by AJ Lancaster
“I intend,” he said, voice gone deep, russet irises nearly swallowed by black, “to be of very great use to you, my Star.”
She shivered as their gazes locked. “Stop delaying then,” she said. “Or with our luck, our ‘chaperone’ will turn up before you’ve begun.”
He grimaced at the reminder that her cousin Jack was more likely than not to come hunting for them. In Marius’s absence, Jack had taken it upon himself to guard Hetta’s virtue, whether or not she wanted it guarded. And whether or not it actually needed guarding. Wyn’s erratic magic and Stariel’s attitude were perfectly adequate chaperones without additional help, she thought sourly.
“You’ll do fine.” And Stariel will catch it if you don’t, she added silently, pressing her fingertips into the earth and burrowing a little deeper into Stariel. But she wasn’t truly worried. Wyn was rarely reckless and never with magic. She’d never have talked him into this if he thought there was any real danger.
Wyn took a long breath and shifted his stance, fanning out his wings to their full extent in a glory of iridescent azure. A feral wildness rose in him, bringing with it the smell of dust after rain and the thick spice of cardamom. His brown skin grew faintly pearlescent, the strands of his hair shifting into a liquid metal that matched the silver filaments on his blue, blue wings. Pressure beat against her eardrums, and she swallowed to try to release it.
In that moment, he looked both magnificent and inhuman, with no connection to his usual everyday self. Power swelled in the air, and though the sky was clear, in the distance Hetta felt clouds respond to his summons, a storm trying to begin with him at its centre. Leaning in to Stariel, she discouraged the unnatural weather. It felt remarkably like taking handfuls of grain and scattering them, only to have the wind whirl them back into piles as quickly as she could throw.
Wyn corralled the effect with visible effort. The gathering of distant stormclouds ceased, and the power shifted to the here and now, rippling in the air in front of her.
Lightning—or at least its lesser cousin—curled around him in blue-white snakes. He opened his eyes, and she gasped, for in the russet of his irises, tiny bursts of lightning flickered, as if the storm was looking out. Goosebumps broke out on her arms, every fine hair standing on end. Stariel crouched just beneath her surface, waiting to pounce. She held her breath.
He smiled and drew a smooth shape in the air. The lightning wound down his arm and pooled in his hand, a stuttering ball of blue-white charge. Laughing, he held it up and let the ball spin slowly over his palm.
“Pretty, isn’t it?” A rare joy shone in him, and her heart lifted. He didn’t often let himself simply enjoy magic.
She let her grip on Stariel ease, smiling back at him. “Can I come closer?”
He transferred the blue orb from one hand to the other. “Slowly,” he warned. “People carry their own elektrical field. They start to interfere with each other, and I need to adjust for that.”
She got up and took one tentative step forward, then another. The air on the grassy hilltop grew dry and thick with ozone, and the storm in Wyn rippled in response to her movement, contained but churning. She took several more steps and felt the moment the magic began to unravel even before he spoke.
“Stop!” he said. “I’m going to have to ground the power.” His chest heaved with exertion, primaries spread wide. Little sparks arced from feather to feather, and his silver hair stood on end, rippling in response to currents not caused by wind. The lightning in his eyes almost obscured the russet. He’d never looked less human, an unearthly being of storm and wind.
“I’m ready,” she confirmed, gathering up Stariel again. The land bristled under her skin, heather and pine and bluebells in this season.
Wyn nodded.
The power slammed into the ground at his feet in a rush, and Stariel leapt, swallowing it in a single gulp. For a moment, she was blinded by the sudden assault on her magesight, and she stumbled. Strong arms steadied her, and she found herself crushed against a warm male chest.
The lightning was gone from his eyes when she looked up, and she could feel his heart pounding under her hands.
“Do we call that a success or a failure?” he said ruefully.
She was about to answer when the world shuddered. They both gripped each other for balance before simultaneously realising that the world wasn’t literally shaking; something was disturbing Stariel’s magic. She reached for Stariel for an answer and received it between one breath and the next. There. She turned instinctively towards the source of the disturbance.
Between two of the stones, where Wyn had previously made a portal to the Court of Ten Thousand Spires, a line of dead grass was spreading, reaching towards them. Not them, she realised in horror. Reaching for Wyn.
The dead grass was just the visible sign of the searching tendril of foreign magic creeping into Stariel, tasting of storms and minerals and blazing heat. In the space between the stones, hints of another landscape glimmered in and out of focus—a city built of towering rock needles.
Anger not all her own blazed up, and for a heartbeat her and Stariel’s goals were perfectly synchronised.
ThousandSpire was bigger, older, and probably stronger than Stariel, but they stood in the heart of Stariel’s territory. She and Stariel forced the incursion out, inch by inch, until the space between the stones settled to show only the forested foothills of the distant Indigo Mountains once more.
Wyn stood a few feet nearer to the old portal, as if he’d taken the steps without realising. He looked down at himself and back up to where ThousandSpire had tried to reach through, slow horror creeping over his face. Every one of his feathers was raised, making his wings appear larger.
“It wants you,” she said. “The Court of Ten Thousand Spires.” And that meant—what? That it hadn’t bonded a new ruler yet? Or had it been acting under its new ruler’s instruction?
“Yes.” His voice was hoarse, and the same panicked speculation she felt skittered across his face before he folded his horror under a mask of composure, though his feathers didn’t flatten.
Running footsteps sounded on the path, and Jack came crashing into the stone circle like a red-headed dervish.
“What in blazes was that?” he said, spinning around and searching frantically for danger. All the Valstars had a magical connection to Stariel, but Jack’s was stronger than most. He spotted the line of dead grass making an arrow from the two stones towards Wyn’s feet and whirled on Wyn. “What did you do?” he demanded. A quick glance at Hetta and he added, for good measure: “And what do you two think you’re doing, wandering off alone together?”
“In order: I don’t know; Wyn was experimenting with his magic; and none of your business,” she said.
Jack bristled. He was a broad-shouldered man with brilliant red hair, but when he bristled, he looked like nothing so much as a bulldog with a bone. “What do you mean, experimenting?”
Hetta ignored him for the time being and put a hand on Wyn’s shoulder, making him start. “I thought the wards we set were supposed to stop portals from forming inside the borders?” she asked him quietly.
“The resonance here must be stronger than I realised.” He stared down at the line of dead grass only a few feet from the tips of his boots, tracking it back across the hilltop to the base of the two stones. “Or ThousandSpire more desperate. My magic just now must have strengthened the link.”
“Could it happen again? Was it acting under someone’s instructions or of its own accord, do you think?”
“I do not know,” he admitted, still staring at the stones. “I never expected ThousandSpire to make another grab for me. I cannot think of a precedent for two faelands warring in such a way.”
Jack glowered at where Hetta’s hand rested on Wyn’s shou
lder.
“It’s not appropriate, Hetta!” her cousin burst out, unable to help himself. “The two of you lollygagging off together without a care for what people think. You know the rumours are spreading.”
She frowned at him. “If anyone knows the two of us are up here alone, it’ll be because you told them.”
“That’s not the point and you know it! I don’t like it, and the gods know the family doesn’t like it, but you better bloody well be planning to marry him, the sooner the better! Either that or send him away!”
She glared at Jack. He glared back. Marriage. Neither she nor Wyn had said it aloud, but Hetta had felt it circling them, becoming ever more conspicuous in its omission from their conversations.
“That’s a conversation for Hetta and me, not you,” Wyn said with deceptive mildness, his feathers still fluffed up—this time in irritation, she thought. “But was that the only reason you came up here, Jack?”
Jack narrowed hard grey eyes at Wyn. “No, it wasn’t.” He turned back to Hetta and spoke a sentence Hetta had never thought to hear again: “Lord Penharrow wants to speak to you.” He scowled at the thought of their traitorous neighbour. “He’s down at the house.”
6
An Old Flame
“For the love of little green apples, why didn’t you send Angus packing?” she asked Jack as she accompanied him back. The Standing Stones were only a short walk from Stariel House, though they were shielded from view by the surrounding forest. Wyn took the sky road so that his return wouldn’t coincide with theirs. It was irritating to have to take such measures, but still better than suffering through another round of censure from Aunt Sybil.
“My mother invited him to take tea before I could intervene,” Jack said stiffly. He knew as well as she did that Aunt Sybil had her own agenda, which probably involved Hetta marrying Angus and Jack managing the estate while Hetta settled into domestic bliss with the neighbouring lord. Hetta had made it clear she was no longer on speaking terms with Angus, but Aunt Sybil wouldn’t let a little thing like that stand in her way.
“Oh, well, that explains everything! We mustn’t be uncivil if there are teacakes involved, after all!” Her anxiety about what had happened at the Stones had transformed into anger, aimed at this much easier target. She might not know what to do about ThousandSpire, but she knew exactly how to feel about Lord Angus Penharrow. How could Jack have sided with his mother in this instance? He knew exactly what Angus had done to Stariel.
Jack drew up short and swivelled to face her. Behind him rose the great bulk of Stariel House, the standard of the Valstars fluttering from the tallest of its three towers. “What in the hells else was I supposed to do?” His grey eyes glittered dangerously. “We never made it public knowledge, what he did. Did you want me to open that particular can of worms in front of my mother?”
Hetta glared at him, because he was right. Aunt Sybil had always hoped Jack would be chosen as lord, and she’d make a terrific fuss over the fact that Hetta’s lordship had been illegitimate for those first few months thanks to Angus’s efforts.
“Oh, very well, you’re right,” she said ungraciously, wrestling her temper under control. “But what does Angus even want? He must know he isn’t welcome here.”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Jack said, scowling at the house.
She shared his sentiment. If Angus Penharrow thought he could just waltz in and take tea with her aunt as if nothing had changed…well, she was going to make certain he regretted his choices regarding Stariel. With this goal firmly in mind, she made a detour to change after they reached the house and allowed herself some judicious use of illusion. The magic boiled out of her and knotted itself into tangles on her first efforts, creating the opposite of the smoothly coiffed appearance she’d intended. It didn’t help her feel any more in control of today’s series of events, and the Hetta who’d earned her mastery in illusion was appalled at the slip.
She sat down in front of the mirror and took several deep breaths before trying again, pushing Stariel away. Her connection to the land might boost her power while she was on the estate, but it didn’t change the fact that illusion required fine control and rigid mental focus. I didn’t fight to earn my mastery just to forget it all upon my lordship, she told herself firmly, visualising the loops and whirls of the spell.
She was glad she’d taken the time both to calm down and to do things properly when she entered the room where her aunt was entertaining their neighbour. Angus caught himself quickly, but not before she saw the pang of mingled admiration and regret cross his expression when he saw her.
I might be petty, she thought, but that was still very satisfying.
Angus rose when she entered and bowed a greeting. “Hetta,” he said, irritating her with the way he said her name as if he still had some kind of right to do so. But irritating her even more was the fact that he was still just as handsome as ever, continuing to be curly-haired, broad-shouldered, strong-jawed, and smiling the same easy smile that had set her heart fluttering as effectively at sixteen as at twenty-four. Shouldn’t villainy make a difference to people’s appearances?
“Lord Penharrow,” she said frostily. Aunt Sybil’s lips pursed, and she pointedly put down her teacup. “You wished to see me?” Her aunt could disapprovingly rearrange china all she liked; Hetta wasn’t going to pretend to be happy Angus had come here.
“Yes,” he said, and again regret flickered over his face. “Though I know you’ve not much love for me. I’m deeply sorry for that.”
Aunt Sybil looked between the two of them, burning with curiosity but too well-bred to ask for an explanation. Everyone knew that the courtship between Angus and Hetta had cooled very suddenly, but only Jack, Marius, and Wyn knew why.
“Well, if you’ve something to say to me, come up to my study and say it,” she said finally. “Otherwise, I have work to do.”
He took his leave of her aunt, and it irritated Hetta all over again that Aunt Sybil didn’t protest. She knew exactly how her aunt would react if she’d suggested speaking with Wyn alone.
He silently followed her up, and she shut her study door with a snap. “Well, are you going to explain why you wish to talk to me?” she said, folding her arms. “Or is this simply an excuse to steal another family heirloom?”
Angus winced. “I suppose I deserve that. For what it’s worth, I regret my actions deeply. Are you going to invite me to sit, or are we going to stand here glaring at each other until day’s end?”
She’d always liked Angus’s frankness, but it irked her now. How dare he try to be likeable?
“You may sit. Don’t think it means I forgive you.” She took her seat behind her great oak desk, the solid weight of it reminding her of her position. She wasn’t the teen girl who’d been infatuated with Angus Penharrow anymore; she wasn’t even the woman who’d considered marrying him when he’d proposed several months ago, before his deception had come to light. She bolstered herself against his disarmingly non-villainous appearance. I’m the lord of a great estate and in love with another man. I don’t care what Angus Penharrow thinks of me, and I’m not going to forgive him just because he says sorry nicely.
Angus seated himself opposite, at ease despite having to fit his large frame into what she knew to be quite an uncomfortable chair. It felt strange to be seated so formally, as if she were interviewing him. They’d never been in this room together before; all their previous encounters had taken place in other, less business-like settings.
Despite vowing not to care what he thought, she wondered how it looked to him. Was he making comparisons to her father’s day? She saw him take in the framed picture of the Sun Theatre on the far wall, one of the few changes she’d made to the otherwise old-fashioned room.
“I know the decor is traditional rather than fashionable, but I like it,” she said, knowing she was being shrewish but unable to help it. “A happy coincidence, since we can ill afford to redecorate, thanks to our previous steward’s dishonesty
.”
He gripped the armrests tightly, pressing his lips together. “I never knew about Mr Fisk’s skimming from the accounts, and I certainly wouldn’t have condoned it.”
“Perhaps you should’ve given him a bonus for going beyond the line of duty?” she suggested, her light tone at odds with the white-hot anger flaring up as she remembered that piece of Angus’s work all over again. “After all, you were paying him to make sure my father, and then me, got into such financial trouble that we’d be forced to sell you the land you wanted, weren’t you? Ha! How dare you try to draw lines between ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable’ treachery and tell me you could’ve done worse!”
He sighed. “I’ve said I regret my past choices, lass. If you rake up at me about it every other sentence, this conversation’s going to take a while.”
“Don’t you ‘lass’ me; it’s Lord Valstar to you.”
Amusement glinted briefly in his hazel eyes. “Well, I will if you insist, though it seems a mite silly to pretend to be strangers. Also, ‘Lord Valstar’ rather puts me in mind of your father.”
“He was Lord of Stariel, as am I. The comparison is appropriate,” she said, though she was already regretting her hasty words. She’d known Angus since they were both children; no title in the world would erase the history between them. It was silly.
“Yes, but I’ve never kissed your father,” Angus said frankly, startling a laugh out of her.
“You’re not going to humour me out of my displeasure,” she warned him, even though this was already occurring in spite of herself.
“No harm in trying though, is there?” he said with a quick, disarming grin. His gaze grew thoughtful. “And since you’re here permanently now, I’ve plenty of time to try to make things right, don’t I?”
She stiffened. Did Angus still think she was a fake lord? He’d never really believed in Stariel’s magic, and they hadn’t spoken since she’d confronted him and forced him to hand back the Star Stone that was an integral part of Stariel’s Choosing Ceremony.