“Wait!” Henrik darted forward, grabbing Elias by the arm and spinning him to face him. “You need to think this through, Eli. You risk angering our Gods by doing this. It was gifted to our people. Think carefully before you give it away.”
Elias raised his hand and stroked Henrik’s cheek with the tips of his fingers.
“Have you ever thought that maybe they angered me first, Rik? During all the years of slavery that I needed them, what use to me was this ‘gift’ as they call it? I’ve been cut off from magic for five years, and I’m taking it back. Our Gods owe me, not the other way around.” His voice fiercer than his gentle touch.
Henrik didn’t argue. He let Elias’ words percolate through his mind. Lifting his head to Johan, he asked, “Would you do it? Would you give the gift away?”
Johan didn’t answer, but he stepped forward and squeezed the back of Henrik’s neck with one hand and pressed the other over Henrik’s heart.
He didn’t need to hear Johan’s words to understand. Johan was telling Henrik to follow his intuition and heart. He also knew that whatever he decided, Johan would understand, but when he looked at Elias, with the stubborn and determined set of his jaw, he knew what he needed to do.
“Okay. You may have it,” he whispered.
Elias went first with an almost feverish desperation to have it done. Unfortunately, the process caused a repeat of the earlier burning, only far worse. The skin underneath the bangle bubbled and blistered as the sorcerer held it, his eyes closed as he performed his spell. It was gruesome to watch, and Henrik gagged when the smell of burning skin wafted towards him.
Elias remained stoic through it all, concentrating on his wrists until he appeared lightheaded from the pain and began swaying. Johan wrapped a large arm around his waist, holding him upright until the sorcerer had finished.
Henrik could see the second it was done, even through the pain, Elias smiled a smile Henrik had never seen on his lover before. It held contentment and relief that made him appear younger somehow. Johan squeezed Elias and pulled him into a hug that seemed to release a valve in his love.
Powerless to help, all Henrik could do was watch as Elias sobbed, a torrent of tears and emotion pouring from his soul as he felt magic for the first time in over five years. Magic which had been stolen from him.
“Damn my Gods,” Elias hiccupped. “Keep your gift. This is what it means to—to—to live again.”
It was difficult for Henrik to swallow past the lump in his throat. He’d had no idea that Elias had been burying so much pain under his optimistic facade. It hurt his own heart just to witness it. The sharpness of it stung the air that surrounded them like thousands of pinpricks against Henrik’s skin.
“Come here,” the sorcerer said, entirely unmoved by the life-altering moment for the elves.
A bolt of fear lanced through Henrik, but he stepped forward, heartbeat racing, and his hands began to sweat. He feared his Gods in a way that Elias did not, but he’d made his choice. Swallowing down his trepidation, he straightened his arms to present the sorcerer his wrists.
It felt like his skin was being flayed open, so he scrunched his eyes shut and panted through the pain. The heat of it spread into every crevice of his being like he’d been set on fire from the inside. It seemed that he’d endured the agony for an eternity, but then when it stopped…
Oh, when it stopped, he could hardly believe it.
Magic. Lighter and brighter than the summer sun, it rushed through his veins like a tsunami of ecstasy. How could he have forgotten what this felt like?
Henrik suddenly understood Elias’ reaction as his own face was saturated with tears of pure joy. He stumbled into Johan and Elias’ embrace and wept.
How had he forgotten what it felt like to be whole and truly alive? What had he ever done to deserve having this stolen from him?
Like the needles they used to make fine shoes, magic began the arduous process of sewing the fractured pieces of Henrik’s soul back together, and he could take a deep breath for the first time.
Eleven
Elias
T
hey thanked and bid farewell to the sorcerer and his golden-haired friend in a daze. When they made it back into the forest, Elias could hardly recall how they’d got there.
He had magic back.
Once, back at the textile mill, Elias had dreamed of this very thing. He’d been free and walking through a meadow filled with wildflowers. The grass-covered earth beneath his bare feet had felt so incredibly tangible that it had never occurred to him he was dreaming. Wrists free of magic-suppressing bangles, he’d felt the thrum of magic tingling beneath his skin. Only now that he could really feel it, did he understand what a poor mimic his imagination had been.
He was also fairly certain that in his dream state he wouldn’t have hot, white pain lancing through his feet with every step.
They took a break a couple of miles from the tower, having all walked in a sort of stunned silence up until that point.
“Pass me your shoes?” Henrik asked both Elias and Johan.
