CHAPTER THREE
A slap. Stinging pain. A locked closet. A flash of blond curls. The tail of a golden thread.
Bile bit at my throat as images flooded my mind. My hand reached for the palace wall to steady myself, to keep from swaying on my feet. A few nobles glanced at me with concern, but none stopped to ask if I was alright.
Why would they?
The flickers of danger faded to black, and a sick weight settled in my chest.
Poor Ella.
I swallowed hard, even as the acid at the back of my mouth burned.
I have no troubles at home, she’d said. It’s what she always said.
How could I help someone who refused help? Who shut me out and hid her pain?
I lifted a trembling hand to my face, sore with the ghost of a slap I never received.
My gaze caught another’s down the hallway. Prince Thomas peered at me, head tilted, his deep green mage robes brushing against the floor. His spectacles glinted in the candlelight.
I hesitated.
And then I remembered his words from the pond. His dismissal of my fresh grief.
He most likely thought I was in his way again.
I huffed and whirled away, leaving him behind, even as the world tilted beneath me and my body begged to rest.
Even as my best friend in the world’s pain left me breathless and ill beyond measure.
My older sister, Kelara, sat with me in the chambermaid’s quarters, her ankles crossed before her. She picked at a loose thread at the bottom of her dress.
“Let me,” I said, running my thumb along the seam. Kelara obliged, leaning back. The air above the fabric blurred, the thread resewing itself into the dress’s hem.
Her eyes crinkled. “I wish I had your gift.”
“You shouldn’t.” As I spoke the words, my stomach churned and nausea clutched at my throat. So many lives ruined from a gift I didn’t even want.
I would have to confront Ella eventually. But what would I even say to make her hear me?
“Why not? It seems so useful.”
“Yes, so useful that Papa could never put me to work in his shop.”
“Lyranore.”
“What?”
“You can’t really mean that.” Her gaze searched my own. “Papa was proud of you.”
I schooled my features, but all I could hear was Papa’s words on his deathbed, thick with disappointment about my life’s trajectory: You’re meant for more, Lyranore.
“Yes, I’m sure he was very proud when he fired me at fourteen.”
Papa had been a talented fire mage. He worked as a blacksmith along with his father, who’d learned the craft from my great grandmother. If he’d been born in different circumstances, he might have one day made the Mage Council.
But status played favorites, even in magic.
And Papa’s life was cut too short to make a difference.
Kelara wrinkled her brow. “You came home with new burns and blisters every day. He didn’t fire you because he was disappointed—”
“He didn’t have to,” I interrupted. I looked down at the callouses and scars that graced my fingers and palms. “I was sloppy. We both knew it. I didn’t have it in me.
” The line of fire mages ended with me. The promises and dreams he told me growing up, of outwitting the system, of bringing honor to our family name, ended with my simple gift: textile magic.
“I make an excellent mender of clothing,” I said with a bitter edge to my voice. “Nothing more.”
“Mending is useful.”
“Mending is a neat parlor trick. But it won’t earn me a place on the Mage Council like Papa wanted.”
Kelara sighed, her fingers running over the thread I’d just repaired. We’d had this argument enough times to know it always ended the same way.
She eyed me. “Have you heard about Gina?”
“No.”
“She’s caught the plague.” Her tone faltered.
My entire body went rigid.
The Quiet Passing. It was the same sickness that had taken Papa, the same one that continued to steal friends, lovers, and family with steady cruelty. “She’ll be alright,” I lied.
Kelara’s face scrunched. She tried to nod, but a tear slipped across her cheek, dripping off her nose. I leaned forward and wrapped my arms around her.
“She won’t.” Kelara cried inside my arms, shoulders shaking, and I patted her back, my own heart breaking within me.
Gina had been my sister’s best friend since childhood.
She might survive, but not without scars from the sickness that stole her innocence, her deserved right to live a long, happy life.
It hadn’t spared the King’s eldest daughter—why would it spare a poor girl from the city?
When Kelara stilled, I released her from my grasp. Her nose was red, her eyes swollen. I rustled through a nearby drawer for a kerchief, which she took and blew her nose into. She wiped her cheeks roughly, then finally turned to look at me.
“I’ve been thinking…”
I shifted in my seat.
“Life is short. Shorter than it should be.” She blinked back more tears. “Felipe has been coming by the house, asking for another chance.”
My throat tightened. I could feel what would happen. It slammed into me, the vision of Felipe with yet another girl, my sister heartbroken again. Her daughter Asha wailing as the father she deserved betrayed their family yet again.
My jaw clenched. “Don’t do it, Kelara.”
Hurt flashed in her eyes. “Why?”
“I… I have a bad feeling.” I should tell her the words—that I had a premonition, that I didn’t just think, I knew, but I couldn’t.
Nobody could tell the future. At least, that’s what the Mage Council taught.
And of course, I’d never been able to tell the future. I merely had a feeling.
A feeling that happened to come true.
She looked down at her hands, knotting the soiled kerchief. “But what if he’s changed? It’s been years. A lot can happen in a couple of years.”
I placed my hand atop hers, stilling her fidgeting. “You know what else can happen in a couple of years? Nothing. He already betrayed you once, Kelara. Asha wasn’t even a year old at the time. I don’t want to see you retreat into yourself again. Think of Asha.”
She sniffled. “I am thinking of Asha. She deserves to get to know her father.”
“She deserves the world. But that man cannot give it to her. You can.”
Kelara refused to meet my eyes. “I’ll think about it, Ly.”
“Please do.” My face tightened. “Please believe me. He wasn’t honest then, and he’s not honest now.”
She gave a faint nod, and I let go of her hand, returning it to my lap. She rose on wobbly feet, stretching her back. Her eyes were puffy, her cheeks blotchy and red.
“I love you,” I told her with the most sappiness I could manage.
Her lips curved upward, ever so slightly. “I love you too.”
The door opened, and one of my roommates, Anna, walked in. Her nose wrinkled at the sight of us. “You’re supposed to ask before having visitors.”
“And you’re supposed to be cleaning the water closet,” I said. Anna huffed and left.
Kelara gave me a look. “I take it the two of you don’t get along.”
“If only everyone were as sweet as you and Asha.” My shoulders sagged. “I have Ella. She cleans the rooms with me. That’s all I need to be happy here.”
Her brow lifted. “And you promise you’re happy? Papa wanted you to be happy, not toiling away at duties that make you miserable.”
My insides turned, though I wasn’t sure why this time. No premonition loomed over me, no insight into what would come to pass. Nevertheless, I cleared my throat against the uneasiness coursing through me. “I am happy. For now.”
Kelara nodded, then grabbed her bags to leave.
“Thanks for dropping by,” I said, rising to give her a hug. “Give Asha and Mama a kiss for me.”
She grinned through tear-stained cheeks. “I always do. See you at home next week.”
She closed the cracked wooden door behind her. I sank onto my simple bed, the straw mattress denting beneath me. Light slipped in through the basement’s windows and danced across the cool, stone floors.
I’m happy, I told myself.
Aren’t I?