this morning? I was thinking about testing the blades’ interaction with other substances…liquids, and gases?” Amelia asked.
“Actually.” Silas pulled out the note, handing it to her. “Mother has decided to be useful, after all.”
He stayed quiet as Amelia read. Finishing, she looked up with a frown, dark eyes sceptical. “A mage? Most ‘mages’ are crackpots,” she said indignantly. “A true mage is rare, and I don’t believe I’ve heard of any living in Lunarian. There’s one working in the Spire, and another further south.”
Silas shrugged, not bothering to disagree.
Mages, even the true ones who could wield magic freely, were oddities.
No one, not even mages themselves, knew how they came to possess such power, just something they had been born with.
Speculations ran rampant with theories ranging from the mother giving birth in a star-soaked field at the stroke of midnight, to the mage having been conceived during a half-moon at the precise moment a celestial alignment appeared in the sky.
It was all madness, but only one truth lay behind it: every generation, a handful of true mages were born who could tap into the Monoliths’ magic as though they were the formidable spires themselves.
Possessing such power equalled a responsibility to the people. They produced runes and created magical trinkets, like arcane lamps, and structures like the Waystones, that formulated the modern society they led today.
“I agree,” he said, “but with my mother’s penchant for discovering sources for her research, we’d be silly not to explore it.”
Amelia pulled gloves onto her hands with a sigh. “Alright, I suppose it can’t hurt to see him.”
Silas opened the door for her. “Let’s grab a quick breakfast, and then we’ll go.”
The streets were slick with frost, the frigid wind biting at his nose and cheeks. An early drift of snow began as they walked, little flakes swirling lazily through the air, coating the stones with a sheen of white.
It was nothing new to Silas, though Amelia’s soft gasp caught his attention, finding her with a wondrous expression, face upturned, the snowflakes landing in her eyelashes and the curved smile of her lips.
“I’ve never seen the snow,” she said on a sigh, laughing lightly as she met his eyes.
He returned the smile warmly, basking in her joyous moment.
“It is beautiful,” he conceded, “though be careful underfoot, it can be very slip—”
A gasp tore from her, the heel of her boot hitting a patch of ice. She slid forwards while her arms careened, screeching with shock. Silas shot out a hand, catching her before she could fall, twisting her towards him. She panted, her gloved hands clutching his arms.
“You have to stop falling for me,” he joked, unable to help himself.
Her glare was so familiar that he laughed before directing her to the stones which had already been salted. She toed at the ground uneasily, and finding traction, began to move with more confidence.
They walked through the city, a maze of stone towers and archways, built into the mountainside where the shadows and cold were deep and unforgiving.
The people of Lunarian wandered the streets, bundled against the chill.
He noticed a tension on the faces of those they passed by, and Silas knew the reason.
On every noticeboard they passed, were missives noting the Rift’s rapid growth along with a warning against using any magic near midnight due to the increasing number of accidents and disappearances. Other notices featured the ‘ diligent work ’ of the Ivory City scholars to correct the anomalies.
The reminders were everywhere, not to mention the sliver of Monolith bumping against his hip with every stride.
Amelia shivered, pulling her cloak tightly around her. They turned down an alleyway before approaching a twisting wooden staircase which led to a crooked, half-collapsed shop that looked like it had been wedged unceremoniously between two far grander and sturdier buildings.
The sign above the door was so faded it was nearly unreadable.
The mystical arts of Archmage, Fabian Eros.
Wards, visions, and unravelled destinies.
Silas exhaled a misted breath. “Why does this already feel like a mistake?”
Amelia squinted at the sign before looking at him incredulously. “What was your first clue? The half-decayed sign, or the fact that this place looks like it might fall apart if I sneezed too hard?” She sniffed, rubbing at her red nose. “Which is a dangerous possibility.”
He chuckled. “I was going to say the use of ‘Archmage’,” he said, eyeing the peeling signpost. “I’ve never found a true mage who needs to remind people they’re powerful. Feels forced.”
Amelia hummed her agreement. “Well, we don’t have many options, so let’s see this through.” She reached for the handle but stopped, glancing back with a sly smile. His breath hitched at the sight. “Though, perhaps we can have a code to indicate we should leave. How about ‘hokum’?”
Silas snorted, reaching past to pull open the door for her. “Delightfully applicable.”
A creak echoed underfoot as they stepped inside, both pausing as the door clanged shut.
The small shop was a disaster.
Shelves leaned precariously, groaning under the weight of dusty tomes and mismatched bottles filled with shimmering liquids. The scent of herbs and incense cloyed at his nose, filling the air with an unpleasant thickness. Crystals hung suspended above their heads, humming faintly.
A table sat in the centre, covered in brightly burning, half-melted candles, wax across the wood and dripping from the sides. A large skull of unknown origin sat in the middle of the table, empty eye sockets watching with judgement.
“Uh, I’m not sold,” Amelia whispered, edging slightly closer to him, eyes darting around.
A throat cleared behind a shelf before emitting a disturbing honking noise.
They shared a cringing look, Silas already fumbling behind for the door handle when a man, surprisingly young, in an oversized robe with bright, green eyes, walked around the corner, spotting them.
“Ah-ha!” he bellowed, slamming a hand onto the table, dislodging a wax stalactite from the edge to clatter to the floorboards.
Silas blinked, stunned. Amelia took a surprised half-step back.