“Is there anything else you need, or can I leave now?” Elara asked, impatience coloring her voice. Not that she had pressing plans—pathetically enough, her evening's highlight was to watch the equinox festival from the solitude of her tower. She couldn't help but crave the sight of the celebrations, the distant laughter, and the spicy scent of the harvest that seemed to ride the wind straight to her each year.
Algernon flashed a quick smile. “Actually, if you could take a look at these calculations before you go…”
Elara’s eyes flicked to the stack of parchment he pointed to—star charts, half-finished graphs, and the unmistakable scrolls of divination scattered about his desk. She nearly sighed, biting it back as she glanced over the mess. “Fine,” she said with a tight smile. “Whatever you need.”
Elara climbed back down the ladder and looked over his work. Algernon was focused on graphing star patterns—he’d mentioned it in passing a few days ago—but his enthusiasm for astromantic theory often led to careless mistakes in the numbers. And that’s where she came in. Elara had always been quick with math, quicker than most, and her reputation had spread through the sanct. From scribes to astromancers, they sought her out, handing over their half-done work, hoping for a second set of eyes.
She set the scrolls down on one of the reading tables, skimming the first set of numbers. It didn’t take long for her to spot the error. He had miscalculated the angle of the star’s declination in relation to the lunar cycle. A simple mistake, but one that would throw off the entire chart. Her mind worked quickly, automatically correcting the equations in her head. “You’ve offset the meridian by three degrees,” she said, not bothering to hide the mild exasperation in her voice. “If you plot the stars based on this, you’ll end up with an entirely different constellation.”
Algernon blinked up at her. “Really? I could’ve sworn…”
Elara sighed. “If you’d double-check your base calculations, you wouldn’t need me to fix these for you every other week.”
But truthfully, she didn’t mind. There was something calming about numbers. Equations never lied, never twisted themselves into the unpredictable mess that people did.
She glanced back at Algernon, who had already begun adjusting the graphs. She turned to leave, but his voice stopped her.
“Oh, one more thing.” He flashed that charming smile again, the kind that made him seem a bit too innocent. “If you could sort out these scrolls before you go, I’d be most grateful.”
Elara’s eyes drifted to the mountain of parchment he had clearly pulled down in a fit of inspiration and promptlyabandoned. She forced a smile. “Of course,” she muttered, knowing she couldn’t exactly say no. Her fingers flexed as she gathered the scrolls, already mapping out the fastest way to organize them in her head.
She climbed back up, scaling the towering shelves. Navigating the archives by ladder was the quickest way, and she hardly minded how mad she might appear, flying through the stacks like a bat out of hell.
With a thrust of her foot against the side of the sturdy shelf, Elara sent the rolling ladder hurtling down the row of towering bookcases. The screech of metal wheels echoed through the vast archives, as stray curls, escapees from her hastily made braid, danced wildly around her face. The sensation, that brief thrill of flight, stirred something deep within, and a small, irrepressible smirk curled her lips.
But the rush of wind against her face, that intoxicating rush, was abruptly soured by a familiar, cold sting of ether.
With barely any time to react, the ladder jerked to a sudden stop, sending a shock through her spine. Elara's fingers tightened around the rung, a desperate grip to keep from tumbling. But as her body jerked, the divination scrolls she was carrying slipped from her grasp. She helplessly watched as Algernon’s meticulously arranged work scattered, his efforts undone in a heartbeat.
Elara took a deep breath to calm the trembling in her hands, the twinge of anger simmering in her gray eyes. She didn't need to turn around to know who was responsible.
“Branwen,” she hissed, spitting the name out like a curse. “Have your little predictions bored yousomuch that you've taken to playing god with mylife?”
Branwen stepped out from behind the towering bookshelf, his smirk sharp and joyless. “Why would any god bothermeddling in your affairs when you've turned self-destruction into an art form?”
Elara’s jaw tensed, his words striking a raw nerve. Her hands clenched around the ladder's rungs, knuckles bleaching under the pressure, as she wrestled with the impulse to retaliate. Instead, she drew in a deep, steadying breath, and began her descent, each step down the ladder a swallowed comeback, until her feet finally met the solid ground below.
“What exactly is your issue with me?”
His contempt seemed too deep to be random.Could it be envy?His devotion to the Mothers bordered on the pathological, spending every day and night bound in ceaseless prayers, like a pendulum swinging to the same haunting rhythm. The more she considered it, the more suspicion crept in. It was a gamble, but she was never one to shy away from playing her hand when intuition called.
“Don't tell me you're jealous.”She laughed as a cruel smile played on her lips. “Afraid the Mothers favorme, the wayward child, over their ever-devoted son?” There was a flicker in his eyes, a crack in his otherwise stoic facade. She couldn’t help but push harder, the words flowing like a sharp, sweet poison. “Perhaps, like your own mother, they too find you lacking.”
The fury that surged across his features provided all the confirmation she required. Yet, her fleeting triumph swiftly curdled as his face contorted into a snarl, pale with rage.
With a vicious flick, Branwen unleashed a tendril of ether toward her.
The sheer audacity of his attack stunned her into stillness, leaving her unable to dodge in time. Not that it would have made a difference—Branwen's bond was with the wind.
Around her, the air thickened, charged with repulsive threads that wrapped around her, constricting her lungs, turning each breath into a struggle. His ether smelled of rot,a sickly sweetness that slithered down her throat, leaving a poisonous trail in its wake.
Branwen's laughter, cold and mocking, echoed around her. With each step he took, she stepped back, a dance of predator and prey until she felt the spines of ancient books dig into her back.
“You think you'resofucking clever?” he sneered, leaning in close, the strands of his greasy black hair brushing against her face. “I know truths about you, secrets that would make your skin crawl. You arenothing. Less than nothing.”
Tears stung Elara's eyes. The weight on her chest, the thick smog in her lungs—darkness began to nibble at the edges of her vision, the last strands of consciousness fraying when the world shifted beneath her in a jarring lurch.
They both crashed to the ground, and through tear-blurred eyes, Elara watched as thick vines surged, yanking Branwen from her side. With a violent snap, they flung him across the room into a bookcase. He hit it hard, the thud echoing through the silent archives. Books tumbled from their shelves, each hitting him with sharp, punishing thwacks, accumulating around him like a verdict rendered by the archives themselves.
