“Don’t apologize.” Fritz shook his head. “It must be a lot.” Vhalla nodded mutely. “Were you in the palace before this?”
“I was,” Vhalla answered, finding talking helped work out the lump in her throat. “I was a library apprentice. I’ve lived here since I was eleven. Almost seven years now...”
“That’s good,” he smiled. Vhalla stared at him, puzzled. Before she could ask what was good about her situation, he elaborated. “Some of the new apprentices are dropped off by their families. They’ve never lived in the palace before—or even out of their homes. The worst is when their family disowns them as well.”
“Disown? Their own family?” Vhalla blinked. She didn’t know what her father really thought of magic, but Vhalla wanted to believe that nothing would make him abandon her on a doorstep. He had been teary eyed leaving her in the South.
“They’re afraid.” Fritz shrugged. “They don’t think it’s natural, even though people can’t choose magic.”
“Is that what happened to you?” Vhalla asked.
“No,” Fritz chuckled. “No one in my family is a sorcerer, but they hardly minded. My sisters thought it was hilarious when I couldn’t stop randomly freezing things.”
“Freezing things?” Vhalla mused aloud. “That would make you a-a—” She couldn’t remember the proper name. “You have a water Affinity.”
“A Waterrunner,” Fritz filled in the blank helpfully. “Okay, right, well, I’ll let you read. I just wanted to make sure that you weren’t in pain.”
“Don’t,” Vhalla grabbed the hand resting on her knee as he went to stand. “Don’t leave.” She looked away, a flush rising to her cheeks. Vhalla didn’t want Fritz to go. He was the first stable person in the whole Tower, and she needed someone warm and genuine right now. Something about his Southern hair and eyes reminded her of Roan.
“All right,” Fritz agreed with earnestness, settling next to her. “I’ll read with you; it can’t hurt to brush up on my history.”
They began reading together and Vhalla appreciated that he read almost as fast as she did.
The story of the Windwalkers started centuries before the last Windwalker died during the great genocide that was known as The Burning Times. It was a rich history of Cyven, the old East, that Vhalla had never been taught despite being born there. The story was incomplete in some areas, being taken from oral histories, but it wasn’t until Vhalla reached the middle section on The Burning Times that she began to have questions.
“I don’t understand.” Vhalla shook her head. “The King of Mhashan was invading Cyven?”
“Mhashan could have been greater than the Empire Solaris if they had kept Cyven, some say,” Fritz confirmed.
“Why didn’t they?” The book took a distinctly Eastern viewpoint, and the explanations for the West’s actions were lacking.
“King Jadar claimed the invasion was to spread the word of the Mother Sun.” History was clearly a favorite area for Fritz by the way he spoke and through the animation in his hands. Vhalla wondered how many nations would use the Mother as an excuse for conquest. “But really, what he wanted was the Windwalkers’ power.”
“Why?” Vhalla tried not to sound too eager. The prince and minister’s conversation was still fresh in her mind.
“I don’t really know,” Fritz replied apologetically.
Vhalla felt her chest deflate. Whatever the reason, the king had enslaved every Windwalker found by his armies and a specially trained secret order of knights. In the process, most of the East was put to the flame. There came a point when the Windwalkers admitted defeat, hoping to spare the rest of their people. Compared to the West’s military, they were disorganized and weak. The king accepted their surrender; after the last of the sorcerers were in irons he burned every remaining resistance or love for those with the air Affinity, as though he wanted to erase them from the earth.
Vhalla stared at the words, realizing she was nearing the end of the tale. The last quarter of the book focused on what the West did with their captives. Live experiments and forced labor that churned contents of her stomach sour.
“Why would they do this?” she whispered.
“I don’t know.” The Southern man patted her knee. “But it was a long time ago. Things are different now.”
“How have I not known this happened?” Vhalla tried to wrap her head around what she had just read.