Chapter 12
The Crown Prince was dressed in his white Knight’s cloak, but the clothing beneath was different.
For the first time, he looked like her future king.
He wore elegant black trousers and a fine white silk tunic with golden runed stitching around the neck.
A deep V at the top revealed not only his absurdly large pectorals, and the gold chain with Vivorr’s flame sigil upon it – but also the furious scar that stretched even deeper than she’d initially thought.
Like it had nearly reached his heart.
His pale hair was braided back in elegant knots, the sides freshly shaved to reveal the devastating lines of his face.
His blue eyes narrowed as he glanced from her to Zey and Izill, then back again.
As if he knew exactly what had transpired.
‘Your Highness!’ Zey’s voice had changed from storm clouds to a bright, airy breeze, and she bowed her head in respect. ‘You’re back.’
Everyone else bowed and came up wide-eyed, as if they, too, were surprised by his presence. She could have sworn one of the younger girls actually sighed in admiration.
‘Bow,’ Izill whispered to Ezer, as if she were throwing her a lifeline. She felt Izill’s small hand on her shoulder and gave an awkward curtsy.
The corner of Arawn’s lip quirked. She saw his eyes move across her, the salve and the swelling on her face.
‘At least the uniform fits,’ he said with raised brows as he beheld her, all in black. ‘We’re going to be late. Izill, I’ll take it from here. Thank you.’ He nodded his thanks to the servant, then gave Ezer a pointed glance. ‘Come on, Minder.’
She hadn’t the faintest idea where they were going, but for the first time, she didn’t need convincing to follow him. She practically fled the room like it was on fire.
‘Good luck!’ Izill hissed as she reached the threshold.
Arawn closed the door behind them. They stood in a narrow hallway, ancient white stones all around them, and towering arched ceilings with wooden beams covered in runes.
He cleared his throat.
She felt suddenly small in his gaze.
Someday, he’d have a golden crown on his head. Someday, he would be her king.
‘Making enemies with Zey is unwise,’ Arawn said.
His tone unraveled all semblance of royalty and any admiration she might have felt.
Instead, there was only annoyance.
‘I can handle Zey,’ Ezer said, and crossed her arms. She was plenty used to bullying, plenty used to being underestimated. ‘But you lied.’
His eyes widened. He looked like she’d accused him of murder. ‘I’m a Sacred. I do not lie.’
‘The Citadel doesn’t allow anyone without Sacred blood to enter,’ she whispered, as a servant in brown walked by, quickly bowing at the sight of their prince.
‘You knew, the entire time, that I’m—’ She waved a hand at herself, as if it would make it all make sense, because she’d heard the way even soft and kind Izill had said the word.
As if Ezer was somehow even less. ‘I’m an outsider. An Unconsecrated.’
Somehow the word felt spoiled. Like a curse she shouldn’t utter inside these walls.
But Arawn didn’t look at all surprised by it, like he truly had known the whole time.
‘You didn’t ask,’ he whispered back. ‘I assumed you knew, with your magic.’
‘I don’t have magic,’ she lied.
‘You do. And for whatever reason, you’re hiding exactly what it is. Why?’
Her fists curled in frustration.
‘You’re afraid,’ he said. ‘Because you cannot control it. Is that it?’
She barked out a laugh. ‘No.’
‘Then what is it?’ he asked. ‘You are here now, where all Sacred belong, whether they were raised beyond these walls or not. This is your true home. So, tell me why you seem to have everything against it.’
She released a breath.
How could she tell him?
The list was far too long.
Because I’ve watched people thrown in prison for accusations of spoiled magic just like mine, she wanted to say. Because for two years, I’ve fallen asleep to their cries echoing through the floor of my tower in Rendegard.
Because I’ve read about all the pillars, tried to find space for myself within one, and I cannot. I do not fit.
Because people fear the omens, and I find sanctuary in them.
And if she was really being honest with herself …
It was because she did not love the gods with her whole heart, like Ervos did.
She’d tried. For years, she had lit the right colored candles and said perfectly recited prayers, and she sang all the songs on Allgodsday beneath the light of the full moon.
She’d memorized the stanzas in their Book, and she’d even blessed the bread each time she and Ervos sat down for a meal.
And still, the Five had abandoned her.
Still, they had allowed terrible things to happen to her, and she did not have it in her heart to forgive them. To give her entire heart and mind and soul to serving them.
Not yet.
Not until they answered her.
Not until they showed her they were real.
And she had not been forgotten.
‘I am not my father,’ Arawn said, keeping his voice low. ‘You’d be wise to trust me with your gifts.’
A spike of fear jabbed her in the gut when he spoke of King Draybor Laroux.
He was double-pillared, capable of sending invocations to not one but two gods. Very few Sacred had ever been capable of surviving such power required.
For twenty years now, King Draybor had torn himself down, bit by bit, to defend them from the Acolyte in battle. He could wield both fire and wind at once, a deadly combination. And with each granted invocation that surged power through his body …
She’d heard the rumors that he was aging fast these days.
That he was on the battlefield less and less, needing to recover between bouts of using his magic.
And if the rumors were true, then soon enough, Draybor Laroux would be well on his way to a classic Sacred end.
A death, too young.
Another sword plunged in the snow.
And then this man before her, this cold prince of the north …
He would become his father.
And she would be another anomaly that the kingdom feared, just like her ravens. Different.
Dangerous.
She wouldn’t dare give Arawn an inkling of her strangeties.
It wasn’t safe.
Arawn seemed to sense the battle writhing within her, because his voice softened. ‘If you allowed me to help you with that hidden magic of yours … it’s worth honing. It’s worth discovering which pillar you lean into, because it saved me. And it can save you, too, with what’s coming next.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
Fear washed over her anew.
Arawn’s jaw twitched. ‘You have been reassigned.’
‘To what?’
‘To Kinlear,’ he said.
She raised a brow.
‘To do what you do best,’ Arawn said. ‘Minding.’
Without another word, he turned and marched down the hall, his pressed white cape sweeping out behind him as if caught in a rogue wind.
She sighed and followed as he led her down the Citadel halls. They were endlessly twisting, the stones painted with runes that glowed like stars as he guided the way. Stained glass windows showed depictions of the gods in their triad forms.
Each person they passed bowed when Arawn came into view.
Their future king walked amongst them.
But she could feel their eyes on her back instead, as he guided her away.
Something like nausea roiled in her gut.
They finally paused before a towering set of ancient wood doors. Two guards bowed and opened them for Arawn to pass.
She followed him inside, expecting a throne room, or perhaps a torture room of some sort …
But to her relief – and surprising delight – it was only books. They’d entered into an enormous room, with rows of massive wooden shelves that could only be held aloft by runed magic. They were the largest Ezer had ever seen.
Her eyes widened.
‘A library,’ she breathed.
A true library, not like the dusty, shadow-filled pawn shops Ervos had taken her to, where very few books on magic remained.
After the war began, King Draybor had most of the books on Sacred magic, war eagles, raphons, runes – anything, beyond the literature on the Five – rounded up and sent to the Citadel for safekeeping.
His guards had taken all they could find and handed out the Sacred Text instead.
It held the laws that all mortals must keep in order to become as close to the Five as they could. To fail was to deny the gods. And with each failure, a dark mark was placed upon one’s soul, dimming the light that the gods needed to find their soul when death came.
Too many laws broken and that light would go out.
There would be no Ehver.
No eternity in peace with the Five.
Instead, the soul would be tossed into a lake of darkness, a cold and endless abyss with not a shore to be found. Of course, that fate was too harrowing a task for every mortal.
So, the gods had children … and so were born the very first Sacred.
The Sacred were given magic – and invocations to call upon it – as a way for the gods to keep their power in check. With it, they were sworn to protect the innocent and strive for perfection on the nomages’ behalf, apart from one Absolution Day a month to keep them appeased.
The Sacred had always been the sacrificial lamb.
Without them, Ezer guessed they’d all be souls, heading for that lake of darkness.
The Sacred Text was the first book she’d ever read, cover to cover, and it was lucky she could read at all.
Most of the children in the temples were taught only wartime things.
Like how to cook or grow crops or sew uniforms for the soldiers. Most were taught simply how to survive, in a world where the chances of being drafted into the war were much higher than the chances of finding a good storybook.
But Ervos had valued books, and he knew Ezer would, too.
A child needed something to escape to, a place to feel safe and separate from the horrors of the war.
So he did all he could to purchase the ones left over for her.
He brought her books with stories of brave knights.
Stories of princes and princesses and dragons, where she’d learned that not every character needed saving.
And not every villain needed to be slayed.