AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Wherever I go, I see Arluin. Today isn’t the first time I’ve imagined him, but it has never been this frequent. Maybe it’s because our Mage Trials are around the corner, and my mind is haunted by the promise Arluin and I made. That we would marry when I graduated from the Arcanium.
“I...” My throat closes around my words, but I force them out as best I can. Or else, I will only make myself look more foolish. “I thought you were someone else.”
I’m glad he turned before I could shout Arluin’s name, because everyone knows who the traitor’s son is. Now I can only hope he doesn’t ask who I thought he was. Maybe I could give him Koby’s name. He probably doesn’t know Koby well enough to know that he looks nothing like him.
Fortunately, the boy doesn’t ask.
“Oh,” he says. “You’re Reyna Ashbourne, right?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s amazing.”
“It is?”
“You’re the Grandmage’s daughter.”
“Yeah,” I say again, hoping my voice doesn’t sound as bitter as it does in my head. Is my father all people see when they look at me? Will I forever live in his shadow? “I am,” I add, in case my initial response sounded as short as I think it did.
“What’s it like having the Grandmage as your father?” he blurts and then seems to remember that we’re both strangers. “Oh, I shouldn’t ask something like that. You don’t need to answer if you don’t want to.”
“It’s fine,” I reply. It isn’t as if other adepts haven’t asked me the same question a thousand times before. Though that was mostly in my first year at the Arcanium. “I suppose it’s like having any other father,” I say with a shrug.
The boy doesn’t seem content with that response.
“Maybe he has higher expectations for me than most?”
He appears a little more satisfied with that. “Your Mage Trials are next week, aren’t they?”
“They are.”
“I bet you’re nervous about them.”
I smile and try to make it not look like a grimace. “A little. Anyway, I should get going.” Most of all, I don’t want to get caught by any other adepts. Hopefully, he won’t tell anyone he’s seen me here and Eliya won’t find out I lied to her.
“Oh, of course,” he replies. “Good luck with your Mage Trials next week.”
“Thanks,” I say.
With that, I turn and head back to the winding steps.
When I return to the central chamber, Erma is still reading the same book. She looks up as I placeConcerning Conflagration and Combustionon her desk.
“I would like to borrow this one for two weeks, please.”
Erma scans over the cover and then reaches across her desk for the ledger, opening it to the current page. The current date, Friday 2nd December 1694, is scribbled across the top. The rest of the page is split into a table with five headers:Title, Author, Name, Duration,andReturned. She dips the nib of her quill into her pot of ink and writes out all the information onto the next empty line in the table. She leaves the cell forReturnedblank.
“Concerning Conflagration and Combustionwill be of use in the Trial of Magic,” she says as she returns her quill to its golden, bell-shaped holder. Her nameis etched into the gleaming surface. “Particularly on the second round.”
“That’s what I was thinking. I was hoping to improve my fire wings spell before then.”
“Best of luck with the trials,” Erma says, to my surprise. Until now, I didn’t know that she could even manage a single nice sentence.
I retrieveConcerning Conflagration and Combustionfrom her desk and turn to the steep stairs leading out of the library.
“And do remember, there are no second chances. If you fail even one trial, you will never become a Mage of Nolderan.”
As if I needed that reminder.
