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But the empathy Cassia had felt that day in the past now waxed under her breastbone. Her heart thundered in her chest, and her blood seemed to carry Miranda’s grief through her every vein. Her friend’s rage became a part of her flesh and bones.
In her present voice, Cassia screamed at the memory of Miranda’s father, although he could not hear.
“How could you? That bird is the one thing that comforts her after the cruelties you deal her every day. And you don’t even comprehend. You’ll forget this happened when you’re sober tomorrow. How can you so carelessly destroy your own child?”
Lio enfolded her in his arms. His voice echoed in her mind and blood. “Your Blood Union has awoken.”
The unbearable pain flowed into him, and with both of them holding it, she felt she would not break. But still she wept. “I can’t stop what’s going to happen. I can’t help her.”
“You tried to help her that day, didn’t you? Show me what you did.”
Cassia hurried to her friend’s side, fearing what would happen if Miranda lashed out at her father. All she could envision was the next arrow going through her friend’s heart.
She knelt beside Miranda and pulled her friend’s head against her shoulder to stifle her outburst. “It’s not worth it,” she whispered in Miranda’s ear. “Don’t give him the satisfaction. I won’t let him hurt you.”
Miranda clung to her, shaking with quiet sobs.
“Stupid bitch,” her father said. “Crying over vermin. Why didn’t the gods give me a son?”
His emotions struck Cassia in the Union like foul breath. Derision. Bitterness. Lust for his next mug of ale. He stalked away and left them alone.
Dusk had fallen by the time Miranda’s tears were spent. In the fading light, she carefully snapped the arrow and removed it from the crow’s body.
When she gathered the broken creature on her lap, there came a flash like what Cassia had felt in her garden, a dark mirror of the power she had poured into the soil. The force swept out of Miranda, leaving her gasping.
The crow spread its wings and took flight. Its happy chatter filled the orchard as it circled their heads, then returned to perch on Miranda’s lap again.
With shaking hands, she touched its breast. “Its heart isn’t beating. Cassia, what have I done?”
Just like Miranda had for her in the garden, Cassia kept her tone calm and without judgment, putting an arm around her friend for support. “I believe you are a mage, as well. There’s only one kind of magic I know of that can bring a creature back like this.”
“Necromancy.” Miranda held the bird against her chest, rubbing her face in its feathers. Her emotions washed over Cassia in powerful waves, awe and fear and horror and joy.
“You can’t tell anyone!” she begged. “Not even Agata. I don’t want the mages to punish her for keeping a secret like this… Cassia, I can’t be sent to a temple. I’m my parents’ only child. What will my people do if I can’t inherit Paradum?”
Cassia knew what would happen. Her own father would install a new lord as wretched as Miranda’s father. Like Tenebra without Solia, Paradum would lose any hope of a better future.
“I will keep your secret,” Cassia said. “I swear it. Temple life is for me, but not for you. We’ll do everything in our power to make sure no one ever learns of this.”
The promises tasted like ash in Cassia’s mouth, for she already knew she would break them.
“How could I do this to her?” she whispered to Lio.
“I know this next part will be most difficult of all,” he said, “but I’m here.”
RECKONING
Now Miranda stood in the shelter of the garden wall. “I’ll go to my grandmother’s.”
“Is she kinder than your parents?” Cassia wiped her spade clean on a rag.
Miranda snorted. “Hardly. She’s the woman who made my mother. But she’ll be all too eager for me to stay with her for a few weeks so she can treat me like a servant.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s a small price to pay to ensure I won’t be here when the mages come to test you for your magic.”
“When do you leave?” Cassia asked.
