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Another snort from Rafael blew the dust into little swirls near his enormous, clawed paws. Rafael was a step away from Sinsorias when the skinny man sliced his hand down toward the earth. Sparks flew from his palm and sizzled against Rafael’s face and the thick fur at his neck. He roared and rose to his hind legs. I recoiled, certain he was about to rip off the man’s head.
“Do you know why he married you?”
The courtier’s question hung in the hot air. Rafael’s paws remained at his sides. Then he crashed back to the ground, blowing his hoarse breath into Sinsorias’s face. They held each other’s stares a long moment; all the while, my mind raced.
What was this enormous secret they were all keeping from me?
“If you don’t tell her, I will,” came the man’s sticky voice. He cracked a wicked grin at Rafael. “But it will hurt all the more coming from you, so I’ll leave that pleasure to you…for now.” He bowed slightly, the crown of his head so close to Rafael’s snout, he must know that he was tempting the bear to sink his teeth in. When he’d risen back to his full height, he said, “By the time we depart, she will know.”
28
Talia
I followed Rafael to the house, but he was much faster in his bear form, and I lost sight of him in the overgrown garden.
“Wait,” I called for the third time. He clearly didn’t want to speak to me, but sun forsake me if I wasn’t going to track him down and learn this secret that hung over me like a storm cloud.
I tried the library first. The dining halls were both unoccupied. I wandered down hallways I hadn’t yet discovered. Everywhere I checked came up empty. Eventually, I heard a heavenly voice singing and followed it until I discovered Everence in a room entirely enclosed with glass windows. She walked with a book in hand, singing by herself. When she saw me, she nodded politely.
At my sideways glance at the book, she held it up so I could read the title, Hymns of Winter. The book was elaborately decorated with pale blue lines.
“I miss the cold. Sometimes, in this eternal summer, I sing the songs of my mother’s homeland and feel the flakes of snow on my face. Here.”
She handed me the book. I flipped to a random page and quickly realized I couldn’t read a single word. I shrugged and handed it back.
“Try again. The words should come to you.” She crossed her arms and nodded at me.
Perplexed at how I could possibly read a language I didn’t know, I peered down at another random page. The symbols were meaningless, and my mind began forcing the Avencian pronunciation as best I could onto the strange words. But as I moved to the second line, my mental voice slipped into an accent I didn’t recognize, and a single word fell into place in my head. Agrotha.
“Blizzard.”
Everence let out a tiny yelp of delight and clapped her hands. “Yes!”
“How did I know that?”
She slid a hand under the book and stepped around to stand beside me. A finger traced down the lines and landed on another word. Ymil—Sing—san rethmarka—to the maker—ta cora—of all.
I gaped at her.
“How can I read that?”
She smiled knowingly. “Because he can.”
“Who—oh.”
A fae’s wedding vows, it seemed, bound two people together in ways human promises never could. My heightened sense of smell…was that from him too?
I stepped away from the book, fueled by an increased desire to find Rafael. “What else will I take from him and make my own?” His skill with a blade? His strength? I cringed. “What will he take of mine and make his own?”
Everence offered a closed-lip smile. “Only time will tell. With all marriages, the bonds are made stronger with love.”
“Where is Rafael?” I asked.
Her smile fell away. “Right now? I sensed him leaving the property a little while ago.”
“He left me? With Sinsorias still here?”
“He doesn’t have the whistle anymore, you know not to eat any more fruit, and you have a lily. You are safe.”
