Page 86 of A Whisper of Cinders

I really have to contain a giggle from escaping. I don’t think I believe myself either.

“Time to go, Amira. I need to examine her.”

Ami hugs me tightly and leaves the room.

I fall back into the pillows, giving in to the exhaustion I tried to hide. I let my eyes rest for a second and startle when fingers touch my wrist.

“It’s just me,” Althea says. “You’ve overdone yourself, haven’t you?”

“I don’t know, I thought I was fine and wasn’t that tired, but now…”

She releases my wrist, her hands now wavering over my body. A faint glow radiates from her fingers, bringing instant relief to my tired body.

“The outburst of magic you showed was big, especially for someone whose magic has been suppressed for so long. It was felt through the whole academy. Needless to say, you were in a deep slumber for five days and the things you’ve heard today were a lot to take in.” She stands up straight, her hands folded in front of her. “Rest now, Maily. Tomorrow will bring a new day with opportunities and chances.”

Sleep pulls me under before she leaves the room.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Iawake in the middle of the night, a bone deep fatigue clouds my mind. My heart races inside of my chest and I’m convinced I haven’t fully woken up yet.

I glance out the window, my eyes drawn to the moon, huge and luminous in the midnight sky. Its pale glow spills across the room like liquid silver.

I’m still in the sanctum, but something feels different somehow. My gaze falls to the right side of the window and my heart stops. Two glowing eyes cut through the dark like embers in the night. I know those eyes, my heart starts beating again. “Conláed?”

The eyes, his eyes, disappear for a second and when I see them again he is a lot closer. “You’re awake.”

His voice sounds low and rough — more than usual — and strangely relieved. Which doesn’t make a lot of sense. I sit up, trying to ignore the sudden rush of heat that floods through me as he comes into my line of sight.

“I am.”

The fae sight is on, I’m certain, because looking at Conláed makes me want to tear off all my clothes, even more so than before. He looks like magic, it’s embedded in every single fibre of him.

“I shouldn’t be here, I don’t even know why I am. I should let you rest,” he mutters. “But I just had to see if you were…okay.”

He’s so close, I could easily reach for him and take his hand. One of his twitches and for a moment, I’m sure he might actually grab mine. The thought alone makes my breath catch. A vague memory flickers in my mind. Him holding me, me floating in some sort of lake. “You…helped me?”

He nods, face tense. “I was the only one that could hold you without getting completely burned.”

“Did I hurt you?”

He sits down on the chair where most of my visitors sat. “No. You and I? We’re kind of the same, our powers are similar. Mine too are fire bound.”

Maybe that’s why I’m so drawn to him. He holds up the palm of his hand, creating a small flame in the middle and lets it spread towards his fingers until his hand is completely enveloped with flames.

I reach out before I even realise what I’m doing. Tracing his palm with my fingertips, letting the small flame dance around my own. I giggle, it tickles, somehow.

Instantly, the flames are gone, and warm fingers enclose mine. I meet his burning gaze, noticing the pointed tips poking through his dark curls and I wonder… “What happened to me?”

He relentlessly releases my fingers and analyses me for a second before he starts talking. “Magic is connected to our emotions. You will learn how to work with that later, but since you were feeling so many things at the time, it must’ve cracked something inside of you and your fire responded.” I nod, I knew that already, Mrs Delalune had explained as much, so I wait until he continues. “It rarely happens that magic isn’t used for such a long time. We all knew you had it inside you and knew it was about to erupt at some point. We just didn’t know this would be the cause of it. I do have to apologise for that, feather, I wasn’t fond of the plan in the first place.”

It makes me wonder what his plan might have been, but I won’t ask. “That’s okay, I get it.”

“We can all have a burnout, mostly due to overuse of our powers. It was different with you, but the result was the same, you were literally burning from the inside out and since your magic is fire related, you burned even brighter. We needed to cool you down immediately, so I brought you to the healing pools underneath the Sanctum. They are ancient and have tremendous abilities. I carried you into the water, not only to soothe the pain, but also to temper the burn within you.”

I try to remember it, but it feels like I’m trudging through mud. “Will it happen again?”

“It could. But you will be trained by the best teachers and if all hell breaks loose, I’ll be there.”