Chapter 20
Iknow your secret, Corinne Anastos.
The voice drifted from the shadows of the castle corridor, stopping Corinne dead. A cloaked figure appeared at the stairwell a few feet ahead. A disembodied voice floated past her ears again.
Your father was a defector. A heretic. A traitor.
“What do you want?” Corinne asked, her voice breaking. She drew her sword, but the voice only laughed.
Admit it, to the world, to yourself—you will end up just like him.
“No,” Corinne growled, gripping her sword more tightly.
She whirled around, but the corridor was empty. The cloaked figure at the stairwell entrance lifted their hands to lower their hood. It revealed a middle-aged face, hazel eyes, and cropped hair the same chestnut color as Corinne’s. His expression was rigid, his eyes cold.
“Father,” she whispered, the blood draining from her face.
“Corinne!”
She whipped around again, and this time, at the opposite end of the hallway, her mother was there, her dark brown curls falling into her eyes as she searched wildly for her daughter.
“Mother!” Corinne called, but she didn’t seem to hear her.
Corinne looked back to her father just as he summoned his magic, and it wasn’t just light along his arms and hands, but flames that licked up his skin.
No.
Corinne sprinted toward her panicked mother. She could save her. This time, she could save her. She had to.
Fire engulfed the entire corridor in an instant. Corinne screamed as it rose to her legs, and suddenly she was falling.
She wasn’t in the castle anymore; she was in that tiny room in that little house, and it was burning. She was burning and choking on smoke. She couldn’t move, so she just screamed and begged for help, begged for her mother—
“Corinne!”
Corinne’s eyes flew open, greeted by disorienting darkness. Her magic was blazing from her hands and arms, up her shoulders, illuminating the panicked face a few inches from hers. Goddess, she was still burning, and Aryel was there. What if she hurt him?
The way her father had hurt her mother?
“Corinne, are you hurt? What can I do?” he asked, his hands on her upper arms.
Some small part of her realized if she was actually on fire, that would have caused him pain.
“Shower,” she choked out. Aryel quickly helped her out of bed, supporting her weight as he guided her to the washroom. “Cold.”
Aryel stepped into the shower with her, both of them fully clothed, and turned the tap to the coldest setting.
“You’ll get wet,” she said hoarsely.
“I don’t give a fuck about getting wet, Corinne. Here.” He helped her sit on the tiled floor and joined her there, his back resting against the wall as Corinne bowed her head beneath the frigid water.
It washed over the back of her neck, her head, her shoulders, soaking through her nightgown just as it had the last time.
Her magic finally calmed, the light fading until they were left in darkness. Corinne clumsily reached up to cut the water off. Aryel leaned forward, one hand on her water-slick back between her shoulder blades, right where her Sun of Helaera tattoo was.
“How did you know?” she whispered, pushing back the wet hair plastered onto her face.
“You were screaming,” he said, his voice strained. “The guard outside and I thought something had happened, and I had him unlock your door.”
“You heard me from your room?”
“I would’ve heard you from down the breezeway.”
Corinne dropped her face into her hands. “That is humiliating.”
“D-don’t worry about it,” he said, leaning forward and shivering against her. “He won’t say anything. Goddess, without your magic, it’s freezing in here. Come on.”
He helped her stand and retrieved two towels, draping one around her shoulders. Corinne shivered herself now, and more embarrassment prickled along her skin—beneath the soaked white fabric, her body was very much on display.
“I’ll, uh, give you a moment,” Aryel said, toweling at some of the water drenching his loose gray shirt. “I’m coming right back, but I’m going to put dry clothes on while you do the same.”
Corinne mechanically dried herself off and retrieved a comfortable shirt and loose trousers, trying not to wilt from mortification.
Plenty of people at the monastery had seen her entirely naked, but Aryel seeing even that much of her felt…
different, somehow. Exposed. Yet it didn’t bother her as much as it should have.
She quickly pulled on the dry clothes and squeezed as much excess water from her hair as she could. When a soft knock sounded on her door, she called, “Come in.”
Aryel stepped inside and shut the door behind him, a small candle in his hand. He placed it on the table right by her door.
“Feel better?” he asked as Corinne stood there, her right hand clutched around her left arm.
She shivered again. “Y-yes,” she said.
“Do you want me to stay for a bit?”
Corinne stared at him, at his tousled black shirt and loose tan trousers.
At his earnest face.
“Yes,” she said, her voice small.
She padded over to her bed and climbed beneath the blankets, and Aryel sat on the rug beside it, his back propped against her mattress.
“Is this okay?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at her. “Me sitting here?”
She nodded against her pillow, and he faced her room again. Corinne studied the outline of his profile in the flickering candlelight, his still-damp hair.
“Was that…were you having more of those thoughts?” he asked.
Corinne exhaled slowly. “Those happen more regularly,” she said. “And sometimes I can’t calm myself down. The nightmares are rarer. Well, they used to be. I’ve had this happen twice since I’ve been here.”
Why was she telling him this? It was like being around him put her in some kind of trance where she had to tell him the truth about everything.
Almost everything. Only Corinne, the Priestesses, Vera, and whoever had written her that note knew about her father.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked. “Will that help?”
Corinne breathed deeply. “My mother died when I was ten, in a fire. Sometimes I still dream about it.”
Aryel turned to look at her again, horror etched into his face.
Corinne closed her eyes as she said, “Fifteen years later and each time I have a nightmare about it, it’s like I recall every detail so clearly. I nearly died too, but my magic saved me.”
“Goddess, Corinne,” Aryel murmured, and she opened her eyes. Tears shone in his in the dim light. “I don’t know what to say.”
“What is there to say about tragedy?” she said, shrugging a shoulder. “All we can do is hope it does not befall us or those we care for. And if it does, hope it does not visit us twice.”
Aryel turned away from her again, silent for a long moment.
“You nearly died in a fire as a child,” he said slowly. “And those—and they burned you as punishment for some perceived mistake?”
The small, weak child tucked deep in her heart cried out for this understanding, reveled in the barely suppressed rage in his voice. But Corinne pushed her away.
“It’s a typical punishment for a Lightguard who has strayed,” she said. Exhaustion tugged at her now, heavy in her heart and her head.
“That doesn’t mean it isn’t deeply fucking wrong. Sorry,” he added.
Corinne closed her eyes again, smirking. “S’fine, Ari.”
He said something else, but Corinne didn’t catch it as she drifted into the waiting arms of sleep.
Sunlight warmed Corinne’s face, and she opened her eyes slowly. Aryel’s right arm was draped close to the edge of her bed, his head resting atop his shoulder. It would be so easy to reach out and glide her fingers along his skin, grasp his hand in her own.
Coming to her senses, Corinne shifted in bed, sitting up. Aryel stirred, then, inhaling sharply.
“Goddess,” he said, stiffly rolling his shoulder and neck. “That’s going to be sore.”
“I can help,” she said. She started to reach for his neck, then hesitated. “Can I?”
“Please.”
Corinne placed her hand on the back of his neck and summoned her light.
She sent the gentle warmth into his stiff muscles and felt him relax as they released.
It only took a few seconds for her magic to do its work, but then her light drifted downward, seeking something else to mend.
She didn’t see it, but she sensed bruising on his upper right arm.
It was easy enough to heal, so she let her magic soothe that little injury too.
“Better?” she asked.
Aryel turned to face her as she removed her hand. “Infinitely. Thank you.”
Corinne sat frozen under his gaze for a few more moments before reality crashed into her.
“Oh, Goddess,” she said, her face going red as she flew out of bed, pacing to her window and back. “You were in my room overnight.”
“Yes,” he said, standing slowly.
“People will…assume things,” Corinne said, wringing her hands, and understanding lit Aryel’s face.
“No one is going to assume anything,” he said. “Hey.”
He stepped into her path, and she halted right before running into him. He gently removed her hands from her horrified face, holding her wrists.
“Listen, Sunshine, the only person who knows I stayed in here last night is the guard stationed out there right now,” he said. “He’s not going to say a damned thing, so please breathe.”
Corinne chewed her cheek but nodded. He was right. No one ever came to the alcove unless summoned.
Except for Nik. Or—goddess above—Lana, that one time. Still, it was unlikely, so Corinne calmed herself.
“I’ll meet you outside in a few minutes,” he said. “I’ve got an early meeting with Councilor Toro today.”
Corinne nodded and remembered just before he walked out.
“About Councilor Toro,” she said. “I’ve been invited to dinner at his home tomorrow evening.”
Aryel smiled softly. “His family are good people. You should go.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to inconvenience anyone.”
“I’ll talk to Captain Ekhana today when we train,” he said. “Should be easy enough to find someone to cover for you for a few hours.”
Corinne returned his smile. “All right. Thank you.”
“Anything for you, Sunshine,” he said, winking, leaving Corinne somehow both annoyed and flattered at the same time.