The hedge curved again, revealing a stone arch grown over with vines, and as she stepped under it, a warm breeze stirred her hair. This place would have been the perfect spot to bury herself in a delicious novel, but this was Dravaryn, so she was far more likely to find blood than books.
She wanted to weep, or scream, or curl into the earth and never leave.
But the pull was back, that tug even stronger now, dragging her away from the roses and toward the castle. Her hand fell from the rose as she stepped back through the hedge, the scent of spice and velvet clinging to her hair.
She didn’t want to leave, yet her feet moved anyway.
The garden watched her go.
She felt it, like eyes between her shoulder blades, patient and knowing, as if she would return whether she intended to or not.
She eased through a side entrance, torchlight wavering as though it recognized her, the obsidian in the floor shimmering again. Ella walked for what felt like ages, half-tranced, half-hunting. The halls blurred around her, but she would memorize the turns later. Right now she was following her instincts, which she hoped would lead her straight to the relic.
She turned the next corner and voices caught her ear. A familiar scent wafted toward her, bitter herbs and tinctures filling the air, the same smell that always clung to Bryn’s clothes. This had to be the healer’s quadrant. She froze just before the archway and melted into the shadows. The door stood ajar, lamplight spilling into the hall, voices threading easily through the gap.
“I’ve treated plenty of injuries in my time, Jakobav,” Bryn said. “But Ella’s power, whatever the shit-eating brumble-bunnies it is, doesn’t feel like anything I’ve known. Not in decades. Maybe longer.”
Jakobav’s voice was quieter. “You think she’s hiding something?”
“No,” Bryn said. “I think something inside her is hiding from her. And that’s what worries me.”
Ella’s breath caught. Her palm flattened against the wall. What in the hell were they talking about?
She wasn’t some walking magical time bomb. She had trained, honed, controlled every flame in her until it bent to her will. Just because she couldn’t access it now didn’t mean it was wrong.
“You don’t think she’s from the South like I suspected?” Jakobav asked.
“I’m starting to wonder,” Bryn admitted. “Maybe she’s not from anywhere we’ve mapped recently.”
A long silence stretched between them.
Then Bryn’s voice dropped. “Whatever it is…it wasn’t Claimed magic. It didn’t behave like normal elemental abilities rooted in sacred soil. It was like she had one foot in this realm and the other too far for my gifts to touch.”
Ella’s throat went dry as she backed away from the door.
One foot here. One foot elsewhere.
The thought gnawed at the hollow beneath her sternum until her breath turned shallow.
She took a step into the corridor, then another.
This was good. She needed to keep moving, because if she stood still, then what she had just overheard would consume her.
The torchlight rolled across the charcoal veins in the wall as if they, too, were listening.
She found herself heading toward the solitude of Jakobav’s chambers.
But heat flared beneath her skin, dizzying, and her body remembered before her mind could stop it. Bryn’s words had cracked open a memory, and the past surged up to meet her.
Caelen Verelith leaned against the silver-barked tree, golden hair glowing beneath moonlight, watching her with that familiar mix of amusement and envy.
He was beautiful.
That was only part of the problem.
His hands were soft. His smile even softer.
“You’ve been distant,” he said.
