Leon talks to my back, unmoved by my claim.
“And how would your parents be so sure you didn’t have magic when you were born? Don’t most human children have to wait a few years for their powers to show?”
I don’t have a response for that one. It’s true that the first act of terrial magic usually happens around age five, though there are exceptions. I never bothered to wonder what happened if your magicwasn’tterrial. Instead, I’d assumed my parents were curious about my magic when I was born. That they’d maybe had a dryad perform a viatic spell to try to predict what sort of terrial power I’d have, and that was when they discovered my lack of power.
But if therewasa spell, how could it have missed that I actually do have power?
It couldn’t. So whatever test they did showed them you had thewrongkind of power.
The voice in my head whispers what I don’t want to hear, leading me to a much darker place—a dangerous alleyway full of shadows. I don’t know if I’m ready to walk down it.
Alastor clears his throat, and I turn back to the fae at last.
“As dramatic as this all is,” he says, “we should get going. We’re still not that far from the trading post, and those cretins might have friends who’ll come looking for them. I’m guessing we don’t want anyone to guess that Her Highness was connected to…this.” He points to the massacred trees.
Leon nods. “My horse is by the wagon.”
“And mine is here…somewhere,” Alastor sniffs, peering through the trees. “It bolted the moment Ralus over here did her thing.”
He means me. Ralus is the king of the gods, protector of the sun, and I seem to have his magic. I wasn’t brought up to be religious the way my friends from the village were. In Gallawing, the only one who cared deeply about faith was Etusca, and she had her dryad ways, which had next to nothing in common with the practices of the Temple of Ethira. I heard about the Temple’s rituals from Tira, but I never felt the need to follow them myself.
But still, I was taught enough to accept what most do: that all our magic is a gift from the divine beings. Except celestial magic, of course.
I know I didn’t steal my power, and even if I have no idea where it came from, I don’t see why it couldn’t have come to me like everyone else’s magic does.
But if Ralus is responsible for this, it doesn’t feel like a gift. It feels more like a curse.
This time I hardly notice the passing hours as we ride late into the night, my mind too busy turning over the pieces of everything I thought I knew. Somehow, I have to try to put those pieces back together in a way that makes sense. It doesn’t help that the headache has gotten worse. By now I’m struggling to remember a time when my body didn’t hurt.
When we eventually stop to make camp, I’ve reached a decision. The thousands of questions I have outweigh my wariness of the fae. I need to know what’s going on more than I need to be cautious right now.
“Here.” I stand over Leon where he and Alastor are sitting by the campfire, handing over the vial with the last drops of the crimson potion.
“Your medicine?” The fae prince flicks his gray eyes from my hand to my face.
“I’ve taken that potion every day of my life, since I can remember. Do you know what it does?”
The fae prince uncorks the top and sniffs, then passes it to Alastor, who also looks it over. But he shakes his head.
“I don’t,” Leon says, and I believe him. “But I’m no expert on potions. Didn’t your healer ever tell you?”
“Yes. She told me it was to keep me alive—and that it was necessary for me to have a full dose every day. But in the last few months, I’d made a plan to leave. And since I knew I needed the potion, I found a way to take a smaller dose, storing up the rest so I could take it with me. I don’t think it’s an accident that after a few months on a reduced dose, I conjured my first burst of magic.”
I wasn’t sure how to explain that the second burst came so much faster, but maybe it was because the dose I was taking was so much smaller.
He watches me, saying nothing at first. Maybe it’s crazy to be looking for validation from these two—but I can’t stop thinking of the connection between the times when I was taking less medicine and the times when my magic came out. I need someone to tell me that it makes sense—that what I’m thinking, however devastating, is possible.
Alastor is the one who comes out and says it.
“You think the potion has been suppressing your magic?”
“Yes,” I say, waiting for them to contradict me.Wantingthem to contradict me, but knowing they probably won’t.
“Do you think that’s all it does?” Leon asks. The vial looks tiny in his fingers, but he handles it nimbly as he turns it over, examining its ruby hue in the firelight.
That’s the question that’s haunting me. Because maybe it’s still true—I’m sick and need the potion to survive. The suppression of my magic could be a side effect. After all, better to be without magic than dead.
But I doubt it. I think my parents set out to hide my power all these years—at any cost. Because they were ashamed of me.
