Chapter One
AVELINE
The trees beyond my window had changed while I had lingered in a haze.
Orange and rust decorated the branches, some of the leaves deepening into bruised purples that caught the lowering light. I rested my palm against the glass, trying to remember when the leaves had last been green. Yesterday, perhaps. Or longer. Time in the tower passed differently, or so it seemed. It softened at the edges, bled into itself, slipped quietly away, no matter how carefully I tried to mark its passing. I often felt carried along in the drifts, helpless, as if I slept through days, weeks, months at a time. And then I saw signs that reaffirmed this feeling, and it only distressed me further.
The glass warmed beneath my hand, a warmth that spread throughout my body. For a moment, I thought maybe it was the sun that streamed through the window that heated my spot. But when I shifted into the shadows, I realized that my entire body was warm, almost feverish. My stomach ached, and lower—in the area that I often ignored—I felt a heavy throbbing that was unusual.
I had never been sick since I came to the tower. But when I was younger, I remember fevers, coughs, and cool handssoothing me. This felt different somehow. But I didn’t know what it meant.
I curled deeper into the cushioned seat, the stone at my back cool even through the layers of fabric, easing the heat simmering in me. The air drifting through the narrow crack in the window carried the scent of earth and decay. Autumn had a richness to it—damp soil, dying leaves, something faintly sweet beneath the rot.
I wanted to be down there.
I hadn’t been out of the tower in years, but I was growing tired of watching the world and being removed from it. It was not a passing wish, not idle curiosity. I wanted to feel the leaves break beneath my boots. I wanted wind against my throat. I wanted dirt beneath my nails. I hadn’t seen another person, except my father, since I had been here. But I yearned to speak with someone, to have a friend. But I had to remain alone. Isolated.
It was not safe beyond the tower. Not safe for anyone. Least of all for me.
That was what Father said.
It could have been true. It could have been a lie repeated so often that it no longer felt like one.
He had told me that since I was placed here, young enough to listen without question. I didn’t know exactly what danger I posed. Only that I did. Only that if something terrible happened, it would be my fault.
I had tried to leave. Once. I dared challenge the story I had been told.
Father had been gone for so long, not visiting, and I had waited for him, patiently watching the leaves bloom and fill the canopy around me. Then slowly, the edges changed color and they faded. I feared that I had been forgotten and I determined to leave. I followed the spiral staircase downward, beyond mybedchamber and cozy nest, past the library shelves filled with books that recycled with new books all the time, the dining hall with its polished table and empty chairs that had space for so many people when I only ever needed two spots. At the bottom, I had found a room of bare stone.
No doors. No windows. Only cold stone walls.
I had pressed my palms against them until my skin froze, waiting for something—anything—to yield. Nothing did. And when I searched for that room again, the staircase never seemed to end in the same place twice, as if the tower itself was conspiring to keep me prisoner.
Most days, I remained above. In the nest, with its furs and cushions, dozing in the warm sunlight. In the garden that bloomed at the tower’s peak, regardless of frost. In the library, with its endless shelves and careful silence.
Meals appeared when the bell rang. Baths were always hot. Clean dresses replaced the soiled ones in the wardrobe.
I never saw who tended to these things.
Magic, Father said. The tower took care of me. Protected me. It was linked to me and my needs.
If that were true, it had never answered when I tried to coax it into answering me. I even tried learning magic from several books in the library, hoping to gain control over my powers and connect with the tower. I had copied every gesture from the spell books. Spoken the words precisely as written. I had traced sigils with steady hands and careful words.
Nothing stirred. No spark. No ripple.
When I asked Father about training, telling him about my efforts, he called my failures a blessing.
Power without discipline destroyed what it touched. And the only way to control my power is to suppress it with the tower.
The sunlight shifted across my lap, and the warmth seeped into me more deeply than it should have. It didn't rest on myskin—it settled beneath it, loosening something low and slow beneath my ribs. The sensation was not painful, but it was not entirely comfortable either. It made me aware of my body in a way I had not been before.
Restless.
That was the word for it.
My pulse felt closer to the surface. My skin more sensitive to the movement of air. Even the birdsong drifting through the window seemed sharper, each note distinct and lingering.
Then the tower changed. It was a subtle sensation. A change in the atmosphere, in pressure. A subtle tightening through the stone, as though the walls themselves had drawn a breath and were holding it.
