“Is it?” she asks, her expression cynical. “Was it more complicated at Mistwell?”
A chill sweeps over me at the name. I take a step back, and she must notice my reaction because she keeps talking, pushing the point.
“Or is it like they say, and you slaughtered everyone in that town because you’re not capable of mercy?”
Her words conjure up the memory like it was yesterday—the bodies scattered for miles, the blank, unseeing eyes while red tokens fluttered in the wind.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I growl. I’m done with this conversation. Maybe it’s my fault this blew up as spectacularly as it did, but that doesn’t mean I have to stick around to let the debris slice through me.
“No?” she says. “Then what really happened? What’s your excuse for massacring all those people?”
I realize now she’s not just angry, she’s fishing. She wants to know the truth, and she’s trying to provoke me into talking about it. I feel like I’m back in Lavail, trying to explain myself to my grandfather. It’s been eighty years of trying to wipe away the images of my biggest mistake, and to have them dredged up and flung at me now so unexpectedly—byherof all people—is like being plunged into icy water.
Footsteps sound outside: the familiar gait of Proctor Gallis.
“We’re done,” I say. I can hear the coldness in my voice. It matches my insides, and even her burning gaze can’t thaw it as I sweep out of the training room.
Chapter 6
Morgana
Ipull a book from the shelf, flipping it open to read the index. A cloud of dust rises up from the pages, which doesn’t fill me with confidence. Obviously, no one’s opened this one for a while, which means it’s probably not brimming with useful information.
Since Leon refused to even talk to me about Mistwell, I’ve been back in the library a few times—whenever I could slip away from training or trying to distract Tira from her homesickness.
I haven’t been able to find any new information on what happened that day in the Trovian town, so I’ve moved on, focusing instead again on trying to figure out what Leon and Gallis really want from me. In our sessions, the proctor has continued to mention the “celestial flame” that burns in all living things—plants, animals and people—the divine spark of power from the gods that gives life.
But there’s been nothing to explain what—if anything—that has to do with me, and I’m tired of wondering if that information’s going to come anytime soon.
I slip the book back on the shelf and check the index of the next one, skimming as I try to spot key words in these books on plant magic and botany.
One of these booksmustmention a “celestial spark” or “flame” somewhere. Especially if every living thing has one, as Gallis says. If I can read about it with some context, it might help me understand how the concept applies to me.
Rustling across the small side room I’ve retreated to reminds me that I’m not alone. There’s another fae who’s been studiously examining a stack to my right. I glance toward him now, taking in his slender frame. He has brown skin and sharp features, even for a fae, and I frown because they’re familiar. Didn’t I see that same fae when I was searching through another section of the library earlier?
Could he be following me?
He looks up and meets my eyes now, just as a gust of wind blows the doors shut, cutting the room off from the rest of the library.
Shit.
I try to focus while my heartbeat thuds in my ears. My every instinct screams that I’m in danger. Which means I have to?—
The shelves around me explode.
Books and parchment fly everywhere, enveloping me in a storm of paper. All I can see is a stream of white, then a sharp pain radiates across my neck, and another rips across my cheeks. The pages slice at me—slashing a hundred paper cuts into my skin. I throw my arms up to protect my eyes as the fae’s hand reaches through the blizzard and snatches at me.
Whatever my attacker wants, he’s using his aesteri magic to disorient me. But I have magic too.
I push past the pain to find my power. The heat running through my veins comes quickest, stoked by the burning sensation from the sharp parchment edges still biting into my flesh. I throw a beam of sunlight in the direction of the snatching hand, searing a hole straight through the whirlwind of books.
There’s a yell and thud as the fae tries to throw himself out of the way. Most of the paper and books tumble to the ground when his concentration breaks, but flecks of ash and smoldering scraps float around me.
I need to be careful using my power in here. I could send the whole place up in flames.
Still, the sun beam was enough to buy me a moment. I can see the sharp-faced fae now. He managed to dodge the stream of light, but he’s fallen and is still in the process of scrambling to his feet. As he does, our eyes meet again, and a fresh spike of fear runs through me.
They’re not the same ordinary brown eyes I saw before. There’s now another presence in them, something black and sparkling with malice. Somethinghungry.It wants to consume, to endlessly swallow up everything in its path, a kind of darkness I’ve never seen before.
