“Princess Bahira, it is lovely to see you.” He hides his trembling hands within the sleeves of his robes as he brings them together in front of him, his gray eyes glassy from age.
“How is he?”
The palace healer smiles sadly at me, and my heart dips. “No different, I’m afraid,” he says with a sigh, shaking his head. I swallow back my disappointment and fear as my gaze moves to the door. “Even the most powerful have weaknesses. I suppose it was only a matter of time before we found the prince’s. But don’t worry, we’ve got the best of the best looking out for him.”
He pats my shoulder before ambling away, and I blink back the pressure building behind my eyes as I reach for the handle to the door. I spot Cass first, his white-blond hair pulled up into a ponytail while a few loose tendrils frame his face. He offers me a tired grin, one that I mirror as I shut the door behind me and walk to the foot of the bed. “How is he?”
“Did you see Galen leave?”
“I did,” I respond, looking Nox over where he lies in perfect stillness. “But I want to hear it from you.”
Cass releases a breath, his shoulders slumped beneath an invisible weight. “Nothing has changed. Not physically or magically, and I can’t help—” His mouth closes abruptly, but not before I catch the tremor in his voice. The uncertainty in it.
“Can’t help what?”
He looks over at Nox from where he sits at the side of the bed, his elbows resting on his knees. I give him the time to formulate his thoughts as I watch the steady rise and fall of Nox’s chest.
“I can’t help but wonder if this is more than just him overexerting his magic,” he finally says, the words hardly louder than a whisper.
“In what way?” I ask, just as quietly.
“I have seen your brother in nearly every setting but war. True war. And IthoughtI had also seen him use his magic to near capacity.” I raise my brow in question, folding my arms over my chest. Cass huffs out a small laugh, the smile on his face good to see, even though it only lasts for a few seconds. “He practiced a lot with it—”
“I’m aware,” I drawl, tilting my head.
He smirks. “Well, what you mightnotknow is that sometimes he and I would walk deep into the forest. I’m talking the kind of deep where the treetops aren’t just woven together but the trunks right beneath them are too. Where light is scant and the air is silent of all noise except what the forest wants you to hear.” He slips into the voice he uses when telling a story, its lilt just a bit lower. “And we went there because, occasionally, Nox would have thisurgeto use his magic in a way that he didn’t normally.”
“What do you mean?” Growing up, it was hardly uncommon for Nox and Cass to venture out together for days at a time, but I had never assumed it was for anything other than a need to explore.
“He said it felt like his magic was suffocating and that if he didn’t heed its call to be used in the wayitwanted to, he would go mad. We trekked to secluded spots where he wouldn’t be spotted, and it was…” He shakes his head in near disbelief. “Incredible. His power would flow out of him, swaths of dark purple and black magic blanketing the forest for what felt like miles. Stars above, maybe itwasfor miles. Sometimes, he’d simply blanket the earth with his power for minutes, and other times, he would mold it. Morph it to mimic the trees andanimals.” His icy blue eyes hold mine, awe shining in them. “He created a world based entirely in shadows. His magic has always been something otherworldly, Bahira, but this was on a different scale. I’m struggling with the idea that the magic he released at the beach put him in such a state. Not when I’ve seen what he canreallydo.”
I take in his story about my brother, turning the information over in my head. “I think we have to approach it from a different place of understanding his magic,” I muse, rounding the opposite side of the bed from Cass and placing my hand over my brother’s. His skin is cool beneath my touch, and he doesn’t stir at all. “From what I gathered, Nox fled the palace in search of Rhea the moment he realized she was gone. He wasn’t in his right mind. He was in a place of desperation. Perhaps, that is the difference.”
Cass gives a noncommittal nod, and my heart falters a beat at the devastation on his face.
“He’ll be okay.” Looking down at Nox, I give his fingers a squeeze as I release a shaky breath. “He has to be.”
Leaving is hard, but Cass promises to send for me the moment Nox wakes up. I shiver as I descend the palace stairs, the temperature pleasant but the coating of unease that follows me not so easily dispersed. The guards at the bottom of the steps separate to let me pass, dappled light from above dotting the white stone path as I make my way to my workshop.
I think of Cass’s story and internally grimace that I hadnoidea my brother’s magic affected him that way. I had read past recollections of the balance of magic—back when it was more robust amongst our people and not dwindling away year after year—that spoke to the effect of not using your magic for along time. To curb that, most mages used small magic on a daily basis. Though I didn’t take the courses myself for obvious reasons, early education teaches of the dangers of going long periods of time without using your magic. I had always assumed that the talk of someone going mad was a bit facetious. It doesn’t seem so out of the realm of possibility now.
Walking up to the door of my workshop evokes a feeling of coming home all its own. This place where so many failures and so few victories are kept has always been a refuge for me. Despite the less-than-stellar progress I’ve made on my own inquiries, I still feel like a weight has been lifted off my chest when I step across the threshold. It smells the same as it always has, like the forest and something metallic.
I haven’t spent time here since returning, nothing beyond quickly putting away my magnifier and some of the glass jars of experiments from the shifter isle. Dragging my fingers along the scarred wooden tabletop, I take inventory of everything that remains. In a corner on the countertop rests the glass jars filled with dead and decaying leaves, remnants of the last experiment I had done with magic. Cobwebs are tucked into the corners of the ceiling, perhaps a realistic representation of how little advancement I have made with finding my magic. A thin layer of dust coats every surface, prompting me to open one of the windows and grab a cloth to begin cleaning everything off.
I’m a few minutes into the process, focused on how I might organize my next test, when a small voice interrupts the silence, and I let loose a surprised yelp, my cloth flying from my hand as I come face to face with Starla.
Her dark eyebrow arches, a disappointedlook crossing her face. “I would have thought that you of all people, Bahira, would know when someone is behind you.”
I scoff, folding my arms over my chest. “I don’t expect to be ambushed in my own shop.”
She has the audacity to shrug, sliding one of her pointer fingers over the dust covering the table and scrunching her brows in response. “Well, you did offer me a job before you left. I wanted to make sure you made good on it.”
“I—”Shit. The memory of me doing just that jumps to the forefront of my mind. I look over the little girl as I rest my hip against the edge of the table. Her hair has grown longer in the months since I’ve seen her, the little brown ringlets now dangling down to her midback. She’s dressed in dark trousers and boots, her top a size too big in a light green color that hangs down to her hips. The orphanage must be low on clothing for girls her age, so I make a mental note to speak with my father and make sure we get them everything they need.
She mirrors my stance, her mannerisms making her appear so much older than she is.
“When I offered you that job, I hadn’t known I was going to be leaving for the Shifter Kingdom. Things have changed a bit since then.”
