“Where is he?” I asked Eywin.
He looked at me strangely. It wasn’t as if Hal and I had often been apart in the past weeks.
“He said he was leaving. He didn’t say why or for how long,” Eywin said, seemingly unconcerned.
Worry crept in at the edges of my anger, but I tried not to give in. I’d told him I never wanted to see him again. What did I expect? I hated the way he’d lied. That was what I needed to hang on to. I couldn’t let myself think of how he’d made breakfast for me day after day, how he’d taken care of me in fights, or the way he’d made me laugh in Eywin’s workshop. I couldn’t dwell on how it had felt to trace the angular line of his jaw or to kiss the dimple in his cheek. I needed to stay focused on finding Atheon.
Still, I couldn’t help needing to confirm what Eywin told me. I knocked on the door to Hal’s room after dinner, but there was no answer. And when I tested the knob, the door swung open to reveal a chamber that showed no signs he’d ever been there.
That empty room crushed my heart like a vise.
I told myself I didn’t care.
Every day after that, the battle between Ina and the king felt more inevitable. Though I did not see Ina again, her presence in Corovja was palpable even in the castle. Outsiders poured into Corovja in droves. No one spoke about the challenger in polite company, but rumors spread quickly among the servants. I even caught one of my maids tugging her sleeve down to cover a white ribbon tied around her wrist. Without asking, I knew exactly what that meant and who she supported. She’d gazed at me with panic in her eyes, but I shrugged and said nothing. I had sworn to support the king, but that didn’t mean my choice was right for everyone.
Sleep stopped seeming particularly important. My days were spent in the workshop, and at night I used the king’s token to sneak out a side gate and stalk the streets of Corovja in my shadow cloak. No matter how deeply I probed with my Sight open, I couldn’t find the thread of magic my mother said would lead me to Atheon. I didn’t know what my mother had meant when she said to listen to my heart. If the magic I was following felt like my own, shouldn’t it have been one of the brightest things in my Sight?
The ache of Hal’s absence grew the longer we were apart, showing no signs of healing over. Still, I refused to allow myself look for him. Instead, every time he crossed my mind, I let the feeling burn to galvanize me. I would fight him, Ina, and Nismae that much more fiercely knowing they all deserved it.
But at night, when I put on my cloak of shadows and left the palace to follow random threads of magic in search of Atheon, I remembered him in other ways. In the palace gardens, I remembered how he’d rained petals over us. In the woods outside the castle walls, I remembered the way we’d slept next to each other, his warmth radiating through me. In city cemeteries I remembered running through the streets of Valenko with him, and the spark that had jumped between us the first time we touched. When I returned to my room, I remembered the way he’d kissed me and it felt like coming home.
In those moments of weakness, I would have given anything to have him back.
With less than a moon remaining until the autumn equinox, the king summoned me to the coliseum to exercise my enchantments and strategize for battle. He had never seemed to notice Hal’s absence, and I had never felt compelled to explain.
The coliseum lay on a plateau carved into the side of a sheltered valley in eastern Corovja. A tingle of magic made me shiver as Eywin and I passed beneath the arched entrance. As soon as I was inside, I knew what that feeling had had been—a ward. Apparently the battle was meant to take place in a protected area. Neither the king nor Ina would be able to draw on the magic of anything outside the coliseum. The barrier was so strong, it had even protected the inside of the coliseum from my Sight, so I was surprised to find the king already waiting when we arrived.
He stood in the center of the coliseum, wearing practical armor for fighting. He’d brought four guards—two who stayed close, and two others who patrolled the edges of the ring in case anyone decided to preview what was going on here today. An even greater surprise than the coliseum itself was who he’d chosen to be his champions. Until now, he’d been secretive about his choices, no doubt to keep rumors from spreading.
“Raisa?” I asked Eywin, surprised. She sat on a portable chair heavily laden with cushions. Could she even fight at her age?
“Don’t underestimate her,” he said with a glimmer of something unreadable in his eyes. A warm wind from the south gently tugged strands of hair free from my braid. The sun shone brightly, forcing me to shield my eyes from both the sky and the white sand under my boots. I was grateful for the mild day—my injured arm always felt better when it was warm out.
As we drew closer, I saw that the other champion was Gorval, the king’s steward, a wiry man with a hooked nose, and eyes so dark I could barely see the pupils. He had a pasty face and a balding head, his shoulders perpetually stooped. Something about him had always felt off to me, something to do with his manifest, but since I’d never seen him take animal form, I didn’t know what it was.
“Welcome, Asra, Eywin,” the king greeted us.
Gorval gave us a curt nod, and Raisa stared silently as she always did.
I shuddered beneath her sightless gaze.
“Let’s begin,” the king said. “I’d like to enhance each of us in a way that complements our own abilities.”
“First it may help to give you the Sight again, Your Majesty,” I said. “That way you’ll be able to See with the clarity I have and make your own decisions about which are the most useful.”
The king regarded me with appreciation. “Clever thinking,” he said.
“I have three gifts to offer today,” I said, addressing the broader group. “First is the Sight, which I’ll give the king. Raisa would not need it anyway, as it’s something she already possesses.”
I turned to Gorval. “The second gift is that of healing—to restore injuries. But it can be costly if you don’t have the energy of another living thing to draw on.” Or a dying demigod, as in the case of Leozoar. “The third enchantment allows you to conjure a shield. It can deflect magic or reflect it back at your opponent, but again, it will require my energy or the energy of something else to sustain.”
The king frowned. “Are you sure you can hold all these enchantments together at once, or will Eywin be providing one of them?”
I glanced at Eywin where he stood quietly beside me. We actually hadn’t practiced that. Without Hal, we didn’t have anyone else to test things on. We couldn’t risk word of what we were doing spreading far enough to reach Nismae—and it wouldn’t have to go far to do that.
“I think it’s best if Asra places these enchantments. She is far more powerful than any human attempting to wield the same magic.” Eywin’s long robes fluttered in the wind, the silver frames of his spectacles glimmering in the sunlight.
A little burst of warmth for him swelled up in me. Eywin believed in my strength. He trusted me. At least one person did.
The king smiled. “That is what I’m counting on.”