I exhale, exasperated. ‘Because it was depleted. Because their Gods decided to punish them. That’s what everybody says. How else would you explain it?’
Fox rakes his brandhand through his hair. He hesitates then says, ‘What if I told you there was a secret weapon? One that held unimaginable power.’
I shake my head. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘The Etheri, they used it to strip the Magi of their magic. Their powers weren’t depleted. Or taken by their Gods. They werestolenfrom them. Sealed, for more than fifty years, inside the weapon used to win the war.’
Reeling, I take a step backwards. ‘What are you talking about? Whatweapon? And what has this got to do with Elva?’
Fox coaxes a spoonful of liquid into Elva’s mouth. ‘Before the war, Obsidia, the isle known as the Land of Eternal Night, was home to Shadow Magi – those with the gift of darkness.’ He pauses. ‘It seems … Well, it seems that Elva’s powers, the powers stolen from her people, have been returned to her.’
My heart trips over itself, beating too hard, too fast. ‘You can’t be serious.’
Fox’s steady expression remains the same.
‘There has to be some other explanation,’ I insist. ‘There has to be something else, something –’ I place both hands on the table between us. ‘How?’
‘How,’ says Fox, ‘is always inextricably linked to who. You ask how her powers have been returned to her, but really what you should be asking iswhoreturned her powers? How follows after.’
I choke back the nausea creeping up my throat. ‘Fine. Who? Who could have possibly returned magic that was stolen from her ancestors before she was even born?’
Fox pulls something from his pocket and holds it out to me. I barely have time to catch my breath before his next words knock me off the side of the world.
‘You did, Storm Weaver.’
Held in his hand, watching me, is the golden Eye.
41
Fox tells me that the War of the Empires wasn’t started by the seven Magi rulers, but by his grandfather, Caius Castellion. That he invited their ambassadors to Ostacre under the pretence of forging an alliance and then slaughtered every last one of them, leading the Magi to declare war. Only when they sent their battleships across the Second Sea to invade and supposedly reclaim Ostacre from the Etheri, Emperor Caius sent his Imperial Guard to the Otherlands with orders to track down the three sisters.
When the emperor enslaved Syla, he had her seal the gifts of the Magi inside her Eye – the secret weapon, and the key to power itself. And I, unwittingly, have returned one such gift to its rightful owner.
Fox is still treating Elva, selecting green vials from the shelves and grinding up herbs into a powder.
‘So … so when Elva touched me, when I touched her, the Eye gave her back her magic?’ I say weakly. ‘It made her aMage?’
Fox nods, stepping back and wiping his hands on a scrap of cloth.
‘Will she be all right?’
‘I’m fairly confident that if she survived the bolt to the heart that would have been the decades’ worth of raw power entering her system, then she’ll pull through.’
‘So she’s out of danger?’ I ask.
‘She’s out of danger,’ Fox confirms. ‘Let her sleep.’
I glance at Hal, who’s still as unconscious as Elva.That’s another reason for knocking him out, Fox had said. Aside from the fact that I would as soon punch him than look at him, it’s best that we keep him in the dark about the Eyes, for now at least.
I take a deep breath. ‘I still don’t understand how all this could possibly have been kept a secret.’
‘When so few people know the secret in question, it’s not difficult to keep it,’ Fox says. ‘Especially since most of that number quite literally took it to their graves. There were some old Magi legends, of course, folktales about the sisters and their Eyes, but there was nothing to connect them to the war. And as for my grandfather, he was the one who made sure the truth never got out in the first place. It was easy enough. All he had to do was spin a few tales, speculation about wrathful Gods and the superior strength of the Etheri, and there you have it, the Eyes were erased from history.’ He grimaces. ‘Well, not quite.’
‘What do you meannot quite?’
‘Take the Imperial Court,’ says Fox. ‘Formerly the Golden Court, now the Court of Eyes. People think it a nickname picked up during the war, when so many of the courtiers turned spies for the emperor.’
Realization burns a hole through my chest. That’s whenmy gaze wanders to the prince’s right hand. ‘It was Caius Castellion who added the eye to the Imperial brandmark, wasn’t it?’
