Blue Sun

Chapter 2 - Part 1

Tesni left the gael with a heavy heart. Even among the Wilde she was a freak. A miracle, the Wilde boy had called her. She snorted into the night air. Her magic was no miracle—it was a curse. A curse that would get her exiled or worse.

Before the Wilde boy she'd told nobody what she could do. She'd discovered her magic by accident on the eve of her eleventh birthday. It had been a bleak birthday, too. Owen was off fighting at the Border and her mother and father were attending the king's soiree, an all-day and all-night affair. Gareth, who'd been all of eighteen at the time and new to his military grays, had been assigned to watch over her in her parents' absence. He'd protested vociferously—he thought the job beneath him, even then—but the General had insisted that ensuring the safety of his daughter was a matter of national security. In some ways, what happened that night was Gareth's fault. Perhaps that was why she hated him.

You wouldn't think that the daughter of the king's first General would have to spend her birthday alone (Gareth didn't count), but it wasn't the first time it had happened and it wasn't the last. For someone so well-loved by the people of Oldfall—her father was a war hero, and she was uncommonly pretty—Tesni had few real friends.

Alone in her bedroom, Tesni had lit a birthday candle for herself and hummed a birthday tune. In Oldfall, the tradition was to let the candle burn itself out—the longer it lasted, the greater luck it would bring for the year ahead. And so she'd gone to sleep with the wick still alight.

She'd woken to the smell of smoke and scorched fabric. Red and orange flames covered the carpet and crawled up the wooden posts of her bed. A lit char fell onto her cotton sheets and they burned too, entombing her in fire.

She should have burnt to death.

Tesni had been only eleven, but she knew the tales about the Wilde as well as any Oldfallian. Fire could not burn the Wilde, they said. Fire could not burn her either.

By the time Gareth found her, the walls of her bedroom had long since disintegrated. His hazel eyes had been huge in his face and it was the only time she could recall him looking frightened. “I thought you'd be dead,” he breathed.

She lifted her chin, clutching a singed blanket to her chest. “You should have been here sooner.” If he'd come for her at the first sign of smoke, then she would still be normal. Ignorant, but normal.

He swallowed and nodded. “Will you tell your father?”

She'd say nothing, because the fire had been her fault, and worse, she'd have to explain how she survived. “Maybe I will,” she lied.

“Please, Miss Kendrick,” he said, his voice breaking. “He'll never forgive me.”

“I'll consider it.”

She’d kept her silence over the years, and they’d never spoken of it again, at least not directly. Her father had declared Gareth a hero for rescuing his daughter from the fire, and he'd risen quickly in the ranks after that.

Gareth was a miserable coward, she’d always thought, staking his career on an act of heroism he never committed. But she had her own dark secret, and when push came to shove, she was no less cowardly than he.

A strained silence stretched between them as Tesni and Gareth walked back from the gael to the General’s state house. Tesni tried to keep her scattered emotions from her face and concentrated instead on her surroundings. The moon glimmered above, a pale, silver crescent against a black canvas dotted with stars. A thousand miles away in the Wildelight, anyone who gazed up at the night sky would see the same moon as she.

The General was waiting up for her when she returned home, dressed in his favorite navy blue evening robe and puffing on a cigar. He should have looked ridiculous, but Andras Kendrick defied ridicule.

Having seen her safely returned, Gareth bowed and went to take his leave, but her father interceded. “Stay, stay,” he said, ushering them both into the parlor and maneuvering them onto the settee. “I want an update on your visit with our young prisoner.”

Gareth looked at her askance, his lips tight. She was on her own on this one. “He…ah…The boy…The prisoner, that is, well…I didn’t learn much.” It was the truth. The only thing she’d learned was that she was as much a freak among the Wilde as she was among her own people.

Her father clicked his tongue. “Tessie, Tessie…you learned nothing after all that? I confess I am disappointed. You are usually such a clever girl.”

Tesni bit the inside of her lip. She hated disappointing the General, but what was she to say? “I tried talking to him, truly, but he barely spoke.” She pouted prettily. “I don’t think he much liked me.”

He blew out a long plume of smoke. “He spoke to you, you say? In Wildish?”

“A little, but I only know a few words. Mostly he spoke to me in Commons.”

The General stared at her. A few bits of ash fell off the cigar-end and onto her mother’s pristine floor. “Gareth!” he said sharply. “Is this true?”

“Is what true, sir?”

“The prisoner—he communicated in Commons?”

Gareth gave her a helpless look. Of course he’d heard nothing of her conversation with the Wilde boy—she’d forbidden him from coming anywhere near them. He had no choice but to agree with her; the alternative was admitting to her father that he’d left her alone with a war criminal. “Y-yes, sir. He did.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me this little fact?” the General exploded. “I had to pry it from my own daughter!”

Gareth spared a murderous glance for her before replying to her father. “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. I didn’t realize it was pertinent.”

The General sighed, pacing across the room. “You need to learn to think, lieutenant. That boy is a potential goldmine of information.” He stopped in his tracks. “How much Commons does he know?”

Gareth folded his arms over his chest, glaring at her expectantly. She answered truthfully. “Fluent, or close to it.”

Her father whistled. “A Wilde who’s fluent in Commons. Our sun shines brightest tonight.” He clapped his hands together. “You’ve done well, my girl. Really well.”

“I don’t understand,” said Tesni. “What does it matter? He barely speaks in any language.”

“He barely spoke to you, my dear.” The General tucked a loose strand of copper hair behind her ear and smiled fondly. “And if he doesn’t respond well to sweetness and honey…” Her father’s smile turned cold. “Perhaps he’ll find himself more willing to speak with me.”

A/N: Sorry this chapter-part is so short! Just really excited to have my writing mojo back and restart this story again (I'm a bit more into it than my nano project I think...). Look forward to any thoughts and THANK YOU GUYS for being so patient with me. It's been a difficult year writing-wise.

Beautiful pic on the side is by @Dimzzu!