“Oh, give an aging woman her fun.”
They came to a stop, where Hellebore would descend into the lower levels where—if he were at the academy—she would go find Emerson and eat with him in the mess hall as they always did even before they’d entered the flirtation they’d been carrying on for a year now. Well, flirtation on his side. Hellebore tolerated him because he was her brother’s oldest friend and a skilled alchemist in his own right. It didn’t hurt that he looked good on her arm.
She looked up at her aunt. “Did you ever regret it?”
“Regret what?”
“Not getting married, having children?”
Palladia turned to face Hellebore, putting her hands on her shoulders before reaching up and cupping her cheeks. “Never. Not since the day I held your brother and then four years later you as well. What need do I have for children when I have loved you as my own since your birth and your mother’s passing?”
“You never desired a marriage of your own?”
Palladia sighed. “It was not the path for me. And while we might be alike, that is where we will differ, because I know it is meant for you.”
Hellebore nodded, biting her tongue. She wasn’t convinced it was. But Emerson was acceptable, he was an alchemist, from a good family, and a loyal friend to her brother. If Hellebore had never been born, he would be the obvious choice to be the next King’s Alchemist. Hellebore and Emerson were a perfect match on paper. But what if she was like Palladia and she wasn’t meant for it?
Would he be miserable? Would she?
Would they all be better off if she kept to the exact path her aunt walked? Was she even worthy of that path? How could she really know if she deserved everything that had been given to her?
Hellebore looked at the window again and the craigs in the distance.
What she did know was that she wasn’t going to be on the border and so close to a Sunrise Iris for long.
No one ever needed to know.
Chapter 2
Hellebore was scaling down the outer wall of the academy grounds when the sound of the guards’ voices caused her to freeze in place, feet braced against the wall. But none of the voices were near her.
She looked to the side and out into the night to see two riders approaching the academy’s walls at a furious, breakneck pace. Wait… She recognized those horses.
Callahan and Emerson. What were they doing racing back to the academy when she and Aunt Palladia were about to travel to the capital?
She’d find out as soon as she got back with her treasure. If the Sun Elves would never give them a Sunrise Iris, she’d just sneak one away and they’d never notice. They were scheduled to be back in Iubar by the time she and Palladia reached the capital.
She’d never show anyone. But she needed it. If she had it and managed feats in secret no other living alchemist could, she could rest assured she did deserve her position.
She waited for the gates to open and her brother and Emerson to race through before she finished her descent. She hit the ground and transmuted her thin rope back into the coat ithad originally been and then she shrugged it on over her blouse, kirtle, and skirt, bustled up into her belt. She then slunk into the shadows, kept low to the ground, and hurried off to the border.
Hellebore knew she wouldn’t have long, not with Emerson and Callahan’s return, but if she’d gone back, she wouldn’t get another chance. So she ran as fast as she could once she was out of the guards’ sight, her braid whipping through the air and her belt full of tools painfully jostling against her waist and hips.
Dawn was breaking as she reached the rocky craigs that marked the border, and she immediately started clambering down the slopes and deeper into enemy territory. Once she was on the other side, she paused, taking the time to catch her breath and to start looking around for any irises.
But there were no plants. Not… too odd, given the rocky soil. She would have to go deeper. She forced herself to press on, climbing up over rocks, seeing a large forest in the distance grow larger as she got closer. That was farther beyond the border than she wanted to go, but she would have to if this stretch wasn’t producing—
Hellebore stopped as she spotted a few flowers springing up between rocks. Unfortunately, they weren’t Sunrise Irises. It was hard to tell what they were, even as she knelt on the ground in front of them. She flipped open her notebook to her sketch of the flowers in her current experiments and held it up to the drooping, brittle, browning thing.
They were different species but the same appearance. It was sick. Strange.
If she had an extra pot, she would have taken one.
Instead, she pushed herself to her feet and pressed on. She was crossing the last stretch of boulders before an empty field that led up to the forest when she finally spotted the brilliant, glowing orange, gold, and pink iris that she was looking for.She reached into a pouch and checked her Alchemist’s Compass, pointing right at the flower in front of her.
A Sunrise Iris.
An Alchemist’s Compass pointed in the direction of whatever the formula written on its back determined. Hellebore had hers set to point in the direction of Sun Elf magic, the same type the Sunrise Iris had.
