Cold Magic

Voices murmured, his and hers, breathy with desire; the door clicked shut, followed by footsteps slipping away to some other private place. I was, again, alone. A dreamy languor swallowed me. What would it be like to kiss Andevai? Surely he affected that trim line of beard because he knew it emphasized the aesthetically pleasing line of his jaw. A few people, like Bee, were beautiful because they were so vibrant that the gaze is drawn to them whenever they are nearby; a few have become accustomed to being praised for beauty and expect those around them to be grateful to dwell in beauty’s shadow. Andevai was, apparently, vain enough to care how he looked, but what I had taken at first for arrogant vainglory I now suspected had more to do with insecurity. He did not undervalue his cold magic, but he hauled other burdens. He, too, seemed not entirely sure of what he was, caught between his village and his House.



He had pulled me back within the wards, when he might have left me out to be swept away by the tide. The ghost of the memory of his fingers entwined with mine had left its imprint on my skin.



He hadn’t meant to cut me. He’d stopped himself. He’d said, “No.” It had been an accident. He was ashamed. That’s what made him act that way, gates closed and guard up.



What an idiot I was! Falling into sleep making up stories about a man I did not know and who had been commanded first to marry me, a woman he had never met, and then who, having botched the task, had been ordered to kill me. He had destroyed the airship, and perhaps lives with it. I had seen him kill two men; I knew what he was capable of. His blade’s cut would have dispatched me if—for this was the only conclusion I could reach—my true father’s blood, knit into my bones, had not protected me from the cut of cold steel.



His face meant nothing. It was just a face. He was a cold mage, even if he was not the actual son of Four Moons House, even if the magisters scorned him for his birth in a village they considered bound to them as unfree people little better than slaves. He was bound to the House by old laws; he was theirs to claim, to raise and train, and to unleash on the world when they needed his magic to enforce their will. Or, to be fair, to curb the excesses of the princes and lords as the magisters were said to have done in the early days of the mage Houses. As the old saying went, “Fear the magister, but if you pay him what he demands, he’ll give you what you need. If only the prince’s hunger could be satisfied as easily.” Yet in these days, many hated the cold mages as much as they hated the princes and the old hereditary councils. The radicals said that those who had little because they were denied more than a pittance would, in time, rise up to demand a larger share.



I had been content once with what I had. Now it seemed I was caught in the flooding current of a river, torn away from all I had once thought was mine. The Barahals had sacrificed me. Four Moons House wished to kill me. At least the cats hadn’t eaten me.



The latch clicked. Humming softly and a bit off-key, Rory slipped into the room. A bed creaked as its ropes shifted under his weight.



“Rory?” I whispered.



“I was trying not to wake you.” He sounded cheerful and not at all tired.



“What have you been doing?” He started to speak, but I cut him off. “No, never mind, don’t answer.” I knew perfectly well what he’d been doing. I could smell. “Are you moon-dazzled? By which I mean insane? Folk don’t take kindly to men dancing into their towns, however so humble and isolated that town may be, and… ah… rollicking with their young women.”



“Wasn’t that included with the food and the bed?”



Perhaps I was only tired. But something about his tone of genuine surprise, and my mood, made me snicker. “You’re awful. You know, I have only your word that you and I share a sire.”



I sensed the change even before he spoke, a cat gone spiky with feline contempt. “Are you implying I am lying to you about such a matter?”



I stuck my head out of the blankets. The waning quarter moon was rising, visible as a hazy fragment of pearl through the thick glass. I saw him sitting upright with a rigid set to his shoulders as if he were trying to decide whether to claw me for the insult.



“No. But I woke up one morning assuming I knew everything about my world and my life, and now I know nothing.” His posture softened infinitesimally, but I could tell he was still offended. “If I’ve insulted you, then please forgive me. I’ve had a terrible time. I don’t know what to think about anything.” My voice choked.



He said, more softly yet, “Go to sleep, little sister. I’ve arranged for us to leave at dawn.”