Chapter 6
He was twelve, locked in his room, with tear tracks staining his cheeks from yet another bout of penance.
He hadn’t Settled on magic yet, as all the other younglings had. Day after day, he’d tried invocating, begging one of the Five gods to answer. Surely, they’d not deny a Sacred prince.
But deny, they had. Time and time again.
He was already counting down the days until he turned thirteen, when it would become almost impossible for him to Settle after that. For the first time in his life...he didn’t want to grow older.
Still, he wasn’t one to wait around for opportunity to strike, for life to pass him by. He had other ways of living, so Kinlear had taken to using the cleverness of his mind as his own magic.
At least...until the gods remembered him.
They will, he told himself, as he wiped tears from his eyes. They must.
This time, he’d been caught out in the nomage barracks beneath the Citadel, amidst a cluster of young soldiers placing bets in a game of Bear’s Bane.
He’d never once played the game before, but after a few tries, he had bested men and women three times his age, even the old Ravenminder who’d come down from his tower. The omen-watchers so often visited the nomage barracks, half-drunk and eager to spill all their secrets alongside their coin.
Kinlear won every game. He had a purse full of earnings he did not need, for he was already rich. But for the first time in ages, he was proud of himself.
At least, until one the Sacred Realmist Master had ridden past on his war bear...and locked eyes with Kinlear.
It was no use lying after that.
“A prince does not bet,” the Master had told him, as he scooped Kinlear from the snow and dragged him, kicking and screaming, back to the Citadel’s steps. “A prince certainly does not find himself fraternizing with lowly nomage recruits.”
“They’re more fun than any of you,” Kinlear had growled back at him.
The Master had raised a brow. “Us,” he said. “You are one of us, Little Laroux...even if you so often try to forget it.”
He’d paid penance.
A brand for every bit of coin he’d earned, and the pain was so deep he’d nearly passed out.
His cough came on heavy after that.
His mother had sent him straight to his quarters, where Runes of Locking had been inscribed on the other side of his door. His own Scribe’s practice blade, which he’d been given like the others who’d yet to Settle, had been taken from him as extra punishment.
But Kinlear was clever enough to know...
That was not the end of his sentence.
They’d left him in his room for hours while he awaited their decision. He was just beginning to wonder if one could die from boredom when a sound came from his bedroom door.
The shifting of a lock...then the creaking of the door opening.
“I told you I could get inside,” whispered a small, female voice.
Soraya, who’d Settled on her Windmage magic just weeks ago...later than all the others. For a moment, Kinlear had hoped she’d end up like him, a Scribe, if only so they could spend more time together in training.
She was a truly kind Sacred. A girl who looked at both twins, despite their glaring differences, as if they were one and the same. She saw no difference between future king and spare. Between crown and cane.
“An unlocking rune isn’t as difficult as you think, Arawn.”
His twin brother was just past her shoulder, so tall compared to Soraya, that she was cast in his shadow, while he was outlined in the warm torchlight.
Kinlear leaned around the back of his chair, hair falling into his eyes as he glared at them. “Come to ogle at my newest penance mark, both of you?”
He didn’t tell them how many he had across his back.
He didn’t tell them that he was covered in a salve he’d kept hidden beneath his mattress, because his mother had denied him anything to help with the pain.
She claimed it taught him a better lesson that way.
“I want to see first,” Soraya said, and crossed her small arms, ignoring Arawn when he tried to push past her to get inside.
She grinned at Kinlear, her dark curls sticking all over the place.
She had a bruise on one eye and a cut on her chin, and she wore each proudly.
“Ooh. Gods’ graces,” she told Kinlear, as she looked at the brand on his wrist. “It’s good.
But my last one was bigger. At least twice the size. ”
Kinlear let her believe it. “You’re probably right, Sora.”
“I know,” Soraya said, lifting her chin as she grinned again. “I’m always right.”
“Bragging about penance isn’t something a good Sacred should do,” Arawn whispered to her, his eyes wide as he glanced over his shoulder into the empty hall, senses fully on guard as usual. As if shadow wolves would come pouring right into the room to attack her.
He was always such a protector, even if there was no true threat in this place.
Still, his brother stepped closer to her, as if he’d fight the world to keep her safe.
They’d probably be Matched someday. Kinlear fought the inkling of jealousy that surged inside of him.
A Matching was probably not his fate. The gods would never pair someone like him with someone like her.
“You should go before our mother comes back to check on him,” Arawn said. “We’ll all pay penance if she catches us here.”
Soraya crossed her arms. “Do you even pay penance? Our perfect Crown Prince.”
Kinlear met Arawn’s gaze knowingly, as the memory of a lie and a darksoul sketch hung between them. They had never spoken of that moment since.
“Of course I do,” Arawn said. “Everyone does, until they learn their place.”
“Kinlear knows penance better than anyone,” Soraya said, glancing back at him with a beautiful grin. “Did you cry, Little Prince?”
“Call me that again,” Kinlear said, “and you’ll be the one with tears in your eyes.”
“Kinlear,” Arawn growled. “We don’t speak to—"
But Soraya only laughed, the sound like ringing bells. “Next time we’ll go together. Hold hands while they do it, yes?”
Kinlear blinked.
Arawn blinked.
“Hmmm.” Soraya sighed. “Well. This isn’t as fun as I’d hoped. I’m off to find other joys, boys. I heard Zey might Settle soon. Gods know I want to be there to watch that.”
She whispered an invocation, and the wind slammed the door behind her as she left.
“She...frightens me,” Arawn said.
Kinlear laughed. “Nothing frightens you.”
Arawn shrugged and took his usual chair across from Kinlear’s.
“Well?” Kinlear asked. “What will my punishment be this time?”
Arawn, to his credit, was often his eyes and ears when Kinlear was locked away. Kinlear had an inkling that Izill, often assigned as their family servant, helped him spy. But she’d never dare admit to it.
“It’s...it’s bad,” Arawn said.
He was still the larger twin, a head taller and far broader. He was only twelve, and already, he could heft a true warrior’s sword. Not the wooden training ones, like many other younglings still had to use.
Soon, Arawn would pass through the Snow Gates and march into battle with the nomage ground forces. He’d witness true death up close...and earn his own sword if he survived.
Then he’d be off to his true dream: the test of strength and will to see if he could become a Rider. Soraya claimed she’d become one, too. And Kinlear would again be left behind.
“It’s...bad?” Kinlear asked. “Or bad-bad?”
Arawn didn’t answer.
“Spit it out, then!”
A sigh. Arawn met his gaze and said, almost in a whisper, “Mother is taking you to Touvre.”
“Touvre?!” Kinlear blurted. Arawn flinched. “Gods, no.”
Touvre was the summer palace, in southern Lordach. A place covered in the reek of his mother’s flowers, grown with her cadre of Realmists and their delicate earth magic. It housed musicians and artists and seamstresses and every passive person in the kingdom he could possibly think of.
As a twelve-year-old boy, going to Touvre with his mother sounded like a death sentence.
And he wasn’t ready for death quite yet.
Arawn nodded again. “I heard Mother and Father arguing about it with the other Masters. You’ll go south...and train there as a Scribe.”
“But I’m already doing that here!” Kinlear said. He spent every second he could, when he wasn’t ill, poring over books of runes with the others who hadn’t Settled yet, but still showed promise of magic.
After that...they’d be relegated to being servants.
Those poor, unfortunate Sacred souls who had no magic within.
Arawn’s voice was emotionless. Factual, as it always was. “They hope getting you away from the north, away from the cold and the war and the darkness, will help cleanse your mind. And... they think it will help with the illness.”
Kinlear winced.
The godsdamned illness.
It was the worst thing about himself, beyond the monster in his mind.
As he grew, the coughing fits had worsened. Sacred magic had little effect on it. Whatever the healers tried to do didn’t last long, because even with magic...if the Five didn’t deem it worthy, then it wouldn’t be done.
To his surprise, his mother had even sought out the famed mages of the Southern Continent to help him. Their magic was different, for they weren’t Sacred. They were strange, other beings: not fully human, though Kinlear had never met a person alive who’d seen one.
They certainly lived far longer than Sacred or the nomages, the tales told...and though they couldn’t invocate, they’d found a way perform magic through works of sacrifice.
For whatever reason...
The southern mages had denied helping him, and Kinlear truly believed, as the years went on:
He was born to die, while his brother was born to wear their father’s crown.
He almost laughed at the sheer madness of it.
“When do I leave?” Kinlear asked.
Arawn shifted in his chair. “Tomorrow. First light, after the war.”
So, they’d give him no chance for a true goodbye, then. They’d ship him off to the south, where he’d be out of the Citadel’s way. Where people wouldn’t have to pity him for his lack of magic or strength.
“For how long?” Kinlear asked.
Arawn shrugged his large shoulders. “I’m...not certain.”