She straightened, rolling her shoulders back as though the thought made her uncomfortable.
“I do not know what name my father gave his sword though,” Cedric said. “If he ever told me, I was too young to remember. So, I pickedmy own when I became a knight of the realm. Whatever additional meaning it might have now is simply coincidence.”
Elyria’s voice was quiet when she said, “After all we’ve been through, you still believe in coincidence?”
Cedric loosed a breath. “I don’t know what I believe anymore.” His gaze returned to the charred training dummy still haphazardly thrown aside. He didn’t even realize he was frowning until a light finger was suddenly touching his forehead, Elyria’s thumb brushing against the parallel lines that had formed between Cedric’s eyebrows as if she might smooth away his worry.
His breath caught. Her eyes—those pools of silver-flecked green—were only inches from his.
“You aren’t the only one trying to make sense of a power that doesn’t want to cooperate,” she said, exhaling slowly, her dangerous almond scent enveloping him. “Nox wants me to shadowstep, and maybe one day I’ll figure out how. Until then, I can at least focus on other manifestations of my shadows—even if I can’t travel through them.”
She stepped back, apparently satisfied with the release of tension in Cedric’s brow, and he could not ignore the feeling of loss that came with every increased inch of distance between them.
“They’ve at least conceded that my sparrows could prove quite useful.”
“Your . . . sparrows?”
“That’s what I decided to call them.” She flexed her fingers, turning her wrist, palm up. Wisps of shadow gathered in her hand, just like at the orphanage when she’d conjured those ghostly butterflies—a feat Cedric still couldn’t quite wrap his mind around.
With a purse of her lips, Elyria blew into her hand, and Cedric watched in amazement as her breath coalesced into black smoke that joined the shadows in her palm, forming a small sphere. And from that sphere sprouted two shadowy wings, a delicate head, a tiny beak.
A sparrow conjured from the dark.
Cedric’s jaw went slack as the shadowbird flitted into the air, silent as a ghost, dark mist trailing from its wings as it circled his head. It was already so much more formed, so much morereal,than what she had demonstrated to the children of the Walk.
“You made a bird. From shadow.”
“You conjure fire,” she shot back. “We all have our tricks.”
Cedric shook his head. “You misunderstand my meaning. This is...” He tracked the bird flying overhead, trying and failing to come up with a word capable of encompassing what he was witnessing. “Incredible,” he finally said, his voice little more than an exhale.
Elyria shrugged, as though this shadowy miracle was nothing of note. Though, as the small creature landed on her shoulder and she turned her head to whisper something to it, Cedric caught the faint curve of a smile tugging at those perfect lips.
A few moments later, the sparrow was back in the air, flying a winding path around the room before finding its way back to Cedric. This time, it landed onhisshoulder, though if he hadn’t been tracking the miraculous creature so closely, he wouldn’t have been able to tell. It felt like nothing. Like less than air.
Which is why it was all the more shocking when hushed, melodic words made their way into Cedric’s ear from a shadowed beak.
“Why thank you,”came Elyria’s voice, as surely as if she’d been standing right next to him, whispering the words in his ear herself.“You’re very kind, Ashrender-er.”
Cedric’s mouth popped open.
And then the sparrow was gone, dispersed back into the ether from whence it came.
“It spoke.”
Elyria nodded. “I can construct a few at a time. Nox says it is a...unique skill. They have me working on maintaining the sparrows’ corporeal form for longer. They think I could get them strong enough to skip through the shadows, to carry my voice quite some way. Maybe even carry the voices of others.” She pursed her lips to one side of her mouth, as if irritated at the thought that her sparrows might master shadowstepping before she herself could.
“A way to communicate across distance,” Cedric said, incredulity making his voice crack.
“Probably no more reliable than our current methods of sending missives, but it could prove useful. We’ll see.”
A few moments of stuttering silence passed between them as Cedricsearched for what to say in light of this new revelation of her power. He’d seen the raw physical power she wielded thanks to her shadows, but this was something else entirely. New, strange.
Miraculous.
What else can you do?he wanted to ask.Is there anything you can’t?But the words wouldn’t form.
As if she heard them anyway, Elyria shrugged, her shoulders lifting in an uncharacteristically bashful manner. Though, there was no disguising the pride beaming in her cheeks as that smile she’d been suppressing finally broke through. It radiated from every inch of her, illuminating her more than the burgeoning dawn. The sight stole the breath from Cedric’s lungs,tuggedat him from behind his ribs.
