“Val,” Evander said firmly, his breath coming rapid and rasping. “There is no more wyvern bone powder in Allagesh. Trust me.”
“Then look harder,” she insisted. “Look outside Allagesh.”
“Wyvern bone powder!” the hermit cried, holding up his pointer finger in a gesture of discovery. “I have a little bit of that.”
Valenna spun around so fast, she lost her balance. “We need it!”
“I’ve just got a pinch. Enough for one cup of tea …”
As the hermit put a kettle onto the stove, Valenna found a clean cloth and wetted it with water from a pitcher on the table. She busied herself with scrubbing aggressively at Evander’s gory face, neck, and arms, trying to tamp down her strangling panic. Plum-colored vines crawled over her legs and entwined her waist. She glanced over her shoulder at the hermit preparing tea with agonizing care.
“Can you hurry?” she demanded.
Evander laughed. “You can’t rush … good tea …Val.”
“You can when it is literally a matter of life and death!”
The hermit smiled kindly as he placed a hand-painted ceramic teacup on the table. “Nearly done, my dear. I’m Torsten Oakwhistle. Physician and wizard.”
“I’m Valenna.”
“And you and Evandaine are …” He glanced between them.
“Confused,” she replied tersely.
“Ah.” Torsten mixed a pinch of white powder into the teacup and handed it to Valenna. Her hands trembled as she took it, and some of the tea sloshed out, burning her. She let out a string of curses, and poison ivy covered the window, darkening the room.
“I’m alright, Val,” Evander soothed.
“Don’t lie to me, it’s insulting. Now sit up and drink this.”
His eyelids drooped.
“VANDER!” she shouted, shaking him. “Drink it, or I’ll drown you with it!”
Evander took the cup and swallowed the contents like he was tossing back a glass of whiskey, then he set the teacup on the bookshelf and wiped his brow with his forearm. Gradually, the color returned to his cheeks.Valenna waited—silent, tense, her finger tapping a nervous rhythm on her knee. With a tight smile,Torsten left, claiming he needed to get Hera out of his garden before she ate his crop. A moment later, Valenna heard him through the wall, scolding, and Hera’s feet crunching on vines.
“Alright, now that you’re out of imminent danger, explain why he calls you Evandaine,” she said.
Evander leaned against the wall and drew up one of his legs, resting his arm on his knee, and said with a sudden accent he’d never had before, “Because that used to be my name.”
Chapter twenty-five
Valenna
Valenna’s heart sank. Once or twice in their acquaintance, she’d noticed he pronounced certain words awkwardly—rolledr’s, rounded vowels, and sometimes his syntax seemed off-kilter. She never gave it much thought. Now, she realized he’d had a musical Ashkendoric brogue lurking beneath every word.
“Have you always had that accent?” she demanded.
“It’s such a relief to use it again,” he said, smiling, and he did seem lighter, like a weight had lifted from his shoulders. “It’s exhausting, you know, faking standard tongue.”
“Please tell me Evandaine is a common name in Ashkendor and you really are just a woodcutter’s son.”
“You know who I am, Valenna.”
“Oh … Oh, no, no, no …” She ripped up the vines twining her legs and body, and stood. “This isn’t happening. It’s a nightmare, and it’s not happening.”
“I'm so sorry, Val. I couldn’t work out a way to tell you, especially with the wyvern bone powder running out …”
