Inkmistress (Of Fire and Stars 0.5)(84)
But at night, when I put on my cloak of shadows and left the palace to follow random threads of magic in search of Atheon, I remembered him in other ways. In the palace gardens, I remembered how he’d rained petals over us. In the woods outside the castle walls, I remembered the way we’d slept next to each other, his warmth radiating through me. In city cemeteries I remembered running through the streets of Valenko with him, and the spark that had jumped between us the first time we touched. When I returned to my room, I remembered the way he’d kissed me and it felt like coming home.
In those moments of weakness, I would have given anything to have him back.
With less than a moon remaining until the autumn equinox, the king summoned me to the coliseum to exercise my enchantments and strategize for battle. He had never seemed to notice Hal’s absence, and I had never felt compelled to explain.
The coliseum lay on a plateau carved into the side of a sheltered valley in eastern Corovja. A tingle of magic made me shiver as Eywin and I passed beneath the arched entrance. As soon as I was inside, I knew what that feeling had had been—a ward. Apparently the battle was meant to take place in a protected area. Neither the king nor Ina would be able to draw on the magic of anything outside the coliseum. The barrier was so strong, it had even protected the inside of the coliseum from my Sight, so I was surprised to find the king already waiting when we arrived.
He stood in the center of the coliseum, wearing practical armor for fighting. He’d brought four guards—two who stayed close, and two others who patrolled the edges of the ring in case anyone decided to preview what was going on here today. An even greater surprise than the coliseum itself was who he’d chosen to be his champions. Until now, he’d been secretive about his choices, no doubt to keep rumors from spreading.
“Raisa?” I asked Eywin, surprised. She sat on a portable chair heavily laden with cushions. Could she even fight at her age?
“Don’t underestimate her,” he said with a glimmer of something unreadable in his eyes. A warm wind from the south gently tugged strands of hair free from my braid. The sun shone brightly, forcing me to shield my eyes from both the sky and the white sand under my boots. I was grateful for the mild day—my injured arm always felt better when it was warm out.
As we drew closer, I saw that the other champion was Gorval, the king’s steward, a wiry man with a hooked nose, and eyes so dark I could barely see the pupils. He had a pasty face and a balding head, his shoulders perpetually stooped. Something about him had always felt off to me, something to do with his manifest, but since I’d never seen him take animal form, I didn’t know what it was.
“Welcome, Asra, Eywin,” the king greeted us.
Gorval gave us a curt nod, and Raisa stared silently as she always did.
I shuddered beneath her sightless gaze.
“Let’s begin,” the king said. “I’d like to enhance each of us in a way that complements our own abilities.”
“First it may help to give you the Sight again, Your Majesty,” I said. “That way you’ll be able to See with the clarity I have and make your own decisions about which are the most useful.”
The king regarded me with appreciation. “Clever thinking,” he said.
“I have three gifts to offer today,” I said, addressing the broader group. “First is the Sight, which I’ll give the king. Raisa would not need it anyway, as it’s something she already possesses.”
I turned to Gorval. “The second gift is that of healing—to restore injuries. But it can be costly if you don’t have the energy of another living thing to draw on.” Or a dying demigod, as in the case of Leozoar. “The third enchantment allows you to conjure a shield. It can deflect magic or reflect it back at your opponent, but again, it will require my energy or the energy of something else to sustain.”
The king frowned. “Are you sure you can hold all these enchantments together at once, or will Eywin be providing one of them?”
I glanced at Eywin where he stood quietly beside me. We actually hadn’t practiced that. Without Hal, we didn’t have anyone else to test things on. We couldn’t risk word of what we were doing spreading far enough to reach Nismae—and it wouldn’t have to go far to do that.
“I think it’s best if Asra places these enchantments. She is far more powerful than any human attempting to wield the same magic.” Eywin’s long robes fluttered in the wind, the silver frames of his spectacles glimmering in the sunlight.
A little burst of warmth for him swelled up in me. Eywin believed in my strength. He trusted me. At least one person did.
The king smiled. “That is what I’m counting on.”
“Of course, in battle only one of you would be fighting at a time. That would make these enchantments easier to manage.” I drew a vial of my blood from the bag of supplies I’d brought and carefully painted the symbol of the spirit god on the king’s forehead. Because of his geas with them, the spirit god’s symbol seemed most likely to give him strength.
To Raisa, I gave the shield. With so much power of her own, she probably wouldn’t need much assistance from me during the battle, but better defense seemed like a useful thing to provide her if nothing else. When she brought the shield up before her, her manipulation of the energies tugged at my own life force, my own magic. And it was strange to watch the dark river of my magic be unwound and re-formed into the blinding glitter of hers as she crafted a wall of power. She made it look effortless, as easy as breathing. She needed no coaching at all from me once I’d shown her what to do, though her power was so great that my head swam after she was done.