Stunned, I stood there mouth agape.

Water element?

Of course. Why didn’t I realize that? He had shown me his power as children. The boy with the red hair had been a fond memory, until even he became a blur with all of the rest of my memories.

I looked down at my hands. A young boy had his power at the age of five. Why did mine insist on remaining dormant even as an adult?

Balling my hands into fists and lowering them to my sides, I began to wonder if I was truly the girl the Guardians had chosen. Perhaps Queen Sorcha had it all wrong.

“Kala,” I said, coming down to my knees before her.

She tilted her head as I wrapped my arms around her furry neck. “What is it, Celeste?”

“I’m worried,” I whispered. “What if my magic never comes? How could it be dormant for so many years?”

“I see,” she said. “You worry too much. You are the Aether. You have the power to control all of the elements. It is within you to summon the power. When you free yourself of all fear and useless thoughts, you will be able to call it forth.”

“I don’t see how. We’ve been trying for years.”

She nuzzled my neck. “Perhaps that’s what you’re doing wrong. Stop trying and let it come to you naturally. No one can teach you how to be an Aether. They are rare and there are never more than one in the entire world at any given time. You must look within, Celeste. I believe in you. We all do.”

I sighed and pursed my lips. Why couldn’t I feel it if it was truly there?

I could feel Ewan’s magic, and that of the other elementals even though we’d never met. Each individual stream of power was strong enough to wake me from sleep, or cause me to pause during any given activity.

“Try not to overexcite yourself. We still have quite a bit of traveling to do before we reach Allandria.”

I nodded, and watched her walk away.

Her words lingered in my mind as I stood. No one can teach you, she’d said. I looked for the prince.

We shall see about that.

The ship began to set sail, slowly wading through the ice and slush. My hair—now blue with worry—blew in the wind as I joined him at the bulwark of the ship. I wrapped my hands around the rail and looked out over to the passing sea. We stood like that for quite some time, enjoying the quiet and each other’s company.

Surprisingly, Kala left us to our solitude. Though, she did keep watch from afar, occasionally lifting her head to watch us stand at the other end of the ship.

He took my hands into his, and lifted them to the sky. With my palm pressed to his, he closed his eyes.

The cold metal was smooth and silky, unlike the bars of my window in the Crimson Tower.

Though the darkness of The Veil shrouded us like a thick blanket. A heavy fog rose from the water’s surface and made the air humid despite the cold.

“Prince Ewan,” I began, giving him a sidelong glance.

“Yes?”

“Can you teach me to use my power?”

He rubbed his chin with his metal hand, eyeing my hair as it shimmered in the moonlight. “How much do you know about the elements?”

“Everything,” I said. “Kala made sure I knew as much as possible.”

“Well, as the wind element, I can only try to teach you about that one.”

Good. That’s all I wanted. Just a try. Anything to prove I wasn’t a useless fraud.

“Thank you,” I said, breathing a sigh of relief. For a moment, my worries melted into the back of my mind as his eyes met mine. For years, his power had reached out to me and now we were finally together. I looked away and cleared my throat.

“Don’t thank me just yet,” he said with a chuckle. “I’ve never been much of a teacher.”

He lifted his metal hand. I realized that it was made of bronze and carved with intricate symbols. The cuff ended at a leather bracer at the wrist and his shirt brushed the shiny surface.

“I didn’t get this from teaching.”

I forgot my manners as I reached out to touch the metal again, tracing the engravings. “How did you get it?”

“War,” he said with a shrug, but didn’t stop me. “We’ve been at it for years.”

Guilt filled my chest and I lowered my eyes and took my hand away as if it had touched fire. “Because of me,” I said in a soft voice.

“No,” he said. “Not just because of you. The past decade has been a time of darkness and suffering. Many of us fought to put an end to it. Even though you are free, the fight is still going on. The Veil is open, and with that comes all manner of creatures and evil that do not belong in our world. The war is far from over.”

A bone-chilling scream snatched our attention from one another as we both spun around to see one of the soldiers being snatched away by a creature with black wings.

My lips parted and the color drained from my face as I beheld my first encounter with one of the nightmarish beings that stalked the world.

A weyr.