17. Maddy

Chapter 17

Maddy

I return to the berry bush twice a day for the next three days, but it doesn't change.

I don't see my bear again, and worse, the more I try to practice my magic, the more wayward and errant it seems to become. Sarra relegates me to outside practice only after I almost flood her workshop. Sometimes I cause great snowstorms with a single focused thought, and other times I give myself a headache trying so hard and barely conjuring an ice cube. I'm struggling to see any pattern or reasoning for the lack of consistency, and it's only adding to my building frustration.

Erik stops me on Saturday evening when I'm leaving the feast hall to ask me about seeing his val-tivar .

"Harald told you, then?" I ask.

"Indeed. I wish you told me yourself."

"I wasn't sure whom I should tell. It was a lot to take in," I say.

He holds out an arm, and the snake flickers into view, sliding along his limb. She's watching me, and I gaze at her.

"She's beautiful," I breathe.

Erik smiles, something flickering in his eyes. "You know, it is an unexpected treat to share this. I have lived a long life believing nobody else would ever see her beauty."

I look up at him. "I never thought of it that way."

"I look forward to seeing your animal," he says. "I hear from the others that she was very impressive."

I nod. "Me too."

The other rooks lose interest in me, no longer crowding me in the feast hall or trying to talk to me during training, which I'm actually quite pleased about—even though I'm far from pleased that I haven't seen my bear again. The same is not true for Kain. His interest in me is not waning at all. I faint during my laps around Battleyard on Sunday night, and when I wake, he's ten feet away. He doesn't move to help me up or say anything; he just turns and walks away when I stand.

I dream about him most nights, and it drives me crazy. The dreams vary wildly, from his setting the entire world on fire, to his focusing all his fiery passion on me—very specific parts of me. And because I'm clearly deranged, I wake up hot and flustered and wishing desperately that the dreams could be a reality, that I could truly feel his touch, even though I know perfectly well that it would be a deadly experience.

My longing for him must be one of those ridiculous things where your mind wants something purely because it can't have it,I think on Monday evening, as I try not to stare at him across the feast hall.

When Tuesday comes around, I'm surprised to discover that there's a small part of me that wishes I could go with the other ice-fae to train with Brynhild.

Not being able to control my magic is a problem, and she's the obvious answer. If I'm being honest, there's also a small part of me that wants to go and show her how much I can do now, to show off, to force her to admit that she shouldn't have turned me away.

But my pride won't allow me to go back. Added to this, I don't trust her. The more I think about how much access I allowed her to my brain in the Ice Palace courtyard, the more I regret it. I don't believe she knows about my memory power, or surely she would have said something by now. Either way, I don't want to be around her if I can help it.

So, instead of slinking back to Brynhild and asking her for help with my new ice magic, I train.

I do my weights, and I'm happy to find that I'm still moving up swiftly. I run my laps, and once I've washed, I go to the forge.

My shield had a good test in training on Monday, and I've realized that the straps aren't in quite the right place for the most comfort and ease of moving it around.

I carefully melt down the fixings and set about creating new ones to attach a little farther apart. I'm bent over a clamp, holding a small metal ring that I'm filing, when I get the sensation of somebody watching me. I'm used to it now. It's always Kain.

But this is different.I hear a clatter. Kain never makes a sound when he's watching me.

I turn around, and my muscles tense instantly.

"I think you're getting too big for your castoff boots," Orgid says. He's entered the forge and moved a few feet to the right, and Inga has gone in the opposite direction. It's a circular room with the smelting pit in the center, so they've blocked my exit.

My pulse quickens. "You're supposed to be in magic training," I say.

"So are you," Inga resorts. "And besides, who the fuck is going to teach me—Kain the Ruinous?" She says ruinous sarcastically. "There's nothing that fae has ruined except his own life."

"Leave me alone," I say.

"How did you make your val-tivar appear?" Orgid says. They've both moved closer toward me.

"I don't know. Featherblade's doing it, not me. Now fuck off and leave me alone," I repeat. I move my hand back, feeling for anything I can use as a weapon. I close my fingers around the handle of a small hammer.

"You know more than you're telling us. You've had secrets since we got here."

I roll my eyes. "You're the one who has a problem with me. I've never done anything to you from the day we got in that boat at the Ice Palace. Go back to your magic training and leave me alone."

"We don't need to go to a magic class," Inga says. "I think we can learn more from you."

"You can't learn anything from me. I don't know how she came."

"She?" Orgid says, and cocks his head. I'm annoyed I've given them any information at all.

"Yes, she. Now fuck off."

"How do you know it's a she?"

"I just do."

"Have you spoken with her?"

"No."

Inga picks up my shield, andI can't stop myself reacting.

"Give me that."

"This weighs nothing," she says, then throws it up with one hand and catches it with the other.

"Put it down," I say.

"Is this her?" She turns the shield to me and shows me the bear in the center.

"You know it is."

"Is this how you're doing it? You've created magic in the shield instead of a staff?" Orgid and Inga look at each other and then back at me. For half a second, I wonder if they're onto something. Have I accidentally created a shield instead of a staff to channel my magic? But I didn't put the bear on the shield until after I saw her. And the shield was only finished a few days ago.

"No," I say. "It's got nothing to do with the shield."

"Pity," Inga says. "I thought we might have actually learned something." She shrugs in an exaggerated gesture and then, to my horror, tosses the shield into the fire pit.

I lunge for it, my hands instantly shooting ice toward the burning furnace. I get halfway to the pit, but Orgid steps forward. His shadows burst toward me, slamming me out of the way.

I can't reach the shield.

I see the wood burning to nothing, the metal warping as it starts to melt, the bear's face obscured by flame.

"Arseholes!" I shout as anger floods my system. The shield was so much work, and not just mine. Sarra and I have spent so many hours creating it. It's been a comfort, something to channel my concentration—it's been everything I've needed over these weeks.

And now these selfish, bullying pricks have destroyed it.

Ice blasts from my body, shoving Orgid back. I lunge forward again. My hand is completely covered in frost as I thrust it into the fire and yank out what remains of the shield. It's just the warped metal plate bearing the bear's face, but it's something. I'm staring at it, trying to work out if it's salvageable, when they grab one arm each. I'm about to drop to the floor to escape their grip, just as we've been taught in glima , when a voice growls across the room. Both of them freeze.

"Take your fucking hands off her."

Kain steps through the doorway, and I glare at him.

"I'm not a child," I spit, throwing my arms out as hard as I can whilst dropping to the ground sharply. Shards of ice fire at Ogrid and Inga, and I hear a grunt as each of my arms is relinquished.

A flurry of snow spins around me as I stand back up. For a second, they look at each other, and it's clear they are weighing their chances. But with Kain there too…

"It was a shit shield anyway," Inga snaps, and they both move toward the door.

I swear I can see Kain restraining himself as they move past him, and the great, fiery wolf beside him snaps at their heels. They both speed up.

Kain turns to me, and my snowstorm dies. My arms are still completely covered in ice, though, and water drips around me as it starts to melt in the hot forge.But all I care about is the ruined mess of metal now lying at my feet.

"Pricks," I mutter as I bend down to scoop it up.

"You know, doing magic without a staff is only possible if you're a High Fae or a Valkyrie," Kain says.

"Well, I'm no High Fae," I snap, staring at the mess of what was my shield.

He shrugs one shoulder. "Then I guess that first day in the garden, you were right."I look at him, the memory of our conversation returning unaided.

"Do you really believe you can become a Valkyrie?" he asked me.

"I'm not a Valkyrie yet," I say."I have no wings." I can't help but look at the blank space where his should be. His shoulders tense.

"You're the only rook with a val-tivar so far, princess." I start to tell him not to call me that, and he holds his hand up. "Fine, fine. How do you like 'petal' instead?"

More of the memory of the first time I spoke to him in the flower garden plays in my mind. "You burned the petal," I say slowly.

"I burned you too." His voice is quiet, and I glance down at my arm where he grabbed me. There's no mark there, but I remember the feeling, though now it's covered in ice.

A thought abruptly thrusts itself into my mind.

I just plunged my whole hand into a furnace to retrieve my shield and wasn't burned.

Could he touch me if my skin was frozen?

My face heats first, followed by my whole body. Kain, to my surprise, actually takes a step backward. Surely he hasn't realized what I was thinking? Or… is he thinking the same thing?

"Go away," I mutter. It's halfhearted, and he knows I don't mean it, but I have to at least try.

"Help me get into the vault."

I scowl, but I'm relieved at the change in subject. "No."

"I've always known you're special," he says. "Now they all do, too. You're destined for so much more."

Hearing him say I'm special makes me feel all kinds of ways that I don't know how to deal with. I don't want to be special; special means attention, and that means being at risk of having my memory power discovered.

But to pretend that I don't want to be special to Kain , when he's standing in front of me, oozing whatever the fuck it is that makes me stupid, is impossible.

"Flattering me won't help," I force out. "You want to get into that vault, not me."

His eyes narrow and darken. "If I told you what I really wanted, you'd run a mile, princess."

I gulp. I don't know if he's referring to burning the world down or setting my body alight; I've seen both vividly in my dreams. And he's right. Either should make me want to run a mile. I don't know that I would, though, and I'm aware how insane that makes me.

"Regardless of what I want, Featherblade wants you in that vault. It wouldn't have shown you how to get there if it didn't. It wouldn't have given you access to me and the cells."

I look back down at the center plate of my shield. Could he be right? Does Featherblade have something for me in there?

"It's Featherblade that's giving you that beast," he says, and gestures at the melted bear face.Slowly, I raise my eyes to his.

"Is this your new tactic? Have you given up on the flattery and secret delving?" I ask softly.

"Think about it, petal," he says, then turns and walks out of the forge.