The awe on Ambrose’s face signified he had been waiting for this moment just as much as Maeve.
“Get. Up.” Maeve hissed quietly at her sister.
Arianna slowly carried her gaze to Clarissa, who offered no emotion to her favorite child. In fact, Clarissa was looking at Maeve with her lip quivering. It looked like she could cry at any moment as she clenched her jaw tight. Her mother had never looked at her with such devastation. Such inferiority.
“Daddy, we barely got to duel tell her-” began Maeve sweetly in a loud voice, but Arianna was quickly on her feet at such a low blow.
“Again then,” sighed Arianna, out of breath.
Maeve stepped backward and gestured openly to her sister. “Give me everything you’ve got, sister.”
It had been days since Maeve’s duel with Arianna, but she was still relishing it. She wasn’t sure what she liked more: the look on Mal’s face, the look on her father’s face, or the look on Ariana’s face in defeat.
Mal met Titus Iantrose, Arianna’s fiancé, a few nights later. Maeve didn’t dare look at him when their engagement and wedding were brought up.
The Dread ring was on Mal’s finger as they played with new Magic back and forth, which guaranteed his triumph over Maeve. They practiced nonetheless. “If I recall correctly,” said Mal, “you were called by another name at our Cauldron Ceremony, the night we arrived at Vaukore .”
“That’s quite the recollection,” said Maeve with a laugh.
“What was it?” Asked Mal.
He was in a sprightly good mood today.
“Amaranthine.”
“Ah,” he said, circling her. Maeve countered him. “I was curious about your personal lack of the letter ‘A.’ Given the rest of the Sinclair’s have it.”
“An astute observation and mystery solved.”
Mal blocked the jinx she sent silently with a small smirk.
Maeve blocked his returning spell, but he used a great deal of force, sending her sliding back a few feet. Mal pointed his single finger a second time before she was ready.
Thick white light, like a rope, shot from the end tip of his finger, encircling Maeve tightly. Her hands pinned to her sides as Mal tugged the light forward, bringing Maeve to her knees. Maeve frowned.
Mal smiled in victory, licking his bottom lip and kneeled in front of her playfully. “So why don’t you go by that name?”
“Why do you care?”
The ropes binding her constricted more, making it harder to breathe.
“Answer,” said Mal plainly .
“You really like holding me captive to your questions,” said Maeve smiling.
“Answer,” he repeated.
“My brother couldn’t pronounce it as a child. So I went by Maeve, my middle name.”
The mention of Antony caused Mal’s triumphant smirk to falter slightly. He flicked his fingertips, and the ropes of light disappeared with a pop.
“That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” Asked Mal as he rolled back his sleeves for more.
The summer was flying by. It was only days before the Summer Solstice Party, and Maeve was eager for Mal to meet the most influential Magicals in the world. Rumor had it they were eager to meet him.
On a stormy evening, Maeve was tucked away in her favorite reading nook, a circular alcove on the top floor of the house. She leaned back in a window seat, which was covered in small claw marks from Spinel. Evidence she spent much time here.
Footsteps grew louder down the hallway. Mal appeared in the doorway.
