Page 92 of Taken By Shadows

“I have no magic of my own.” Denora looked at me like she already knew, somehow. But I said it anyway with a deep exhale. It felt strange to be so open with people I barely knew. But it didn’t feel wrong. I had never said it to anyone back home. I had been told it repeatedly. Reminded of it. But I had never said it for myself.

No one actually replied to that. Either because they knew or suspected, or because it was so outlandish or strange, they had no comment on it.

The result was the same. Three pairs of eyes staring back at me. Like I was different.

Not human. Not fully fae. Just different. But then they all smiled.

“I suppose you’d better get much better with a blade then.” Gavrin shoved my arm. And Audrie gave him a thump for it. Much to her own surprise, I think, as well as Denora’s and Gavrin’s.

We all laughed, though. The small size of Audrie beside Gavrin was satirical.

I looked then to Denora, her sleeves rolled up. “How did you do that? Not hurt each other?” I glanced between them both to make sure again.

Denora turned her hands over to show that, indeed, there were no scratches or scars from the blows. “Magic is driven by intent. If Gavrin had wanted to hurt me, he could have.”

They smiled at each other. A camaraderie and something like veneration flowed effortlessly between the sentinels.

“Emotions too?” I asked, remembering Audrie’s accounting of magic use.

Denora nodded. “Emotions are where the power is rooted, and if untrained, will be at the will of those emotions. But intent can shape the magic.”

Kaed’s magic poured back into my mind.

The darkness. The deliberate coiling and caressing touches he used.

Did his magic stem from darker emotions than Denora’s maroon and Gavrin’s emerald magic? It somehow felt too invasive to ask that question. Maybe Kaed’s was just more powerful. I felt each time he was about to use it like it thrummed in my veins as well as his.

When Denora and Gavrin had ignited that magical spark before us, it had taken me by complete surprise. There had been no warning that either were about to conjure.

While I might not be a wonderful sword wielder, I had a feeling that, had I any magic, I’d be even more catastrophic if it all relied on emotions and intent. Right now, my emotions and intent were a litter of embers and kindling that couldn’t decide whether to warm the depths of me or burn me in flame.

Chapter twenty-eight

The golden lights guttered in the late hour where I was tucked away in the library.

More days passed, and I’d not seen Kaed. He’d not been in the study or any other part of the house on any of the nights. I eventually stopped trying.

“What else do you know about the war?” Being from Hayden as she was, Audrie had to know more than others.

Her eyes snapped up from the book on her lap. “Why?”

“Nothing. I mean, no reason.” I had been deliberating on who to ask. Gavrin had not seemed pleased with the topic last time, so I’d waited until we were alone. “Just … you said the books on Aurora were gone and it was before my time. Are they forbidden after the king took them?” Why did I feel the need to obscure Eryk’s involvement? His gift? I felt tangled in my own web.

But Audrie was fully focused on me now.

“They were powerful?” I said it like a question, but I think Audrie took it to be fact.

She nodded.

I had read something in the book Eryk let me borrow; something I had to know about. “Aurorans won the war.”

Audrie’s eyes widened to full moons. She paled as she glanced around her.

So it was true? The floral-scented pages of the book were yellowed with age, the ink paling, but tucked into the margins were fresh ink marks. Notes made by a new scholar. And it turns out they had been telling the truth. Aurora had won the war.

“That information is … guarded,” Audrie said through gritted teeth. She wasn’t defensive; she was nervous.

I waited.