CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE #3
“She’s been haunting this forest for decades, then.
” Sy remembered the name from their history lessons in the first term at Sangfeder.
Turned away from the academy because King Edgard at that time would accept no women in his service, she had used her influence to break into the academy and steal several of Sangfeder’s most ancient texts.
Sy suspected the incident might be in part to thank for the academy’s brutal enforcement of secrecy.
Instilling fear of punishment was certainly why it was taught at all, along with a petty capitulation to the historic injustice of denying women the opportunity to study.
She hadn’t been captured, but banishment to the forest was supposed to be punishment enough – though the history books had never implied it was a self-imposed exile. Nor that she was still alive.
Perhaps she would know a way to fulfill the king’s desire. Perhaps there was a bargain to be struck.
But no; he refused to enter another contract, to be lured by enchanting promises, ever again. Not for any reason. Besides, he had nothing with which to bargain.
“Perhaps another magician could stop her,” Perrine put forward. She looked him over, as if sizing him up. She appeared dissatisfied. “Well, it hardly matters. It’s a curse, not an enchantment. Killing her wouldn’t save Anya. Nothing will but the condition she set.”
“And what might that be?” Sabina wondered.
Sy knew. And he was less sure than ever how to meet it.
With a flutter, Perrine’s falcon launched from her perch on the hollow log.
“Funny,” Perrine said, unconcerned. At the others’ alarmed expressions, she shrugged. “She does that sometimes.”
“It isn’t danger?” Sabina said, an uncertain waver in her voice.
Perrine shook her head firmly. “She wouldn’t leave me without a warning.”
Once the rabbits were cooked, they ate quickly.
Though Perrine offered him part of her rabbit, he refused; there was barely enough for her and Sabina, and he still had plenty of figs and liverwurst. After they finished eating, Sy helped them pack.
They were anxious to make as much ground as they could before nightfall. Sy was, too.
As Perrine gave her rifle a perfunctory clean, Sy took Sabina aside with his kit.
“I want to teach you something,” he said, pulling out his pencil and a scrap of paper – which was dangerously low, he noted. His notes in the grotto had used most of it. He might run out of parchment before he ran out of blood.
Slowly, so she could easily follow, he drew the spell, barely two lines, he had concocted for temporary paralysis.
“It lasts five minutes or so,” he said, handing it over. “You see it’s simple enough, quick, not so costly. Should you need it.”
Sabina took the paper and pressed her lips together thoughtfully. “It’s dangerous making up your own spells. What if you had hurt yourself?”
He smiled. “I didn’t.”
She returned his smile, her eyebrows gone crooked with affection. “A spell of eternal life, of complete transformation. I still don’t think I truly believe it’s possible.” She put her arms around his neck. “But if anyone can figure it out, it’s you.”
As she pulled away, he nodded in Perrine’s direction. “Are you sure about this? About her?”
“I suppose this journey has put some things into perspective for me. For you too, I’d wager,” she said, grinning conspiratorially.
“Nothing has changed.”
She shook her head. “Sylas, you gave her your gloves. The only time I’ve ever seen you without them is when we go to bed.
And you get a lost, dreamy look when you think of her.
Dreamy, I tell you. She’s absolutely bewitched you.
I admit, I was distrustful of her at first, but…
well, she’s proven herself worthy of you. ”
An ironic laugh escaped him. And what of my worth to her?
“You sure you won’t come with us?” Perrine asked, approaching them. “Safety in numbers. Three heads are better than one – or four, if our feathered friend decides to come back.”
“He can’t,” Sabina answered for him, giving him a strange look. “I wish I could help you. If there’s anything I can do, I will.”
He believed her, but he shook his head. “There isn’t.”
“I know,” she replied sadly. “But it’s what you say, isn’t it?”
They left him, and Sy watched them go, sending a silent wish, a blessing, they would reach their destination safely.
It took him a moment to realize how very unlike him that was.
The forest has changed you, he’d said to Sabina, in jest. It had. But had it flooded her? Rooted itself into her? Spoken to her with the voice of the air?
The falcon returned, swooping over Sy’s head on her way toward the pair.
As she did, she dropped something she had clutched in her talon.
It drifted to the ground, directly in front of him.
As the falcon landed on Perrine’s waiting shoulder and their silhouettes disappeared into the fold of green and gold, he bent to inspect it.
A feather, long and sunrise orange, with a sheen of violet and green in the midday light.
A feather from the tail of the phoenix.
He caught it between his fingers just as a gust of wind began to blow it away.
There, said the leaves above him, the roots below. There.