Page 35 of A Touch of Shadows

In the Sacrum, they say the Aurum sleeps. Its light flickers on the white stone of the walls, and on the sentinel stones encircling it. The Aurum was born when the Old Magic was broken, twin to the Nox, eternally in opposition to that dark chaos, the embodiment of order. The eternal flame. Sleeping, silent and still. Just a flame that never goes out.

But some suspect that the Aurum still dreams. Who knows of what it dreams but the sisterhood of Maidens of the Aurum speculate.

Some say it dreams of freedom. Some say it dreams of wholeness. Some say it dreams of a child lost so long ago, or the lost part of itself. Some say it dreams of the day when the Nox is no more, or the day when its sibling power returns.

And in the cool chamber beneath the palace, some say the Aurum plots.

It is light and order. It is careful and patient.

It has been waiting for so very long.

CHAPTER 20

WREN

They rose with the dawn and set out again. Finn said nothing of the night before. It was almost like he didn’t remember. Which was probably best, Wren thought, as she washed herself in the nearby stream and then set about plaiting her hair to keep it back from her face.

She ought to cut it. She knew that. But she wasn’t sure what was best. When her hair was wild, she could tap into the magic around them far more easily. After last night, she needed access to that power. If the shadow kin attacked again, she would have to fight them somehow. It was a risk. She knew that. What else could she do?

She almost lost him last night.

It shouldn’t matter as much as it did. But he was all that she had right now. He’d stood up to help her, to defend her and rescue her. And it had already cost him so much.

With all the mysteries surrounding her past, surrounding Elodie, and with all his suspicion regarding that, she wouldn’t blame him if he had just walked away. But she realised he couldn’t. He needed to know the truth of it as much as she did.

Last night she had kissed him. She’d wanted to do so much more. Every nerve in her body had screamed at her to do more.

The fires of the Aurum blazing inside her, devouring her from within, had been an agony she couldn’t have described. Elodie had never prepared her for anything like that. The shadows were soft and gentle, enticing, and of course a trap. The light, however… it hurt. It burned along her veins and, the moment she released it, that relief had made her delirious with need for him.

And he’d responded. She couldn’t mistake that. He’d wanted her too.

But it wasn’t natural. It wasn’t normal. And she knew not to trust it.

If she reached for the light, the light burned her. The pain that had come with it had been the very reason Elodie had always warned her never to use any magic lightly. Because it was too easy to be lost in it and the agony of withstanding that need was almost too much for her. But the light of the Aurum didn’t hurt Elodie, did it?

Wren wanted to weep with the injustice of it. She had promised so many times to only reach for the light, but every time, every single time, it was like pouring lightning through her veins. But if she reached for the shadows… well, that was another of Elodie’s rules. Never do that. They’ll devour you whole.

How did they do it, the witches of Pelias? They channelled the power of the Aurum, used it to perform miracles, even if the Aurum itself was silent. Elodie said all they felt was pleasure. Oh they didn’t call themselves witches, the servants of the Aurum, the maidens, but Elodie had always said that all the fancy titles in the world didn’t hide what they were. Witchkind were witchkind. They were meant to be free. But those women gave up their freedom for the kingdom, while the men either surrendered their magic entirely, or went into exile. Elodie had been scathing of their restraint and control, as if she didn’t believe for a second that they really exercised anything of the kind. Wren had always thought she was being unkind, or maybe bitter that she wasn’t part of such an illustrious company. She had clearly chosen exile herself.

Now she feared it was something else entirely.

Wren bit at her lower lip until the flash of pain brought her to ground again. No more magic. Not unless absolutely necessary. No light, no shadows. Nothing.

She had to stay in control.

But they were being hunted through the forest. By the Ilanthians, by the shadow kin, by who knew what else. She needed a way to defend them both, and last night had proved that more keenly than she could have guessed.

She could have lost him.

It shouldn’t matter. Finn wasn’t hers. He was sworn to the Knights of the Aurum. Elodie would order her as far away from him as possible.

Don’t trust anyone.

But she did trust him. And she had a clawing feeling that she couldn’t help herself when it came to him. Like they were somehow tied together. And whatever she had done last night to save him had only made it worse.

She longed to reach out and touch him, to entwine her fingers with his. To pull him close, body to body. To drag his mouth down to hers and kiss him until neither of them had breath left in them.

Elodie had always been clear. Magic – of any kind – was not to be conjured lightly. It had a cost, a price, and it took payment without warning or compunction. It changed things, people, emotions, needs. It was dangerous. The words of othertongue were only to be used when all else failed. They reached out to the powers beneath the surface of the world, the powers that resolved ultimately into the Aurum and the Nox. Both might be dormant now, as conscious things, but their echoes and memories lingered in the world. Fragments of the Nox still wandered the world, working ill. And in Pelias, the Aurum slept on. Magic had a way of making its own will known, dark or light. People thought witches manipulated magic either way, but it was often the other way around. And if a witch lost herself in such power… terrible things could happen.