Chapter 14
I massaged my temples as Enhart berated me for my inability to summon a single puff of smoke.
Apparently, Vesper’s idea of tea was two bottles of Hendarian cherry wine and staying up until the early hours of the morning.
What little moonlight there was seeped through the clouds above us and burned my irises.
“You’re not even trying,” he accused.
“I am!” An ember sparked and fizzled out with a hiss between my palms. Heat throbbed beneath my skin like a warning. I had absolutely no intention of performing anything more advanced than that, but I wasn’t about to admit that to him.
“You’re clearly holding back, so you might as well tell me what’s going on before I have to force you to.”
Godsdamnit. “Force me?” I seethed, my cheeks reddening. A flame sizzled between my cupped hands. “Happy?”
He stepped back, eyeing me suspiciously. “No.”
“I thought you said that fire should be born from calm, not chaos,” I protested as the flame disappeared in a whiff of smoke. “And yet you seem intent on provoking me.”
“I find that anger motivates you.”
I cursed him under my breath.
“Are you going to tell me what this is really about?” he asked.
I swallowed, avoiding his gaze. “I just feel like fire should be used sparingly. It’s unpredictable.”
“You’re lying.”
“I told you to stop—”
He held up a hand, silencing me. “I don’t have to, in your words, poke around in your mind to know that you’re lying to me. Remember, I have a lifetime of experience in the King’s court, and you’re not nearly as practiced at deception as the nobility.”
“Perhaps I’d be better at it if you hadn’t abandoned me in the middle of our session last night,” I protested.
The look on his face straddled the line between amused and perplexed. “Last night? Weren’t we already retiring for the evening?”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
He cocked his head. “I apologize that my masculine wiles got the better of me. I promise to stay out with you all night if that’s what it takes.”
“That’s not what I—”
“No, I insist. All night, and into the day. I’ll beat Mordric off with a stick if I have to.”
I rolled my eyes.
“What are you hiding?” he asked, his face suddenly serious.
“Nothing,” I insisted. “I just think there are better things we could be doing with our time together.”
He smirked. “You know I could just take a look myself.”
“Don’t you dare.”
“Then tell me. I command you.”
I snorted. “You command me?”
“That’s right. As your prince.”
“You don’t—” I stammered. “You can’t.” He could, technically, and he knew it.
“Or better yet, I’ll make Mordric command you.”
I swallowed. I didn’t love the options that were being laid out before me, and I wanted Mordric to know about the truth even less than I did Enhart. “Fine,” I conceded. “The last time I summoned fire, more than a simple flame in the palm of my hand, it got out of control.”
“You killed someone.”
I sucked in a breath. “How did you—”
He shrugged. “You forget that I’ve lived through some horrors myself, witch, not that you’ve ever asked. There’s very little that can surprise me. Who was it?”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I don’t know their names.”
“Names?” he parroted.
I ducked my chin, finding his gaze too penetrating. “There were five of them. Five strangers. They stormed the village, threatened us. I didn’t do it on purpose, but I … I unleashed some kind of horror onto them.”
“How vague. What did it look like?”
I shot him a wry look. “Blue.”
“Blue? That doesn’t sound like ordinary fire.”
I shrugged. “It wasn’t, I don’t think.”
“Show me,” he said. His fingers wrapped around mine and I jerked away, surprised, but his hold was firm.
“I don’t think—”
Show me, his voice echoed in my head, cutting me off. I stared at him blankly. I didn’t want him to see me on that cold afternoon in Wealdstone. Not like that.
You can trust me.
Vesper’s words echoed in my head. She had trusted him. Mordric did, too, simply by allowing Enhart to train me. I exhaled slowly, my eyes already stinging. “Okay,” I whispered.
I threaded my fingers through his, clearing a path to my memories. His imprint was cold against my mind, eager to see what I was hiding. Against every instinct, I lowered my wards, and let him in.
The chill seeped through the soles of my boots as I walked the length of Wealdstone’s high street.
A gift from my parents the day I turned fifteen, the leather was flimsy and frayed after years of daily wear.
I clutched a pile of freshly laundered linens to my chest, the faint scent of the lavender soap my grandmother made by hand wafting up to my nose.
My fingers twitched, the skin cracked and pink from spending all day scrubbing other people’s clothes in the creek.
It was early spring, but Felmas had so far refused to release his grip on the hamlet. The townsfolk, most of whom I had known my entire life, bustled past us swaddled in thick wool, their hands stuffed into moth-eaten mittens to protect them against the chill.
My grandmother walked beside me, the top of her head barely reaching my shoulder.
Gran liked to remind me that she had once been tall, like me, and had merely shrunk with age.
Across the muddy road, Silas Proctor tutted to himself as he examined the hoarfrost on the tip of his boot.
I imagined that he would soon claim that the cold was an omen from the gods.
A warning about young folks who rejected life on their ancestral farms and sought their fortunes in Bard.
I’d heard it many times before.
I grimaced as his displeasure washed over me like a foul stench. I bent at the waist, stooping low enough to whisper in Gran’s ear. “Silas is feeling mighty rotten today,” I said.
She chuckled. “I suppose we can expect to be shaken down for offerings sometime soon. Perhaps to Althan, to ensure a boon of healthy babes?”
I grinned. Silas made that offering to the Goddess of Marriage and Fertility nearly every spring. “You know,” I said, parroting one of his favorite lines, “as High Priest of Wealdstone, he is responsible for the spiritual wellbeing of our charming little hamlet.”
“Nor does he take his duties lightly,” she quipped.
“A husband and a few little ones would certainly put some meat on her bones,” came a familiar voice.
I practically tripped over my feet as the words met my ears, whipping my head around to stare at Silas. “Did you hear that?” I asked Gran, astonished.
She fixed me with a sardonic glare. Her eyes were a mirror image of mine, as dark blue and fathomless as the colossal lake that stood between here and Bard. “You know very well that I am deaf to useless drivel,” she said.
I laughed despite myself. As one of the village elders, Gran had overheard her fair share of snide comments. And yet, she never took them to heart. I wished I had even half of her gall. She caught Silas’s eye and gave an exaggerated wave and smile, revealing a row of crooked teeth.
The High Priest turned his watery eyes away from us and shuffled down the street, pausing to exchange heated words with the barkeep, Mr. Farrow, over the state of his grimy windows. “Farrow!” he barked. “The gods do not look favorably upon the unkempt, you know.” I rolled my eyes.
We paused as we reached the home of Willa and Gregor Bonny.
Their house was humble, like most in Wealdstone, with graying walls and a thatched roof that smelled faintly of mildew.
Still, it was nicer than the battered cottage I shared with Gran that sat on the outskirts of the village.
I knocked, my knuckles stinging as I rapped them lightly against the wood.
A few moments later the door swung wide.
“Finn, Ettie, it’s lovely to see you both,” said Willa.
Her youngest boy, Callum, peeked out from beneath her skirts.
Willa and I had been close friends as children.
We used to forage for mushrooms around the edge of the woods under my father’s watchful eye.
The mushrooms would feed our families, but back then it was simply a game to us.
When she met her husband, Gregor, toward the end of our school years, she had fallen head over heels in love with him, as teenagers do.
She dropped out of school shortly after she realized she was pregnant.
Now, she was swollen with her fourth child.
“Hello there,” said Gran, smiling widely at the child. His eyes rounded and he ducked behind his mother.
“Don’t mind him,” said Willa, stifling a yawn.
“A shy one, eh?” Gran chuckled. “Finn was the same as a child. Not Jem, though, couldn’t stop him from befriending every stranger on the street.”
My smile faltered at the mention of my brother’s name. The knife wound that his loss had left in my heart had dulled over the years, but never healed. Willa’s lips stretched into a tight line. “I remember.”
Willa’s family had been spared during the outbreak of violet fever that had ravaged Wealdstone eight years ago, but she still laid a stone on the cairn for mine.
I glanced down as her son reemerged. He took after her, with his ashy blonde hair and big brown eyes.
“How much do we owe you, Ettie?” asked Willa, taking the linens off my hands.
“Just five today,” Gran replied.
“Take these inside,” Willa instructed her son, patting him gently on the back. He clutched the linens with grubby hands before wandering clumsily into the house. Willa shoved swollen fingers into her apron, fishing out five copper coins and dropping them into my palm.
“You look about ready to burst,” said Gran. “How are you feeling?”
She groaned. “My back hurts something awful and my ankles are so fat that I can barely walk. Midwife says another week or so, but I’m just about ready to yank this babe out myself.”
Gran let out a barking laugh. “I remember the feeling, although it was quite a long time ago. Best of luck to you,” she said.