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“That would take away their Will, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, of course. But I cannot imagine them being unhappy with what they gained.”
“They might not gain it,” Komnena cautioned. “Hespera seeks to rescue everyone, but some have chosen a path that takes them away from her. They destroy themselves.”
Cassia listened to a wave break on the rocks below. “What do you mean?”
“Those who are truly wrong-hearted cannot withstand confronting their own deeds. Their own evil is too much for their minds, spirits, and bodies. They do not make it through the Gifting to become a Hesperine.”
“It’s possible to die during the transformation?”
“But that’s not something you need trouble your thoughts about. It is a rare event in our history, when anyone so corrupt seeks the Gift.”
How corrupt was too corrupt? How many cruelties could a conscience withstand?
“Cassia.” Komnena touched her cheek. “If there is anything required to receive the Gift, it is one thing only. Love. Anyone who holds fast to that comes safely through into eternity.”
Cassia knew how to love. She was coming to realize the love she had inside her was very strong indeed.
But was it strong enough to keep her alive, when she must face all she had done in the darkest, most loveless years of her life?
36
Nights Until
WINTER SOLSTICE
DUEL OF INTELLECTS
When the embassy setfoot in Hypatia’s library, it gratified Lio to hear the Tenebrans let out a collective exclamation. Their wonder rose in the Blood Union as the echoes of their voices ascended to the domed ceiling, where models of the planets levitated in orbit.
He sensed Cassia’s low spirits lift for the first time in hours. They had been flying so high last night. What had sunk her? Cup and thorns, her playfulness in the woods… He had seldom felt so…free.
He had felt her teeth on him for the first time.
She had banished all the apprehensions closest to his heart. He felt securer in their future than ever before. She wanted what he imagined for them. She fantasized about it the way he did. She had given him a taste of it last night.
If he did say so himself, he had made good on his promise to drink her pleasure all night. So why had they been unable to recapture that brief sense of abandon they had enjoyed in the forest?
At breakfast, she had been so intent that he help her prepare for this circle that she had given him no chance to discover what worried her. Now she focused on the event at hand, and hints as to what troubled her receded further from his reach.
She ogled the enormous shelves arranged like spokes around the center of the room. “I could not count all these books and scrolls if I devoted the rest of my life to the endeavor. There must be countless ancient wonders here.”
“You see, Lady Cassia,” Lio said, “your first visit to House Hypatia is no cause for grim countenance. The eminent scholar’s bark is formidable, to be sure, but she has promised not to bite our guests.”
Cassia gave a courtly laugh. “I am not intimidated by what I do not understand, Ambassador. I am eager for tonight’s scholarly circle, I assure you.”
If the coming encounter with Hypatia was not to blame for Cassia’s gravity, then what was? Why had she returned from her walk with Mother with such altered spirits? A conversation with his mother usually eased a person’s burdens, and yet this one seemed to have made Cassia’s heavier.
What could possibly weigh on her that she could not confide in him?
Kia, one of many scholars already crowding the library, awaited the embassy at the bottom of the grand staircase. “Welcome, guests from Tenebra. Come see what treasures and surprises the collection has in store for you.”
Cassia took the lead as they joined Kia below in the central aisle. “Sophia Eudokia, when the ambassador told me your bloodline is custodian of an impressive library, he understated.”
Kia swatted Lio’s arm with one of the scrolls she had tied to her sash with silk ribbons. “He is always trying to cover for his feelings of inadequacy regarding his own bloodline’s meager collection.”
Lio smiled, his eyes gleaming with challenge. “Perhaps if your contributions to my experiments on magically transcribing text had been less…destructive…Blood Komnena’s library would have a chance of catching up more quickly.”
