Chapter #2
Kaelan leaned in even closer, confidently. “And do you remember the crystal wand of the fairy queen that our Mistress held on display in her gallery?”
A slight frown flickered over Zuriel’s face. “Yes.”
“And did you see it again, after I died?” he asked.
Zuriel’s head tilted, his eyes glittering like moonlight on hoarfrosted grass as his mind worked. “Mistress moved it to the vaults . . .”
Kaelan smiled and plucked at his nose, just as his mother did, just as Caden had always done. In that moment, because of that one small gesture, the frozen surface of Zuriel’s gaze melted.
“Yes, that is what our Mistress claimed happened,” Kaelan said in that same in-confidence voice. “But if you ever visit the witch on the Isle-Out-of-Current, perhaps you can find a way to bargain it back.”
Zuriel let out a breath. “I can’t believe it’s actually you.”
Kaelan squeezed Zuriel’s shoulder, giving it a good hearty shake.
“And look at you,” he said. “A scribe to the Crown?”
Zuriel’s shoulders pulled back. “Minister of Letters.”
Kaelan stepped back, placing his hand again on Magda’s waist. “And did your mother bribe a witch with a fae wand to make that miracle happen too?”
Zuriel smiled a bit. “I resent your implication that I have not achieved my position by my own merits.”
“As was my intention entirely,” Kaelan said with that same beguiling smile. “Would you care to test my dueling skills now? I admit I’m rather rusty after all of those years in exile with the humans, but you were always much better with the pen than the sword, as I recall.”
“I’m happy to say that you are just the same arrogant imp-hole that you always were,” Zuriel said, chuckling. His gaze flicked back over to Magda, cooling. “I never expected to see either of you again.”
“I’m sure everyone at the Spire finds our return quite shocking,” she said.
He clasped his hands behind his back. “That is one word for it.”
“And another?”
He smiled thinly. “You have defied all expectations. Your story has caused quite a stir. Is it true you possess the Enneahedron?”
The weight of it pressed against her back. “It is.”
“And you have returned my dear friend from the dead,” he said with the half-convinced air of someone attempting to find a loose thread that would set everything unraveling. His gaze skipped over to Honey, who was hovering just behind Kaelan. “And you have a nymph, with a rat.”
Without warning, Hero’s fur bristled and he sank his teeth into Honey’s neck.
Honey shrieked, grabbing Hero and flinging him away. Magda grabbed Kaelan’s wrist as Hero went sailing above the heads of the dumbfounded crowd.
Honey stumbled, bumping into Kaelan and Magda, knocking them both into Zuriel and a number of others standing close by.
Everyone tumbled into a heap, Magda landing nose-to-nose with Zuriel. His eyes had turned cold and hard again.
“What the—?” Zuriel growled.
She struggled to disentangle herself from him.
“What is this?” Flor demanded.
She finally managed to roll off of Zuriel and out from under Honey, ripping her cloak in the process. Honey plopped to the ground, hand on the side of her throat, blood pouring between her fingers and fat tears running down her face.
Flor knelt beside the nymph. “What in—?”
“Hero bit me,” Honey said, wide-eyed and gasping for breath.
“That damned rat?” Flor said. “When I find him—”
“Why would he do that?” Madga asked.
“Because he is a rat,” Flor snapped at her.
Kaelan scrambled up and over to Honey. “It will be all right.” He placed his own hand over hers. While Kaelan healed Honey, Zuriel picked himself up and offered his hand to Magda. She took it, shaking out her cloak as she stood. Not only was it torn, but splattered with blood.
“Damn,” she murmured.
Zuriel shook back his brown locks, teasing them from where they’d snagged in his mouth.
“Life is so much more exciting with you around, Magdalena,” he said. With a bow, he turned and threaded his way through the gawking crowd.
Kaelan pulled his hand from Honey. The blood had stopped, but was thick on her skin.
“Come now. Let’s clean up and rest,” Flor said, easing Honey up to her feet. Honey stared as if in shock, her arms hugging tight to her torso.
Magda peeled off her cloak.
“Meer,” she called.
The brownie appeared at her ankle. “Yes, Mistress?”
Magda held up the cloak for her to see.
Meer rolled her eyes. “What in the Lands—?”
“Long story,” she said as Meer pinched the edge of the cloak, tutting. In the next moment, she and the cloak were gone.
Kaelan approached her again, wiping the blood from his hands with some kind person’s handkerchief.
All around, the crowd spoke anxiously, attempting to ascertain what had happened without asking either of them directly.
“Are you all right?” he asked, bowing his head towards her.
“I’m—” She frowned, struck by a sudden sense of vulnerability. She ran her hands up her exposed arms and shoulders, avoiding eye contact with curious family members, some of them still picking themselves up from the ground.
He moved closer still, as if he could build a wall around her with his presence alone. “What is it?”
She shook her head, attempting to dispel the strange feeling. Yet, she found herself edging closer to him too, wanting to vanish into his shadow.
His cleaned hand slid around her waist. “Magda?”
When his hand pressed against the small of her back, her heart seized, her breath hitched.
He frowned. “What’s wrong?”
She pursed her lips, gaze searching the crowd. Everyone watched them. Hundreds of people filled the field.
It could’ve been any of them.
She reached up and clasped the back of Kaelan’s neck, brushing her lips along his cheek, kissing his earlobe. Under the breath of her kiss, she murmured, “The Enneahedron is gone.”