She paused, digesting his words. “You mean, just name it myself?”
“If you do not, the testers will.”
Becka sighed. “And then I’ll have to live with whatever they use. How does destroyer sound?” she said, saying destroyer like a superhero in an adventure film.
He grinned before quickly concealing it with a frown. “Destroyer might not give the most upbeat of impressions.”
“Hmm. Smasher?”
He pursed his lips and shook his head.
“I’m not going with magic-breaker. The testers talked about how I nullify magic. How does Null sound?”
“Null has a nice, simple, yet powerful ring to it. And it lacks the emotional charge of the other terms.”
“Yeah it’s not as fun, but sounds strong.” She shimmied her hips and clucked her tongue. “Null, oh yeah. It’s a noun and a verb.”
He smiled broadly. “If I may ask, how are you feeling about the outcome of the testing? I mean, an hour ago you were unceremoniously swept back into the fae fold.”
“I don’t know yet. It’s all too fresh. I mean, I’m upset this was discovered now and not when I was sixteen. If I’d known then it would have been odd, but life would have mostly continued as normal. But I have a whole other life now, and I don’t have an interest in living here with other fae. What am I going to do about that?”
“I can imagine finding out now is upsetting. But, what do you think about being a Null?”
Becka laughed, hearing him use the term in conversation gave her a sense of ownership. “That’s easy. I have no feelings on the matter.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“Look, I don’t even know what being a Null might mean. Heck, the testers barely understand it.” She shrugged. “I’m some sort of a magical jinx? All magic I touch dies?”
“I do not feel dies is the right term.”
“Okay, falls apart? Breaks?”
Quinn shrugged.
“Exactly. What use is that? Who knows? I’m sure I’ll figure it out in time, but I can’t imagine the fae will want me around much unless they want all of their pretty things broken. Which is fine with me, because I don’t relish the thought of being around them either.”
“I am sure Duchess Maura has a plan.”
“Agreed, and I dread it already.”
They walked in silence for a minute. Becka knew she should head back to the manor, but also wanted to put off returning as long as possible. The setting sun picked that moment to crest the mountainous horizon and the evening light shifted in tone, surrounding them with an ambient amber glow. Shades of orange, pink, and red painted the clouds above the horizon, creating the illusion they were on fire.
Becka shivered, despite the balmy summer air.
“We should be getting back for dinner,” Quinn said, motioning for her to take a path to the right, and Becka followed his lead.
“I am surprised, but relieved, that your trust in me appears repaired,” Quinn said.
“Your explanation was convoluted, but I can’t imagine the pressures you face in your job.” Becka stopped, placing a hand on his arm. “Please, however many guards Maura and Brent place on me, I want you to stay with me.”
Quinn drew close to her, gently cupping the line of her jaw in his fingers. The heat in his burnished amber eyes reminded her of their kiss from the night before. “I am not going anywhere, Becka. But I also appreciate the guards being assigned. It will only add to your safety.”
She nodded, leaning into the contact as a near-electric surge ran from the tips of her ears all the way down to her toes. “It’s just, I don’t know them,” she stammered. “I haven’t known you long, but with all you’ve shared with me I feel I can trust you.”
“It takes a long time before we know people,” Quinn muttered under his breath. Then louder, he said, “Of course. I can always say it is on orders from Chief Elowen.”
“Wouldn’t that be lying?”
“Nope. Those were Elowen’s orders at the start. She has great instincts.”
“Do you think she figured more threats would appear?” Becka turned and headed back towards the manor.
“Elowen is always convinced all hell is about to break loose.”
Becka laughed, and then sobered when she realized he was deadly serious.
“That’s the rub. She’s usually spot on.”
The conversation had left Becka with a general sense of discomfort. After a few moments of silence, Lagan of House Holly sauntered around the end of a row of yellow tea roses and headed purposefully in her direction, unconcerned with the guards focusing their attention on his approach.
“What could he want?” Becka asked. Was he here to flirt with her again? He wouldn’t get far, not with all of the guards nearby.
“I could signal to the guards to redirect him?” Quinn offered.
She shrugged. “Nah, I’d prefer to tell him off myself.”
Lord Lagan stopped a few feet away, now flanked by two fae guards. “Lady Becka,” he inclined his head.
“Lord Lagan,” she replied. “I thought I made my lack of interest clear the last time we spoke?”
“You did, and I apologize for perhaps coming on too strong when we last spoke. I overstepped.”
“Yeah you did,” she nodded.
A look of surprise at her candor passed over his face, but he continued. “But that is not why I am here today. Your mother, the Duchess, asked me to speak with you. You may not be familiar, but House Holly presides over life transitions. We have ceremonies for births, deaths, rebirths, and such as. I personally specialize in rebirths and life changes, often traveling far and wide between fae territories to aid those who are stuck to visualize a new future beyond their pain.”
Becka held up a hand to stop him. “Maura sent you to talk to me about my new gift?”
He inclined his head again. “Your mother is concerned for your wellbeing, and, as I’m already here, I offered to assist however I may. Adapting to change can be difficult, even for the best of us.”
“Your answer is talk therapy?”
A look of shock passed over his face. “Not at all! I have the ability to journey inwards and see and experience events from your point of view, as you experience them. From this vantage I can assist your transformative process in ways talk therapy never could.”
“Uh huh, and how do you expect that to work on me? I assume Maura filled you in on the nature of my gift? I break magic.”
“I will admit this is a special case,” Lagan replied, his expression concerned. “My normal process will be hampered, but with your aid will persevere through alternatives.”
“Like...talk therapy?” Becka asked.
He waved her off. “I feel my methods are less important than the results.” He withdrew a sealed letter from his pocket. “This is from the Duchess, to you, regarding speaking with me.”
Becka fumed. She reached out and grabbed the letter from his hands and tore into it, revealing Maura’s ornate script. As he claimed, Maura had sent Lagan to counsel her. This letter gave him leave to pester her, not that Maura had said it in those words.
She ripped it into pieces, scraps falling to the ground like a winter snow. “Edicts like this are exactly what I hate about being back here.”
“I suspected that although the Duchess and Duke are thrilled at this unexpected turn of events, you have no reason to share their ebullience. I expect this sudden, traumatic change has left you adrift?”
Becka disliked Lagan but admired his moxie. If she refused to speak with him, would Maura somehow force her hand? She kicked at one of the flakes of letter remnants at her feet. What was the minimum level of compliance she could get away with?
“I’m not adrift, but you’re right, it’s an unwelcome shocker.”
He nodded thoughtfully, as if they weren’t surrounded by listening guards. “Did you have any inkling of being different before you returned home for the funeral? Any thought that you were special
in some way?”
“Nope. I get back here to mourn my sister like everyone else, and then this gift is dumped on me by the testers. If I stayed home, I bet I never would have known otherwise. I’m hardly ever around other fae in the city. And now I’m stuck here, who knows for how long?”
“Perhaps,” he replied. “Or perhaps not. Untrained powers are notoriously risky. You never know what could go wrong, and it might have happened at the worst time. For now, I would encourage you to accept your anger over not being in charge. Your bitterness over feeling ambushed by the testing process. You are not obligated to be happy.”
Becka cocked her head to the side. “I figured you’d be all rah rahing me to be thrilled over the new gift?”
“The discovery of any new gift is wondrous, to be sure, and in time I am sure you will come to appreciate it.”
She shook her head. “For a moment there I thought you had pretty amazing insight. No. I’d give it away if I could.”
Lagan paused, as if taking her measure. “I believe you. I’m going to say something you won’t have heard from your family. This new gift? It is a burden. You didn’t ask for it. It signifies a loss of your old way of life. Your identity. Your control over who you are.”
His words struck a chord with her. “You’re serious?”
“I am completely serious. You don’t have to like this. You’re allowed to not want this gift. Hate it if you want.”
Those words, spoken by another fae, gave her a subtle sense of relief. Perhaps she’d misjudged Lagan’s usefulness? He certainly seemed to understand how she felt better than her family did. “How will hating it help me? I mean, it feels good, but acknowledging my anger isn’t going to help me learn to live with the changes.”
“You might be surprised, Lady Becka. Aim for acceptance of the change first. Liking it will come later.”
She barked out a weak laugh. “We’ll see about that.”
“I will speak with the Duchess, on your behalf, to encourage her and your family to give you time to adjust to this change.”
“Good luck?”
He smiled. “No luck needed. I’m an unusually lucky man. Good evening, Lady Becka,” he inclined his head. “Until our next conversation.”
“Fare well, Lord Lagan,” she replied, surprised to hear the customary farewell from her lips.
As he walked off, she turned to Quinn who hadn’t left her side. “Perhaps I misjudged him?”
Quinn smiled. “You just like that he gave you permission to be angry about your lot in life.”
“Perhaps so, but I still like the sentiment. Screw my gift.”
Her gift. Her Null powers. Her path to being fae guilded, eight years too late.
What reality was she living in now, anyway? Becka’s head was spinning.
Chapter 24
“That was an odd conversation,” Quinn said.
Becka nodded. “I swear I’ve shifted dimensions.” She continued down the hall, passing multiple arched entrances as she aimed to enter the Great Hall near the family table. Becka had no desire to wind her way through the seated masses.
Quinn laughed. “At least you are in a familiar one.” He checked a pocket in his jacket. “Just a moment.” He pulled out his phone, frowning. “I have heard back from Chief Elowen on Tesse’s symbols.”
His reminder of their investigation into Tesse’s death was just the distraction Becka needed at that moment.
“So what‘s the latest news from your boss?”
“Give me a moment,” he replied, reading through the message. “There is a historian named Selby from House Yggdrasil who identified the symbols as shadow-dweller glyphs.”
Becka barked out a short laugh, but then did a double-take of his manner. “Wait, you’re serious?”
“Quite. You have heard of them?”
“Growing up, I read any and all fae lore I could find in our house library, which wasn’t much. I learned the ancient myths and stories were all based on an oral tradition, passed down in each lineage, and eventually scribed independently by each house. But all I could find out about shadow-dwellers was from the primordial fae texts, which are over fifteen hundred years old.
“Needless to say, there’s been some integrity loss in the parchment over the years, despite copies being taken of copies. Once I was sent to the cities, I started visiting vast human libraries and searching for any fae history the humans kept.
“What little I found felt almost purposely vague at times. So of course, I kept searching for more. Neither human nor fae-touched source had information on the shadow-dweller history, beyond rhyming children’s tales or second-hand references from other house records. I concluded they were nothing more than a lost fae-touched lineage. If they aren’t a long-forgotten tribe of boogeymen stories told to scare children into behaving, what are they?”
“Well, this morning there were no gifted nulls either. Sometimes things are unknown until they are known. Or rediscovered.”
Becka suppressed a smile. “The records that spoke of the shadow-dwellers mentioned some great cataclysm related to a misuse of their powers that ‘cast them forever to the winds’. You’re not suggesting, after all this time, that they’re still around?”
He cocked his head to the right, an air of uncertainty in his expression. “No, as you said, there’s nothing to indicate actual shadow-dwellers. According to Enforcer files, the ancient shadow-dwellers were believed to have the ability to consume other fae’s powers.”
“Wait, what do you mean by consume?” Becka’s stomach heaved. “Like, eat other fae?”
“No, not their flesh. Their blood.”
She tried to shake off the nausea. “Does that even work?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “We do not know, but what’s important is the shadow-dwellers believed it did.”
“So, the question is, who’s using their glyphs now? And what do they hope to accomplish? Power-stealing?”
He shrugged. “Stranger things have happened, but we are not sure yet. Chief Elowen’s working theory is someone is either using the glyphs to throw us off their trail, or they are insane and trying revive shadow-dweller ways by using the symbols in an attempted magical invocation.”
“That’s a curious thought. But the first theory doesn’t make any sense. Only I could see the marks on Tesse. Until I came around, no one investigating was even aware of the glyphs.”
“I am in agreement.”
“Which leaves a madman? Mad person?”
“Potentially, yes. Or someone who didn’t want to get caught, or have their activities found out.”
“I don’t get it. It’s not like there’s a reference book or anyone around to teach them the art of ancient shadow-dweller glyph magic.”
“No one on the team is sure. All we know is, despite using the symbols during the attack, the killer did not die in the act or we would have had two bodies, not one.”
“Did Elowen have any other updates you can share?” she asked.
“Nothing else yet. The glyphs are just one more mystery to muddle through.” Quinn cut his chin in the direction of the feast. “Your arrival has been noticed.”
Becka turned to look. They stood at the entrance closest to the Rowan family table. Maura beckoned her in. “It’s all too familiar. I’m dreading having to play the game.”
His guard dropped, and he shook his head. “They are not going to bite, Becka.”
“No, but I guarantee some will have their claws out.”
Becka ventured into the room, noticing, as before, how the entire room hushed upon her entry. She made it to Maura and Vott’s table without incident.
“Welcome, Becka. Please, have the seat between Calder and Sigfrid.” Maura motioned to the open chair. “Quinn, it’s a full table but there’s a space for you down at the end.”
Becka took the seat offered, as did Quinn. She hadn’t thought the space could feel any more awkward than the first night she’d dined with them.
She’d been w
rong.
While during the prior feast there had been clear disapproval and dislike, it had been replaced with an air of forced good humor. Alain sat across from her, his wallowing grief like a miasma of palpable pain. Unlike the evening before, he trained his gaze on Becka, expression inscrutable.
Shivering under the scrutiny of the assembled masses, Becka gratefully accepted a ruby filled glass of House Vine’s Pinot Noir from a passing steward. As she took a long sip, her gaze met Quinn’s, his frown reminding her of his warning not to overdo it.
“I am pleased you could join us,” Maura said. “I was not sure you would make it. It has been quite a full day for you.”
“That is has.” Becka focused on selecting some roast vegetables and raw beet salad from passing shared plates. “I’m planning to crash early tonight.”
“Sensible.” Maura motioned to a young man.
The valet held an intricately carved box, which he carried over to Becka and set on the table next to her. He undid the clasp at the front of the box and then opened it, revealing a pair of long-sleeved gloves covered with intricate embroidery. The fine, golden fabric was covered with images of fanciful fae beasts, some of lore and some native to fae lands. Becka couldn’t even identify them all, but the craftsmanship was exquisite.
She refrained from touching them, although her hands itched to pick them up, turn them about, and see the rest of the images.
“These are quite lovely,” Becka said.
“Indeed, they are quite singular,” Vott replied. “They belonged to my great-great-grandmother who had a penchant for embroidery. She made them herself, sourcing the sea silk from House Ash.”
“I’m not familiar with sea silk?”
“Yes, I admit it is a curiosity! There’s a gland in the foot of clams, which produces the long and silky filaments known as byssus, which they use to anchor themselves to the sea floor. House Ash maintains clam farms and so has a limited amount of the finest sea silk. Even amongst fae, seeing sea silk is a rarity.”
“These are truly remarkable,” Becka replied, her suspicious nature kicking in full bore. “Why are you showing them to me?”
Twinned Shadow (The Shadow Series Book 1) Page 16