Yet the older I grew, the fewer opportunities there were for me to release that energy, and the more desperate I became to be rid of my magic.
A year ago, Neris and I were walking through the forest when we came upon two women with platinum hair visible beneath their white hooded capes. The first looked at me with knowing eyes. “Fear not,” she said, her voice both commanding and soothing. “I sense great turmoil within you. I can help you.”
Neris tugged me away from the woman. “Get away from us!” she shouted.
Yet the woman didn’t balk in the slightest. “My name is Nimue,” she said, lowering her hood. The other woman did the same, her face identical to Nimue’s. “And this is my sister, Aine.”
With a smile and a troublesome glint in her eyes, Aine nodded with practiced politeness.
“It’s not every day we encounter a Terraforger,” Nimue said, and my heart just about tumbled out of my chest. “You carry a dangerous secret, Gwyneth.”
“How do you know my name and?—?”
Neris squeezes my armhardto shut me up.
“The gods told me. I know you long to be rid of that festering curse that threatens to destroy your life. Many other Terraforgers, especially, have before. We can help restore you to the person you were meant to be. Ordinary. With so much potential to do whatever you want. No hiding. No fear. No shame.”
Neris’s arm tightened on mine.
“How?” I asked, my voice a mere whisper.
“There’s a Cleanse—with water from the sacred River Daehan of Siad Nahar. It will cleave the powers from your soul.”
“How can we be sure you’re not lying?” Neris asked.
“Come with us,” Aine said. “There are many of us living in perfect peace just outside the city.”
“I can’t just leave.”
“Speak to your mother about it,” said Nimue. “A mother only ever wants what’s best for her daughter. If you decide to take our offer tocureyou, head southeast to the temple of Rhianu. There, you will find us. You can come as well, Reneris.”
Neris’s lips were an unmovable thin line.
“There will come a day when Erleya will truly be purified of magic. Don’t you want to be free of it before it is destroyed, and your soul along with it? Think on it, Gwyneth.”
Neris and I didn’t say a thing to each other about the odd encounter for days. With harp and dance lessons, constant preening of my appearance by the servants and my mother, and history lessons, the time continued to press on without anyopportunity for me to use my powers. And sure enough, when Arionna provoked me, my emotions were so fragile that my anger nearly brought down the whole house.
It was then, with tears streaming down my face, that I told Mother about Nimue and Aine. Naturally, she agreed, sending a note to Father who came right home to sit down and discuss things. We came up with a plan—to tell everyone that I was going off to study history with a master historian. And then we left, Neris and I, to find the temple of Rhianu.
As dilapidated as the circle of stones that surrounded the statue of the Mother goddess was, the building in the field behind it was even more run-down.
The place where I now stand appears eerily similar. My lungs are ready to burst as I collapse onto my knees near the sacred circle of broken stones half my height. A cool breeze rustles the overgrown grass and my sweat-soaked dress, sending a shiver through me. I breathe in the loamy scent as I press my hand against the soil. The damp earth turns malleable beneath my powers, my fingers sinking into it like it’s water.
I try to forget the lies about my magic—that I’m tainted for possessing such powers and would be better off cleaving it from my being.
I was so foolish. So damned foolish.
“Winnie?” Neris’s voice reaches my ears, and I can’t be more relieved to hear a familiar, comforting voice.
My hand comes out clean when I pull it from the soil. I sit fully in the grass and look up at my best friend, tears staining my face.
“That was Credia, wasn’t it?” Neris whispers.
Wiping the sleeve of my dress across my cheeks, I nod.
Neris heaves a sigh. “Alright, let’s get you home,” she says. “I think we’ve had enough adventuring for the day.”
Chapter 9
