I listen.
No sign yet of Astrophel’s even tread in the hallway.
I shouldn’t look. Shouldn’t want to look. But that desperate, twisted need is unspooling in my chest. I grasp the cord to the right of the curtain and tug, unleashing a thick plume of dust. I’m face-to-painted-face with the four figures who’ve haunted my imagination since Izarius first introduced me to their ill-starred story. I can remember my tutor spinning that sad tale clear as crystal, as if we stood together before this very portrait only minutes ago, rather than nine long sunrings past.
‘How much have you been told about the Branded, Princess?’Izarius asked, bushy eyebrows winging upwards as he unveiled the portrait.
My gaze slid to the floor.‘My father forbids mention of such things, but Mother sometimes reads me stories from the Book of Starlore. She told me the Dusk Sister, mad with jealousy, mind addled by her dark magic, cast her twin from the Cradleworld using a cursed veil, and later sent shadow creatures through the Veil to kill her. That the Dawn Sister created the Branded with her dying breaths to expel these monsters from Arcelia and defend the realms from their corruption.’
Izarius nodded.‘She entrusted her spellbook to the Branded, granted to them– alone of all her creations – the ability to wield both Light and Shadow Lore, so they could serve as her stewards. But the Dawn Sister died before she could teach the Branded the First Runes. Unable to read the Book of Mysteries, they could neither invoke the Dusk Sister’s dark magic to banish the shadow creatures, nor master their Sister-given affinities for the Aethers and use Light Lore to defend the realms.’
‘People came to fear the Branded,’I whispered,‘and the powers they couldn’t control. My kind were shunned…’
Izarius patted my hand. His grey eyes, milky with cataracts, searched my face. ‘Has your mother spoken to you of your ancestor Noelani? Of the other Elemagi?’
I looked at the portrait then, committing its four figures to memory. I shook my head.‘Only to explain she’s where I inherited my… my… That she’s the reason for my affliction.’
Izarius frowned, deepening the furrows on a brow lined as one of his ancient star-maps.‘It’s not right to leave you in ignorance.’
I opened my mouth to protest, but Izarius smiled, squeezed my hand again.‘Don’t worry. Your father need never know we’ve had this conversation.’He moved closer to the painting, running a hand through tousled hair, more grey than silver.‘I’ll tell you what I can, but almost eight centuries have passed since the Elemagi’s reign, and much of their sorry tale’s been lost to the tides of history. What we know for certain is, during the first Tarnished Age, four members of the Branded, intent on reclaiming their rightful place in society, worked together to decode the Book of Mysteries. Piece by piece, they uncovered the secrets of Light and Shadow Lore.
‘Sometime later, they gathered fragments of the Aether cores and incorporated these talismans into four powerful sceptres to protect themselves from Shadow’s corrupting influence. Thus armed, they performed an ancient blood rite to vanquish the shadow creatures and restored balance, peace and prosperity to the realms. In homage, theGuardian races swore new bonds of fealty to them; they were giventhe title of Elemagi, treated like gods– revered and loved. At least for a time…’
Izarius sighed, turned from the portrait.‘But all magic has its price and something went terribly wrong. Arden, the Oralian Elemagus, succumbed to Shadow. Not satisfied with being one ruler among four, she betrayed the others by unleashing the Sickening in a bid to gain dominion over all the realms. The remaining Elemagi confronted Arden, commandeered her sceptre, but she fled before they could bring her to justice. Despite extensive searches, no trace of Arden was ever found. The others pooled their magic, tried to revoke her curse, but only succeeded in creating defensive wards to slow its progress.
‘Defeated, all four sceptres and the Book of Mysteries hidden to prevent Arden finishing what she started, the Elemagi retreated to an island bower in the neutral Borderlands; their refuge since the earliest moons of their friendship. In a final act of cowardice, they cloaked themselves under a slumber spell, abandoning Arcelia to its lingering fate.’
It was here, before this very portrait, I learnt why people hate the Branded – it’s where I learnt to hate myself. Still, I can’t deny the thrill, the powerful sense of kinship. The Elemagi bore my same curse; it’s a bond that transcends the ages.
This is where my morbid fascination with forbidden, tainted artefacts began – the moment I realised I was a tainted artefact myself.
The painted Elemagi hold their sceptres and stand in a lush meadow, an approximation of the bower on the Silent Isle where the cowards retired, forsaking Arcelia, an emerald carpet punctuated by exotic wildflowers I don’t recognise – splashes of violet, yellow and soft-white, the petals painted in a thicker impasto than the rest of the composition, almost begging to be plucked. I reach towards the painting, but start back at the sound of voices on the other side of the door.
I listen, heart in my mouth, but the muffled voices trail away.
Just Watchers patrolling.
I turn back to the painting. The two young men are so strange looking, so wholly unlike my own people. Lyndon Vervale, the Xylian Elemagus, to the left, is stocky and soft-featured, with a mass of soil-brown curls, constellations of freckles, and stark lichen-dappled cheekbones. Green eyes stare out from his cadaver-tinged face. Zale Aguado, the Riverian Elemagus, is taller, still short by Estelian standards, but long-bodied, broad-shouldered and lithe. He’s striking enough, even in this painted likeness, that I can understand Noelani’s decision to reject her court-appointed match in his favour. There’s something magnetic about his lapis eyes and lazy half-smile. It’s almost enough to make me overlook his ocean-hued hair and skin, the scales thickly sprinkled along his collarbones.
But like the first time Izarius showed me this painting, it’s the women that clamour loudest for my attention.
Noelani, because she resembles me with unnerving exactness: the same opalescent hair, willowy frame and oval face with upturned nose and over-thin lips. She, too, bore her brand on the wrist: left to my right. She’s my mirror image in all particulars save for her eyes, which are a deeper purple, her skin, which sparkles like diamonds to my dull shimmer, and the thick streak of grey staining her hair.
Izarius taught me all the Elemagi bore this Shadow Mark, the toll for invoking the Dusk Sister’s dark magic through their blood rite.
Arden Incenzo draws my focus for another reason. Her face has been sliced from the canvas – a powerful, gilded body all that remains of her. Arden’s likeness was expunged from Estelia long before my father’s purges of all other images and texts with links to brandmagic or the enemy realms. I have no idea what the monster who destroyed Arcelia actually looked like, only the grotesque image my imagination has filled in. The effect of the decapitation is as haunting now as it was all those sunrings ago. As a child, and before Izarius’ gift of context, the decision to sever Arden so absolutely from the composition, and from history, seemed a senseless, savage act. Now I wish they’d cut her traitorous body from the painting too.
Pinpricks of light dapple the portrait.
Orthriel is coming.
I scramble to yank the curtain closed, my vision still clouded, but iridescent flames and the waxy scent of night-lilies announce my Guardian’s arrival before I can hide the portrait.
The cold flames slowly resolve into a translucent approximation of a body, one that wavers at its edges, amorphous, androgynous, and swathed in a prismatic halo. Orthriel has decided to materialise for the ceremonies. I stare up at the sharp planes of my Guardian’s face. Their eyes, deep pools of silver, at once ancient and ageless, are hawk-like in intensity. Even after all this time, the angular perfection of Orthriel’s features, their fierce beauty, still knocks the breath from my body.
‘Congratulations on reaching your majority.’ Orthriel’s voice reverberates in the vaulted interior like a great bell. It sounds different outside the confines of my head, deeper, more sonorous. ‘I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to get here.’
It’s true I expected Orthriel much earlier than this. Though we’ve never discussed it at length, and I can’t yet peruse my Guardian’s thoughts as they can mine, I know making the journey from the cielsylphs’ floating-island home of Nimbi drains Orthriel’s Aether reserves more than they care to admit. I glance at my Guardian’s chest. Yes, the glimmer of their heartcrystal is fainter than usual… This explains why the bridging connection between our minds keeps cutting out, why I’ve barely heard from them since my failed escape bid. As Guardians, beings of pure Aether, the cielsylphs feel the effects of the Sickening before the mortal races. Orthriel’s decline is another worrying sign – something to add to my brandsong’s collection of doom-laden whisperings.
