A Curse of Blood & Stone (Fate & Flame 2)

I guess it doesn’t matter. That life no longer exists.

Slipping off the ring again, I follow Gesine’s directions, counting in my head over and over again as I pull air deep through my nose, my lips pressed together.

Gradually, with each new breath, the buzz dissipates.

I open my eyes to find Gesine watching me expectantly. “What does it feel like?”

I search for a way to describe it. “Like a tiny ball right here.” I press my palm against my chest. It’s still very present, but not uncomfortable.

She smiles. “Which is where it should remain, as long as you focus on your breathing and do your best to maintain your equilibrium.”

“Is that why you’re always so calm?” And Wendeline too? “Because you’re so focused on your breathing?”

She seems to consider my questions. “Perhaps. I was a rather hyper child. A caster’s affinity does not make itself known until they begin to mature into adulthood. The simple casters, ones with a link to one fate, often can’t feel it until Mordain’s instructors coax it out. Elemental casters are usually afflicted with this discomfort you’ve been feeling, and the more powerful their links, the more focus they must give to centering them.”

“I never felt it at all before.”

“It is a strange situation, indeed, given how powerful you are. But now that you can, you must remember to keep it centered.”

“If you’d just told me to do yoga breathing, I’d have had it days ago.” I wouldn’t have wasted so many hours, struggling.

“I will have to remember that.” She smooths a palm over her forearm, drawing my attention to the emblems that glow through her threadbare sleeve.

“Were you born with those?”

“These?” Gesine pulls up her sleeve and holds out her arm for me. “No. These, I was given in Mordain when I mastered each of my affinities. All casters are marked as such. Even Wendeline has one.”

“I never saw hers.”

“It is much smaller. They reflect the caster’s strength.”

I only briefly saw the emblems, the night we met. Now, I’m able to study them in more detail. The gilded doe—Gesine’s affinity to the god of water—is twice the size of the other two. I think back to that tremendous wind she drew the night we escaped. If her connection to Vin’nyla, the god of air, is only half of what she has to Aoife …

“I still remember the days I received each as if they just happened. It is an occasion for celebration among the casters. I earned this last one”—she taps the butterfly—“much later than most, but I didn’t mind because it allowed me more time studying in the library with the scribes.” Her laughter is musical. “I spent all my hours in those dank, dark halls, surrounded by dusty scrolls and immersed in prophecy, absorbing all I could while making friends. Since I was a little girl, I’ve always found what the seers see fascinating. I had wished that only one affinity would develop, so I could scribe for the remainder of my years. But the law required that I enter service for Queen Neilina, so I did. You were twelve when I arrived. Princess Romeria was twelve,” she corrects, her eyes flittering to Eden.

The girl is fast asleep, her breathing slow and rhythmic.

“Did Romeria know about her blood?” That a god designed her to kill an entire race?

“When I arrived? No. She knew of her father’s efforts to tender your hand in marriage to Islor’s heir and bring about peace, and she knew of her mother’s vigorous opposition to the idea. But she did not learn what Neilina had done with Aoife’s aid until several years later, and by that point, her mother had thoroughly poisoned her thoughts to all things Islor. When Princess Romeria mounted her horse to cross the rift, she had but one goal: to destroy the kingdom and claim it for her own.”

“And when did you get involved in all this?”

“Not for years. When I arrived in Argon, I hoped that the union King Barris was attempting to broker between his daughter and King Eachann’s son would lead to realizing the prophecy. It was not until years later, after Ianca and I had formed a close bond, that I would learn what Queen Neilina had made her do.” She smiles sadly. “Ianca was so young and naive when she arrived there, nineteen and eager to please the dreaded queen, and without any love for Malachi’s demons. That’s how we were raised, to fear them. Even I was apprehensive upon first arriving here,” she admits sheepishly. “When the queen demanded that Ianca summon Aoife, Ianca didn’t think she had any other choice.

“As the years passed, Ianca grew wiser, and when it became apparent that the Islorian kingdom would accept Romeria in this peace treaty and that the queen’s plans might come to fruition, she began to worry. She knew Neilina’s ambitions were not that of her husband’s, and Ianca could not see how the poison running through Romeria’s veins would ever inspire peace between the two realms. The only future she could see was war and death, and the suffering of many. One night, she divulged her secret to me.

“Others may not have seen it for more than the obvious—a violation of a sacred oath that, in any other circumstance, would’ve resulted in Ianca’s execution. But because I had spent so many years immersed in the seers’ foretelling, because I have seen much, I knew immediately that what Neilina had done would have greater consequences than Ianca feared.” She pauses, as if deciding how much she wants to share. “Many do not value the seers’ visions, nor do they see purpose in the scribes’ work. It has been that way for thousands of years, but especially since Neilina became queen. And many of the guild’s leaders concern themselves far more with politics and power than Mordain’s true purpose. They are happy to relegate the returning seer casters to dwell in the undercarriage of Mordain’s halls, spewing their nonsense until they expire.” Gesine’s jaw grows taut, her anger visible.

Eventually, she will be one of those seers, as all elemental casters are.

As I would have become had I stayed in my world, in my own mortal body.

“I have told you about the prophecy, the one widely accepted. It has been spoken by three different seers, almost word for word. But it is not the only prophecy about the daughter of Aoife and the son of Malachi. There are others, studied by the most scholarly of the scribes. On their own, they may seem nothing more than confused prattling, but when pieced together, they paint an ominous picture of what may come to pass.”

My scalp prickles with unease. Zander warned me of how these casters only share what they feel necessary at any given time.

“There was once a seer who foretold of a day when the fates would meddle in the joining of the daughter of Aoife and son of Malachi, and a great reckoning would follow. This was spoken before the Great Rift, and to this day, most tie that prophecy to Queen Isla and King Ailill.”