The wealth and equipment are worrying enough, but the architecture and design… Those niggle at me, though I know I’ve not seen this specific hall before. I even double-check in my magic, digging enough that the surrounding stones grumble at me, but no, I haven’t seen it. It is, however, worryingly close to—
And Aldrik leads me around a corner that ends at a door that is all too familiar, though I only ever saw it from the other side.
I stop dead in my tracks—unable to breathe, much less give voice to my horror.
My magic—my montai magic, stripped of the telven magic that usually helps interfere with it—writhes around me. The floor quivers beneath our feet.
Aldrik twirls around, gaze dropping down for a moment as he adjusts his stance.
A moment later, his eyes are on me, widened with surprise.
What did he think my magic was inclined to make me, if I Bridge? I generally use my magic to distract people. I don’t need it to help me kill them. And I’ve never lived in anything like the Wailing Marshes, where the montai use their magic to help them travel and camp, for my magic to be inclined to end up a shadow walker like Aunt Bruneli.
Which reminds me—she’s Bridged, but she isn’t barren. That means she is as old as Conláed Arach, if not Manal J’Azpi. I wonder if Lallie and Dakadza know that.
“T!” Aldrik barks, drawing his magic up.
Truly? He thinks me in danger of Gullying? I scowl at him and give my magic a hard smack. The stones around us abruptly settle with only a sharp complaint.
From his slight jump and swift glance around, he isn’t as used to elementals as he generally manages to pretend. Born elementals grow up with our magic acting without us controlling it. Anybody who makes it to our age can tell the difference between magic reacting to our emotions or situation and it trying to Gully.
“Oswen?!” I snap at him. “Seriously, Aldrik? You decided to invade Oswen? Is this supposed to be some creative method for suicide?”
“It isn’t suicide.”
From the tilt to his chin, he actually believes that.
I yank my gaze off him and focus on the huge door, as large as a giant and embedded with precious stones. Take a deep breath, Tully. He thinks he’s made a reasonable decision. Yelling at him will only—
“Did Zanton yank your air long enough to give you brain damage when you were trying to kill him?!” escapes my lips, even while I remind myself that the accusation won’t help matters. “Forget that. What in creation were you thinking? ‘My wife is trying to kill me, so I think I’ll steal her home from her and make it personal’?”
He gives me an odd look. “My wife trying to kill me is personal from the outset, I’d say.”
And he missed that point entirely. “No—it wasn’t personal for her. Now it’s personal. She will hunt down you, your sons, your brother, your nieces, your nephew—”
“What do you mean, my nephew?”
That is what gets his attention?
I stare at him for a long moment, wondering how in aleyi I’m to get through to him, because he still doesn’t get it. “Your prophetess’s brother. F— Whatever it was.” My magic supplies the answer. “Ferrel.”
“How would Sylvair get someone away from AMaC?”
“He—” I halt midsentence. If Aldrik doesn’t know, Ferrel didn’t want him to.
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1st Draft Fridays - A Fistful of Deception: Book #4, Chronicles of Marsdenfel
FantasyThis book is FOURTH in a series + a FIRST DRAFT. It may not make sense without having read the rest of the series. This is being posted as part of the First Draft Fridays run by Carradee, a.k.a. Misti Wolanski. Thus, this version is rough and may or...
