Seren Marudas
Seren’sshinsthrobbed.Shecould feel the welts rising already, red marks that smarted along her pale skin like stripes. Madam Courvo’s cane was as unforgiving as the woman herself, especially toward a wandering-minded witch in her etiquette class.
“Do you think that woman ever relaxes?” Seren bent forward, resisting the urge to rub the tender spots with a bit of soothing ice magic they’d learned in Elementals that morning, but part of her knew the madam had eyes everywhere and she’d only catch hellfire for it.
Lily’s dark brow arched, beneath them her amethyst eyes blinked through the gloom of shadows gathering in the corridor. “Doubtful. In South Silden we fight with blades rather than whatever the hell she’s teaching in there. I’d take someone coming at me with a sword over Madame C and her cane any day. Far less deadly.”
Quietly, Seren contemplated the land across the sea. Before meeting Lily and the headmistress, she had only seen the occasional Sildenian in the port cities she visited with her father in the summers to trade their harvest. Dark-skinned and purple-eyed, they’d fascinated her, but when she got close, longing to speak with one, her father ushered her away. Lily’s description made them sound like her kind of people and a small sound of agreement came from the back of her throat as she rolled her shoulders and straightened. Her stomach gurgled insistently. “I’m starved.”
“If you hadn’t skipped dinner to scour the library, chasing myth and legend, maybe you wouldn’t be.” Lily started off at a steady pace down the long hall. Seren jogged to catch up,
It was true, she’d spent all of her free time hunting down information about what the vessel, omnis stone, and grimoire were. Calder might be insane, but what he’d done to Bella was very real and Seren still felt as though she had next to no clue what was happening to her sister. Bella could deny the change all she wanted, but Seren didn’t trust anything that scheming wizard was up to. Any connection she felt to him when they first met must have been borne out of some brief deliria. She couldn’t fathom another explanation for trusting him at all. Her feelings hadn’t been her own.
“Where are you going?” She finally asked Lily as they walked. Her gaze skirted toward the arching windows and the sinking sun beyond where a robin blue sky had given way to lavender twilight, her mind still lingering elsewhere. Unfortunately, the library had proved almost as fruitless as Darkmore himself. She still had four sections to search but would need to hurry and creep back in to harass the sharp-nosed librarian and her various stuffy attendants. There wouldn’t be near enough time before curfew to find all she needed, but any progress at all was still progress.
“Weare going to the dining hall. You need to eat, Seren. I can’t have you starving to death. You’re the only witch here that I can suffer.”
At that, Seren let a broad grin slip over her face. “Oh, I don’t know. You seem to have taken a shine to Roxie, although I can't fathom why. Such an insufferable busybody.”
Even through the shadows, she saw the heat that rose to Lily’s cheeks. “Come on, if we hurry we can ask the ventus nicely for something small.”
“Don’t the professors usually congregate in the dining hall after meals?” Seren thought back to the rumors whispered amongst the other students. They turned a corner and started down the endless stairs.
“No, they moved those meetings—” Lily cut herself off, a flash of mortification. Seren raised an eyebrow. “My aunt. I hear things when I’m with her. Probably things that are not my business.” Her lips clamped into a firm line as they neared the next flight.
Seren allowed the comfortable silence to settle between them until they reached the dining hall, which was still open but pleasantly deserted. They could have any table of their choosing but still picked their usual one in the corner near the tall windows that faced the courtyard.
“So . . .” Seren began slowly as they settled into their seats. “Know anything about locator or clairvoyance spells?”
The librarian had scoffed when she’d asked for a way to magically locate exactly what she was looking for, before very pointedly telling the young witch that under no circumstance was magic to evenbrusha single page in her delicate and vast collection. But what were rules for if no one sought to break them every once in a while?
“A little,” Lily offered as two steaming cups of chamomile tea, fresh sliced bread, and a small platter of brie and thinly sliced meat blinked into existence in front of them. “But where do you think this search is going to get you? Do you believe Calder’s claim that Arabella is this . . . vessel?”
Seren frowned down at the food in front of her. She wasn’t sure what to think, or who held the answers she needed. The air at Calami had grown thick with deception since Calder Darkmore stepped into her life. Who would tell the truth? Who could she trust? Her list had grown so small.
“Do you want to talk about it? What we . . . overheard in that meadow?” Lily’s voice was coaxing and tentative, the quiet threads of companionship weaved through it.
Seren recalled what they had heard when they’d rushed ahead of Roxie and Bella, before the fighting broke out between Atwood and his impish younger brother.The way Calder had twisted his words to make it seem like they’d . . . like she and he had. . . unable to finish the thought, her stomach roiled as waves of anger ebbed through her once more. The same anger that had urged her to attack so readily. So foolishly, leaving Icarus and Arabella to pay the price.
When Seren didn’t respond, Lily brought her cup to her lips blowing softly. She sipped with a telling grimace.
“Not your cup of tea?” Seren joked, coming back from that dark place, eager to shift the subject.
“I’ll forever miss the coffee in South Silden. But no matter how hard I think of it, it’s always this leaf water I get.”
A memory surfaced, another one of the many trips Seren had taken with her father to the port city. He had spoken to a man about South Silden’s ground coffee beans, but was assured there would be no market for it in Lynoria. The wistful look in Lily’s eyes made her think otherwise now.
“Anyway, it explains why you Lynorians are so miserable. Leave it to me to find the one substance the ventus cannot create.”
“You know that isn’t how it works. Didn’t you pay attention in Magical Theory?”
Lily took another slow sip, smirking. “We don’t have Magical Theory at Dragunreach. We don’t need to theorize our magic. We already understand it.”
Seren laughed around a sip of her own, feeling the mild flavor coat her tongue and pool warmly into her empty stomach. “The ventus don’t create the food, it comes from the kitchens below, since they’re wind spirits, their magic allows them to teleport it up after they read our desires. You can’t make something from nothing. Even magic is bound by the laws of nature. Every magical being and creature has limitations on their power—except maybe the so-called Vessel.”
Lily stiffened, only a fraction before reaching for a wedge of cheese. “You’re starting to sound like Atwood. Must be all that reading. Careful, you might become as insufferable as he is.”
“This is a sensitive topic for you, isn’t it? Don’t think I didn’t notice how piqued you were out in the field when they mentioned the grimoire. What aren’t you saying?”
