The healer within me fumbled over this, leaving me with a push and pull. To offer help or to stay back so as not to further frighten her. What ailment brought about the darkening of eyes?
The girl’s body shook, and the air filled with an indescribable charge. My blood vibrated, accompanied by a prickling sensation that began in my fingers and spread out in static tremors.The hair rose on the back of my neck.
Releasing a breath to steady myself, recollection fell over me of the traveler’s warnings. The whispers of what people believed me to be, the whispers of a dark magic. Despite my knowledge, no other possibility came to mind. The black eyes, the charge in the air. The child was an Alidian.
Aureus’s last rule came to me as an echo in my mind, nearly drowned out by the steadily growing hum in my ears: stay safe.
4
EVERA
The girl’schest rose and fell rapidly. My eyes held hers, drawn into the emotions that drove her. Exhaling a steadying breath, I fought to calm the racing of my own heart, to resist falling victim to panic. I searched my mind for any useful knowledge that could assist me in my current situation. The extent of what I knew of the Alidian came from legends, stories, and Leighis’s teachings. Yet even my mentor spoke little of them. There was a hush to the word. When it was spoken, people averted their eyes, mumbled the wordwitch, for that title was easier to stomach.
Alidians were human by birth. They came into the world like everyone else. Until the age of five or so, there was nothing notably unique about them. Then their magic began to show. The black of their eyes was the tell of a soul consumed by dark magic, the energy in the air the forewarning of unmatchable power.
An Alidian’s magic was deadly, unbiased, and unhinged. Cilician law was finite when it came to the killing of innocents. A death for a death. It was why such children rarely made it past the age of six. Unable to control their outbursts, they were executed for their crimes.
Sucking in my bottom lip, I studied the girl’s charcoal eyes. Within the darkness, I detected a base drive for survival. Like an animal backed into a corner, bristling, hiding its fear behind pointed teeth and snarls of warning.
The charge in the air intensified, and through the rush of blood in my ears, I found an unexpected calm. An acceptance, a calculated cool detachment. Thoughts of Mother came to me, of her warmth, her love for the short time she was in our lives. Her lullaby hummed through me until the tune rose faintly from my throat, sweet and slow, as I closed my eyes.
Time was elusive. I couldn’t say how long I carried the tune, but the charge in the air began to dissipate. Opening my eyes, I found the girl still looking back at me, her dark irises faded, returned to a cornflower blue. As the ringing in my ears subsided, she relaxed her grip on her knees and color returned to her white knuckles.I exhaled another steadying breath, grateful my first instinct to calm the girl had been successful. Grateful Mother’s song had settled her, as it had so many times for me before.
“I used to live in the streets too,” I said hesitantly, voice low.
The girl fidgeted, then faintly she mimicked a few notes of the lullaby. The sound from her throat was rough, as if her voice were underused.
“It was my mother’s song,” I offered. “It’s always brought me comfort.”
The child averted her eyes. What had happened to her mother? My heart wrenched.
“What’s your name?” I asked, unsure if she would respond.
Tucking tawny hair, tangled and unkempt, behind an ear, the girl rocked side to side. “Kalae.”
My heart leapt. “That’s a pretty name,” I encouraged. “I’m Evera. How old are you, Kalae?”
The girl scrunched her nose and shook her head once, frustration drawing her brows together.
“I don’t know my age either. But when our mentor took my brother and I in, he gave us an age.”
Her arms and legs were thin, her cheeks sunken. Malnutrition made it difficult to determine her age.
“Have you bled?” I asked.
She hesitated, then nodded. “Only once,” she said, voice meek.
The loneliness of her statement harrowed me. At least when my first bleed had come, I’d been able to rely on Leighis, who’d calmly explained things and given me what I needed. To go through that alone, unknowing …
“I’m going to guess you’re around five and ten,” I offered, concealing the weight of my sadness for the girl. Old enough for her first bleed, but certainly she couldn’t be any older than that. Not with her slight frame.
Consideration laced her expression. “How old do you believe you are?”
I smiled. “About one and twenty.”
A clatter came from the street, followed by the raised voices of men arguing. One slurred his speech, the other—a merchant I suspected—riddled off a series of insults and complaints over his broken goods.
I drew a breath, but before I could comfort the girl, she was retreating down the alley, the bare soles of her feet flashing. They were raw, scratched, and agitated. Detecting such things was second nature, a part of who I was, as natural a reaction as a voyager charting the stars.
