The Blood Spell (Ravenspire, #4)(82)

Kellan followed her down the steps and through the garden. Flowers unfurled for her, vines curling toward her skin as she passed, and Kellan laughed. “It never gets old.”

“What doesn’t get old?”

“Seeing how plants respond to you. It’s like they know you’re a friend who understands them. They want you to choose them for your next potion.”

As this was precisely what happened with Blue’s magic, she gave Kellan a long side-eye. “That’s some pretty imaginative thinking on your part, Prince.”

He grinned. “We’ve known each other since we were toddlers, Blue.” His voice lowered. “Since before you knew you had to hide your magic.”

Her eyes widened, and she shot a quick glance at the house, though they were too far from it now for anyone to overhear them.

“Don’t worry. Magic was outlawed because of the wraith. Because it was easier to say all of it was bad than to try to figure out where the line stood between harmless magic and someone who could turn their magic into something deadly. I know your magic is harmless. More than that, I know that you are the kind of person who’d rather die than cause someone else harm.”

“You just keep surprising me,” she said as Pepperell batted at a butterfly that had circled Blue’s hair.

“You keep surprising me too,” he said quietly as he lifted a curtain of vines out of the way and then followed her into the apple orchard.

“How?”

He took his time answering. The crash of the sea came closer, and the buzzing of bees flitting from one thing to the next filled the morning air. Blue drew in a deep breath, savoring the sweetness of the apple trees, the tang of sea salt, and the rich soil beneath her. They were nearly to Grand-mère’s house, when Kellan said, “I thought you only cared about rules. About getting people in trouble if they didn’t see the world in absolutes. I thought you believed you knew all the answers and that you were better than other people.”

“Ouch.”

He ran a comforting hand down her arm, tangled his fingers briefly with hers, and then pulled away. “But now I know that you’re passionate about justice, you’re willing to work hard to help anyone who needs it, and you care deeply about what really matters. Maybe we’ve come at life from different perspectives, but at the core, we’re very similar. We love deeply, we fight for those we love, and we put ourselves at risk if that’s what it takes to protect others.”

She absorbed his words, letting them linger and take root as they walked up the path to Grand-mère’s cottage, where the older woman was already out on her porch, a mug of hot chicory in her hands.

“I’m glad we’re friends,” Blue finally said, though her heart wanted so much more.

“I am too.” He smiled.

And then Grand-mère was making a fuss over both of them, getting Pepperell a breakfast of thinly sliced pheasant, and feeding Kellan again, though Blue rolled her eyes and said he’d already eaten enough that morning to feed a small army.

“I would stay and eat at your table all morning long, Miss Destri, but I’ve promised to take Blue on a picnic out west, so we must be going,” Kellan said as he pushed away from the table and carried his plate to the sink.

Grand-mère’s eyes sharpened. “What’s this about going west?”

“We’re looking for Ana,” Blue said. “And I need to leave Pepperell with you because I don’t trust Dinah with him.”

“If that girl hasn’t already shown up, Blue, I doubt you’ll be able to find her. It’s been too long,” Grand-mère said. “And if you go too far west, you’ll reach the Wilds, which is too dangerous. You know that.”

“I’ll be with her,” Kellan said. “And so will my guards. Including at the Wilds. My mother needs assurances that the wraith is still in its prison.”

Grand-mère grabbed Kellan’s hand. “Promise me you two won’t touch the wraith’s gate.”

Blue frowned. Of course they weren’t going to touch the wraith’s gate. She didn’t plan to get close enough to be an arm’s length away from the thing in case the wraith could somehow reach through the bars. She didn’t have a death wish.

Kellan squeezed Grand-mère’s hand and met her eyes. “On my life, I swear we won’t touch the wraith’s gate.”

And then they were out the door, down the steps, and heading back to the lane, where Kellan’s guards waited to escort them west.





THIRTY-FOUR

SCATTERED ALONG THE road that led west away from Falaise de la Mer, there were a handful of cottages, a number of farms, and a small road that snaked north to skirt the mountain range that loomed ever closer. A long, dark shadow spread across the base of the mountains, growing larger as they left the city far behind.

“Are you nervous about seeing the Wilds?” Kellan took her hand and gave it a comforting squeeze.

Blue nodded and tried not to pay attention to the fact that he still hadn’t let go of her hand. “More nervous about the wraith than the forest my mother grew to imprison it.”

“She used magic for that, didn’t she?”

Blue squinted against the glare of the sun. Surely that was the cause of the heat dancing along her skin like tiny bits of fire. But just in case, she slowly pulled her hand free of Kellan’s. “Yes, she did. I know she created the potion that locked the wraith away, but Grand-mère said she had help from the witch’s sister, so I have no idea where one magic started and the other ended.”