Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf 1)

Vitesio’s Compendium de Magia. Wilstine’s Essays on Blood Magic Theory. There was even an anthology on the uses of feral magic for increasing crop yields—?soybeans included—?alongside dozens of other texts and histories, all in pristine condition.

“I may cry,” I said, reverently touching the bindings.

“Please don’t,” Zan said. “Many of those books were brought here after the Assembly of Mages was dismantled. They’re very valuable. I don’t want tears all over them, wrinkling the pages and running the ink. You can find references to Achlev’s spells here”—?he lifted a book and placed it in a new pile—?“here, and here. I’m still trying to find his original writings, but you can use these to get started.”

Zan left me there to immerse myself in the materials while he went off on his errand. I settled myself into cushions with the volumes on my lap, eager to read from books left uncensored. But I had turned only to the first page when I heard voices nearby.

“Do hurry,” a girl said. “The banquet will begin soon, and we can’t be late. It’s just a toy—?is it really that important? And are you certain you left it here, and not in the Great Hall?”

“I know it was in here. I had it by the window.”

My eyes tracked to the other side of the seat. Sure enough, a small object was resting there: a metal figurine with shifting pieces, small enough to hide in the palm of a hand. I knew it immediately; I’d used it as a prize for one of the seek-and-find games I played with Conrad, something to help him sit still and calm during the most tedious of his princely tasks. I didn’t know he still possessed it, much less that he had carried it with him all the way from Renalt—?I’d never seen him take it out during the journey, not once. But there it sat on the library seat, left behind mid-transformation, halfway between a hound and a hare.

I grabbed it and scrambled to my feet, but it was too late. Conrad had turned the corner and was blinking at me with round, saucer-shaped eyes. We regarded each other for a heavy minute before I slowly turned the remaining pieces—?click, twist, click—?and handed it back to him, a fully formed hare. He took it soundlessly.

“Well?” Lisette asked from the other side of the library. “Did you find it?”

I waited, heart pounding, for his response. With one word he could condemn me.

Finally, he said over his shoulder, “Yes, I’ve got it. I’m coming.”

I peered through a bookshelf as he bounded back to Lisette. She ruffled his hair. “You’d lose your mind if it weren’t locked up in that silly head of yours,” she said, smiling as they left together.

He didn’t look back.

* * *

That night, beneath the last waxing crescent before the first quarter, I snuck back to the castle grounds and over to the west side. If Conrad’s bedroom was in this wing, he’d have a decent view of these gardens from his window. I pulled the ribbon from my hair—?blue, one of Kate’s hand-me-downs—?and knotted it tightly around a branch of a rosebush. Then I dropped to my knees and dug a small hole in the dirt just below it, praying that he remembered our old game. Yellow for up, blue for down, red for north, green for south . . .

When the hole was big enough, I dropped the winged-horse charm in and covered it up. I hoped it was enough to convey my message:

I’m right here, little brother. I didn’t abandon you. Don’t be afraid.

18

As darkness fell the next day, Zan met me at my hut. He had a sack on his back and a lantern in hand; I came with nothing but a few scribbled notes and my fluttering heart. “I got what you asked for from Falada, and saw what you did for her,” he said. “She’s unrecognizable.”

“I needed to practice. Seemed like a good place to start.”

“Do you think you’re ready for this?”

“Not at all,” I replied. “But do I have another choice?”

“Not at all,” he echoed with a coy smile.

Tonight was the night. We were going to strengthen High Gate by installing Falada as a symbolic replacement for one of the Empyreans that had already been lost. Using the records of how the original rituals were done, I had pieced together a new spell that would bandage the hemorrhaging seal. I would have liked more time, but tonight was the tenth day of the month. The blood mage doing this would have to act now or not at all.

We hiked through the heavy woods along the old creek bed until we came to the foot of the wall. “There are some stairs over here somewhere,” he said, walking alongside the stone. “Nobody uses them. Here.”

Zan was right; there was a very narrow staircase, no more than two feet wide, that blended into the wall when viewed from the base. He started up them first, taking them one at a time.

I was beginning to feel the anxiety creep in. What if I was wrong? What if I couldn’t do what needed to be done after all? I wanted to hurry, to get on with it, but I was stuck behind Zan on the stairs, and he, strangely enough, appeared to be in no rush. “You seem to know a lot of hidden avenues,” I commented.

“I spend much of my time figuring out how to avoid human interaction. I explore a lot.”

“That’s hard to believe,” I said dryly. “You have such a way with people.”

At the top, the wall was six feet across, the flat width of the walk enclosed by battlements. There were wisps of ancient shades at the crenels, soldiers launching phantom arrows into a phantom army below. I tried not to step on any of the faint spirits littering the walk as we followed the wall north through the steepest ascent. We stopped often for Zan to complain that I was going too fast and that I might reopen the wound in my side—?concerned, of course, because he wanted me to bleed only when necessary.