Chapter 14 Echoes of the Past #2
The hedge curved again, revealing a stone arch grown over with vines, and as she stepped under it, a warm breeze stirred her hair. This place would have been the perfect spot to bury herself in a delicious novel, but this was Dravaryn, so she was far more likely to find blood than books.
She wanted to weep, or scream, or curl into the earth and never leave.
But the pull was back, that tug even stronger now, dragging her away from the roses and toward the castle. Her hand fell from the rose as she stepped back through the hedge, the scent of spice and velvet clinging to her hair.
She didn’t want to leave, yet her feet moved anyway.
The garden watched her go.
She felt it, like eyes between her shoulder blades, patient and knowing, as if she would return whether she intended to or not.
She eased through a side entrance, torchlight wavering as though it recognized her, the obsidian in the floor shimmering again.
Ella walked for what felt like ages, half-tranced, half-hunting.
The halls blurred around her, but she would memorize the turns later.
Right now she was following her instincts, which she hoped would lead her straight to the relic.
She turned the next corner and voices caught her ear.
A familiar scent wafted toward her, bitter herbs and tinctures filling the air, the same smell that always clung to Bryn’s clothes.
This had to be the healer’s quadrant. She froze just before the archway and melted into the shadows.
The door stood ajar, lamplight spilling into the hall, voices threading easily through the gap.
“I’ve treated plenty of injuries in my time, Jakobav,” Bryn said. “But Ella’s power, whatever the shit-eating brumble-bunnies it is, doesn’t feel like anything I’ve known. Not in decades. Maybe longer.”
Jakobav’s voice was quieter. “You think she’s hiding something?”
“No,” Bryn said. “I think something inside her is hiding from her. And that’s what worries me.”
Ella’s breath caught. Her palm flattened against the wall. What in the hell were they talking about?
She wasn’t some walking magical time bomb. She had trained, honed, controlled every flame in her until it bent to her will. Just because she couldn’t access it now didn’t mean it was wrong.
“You don’t think she’s from the South like I suspected?” Jakobav asked.
“I’m starting to wonder,” Bryn admitted. “Maybe she’s not from anywhere we’ve mapped recently.”
A long silence stretched between them.
Then Bryn’s voice dropped. “Whatever it is…it wasn’t Claimed magic. It didn’t behave like normal elemental abilities rooted in sacred soil. It was like she had one foot in this realm and the other too far for my gifts to touch.”
Ella’s throat went dry as she backed away from the door.
One foot here. One foot elsewhere.
The thought gnawed at the hollow beneath her sternum until her breath turned shallow.
She took a step into the corridor, then another.
This was good. She needed to keep moving, because if she stood still, then what she had just overheard would consume her.
The torchlight rolled across the charcoal veins in the wall as if they, too, were listening.
She found herself heading toward the solitude of Jakobav’s chambers.
But heat flared beneath her skin, dizzying, and her body remembered before her mind could stop it. Bryn’s words had cracked open a memory, and the past surged up to meet her.
Caelen Verelith leaned against the silver-barked tree, golden hair glowing beneath moonlight, watching her with that familiar mix of amusement and envy.
He was beautiful.
That was only part of the problem.
His hands were soft. His smile even softer.
“You’ve been distant,” he said.
“I’ve been training.”
“Training to what? Rule with bruises instead of your charm?”
She said nothing.
“Scare the suitors away?” His grin was teasing, but not cruel. “Ellandria, don’t you know that you could simply rule with a smile? You don’t need to bleed for your people.”
Her eyes stayed on the moonlit orchids crawling up the bark of a tree across the field.
He sat beside her, close enough to touch. “You’re different now. You feel…heavier. Like a storm cloud ready to break.”
“I’ve been thinking about the crown. I don’t know if I was meant to rule, Caelen. And I’m not sure that I want to,” she said.
“Sure you do. Why else would you hide so much of yourself?” he said, voice dipping. “You think I don’t see it?”
He moved closer, brushing a speck of invisible dust from his sleeve. “You could have everything, Ellandria. Power. Allegiance. Me. You don’t have to make yourself a weapon.”
She looked away. “That’s not what I want.”
“Sure it is. Everyone wants power. And if we were to unite our bloodlines through the mating ceremony, we could force the fractured provinces to fall in line. Bring the rest of the kingdoms to heel. Make the North pay for the siege they started, once and for all—”
“Stop,” she said.
He blinked. “What?”
“That’s not me. I want to find my fated mate. And besides, that’s not what I was taught. The point of power is to protect, not punish. My parents believe—”
“Your parents are cowards.”
The air stilled.
Ella turned away from him, but he was already reaching for her hand. He didn’t notice her flinch. She pulled away farther.
“Ellandria, it is time to stop being na?ve and start thinking about our future.” He reached for her hand once more. “I see what you’re becoming. You think you’re just fire? You think your power stops there? There’s more. There’s always been more.”
She yanked her hand away, with force this time and a matching scowl.
“You’re hiding something,” he whispered, eyes narrowing. “Maybe you don’t even know it. But I feel it. When you walk in, the whole room shifts. Like it’s bracing.”
Her voice cracked. “Caelen—”
“Come on,” he whispered. “Show me.”
“Caelen, please drop it. I said no.”
“Burn me.”
“No!”
His hand closed around her wrist, too tight. Then the magic broke loose. Not with flame or fury, but ripe with instinct.
It knocked them both back. The sound he made was strangled.
Ella stumbled forward, panting, hand on the wall. Not magic this time, but memory. Just as painful. She hadn’t meant to hurt him. He’d been right, in his way. She wasn’t just fire, maybe she was something else, and it terrified her more than anything Bryn could ever say.
With no other choice but to keep moving, she turned the corner too fast and slammed into someone.
Jakobav didn’t flinch.
Of course he didn’t.
His hair, usually a fall of soft brown waves around his temples and neck, had been bound back tonight, drawn tight at the nape of his neck.
The severe style revealed the full cut of his jaw, leaving nothing softened, nothing hidden.
He looked down at her, one brow raised, and that smug little curve touched his lips.
“I was wondering when you’d start sneaking around.”
“If I were trying to hide, you wouldn’t have found me,” she said coolly.
“Mm.” His eyes swept over her, assessing.
Without warning, he reached out, and his finger barely grazed her cheek as he brushed a lock of hair behind her ear.
The touch lingered just enough to feel possessive, as though he had a right to move her how he pleased.
Ella’s chin lifted, her voice steady despite the jolt it sent through her. “Careful. If I return the favor and stroke your face, I don’t promise to be gentle.”
Jakobav stilled.
A note of surprise broke through his mask, gone as quickly as it came. His eyes flickered, dark amusement glinting there, but before he could respond—
“What did Bryn mean?” she asked, cutting him off. She needed to take control now. Drag the truth from him before he could twist it. “About my power. About it being different.”
He tilted his head, that same assessing look narrowing.
“I think you misheard.”
“I didn’t.”
“Then you misunderstood.”
“Unlikely.” Ella’s voice now had a razor-sharp edge.
Her pulse quickened, patience thinning.
Jakobav leaned just close enough that his breath touched her cheek. “If you’re hunting answers,” he said, “be very careful you don’t stumble into questions you’re not ready to ask.”
She glared. “That’s not an answer.”
“No,” he said, smiling darkly. “It’s a warning.”
Her magic stirred in her chest, angry and insistent. She crossed her arms. “You’re hiding something.”
“Of course I am.”
He said it like it was obvious. Like hiding was survival.
“You think this is a game?”
“No, Princess.” His voice dropped. “I think this is war. And you don’t even know who’s holding the sword yet.”
His eyes tracked the way the word struck her, a slow, knowing curve pulling at his mouth.
The word split her in two.
Princess.
It hit her like a forbidden sorceress chained to a spire, torch flame pressed to her skin, searing through every layer she’d tried to hide. Her pulse crashed, wild and uneven, and her vision tunneled, the walls narrowing to trap her.
He couldn’t know. He couldn’t.
Her hand flew beneath her shirt, clutching at the hidden ink as if she could bury the truth. The flush of her cheeks burned hot and traitorous. Her throat closed, and she nearly choked on the secret itself.
Jakobav looked down at her, unrelenting.
He raised his hand toward her quickly, only for his fingers to then slowly drag across the fevered line of her cheekbone. The touch was not for comfort. She was utterly out of control, stripped bare.
Then he stepped past her. “Go back to my room, Ella,” he said, his voice colder now. “Before someone starts asking what side you’re on.”
She had barely even begun the search, and already, she was losing her footing.