Yew Queen Trilogy, стр. 24
While Lucus fetched a fancy-looking box from a table opposite the door, I studied the floor. I could just barely discern wine-colored marks on the wide stones. They made no sense to me. It didn’t seem to be a language, just more symbols. The shapes and lines connected to echo the curve of the room, interlocking circles of markings that became smaller and smaller toward the very center of the room.
I stepped onto the one symbol drawn in the center. A buzzing feeling started under my skin. It wasn’t painful. Just weird. Like I’d touched a baby power socket.
Lucus approached me, his eyes steely. He held a knife and a sparkling cluster of amethyst.
“It’s beautiful.” I touched the cold crystal, marveling at its size. Candlelight flickered off the facets.
Lucus’s eyebrow lifted a fraction, and his lips tightened. “I suppose.”
“So this casting chamber and this amethyst belonged to Ludovico, to the Mage Duke?”
“Yes. Would you like me to cut your palm, or would you rather do it yourself? You only need a small amount. A minor cut will do.”
“Does it have to be blood from my palm? It’d be loads smarter to cut the top of my arm instead of my hand. I’ll be bleeding all over stuff when I use my hands the rest of the day, because I’m assuming you don’t have a sweet little Band Aid up in here.”
“The blood must come from a place where your magic gathers. The palm is most likely preferable to the forehead, I assume?”
I shuddered. “Uh, yeah. Palm it is.”
“Remember. You only need a few drops.”
My stomach turned, but I had to marvel at the change between us. Not only from the bond tugging at my heart, begging me to understand him, but also from what I’d seen with my own eyes. Witnessing his past had seeded trust in me. Sure, he would kill me if he had to. But I knew he wasn’t going to just stab me with that thing unless he had a damn good reason.
I remained furious about him endangering Hekla, but I also understood why he’d done it—for that boy in his memory, Aurelio, the one who’d sheltered under his protective arm as the Mage Duke’s attack began. Lucus didn’t want to hurt anyone, but he had family, and they had a way of living that wasn’t exactly in tune with what I considered fantastic. He was a bear. I was a rabbit. But maybe with this magic of mine, I could even the playing field.
“I’ll try to do it. Not positive I can make myself go through with it, self-preservation and all of that.”
He handed me the knife. The handle was a pearly color, and an S was inscribed in the middle. I opened my left hand and poised the blade over my skin.
“I really hope this doesn’t screw up my ability to bake the best pumpkin muffins the world has ever eaten.”
“The true loss would be your pancakes.”
“Possibly.” Unfortunately, I was shaking a bit. I took a deep breath, heart racing, then dragged the knife’s tip across my palm.
My stomach dipped as blood welled along the opening. I’d never been a blood wimp or anything, but this kind of sucked.
“Now place your hand on the magestone,” Lucus said.
My lips felt cold. “What’s going to happen?”
“That is what we’re here to find out.”
I breathed through my nose, steadying myself. I had to do this. If I ran, Lucus would lure me back. Possibly any of them could lure me or Hekla. Something about my aura had affected the curse, and now it wasn’t just me, the first woman to see the castle, in danger. Everyone in my town was in trouble. All bets were off.
I grabbed the magestone, and the world exploded.
Chapter 17
Amethyst lightning crashed across the room. An unseen force threw me backward. I slammed into the wall and landed in a heap on the floor, panting. The buzzing I’d experienced earlier was now a full-blown tremor running through me. I felt a crack in the stones under me, a crack that hadn’t been there before I’d touched the magestone. The candles had guttered out, and I could hardly see, the windows’ light watery and pale.
Where was—
I gasped.
Lucus hovered high above me in the domed ceiling of the room. Vines extended from his fingers, and his wings had grown to twice their size. Emerald fire blazed in his eyes, and magic spiraled from his body in bright arcs.
“You.” He spat the word like a curse, and then I knew.
Only one outcome would ignite such a reaction. I was not a shapeshifter. Not a fae.
I was a mage.
Shaking my head, my body buzzing and my brain melting with the fact that I had magic, I scrambled to my feet and glared up at Lucus. “Listen. I didn’t choose this. I can’t help what I am. It’s not like I’m the Mage Duke. I’m Coren. I make cookies! I am not a part of this horribleness!”
It was true, but it also kind of wasn’t. I was fully planning on finding a way to trap him and the others and let the curse eat them alive or whatever it would do when they didn’t offer a sacrifice by the end of this lunar cycle.
Lucus was seething, his chest