Lights flared, and the audience roared with applause. The fantasy had ended.
“It worked, in the end,” Shamino said quietly. We sat as everyone stood. He released my hand. It ached with the sudden emptiness, but I flicked my sleeve to hide it.
I couldn’t look at him. All I wanted to do was cry.
The training of the past few weeks kicked in, and as we left, I wore my mask of ‘normal’ as best I could. Gossip surrounded us, but it only buzzed unintelligibly like bees. Then we broke free. The stone hallways felt chill after the crowded theater, but Shamino felt as hot as a dragon beside me.
The Transportation spell whisked us along in silence. Too soon we stopped at my door, completely alone except for the occasional blur of someone passing by. I tried to release his arm, but he held my hand in place.
“Adara…” I felt him studying me as I stared at his hand on mine. “You said, ‘I can’t.’ What do you mean?”
“I just—just can’t.” It sounded like a straightforward enough response.
He took a deep breath. With a tone of dismayed certainty, he declared, “Because of who I am.”
I looked up in confusion. “Because you’re the Seneschal?”
Surprise, then a spark of hope. “No. I meant my family.”
Everything I knew about him floated to the surface. Dragonsridge, highborn, high enough for his older brother to be betrothed to Tressa. Rogan’s death, inheritance gained, inheritance lost. I didn’t know Shamino’s house. It didn’t matter. He could have been as lowborn and poor as Paige and it wouldn’t work.
“It’s not you,” I said. “It’s me. All me.”
“Because you’re adopted? Adara, blood doesn’t matter to me.” He freed my hand only to cradle my cheek. “Your past, my past, I don’t care. I—I want the future.” He swallowed. “With you.”
I closed my eyes. His thumb caressed my cheek and his arm slipped around my waist. I remembered Shamino’s laughter, and I remembered his tears at the dragons’ deaths. I remembered him sweaty and dirty as he worked, an expression of satisfaction on his face.
When I opened my eyes, his were inches from mine. He was leaning forward—
“I can’t,” I said. I shoved him away and stepped back.
He stood with his arms open. The pain on his face was akin to when a dragon died, except worse.
“I’m so sorry, I just—” If I repeated that phrase again, I’d slap myself. I hugged my chest. “Really, it’s not you, it’s complicated—”
“Someone else?” he choked out.
“What? No! No, you’re everything—” I clamped my mouth shut. I couldn’t let him keep that hope.
He scraped the floor with his toe, ran a hand through his hair. He stepped forward, and when I stepped away again, he held up his hands. “Tell me one thing.”
I waited with dread.
“Adara, look. Me. In. The. Eye.” I wrenched my gaze upward, and the hope and fear I saw in his face made me ill. “If it weren’t for this ‘complication,’ would you have let me kiss you goodnight?”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to. My treacherous face told him that yes, I had very much wanted that kiss.
Shamino blew out a slow breath. “Good. I’ll wait for you.”
He turned to leave. I lunged and barely grabbed his arm in time. “No. Shamino, don’t—my problems are not going to go away. Ever.”
“Your magic? That’s what’s wrong? I don’t care if you never light a candle—”
“Shamino, please,” I begged. I wanted to tell him; shouldn’t I tell him? If anyone understood, it’d be the man whom the dragons chose because he wasn’t like the other nobles…
I hate lies, he’d told me the day Merram had assigned me to the Dragon Quarters. Shamino had meant it. What was our everything, if not based on lies?
When I didn’t continue, Shamino’s expression turned scarily similar to the one he wore around Maolmuire: grim and determined. Quick as lightning, he leaned over and whispered in my ear. “I thought I’d never care about anyone again, and then Merram forced you into my life. Now he’s threatening to take you away, and I just couldn’t—Adara, you are more amazing than any woman I have ever met, and I think your love is worth it. So. I’ll wait.”
With that, he kissed my cheek and the Transportation spell took him away.
I burst into my rooms, rushing through them without seeing. The pain in Shamino’s eyes before he left—the pain in my heart—I wanted, but I couldn’t see a way…
The wardrobe. I’d wandered blindly through my rooms and ended up in front of my wardrobe.
My hand trembled as I opened the door and pulled out a boot.
Thorkel promised me magic. With a Gift, I could stay at the Kyer. I could stay with Shamino. Courtship would always be impossible, but the point was, I would stay. I’d bond. I’d have a chance to confront Merram, and maybe by some miracle his words would…
Hope faltered. Solve one problem first. Everything hinges on the magic. Nothing is possible without it.
I emptied the boot and took the contents to my bedroom, the deepest part of my apartment. Cross-legged on my quilt, I smoothed open the instructions.
Without focus, magic ripples outward like rings in a pool. Most spells will not work in such circumstances, and those that do are highly inefficient. For example, your manifestation. According to reports, Fire appeared not in a centralized location but dispersed, and most of the damage to the hut occurred after the spell transitioned to normal flame. I believe the reason you ‘manifested’ was because of your Gift’s strength: Enough magic managed to collect in one location for a noticeable effect.
A noble’s manifestation, however, always occurs in one location. A noble instantly learns the feel of magic, and he can cast spells at will thereafter. This is because a noble possesses that which you do not: jewelry.
I’d never seen a noble without a bracelet or a
