SHE WILL MASTER TERRIFYING POWERS OF ENCHANTMENT...TO SAVE THE MAN SHE LOVES
In a land of sorcerers and elf warriors, powerful women weld magic--but the only things Elspeth wields are dirty pots and pans in a castle kitchen. That is, until she was...
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As Zephyr is finally face to face with her magic again, she confronts magic that attacks, frightens her, and simply can't be undone.
The rooms Theo had requested were cold as a dungeon, thick with cobwebs, dust, and disarray.
"It's very nice—for a tomb," she said.
"In a way it is—it hasn't been used in, oh, fifty years?" Theo said.
The room was a graveyard where furniture came to die. Listing cabinets, upended chairs missing legs, and broken stools were stacked throughout the dim room. Theo hopped up upon a window seat to pull down long dust cloths covering the windows. She burst into a fit of coughing as dust moiled around in the streaming sunshine.
"At least it gets good light," she choked out, waving her hand.
The room was very basic compared to the rest of the palace, though spacious and with tall ceilings. The walls were plain plaster walls cut and crossed by dark wooden beams. Homey. That was the word she wanted. The only concession to palace design where the two stretches of pointy gothic windows facing each other. They were not only elegant, but flooded the room with light. Like soldiers, standing six abreast, they were each the width and height of a man as they faced each other across the room.
Her spirits began to thaw. It would be a pleasant room in summertime. The windows would let cross breezes through. It was freezing right now, of course, and with such a tall ceiling you could never fully heat it, even if you tried with a forest of trees, but come summer...
A part of her itched to roll up her sleeves and revel in the therapeutic act of a good sweeping out.
"And this leads to?" She asked, opening a arched narrow door. Servant's corridor, apparently. It went straight for a bit, then jogged out of sight. Like it was wrapping around a room. So she opened the next door—maybe this was the room—but inside it was completely dark.
"Shutters," Theo said, and dived in, brave soul.
"Oh, careful. I hear squeaking."
She heard wood creaking and suddenly a small square of weak light entered the room. At least thirty dark moving shapes skittered across the floor in the dim light, and she let out an involuntary scream of surprise. This did not stop all the little skittering mice from suddenly heading her direction. She danced backwards with a yelp, and as the mice quickly dived through the only exit and lost themselves in the furniture heaps of the other room.
Theo drew her forward into the small, dark, bedchamber. "Come," he said, pulling her fists down from around her cheeks.
It was a dark room, which was fine, because they'd only spend time in there to dress or sleep, but it was an extraordinary room nevertheless. She tilted her head at the giant wooden thing in the corner.
