Part Three
PRESENT DAY
Chapter 22
Faylinn
Iclomped my way inside the manor, the toes of the black leather boots I’d been forced into this morning biting my flesh with every step.
Stupid fucking things. Who seriouslywantsto wear shoes every day?
I knew one person specifically who had a penchant for uniformity and comfortable footwear, but I was refusing to think of him at the moment.
He was back in Vespera. I’d seen a glimpse of his black hair, longer after six months away, but I’d quickly averted my eyes. I didn’t want, nor did I need, to see him.
It would just elicit emotions that I had no business feeling at the moment, especially with all that I had on my plate currently.
Afterhesent me back here with Ellowyn and Lord d’Refan, I was quickly named Rune Master, which progressed into Rune Master to the Crown. A gaudy title that I had no desire to hold. But without the one person who could easily temper Lord d’Refan’s demands . . . I was forced to take the position.
Forced to continue administering Life Bonds to Mages that I now knew without a shred of uncertainty were not actually sick.
Why Lord d’Refan wanted these Bonds was still unclear, even after the countless hours of research I’d done in the past six months. I had nearly exhausted the books in the manor’s library and eventually needed to venture into the library at the Academy. But that building made the scars on my arms itch and my heart race.
I’d avoided it up until this point, but knew that if I really wanted answers, I’d have to go inside.
A problem for another day. For now, at least.
I stomped up the stairs to my room, carefully avoiding the Mages stationed inside and the servants that bustled about. I was in no mood for conversation, frivolous or otherwise. Blessedly, the path to my room was free and clear of other souls, and I quickly unlocked my door with my key.
The entire manor—the entirety of Vespera, really—used a type of orb that detected a magical signature to lock and guard the many secrets that existed behind an infinite number of doors. The invention itself was convenient and a really great lock—the only issue was that I didn’t possess magic and, thus, had no magical signature. Art and Gene—the male Mages who made up the Magical Experiments division in Vespera—were stumped by my existence. Apparently, they’d never come across another person like me before, and spent countless hours studying my reaction to and interaction with magic.
After many failed attempts by Gene and Art to get the orbs to respond to the innate magic that existed within my blood, they gave me a small, flat disc that contained a bit of their magic. All I had to do was hold the disk to the orb, and the doors unlocked for me. It was an ingenious way to circumvent the problem, but the magic seemed to run out quickly. I was fearful that I’d be unable to access my room if the magic evaporated during the day, so Art and Gene installed a normal lock on my door.
It was a bit of normalcy in an otherwise progressive city, and I appreciated the heavy feeling of an iron key in my pocket.
I sucked in my first full breath of the day as I quickly scooted inside my room before shutting and locking the door with a heavythump. If a Mage was determined to enter my space, the lock would only slow down their entry rather than prevent it fully, but it still gave me an extra sense of peace.
After all the shit I experienced in Isrun and now here in Vespera, I took every extra measure offered.
“Meow.” I was greeted by my rather cantankerous cat, Cotton, before I even turned from the door. A smile stretched across my lips as my body relaxed, the sound of his little voice mixed with the calming smell of old books and parchment finally easing the tension in my shoulders.
I groaned as I sank into the only unoccupied armchair in my sitting room.
“Cotton, you wouldn’t believe the day I’ve had,” I muttered as I tugged the offending footwear off my feet and aggressively flung them haphazardly into the room. The heavy soles thunked as they rolled between a pile of books stacked precariously in front of the once usable couch. Now it was just as cluttered with books and papers as the rest of my sitting room.
“Meeow,” Cotton grumbled in distaste with a swish of his tail against the floor.
I rolled my eyes, groaned, and flexed my bare toes as Cotton made a huffing sound.
“If you were made to wear those foot prisons all day, you’d do the same thing,” I replied dryly, closing my eyes for a moment as I laid my head against the back of the chair. My curly hair flopped lightly against my forehead and shoulders as I rocked my head back and forth, trying to use the chair back to massage the headache away from the back of my skull.
It wasn’t working.
I heard Cotton pad over to my chair before springing soundlessly off the ground and onto my lap. He prodded my legs a few times with his paws before circling twice and curling up on my lap, a steady purr rising from his chest.
Sighing, I lazily stroked his fluffy grey fur as I tried to take a quick nap before the rest of the day began, one that would inevitably be filled with more Forced Bonds and menial tasks. The shallow scrapes on my arms pulsed in a deep ache at the thought, even as I felt the Healing Runes I’d recently etched into my forearms work to heal the cuts.
It seemed that Lord d’Refan wanted to fill every minute of my day for his own purposes, which left me very little time to pursue my own research and endeavors. Research that was becoming vitally important to figuring out the enigma that was Lord d’Refan.
