This time, Sy broke the spell. “It is you. Isn’t it?”
“Sabina did it,” she said in her altered voice. “She really is very talented, isn’t she? Could scribe circles round the lot of you.”
“Anya,” he breathed. Her face fell, and she pulled him close, burying her nose in his shoulder. He pressed his mouth to her neck, kissed her there ferociously, lost in the feel of her. She shivered and sighed under his touch, exactly as she had that night in the grotto.
“She’ll change me back,” she said, coming up for air. “I must return Bertrand’s suit.” She paused and hummed with pleasure as he smothered her mouth with his. “Tie up a few loose ends,” she mumbled into his lips.
“None of that matters,” he said, taking her face in his hands and kissing her cheek, her eyes. With a soft sigh, she melted into him, nuzzled his cheek with her nose. “Nothing else matters.”
“Sorry,” said the former footman. “Hate to interrupt. Name’s Ingrid, by the way. But, respectfully – what the fuck is happening?”
Reluctantly, they pulled away from each other. Several of the other former enchanted had gathered around them.
“You were enchanted by the witch,” Anya explained. “We all were. She’s dead; her bond on you is broken. She can’t hurt you anymore.” She smiled. “You’re free to go.”
Ingrid’s forehead wrinkled. “Where?”
“Wherever you want,” Anya said, her smile fading.
“I don’t know where I want to go,” said one voice. “I’m not in the habit of wanting.”
“I don’t even remember how long I’ve been here,” said another. “Where I came from.”
“I don’t feel very well,” said yet another, who, Sy noticed with a stab, was barely more than a child. “I think…I think I might be hungry.”
“You know, now you mention it,” said one man, “I don’t think I’ve eaten a crumb since I came here. The last thing I remember is a soggy croquette in the back of my cart.”
“A cart,” encouraged Ingrid. “That’s something.”
“Food always helps; let’s start in the kitchen,” proposed the first voice. “We’ll have tea and toasted rye, and sort some things out.”
This seemed a popular suggestion. Slowly, the others filtered out, leaving Anya and Sy alone in the room.
The fervor of the moment passed. Sy felt self-conscious inher presence. Felt the weight of all he had done. Of all she had done.
Of what would come next.
She read him. “You and I have more yet to do, as well. Another spell. I can’t do it alone.”
Another spell. With Mira’s spell over him lifted, he no longer fed his magic to her, or to the mire. He felt it coursing through his body – not like blood, but like pure motion, ready to burst forth. Soon, the land would flood. The manor would crumble; the lawns would die, turn to muck. New life would grow from what remained.
The phoenix’s magic, the forest’s magic, everlasting, was in him. With nothing to filter it, nowhere to put it, it would overwhelm him. It would take him over.
But he was not alone.
“This power…” He clasped her hands, needing her to understand what he could not put to words. “I don’t think I should use it. It doesn’t feel right to use it.”
“That’s why we’re giving it back,” she said, smiling softly. He could see her smile now, in this new face. How in the world had he ever missed it? Impulsively, he reached out to trace the shape of it on her lips.
Her breath caught, and her eyes closed. “You’re hesitating.”
“Remember why I took it,” he said, his fingers falling away. “To save you. And so no one else could have it.”
Her new voice rang with familiar fury. “That wasn’t you. It was the forest using you.”
“No,” he said, knowing its truth as he said it. “It was both.”
“Alright, well you can both put it back now.”
