Chapter 31
“Oh fuck!”
Meela screeches and hits the ground, dodging a particularly nasty shower of ice crystals that got out of control and went her way. She shoots out a wall of fire as a last resort while she hits the ground, and the ice sizzles and drops as they connect with the flames.
She stands slowly, brushing her knees off. And elbows. And… pretty much everywhere.
Then she looks at me with a look I’d imagine my mother would give me as a child who has done something particularly reckless.
“Should we break for lunch?” she asks, already grabbing her things.
“I guess so,” I laugh.
“Good. I need a bath.”
We stroll back to the castle side-by-side. Even though we’re out here practicing with relative privacy, we’ve barely mentioned this whole new shift in our friendship or our looming journey.
“You’ve always loved a challenge. A puzzle that needs solving,” she says, breaking the silence.
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve just been thinking… about all of it.” She looks off in the distance, her shiny dark hair blowing on the breeze. “I’m not surprised you of all elves wants to find the pieces of this puzzle and reunite them. It’s probably been driving you crazy for years.” She chuckles to herself.
“Okay, maybe you’re right. But it’s not really about the puzzle of it all. We might all die out one day if this continues. Just because the elves are okay right now, doesn’t mean it won’t come for us eventually. What if everyone else starts dying? Then what? It already took air magic away.”
“Yeah, I forget air magic was even a thing… strange,” she says. “I’m not so sure it started that way, though. You’re not usually some savior who wants to help anyone and everyone.”
“What, I like to watch people suffer?”
“No, that’s not what I mean. You do have a big heart. But you also have a determined, relentless, spirit about you that won’t rest until you figure something out.”
I chuckle but there’s not much humor in it. “Well, we’re here now. What does it matter how we got here?”
“It doesn’t,” she murmurs. Then we finish our stroll in silence.
At lunch, Daegan and Raef find us. The moment they enter the room my stomach does flips.
Luckily, Daegan takes the lead. He sits incredibly close and rests his arm on the table as he leans toward me and whispers in my ear. “You look stunning today.”
His voice in my ear makes me shiver, and I’m certain my cheeks are blooming with color. Meela stares right at me and laughs.
Raef tries to lean in close to her, but she cocks her head back and makes a face at him. “First of all, no.”
He holds his hands up, confused. But still smiling.
There’s no one that close to us, but she lowers her voice anyway. “I’ve never ever been a touchy person in public. It would be more suspicious if I started it now. All you need to do is be seen coming home with me at the end of the night. Okay?”
He nods, contemplative. “Easy enough.”
“Princess here is the one who needs to be wooed.” She nods her head at me.
In that moment, I decide to scrounge up whatever confidence I can, stop blushing so much, and start playing into it more.
I stick my chin up, prop my elbows on the table, and interlace my hands.
“That’s right, I do,” I say with a nod and a haughty air.
“I’m not going to run away with just any asshole from Torrynth. ”
I glance at Daegan, whose lips are pulled into a tight line, like he can’t quite decide if he wants to let himself smile or not. “Noted,” he says with a nod, finally letting his grin shine through.
“How were the training grounds?” I ask them.
“About the same as the last time. A bunch of macho idiots thought it would be a good idea to challenge us, and we made them look like fools.”
“Good,” Meela says. “I can’t be seen with some scoundrel who can’t even hold his own in a battle.”
“I feel like we’re being insulted this morning, Daegan. What about you?”
He shrugs, side-eyeing me. “As long as she wears a dress like that, she can insult me however she wants.” I’m wearing a low-cut dark purple one today.
I laugh, holding my composure on the outside. But inside, I’m melting.
“Excuse me,” Daegan rises from the table, and my eyes track him all the way to the refreshments, where he makes a cup of tea. When he returns, he sets it in front of me, setting two hardened sap cubes beside it.
I shift my gaze from the cup in front of me to him.
“What? You take it with two cubes, right?”
“Right…”
I look around the room, feeling a tingling in my neck, and then my eyes fall on Adrian. I know he’s been watching. For how long, I don’t know. But he looks angry.
“The lovesick captain has not been happy with my presence all morning,” Daegan murmurs.
I look over and find him following my gaze. “Did he challenge you again?”
“No. He’d be stupid to do that.”
When we finish, Meela announces that she needs a bath to wipe all the dirt away before we practice more. She looks at Raef with flirty eyes. “Care for an afternoon tangle in the sheets, lover?”
“What?” Raef asks, caught off guard.
She rolls her eyes. “Not really, but… just come on.” She grabs his wrist—not his hand—and leads him away.
“Bye,” he calls back at us.
Daegan and I walk side-by-side out of the dining hall. Adrian’s seething eyes track us on the way out, but I ignore it. Perhaps things between us feel unresolved on his end, but that chapter is over for me.
The tall, muscular dragon clad in all black stops ahead of me, turning to face me. “Do you also need a bath before training and most likely getting dirty all over again?”
I chuckle. “No.”
He folds his arms, his gaze searching my eyes for something. I cannot guess what.
“Do you want to come see what we’ve been working on?”
“Yes,” he answers without hesitation.
I smile and lead the way.
We make light conversation on the way out there. It’s a little chilly, so I pull my cloak out of my bag and put it on. He asks more questions about the castle and the town. Of course he’s naturally curious, having lived so far south his whole life.
“So how did you guys make the journey with no inns for half the route here?”
“Cunning, strength, determination…”
I glance at him and find a teasing grin. “Okay tough guy. Keep your little secrets. For now.”
“Not much of our history is unknown to you, is it?”
“I don’t know…” I take a deep breath, pulling my hands into my cloak. “Lately I feel…”
I sense him watching me, waiting. “What?”
“I feel so stupid. Blindsided by so many things I had no idea about. How can I know so little about the world, when I’ve spent most of my life in the library?”
I glance at him, waiting for a response.
He looks off in the distance thoughtfully, his eyebrows scrunched.
“You’ve studied a lot about history—at least, the versions someone carefully curated to their liking.
You don’t know much about the present, because you’ve rarely left the safety of Ellyar.
” He glances at me, his expression growing more serious. “But you will. You’re far from stupid.”
I think about what he said as I look out at the tall icy walls that line the castle grounds. They’ve kept danger out, but they’ve also kept me trapped in here most of my life.
My hands are still cold, so I cast two small orbs of swirling warm water that I then dip my hands into as I walk. “Ah. That’s better,” I nearly moan with relief.
Daegan lets out something like a chortle beside me.
I whip my head toward him. “What?”
“You’ve spent your whole life barely learning to defend yourself,” he says with an ironic smile. “And yet, many of you have taught yourself so many ridiculous little tricks like that for your own comfort.”
I can’t help but laugh with him. “It is ridiculous, isn’t it?”
“Very much so,” he says, the corner of his lip still turned up just a little. “But I’m glad your hands are warm.”
I drop the water orbs, suddenly feeling stupid.
He glances down at my hands with an eyebrow quirked but says nothing.
We pass a few regal old nox trees with deep green ivy crawling up them in twists and turns, and then I stop just beyond them. They offer a little bit of cover from the castle.
“Well, this is where we’ve been practicing.”
He assesses the area, crossing his arms.
“Learn anything good?”
“Yeah, actually.”
I set my bag down and shake out my hands. “Watch this.”
I show him the trick I learned earlier that almost took Meela out, but this time, I’m a little more careful.
I aim toward the tree, and dozens of sharp ice crystals the size of my pinky finger appear out of the air and whizz past him, hitting their targets.
Every one of them is successfully buried in the bark.
He looks at me with his eyebrows halfway up his forehead. “That’s… great.”
I can’t help the smile that pulls at my cheeks. “Thank you.”
“What else?”
“I can cast a large water orb that I think I can trap someone’s head in… they won’t be able to get out of it.”
His eyebrows remain raised. “You think?”
“Well, I haven’t actually tried it on anyone…”
“Do it to me,” he says.
“You’re serious…”
“Yeah.”
I shake my head. “No.”
“Why not? When I’m on the verge of drowning, just take it away.”
“What if I panic? What if I can’t focus and can’t take it away. What if I hurt you?”
He reaches out, steadying my shoulders as he looks into my eyes. “You won’t.”
I still hesitate, but he steps back and braces himself. Like it’s already decided.
“What are we doing?”
Raef and Meela emerge from beyond the trees.
“He’s trying to make me drown him,” I explain.
“Nice. Can I do it?” Raef says with a grin.
“Yes, please do,” Meela says.
“I don’t want to drown anyone,” I protest.
“I already volunteered,” Daegan adds blandly. He’s standing in front of me, waiting.
“Too bad,” Raef sings, stepping in front of him, blocking most of Daegan out with his own hulking frame. “You’ve been voted out.”
“I didn’t vote,” I protest again.
“Wouldn’t you rather hurt me than him?” Raef asks, placing his hands on his hips.
I lift an eyebrow in an exaggerated manner, sizing up both of them. “Not necessarily.”