Finn never did this. Never held fire, not that I know about anyway. He always just willed an already-made flame to burn higher.
Wide-eyed, I look at Alexus. He jumps up, losing his blanket in the process, and takes the tinder from the tin. Squatting, he stuffs it between two pieces of wood.
“Now.” He looks at me pointedly. “This is the hard part. Just send the fire over here.” He motions with his hand.
Send it overthere?Gaping, I stare at him with as much of an incredulous look as I can force onto my face.
He rises and stalks across the small space between us and settles behind me on his knees. Again, he cups my hand and directs it toward the pile of twigs. “It’s mental. Youwillthe fire where you want it to go. Like most any small magick, it will do what you want once you’ve harnessed it.”
Will. I’ve willed lives back together. Surely I canwillfire.
I close my eyes and see the flame in my hand dripping molten over the kindling. I imagine a blazing fire rising while I hover over it, warming my frozen hands. I envision glowing embers crumbling to ash, the open heat giving rise to new flame.
“Think of the thing you want most in this world,” Alexus says against my ear. “This can strengthen your magick. It’s where true power comes from. We often hold the most will for our strongest desires.”
My mind is never blank, especially these last few days, but in that moment, there’s nothing. Nothing possible, anyway. What I want most in this world are things I can’t have. My mother. My father. My sister. My village.
To reverse time.
The winds blow stronger, and a blast of snow whips my hair against my face, stinging my cheeks and eyes. I try to hold on to the fire like I held on to the sword magick, try to keep my mind focused. But another sharp gust cuts through me, and I still can’t see anything in my mind’s eye, the thing I want most.
I don’t know what I want most anymore. Revenge? To kill the Prince of the East? To find my sister? To live? To die and be done with this frozen world? I have too many desires, and they all feel out of reach or wrong.
Overwhelmed, I open my eyes. The flame is gone. On the rising edge of panic, I face Alexus, breathing hard.
“I can try again,” I sign.
He blinks at me, snowflakes settling and dying on his face. “What happened? You were doing so well.”
I was, but then…
Shaking my head, I turn away from him and draw my knees to my chest.
He runs his hand over my back. “It’s all right, Raina. I imagine we’ll have plenty of cold to practice in these next few nights.”
He goes back to the kindling and tinder box, and I sneak a glance his way. His hands shake harder now, the world outside our little stone fort a wall of whirling white. He’s persistent, and that’s a good thing, because finally, after a time, the flint sparks, and a tiny flame catches and holds.
Tirelessly, he works, trying to build the flames higher while I think the wordsFulmanesh, iyuma,over and over. I don’t believe it helps, though.
Eventually, there’s enough fire that my skin begins to warm. The small blaze fights the wind and snow and wins.
Alexus blows out the lamp light to save the oil, tosses his blanket over his shoulders, and sits closer to the fire. I check on Hel just tomake sure she’s breathing. She is—harder and faster than normal—and her hand is warmer than it has any right to be. I worry it might be a fever, so I heal her cuts and wounds—including the gash General Vexx pounded above her eye.
When I finish, I return to the fire and sit near Alexus, holding my hands near the heat as exhaustion creeps over me. I’m worried about Hel, but I’m not sure what more I can do. Sometimes, even with all this magick inside me, I feel so powerless.
“Sorry,”I sign, my fingers beginning to thaw.“I tried.”
Alexus nudges me with his shoulder. “I told you. It’s all right. We’re going to live.” He gestures at the fire with a blanket-covered fist. “You came so close. It isn’t easy, fire magick. You made it look that way, though.”
“Until I lost it.”
He shrugs. “Again, we’ll live to try another day.”
“Fire magick would have been useful in the vale. All those winters.”
“I’m sure. But magick like that tends to spread, taught from parent to child, friend to friend, mentor to student.” He pauses, as though unsure about his next words. “Fire in a village can be dangerous.”
Biting my lip, I shake off the image that comes to mind and focus my thoughts elsewhere.
