The Tainted City by Courtney Schafer Read Free Book Online Page B

Kiran’s nerves tightened. “Ruslan didn’t teach us much of Alathia. I’d like to remedy that, to learn more of your culture and history. I thought it best to start with the earliest texts I could find and read onward.”
    It wasn’t a lie. Yet his true urgency ran far deeper. He had to find something he could offer the Alathians to prove his value to them. After hearing about the loss of life at Cheltman, a completed design for Simon’s charm no longer felt nearly enough to ensure both his and Dev’s safety. Far better if he could offer the Council methods to counter attacks on their wards from blood magic. But to predict spell interactions and develop countering patterns, he needed to know the materials used to bind and direct the spells in question.
    He’d asked if he might help shore up their wards, and been flatly refused. But he couldn’t simply sit around hoping the Council held to their promises. If he could just develop some definitive spellwork to offer…
    Lena regarded him steadily. “Us…I assume you’re speaking of Ruslan’s other apprentice. Did you and Mikail always have lessons together?”
    She sounded honestly curious. Kiran looked away. “Yes.” Longing pierced him, swift and poisonous as a viper’s tooth. All those hours he’d spent learning with Mikail, magic unfolding before them like a neverending chamber of wonders, their only concern to earn Ruslan’s approval…and even when they suffered Ruslan’s darker moods, it was together, their bond as mage-brothers as solid and unchanging as Ninavel’s stone…
    Nausea twisted Kiran’s stomach. Mikail was as much a monster as Ruslan. He’d betrayed Kiran’s trust, given Kiran’s beloved Alisa into Ruslan’s hands—had been glad of her death, afterward. How could he be so traitorous to Alisa’s memory as to miss Mikail?
    “My apologies,” Lena said softly. “I didn’t mean to cause you pain.”
    “No, it’s just…” Kiran stared at the sun-dappled tree branches outside the window. “Have you ever wished you were nathahlen— born without mage talent, I mean?” He regretted the foolishness of the question the moment he asked it. Calm, reasonable Lena, with her place assured in Alathia’s hierarchy…what cause could she ever have had to regret her magic?
    Yet when he stole a sidelong glance at her, he found Lena’s eyes had gone distant, her straight brows drawn together. She said slowly, “Most mageborn children in Alathia are identified and brought to the Arcanum quite young, two or three years old, but my family lived deep in the Kilshasa Hills, two days’ ride from the nearest town. I was six before a Council magefinder came through the area. I’d shown no sign of talent, so when she proclaimed me mageborn it was a shock to everyone. My parents asked if she could burn out my magic rather than take me away to Tamanath. I begged for that as well, but the magefinder said such a thing isn’t possible without damaging the mind beyond repair.”
    Lena smoothed a hand over the cover of her book. “The first months at the Arcanum were hard. I missed my parents and sisters terribly. I thought I hated magic, because it had taken me from them. Yet the first time I cast a spell…” She held out her hand. A whisper of magic brushed Kiran’s senses. A shining ball of palest rose appeared, floating in her cupped fingers. “The joy of it, the rightness that I felt, was—”
    “Incredible,” Kiran finished softly, remembering his own first spell, a simple illusion of the little copper wagon that had been his favorite toy. His own excitement, Ruslan’s pride, Mikail’s delight, all of it secondary to the soul-deep satisfaction the trickle of power had left behind.
    “Yes.” Lena snapped her fingers shut and the ball of light vanished. “Do you truly wish you’d never experienced magic?”
    “If I’d been born nathahlen , I wouldn’t know what I was missing.” Unlike now, when his soul cried out for it like a