“If not better,” Adelia reasoned. “Forsynthia’s not had someone who understands plants here for some time.”
“Well, I’ll be glad to offer some help,” he said. “It’s the least I can do for what you’ve given me. If you hadn’t been here, I think none of us would have been either.”
“I almost ruined everything, though. I let my magic take control of me, and I nearly took things too far.”
Orson smiled. “That wasn’t what I meant, Adelia. I’m saying that had you not come to Sungarden looking for my help, I certainly wouldn’t have received yours. Forsynthia would be short about a score of wildfolk if not for you. I owe much to you…including the truth.”
“The truth?”
“Gaston and Lucinda wanted you to learn this on your own, but I suspect there’s a part of you that is already aware. You’re an incredible sorceress. Perhaps fated to be even more powerful than your mentors.”
“So they say. I thought they were just being kind.”
“Or you are just being humble. There’s certainly a part of you that gets a sense of familiarity as I tell you this. I can see it in your eyes. Likewise, this won’t shock you either, I presume: last night, when you summoned your flames once more, the power felt overwhelming. You passed out because it was too much magic to accommodate, correct? But what if I told you it wasn’t that spell alone that sapped your energy? What if there was some other magic you maintained that required much of you?”
Adelia furrowed her brow and nodded. True to his words, a subconscious part of her had already prepared her for that reveal. “Then what do I do?” she asked.
“That’s a decision only you can make,” he declared. “You can either continue doing what you are, or you can let go.”
A part of her felt cracked by those words. Even though it was a truth she knew, hearing someone else acknowledge it made it more real than she was prepared for. A sigh pressed past her lips, and she gazed off to the west.
*****
The stars were out in the eastern sky. Adelia leaned on the window there, breathing in the crisp air with a weary smile on her face.
When she heard the approaching footsteps, she closed the shutters and waited for the knock on the door. It simply opened, though, Merlin still not familiar with all aspects of being human.
“You wanted to see me?”
Adelia nodded. “I did. There’s something we need to talk about.”
“What have I done now?” he teased.
She smiled but shook her head. “It isn’t about what you’ve done. It’s about what I haven’t done.”
Merlin stood straighter as he heard those words. “You’ve figured it out then.” When he saw Adelia was surprised by his knowledge, he swallowed away the tension in his throat. “I overheard Lucinda and Gaston when we returned to the keep. They still think of me as a hapless cat—there was no way I would understand what they knew.”
“Well, you knew before I did,” Adelia declared. “On some level, anyway.”
“So what now?” Merlin asked. “What have you decided?”
The young sorceress squared her jaw. “It isn’t my decision to make. You remember what Lucinda said. Just because you change the way something appears, that doesn’t change what it is underneath.”
Merlin shook his head. “I don’t want to go back to what I was. I want to stay here, like this.”
“A part of me wants you to as well,” Adelia said. “But it’s not something I can control much longer. Every day that passes, the magic keeping you this way becomes harder to control. It’s becoming unstable, and I don’t know what will happen if I can’t maintain it anymore.”
He sat on her bed and let his gaze sink to the floor. “These were the greatest days of my life. When I return to…to what I was, how will it even compare?”
“It will be the way it should be,” Adelia insisted. “I cannot promise you won’t have regrets—I’ll have some as well. But I can’t let you hurt yourself by holding on too long.”
“Will we ever be like this again?”
“I’m not sure. Lucinda said everything has a will. The human side of you is losing to the feline side. You’re incomplete, in a sense, and you’re trying to be whole again.”
“I don’t feel incomplete,” he muttered. “So what needs to be done? How will you change me back?”
Adelia shrugged. “I think it’s already been done. Once I acknowledged it was my magic sustaining you like this, I could feel a weight lift off me.”
“But you can’t be sure.”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters,” he assured. “One thing I remember from when I was a cat—one thing I hold onto—was that when I slept, it was curled up with you. There’s any number of things that could happen, Adelia. I could be stuck like this forever, or I could perish because the magic has changed what I am at a deeper level.”
“You could return to normal.”
“And if I don’t for some reason…” He sighed and bowed his head. “It’s foolish of me to ask, and inappropriate in this form, but it may be my last opportunity.”
“You want to curl up next to me?” she teased.
“If I might,” Merlin said. He was as serious as he’d ever been.
A twinge of embarrassment was present in Adelia’s throat, but she found herself nodding. “One night like this, and all the nights to come once you return to your true form.” As she climbed into bed, finding a comfortable spot beneath the covers, Merlin moved closer to the wall. When she was ready, she leaned over and kissed him on his forehead. “Good night, Merlin,” she whispered.
He draped his arm over her stomach and nuzzled against her shoulder.
Adelia stared at the ceiling for a moment, wondering if she had made the correct choice. Once she was done pondering, she turned to the end table and blew out the lantern light.
Chapter Seventeen: The Way Things Ought to Be
A golden sliver of light could be seen beyond the window, blocked by the shutters. Adelia blinked away the night’s fatigue and looked down at the crook of her arm. The room remained too dark, though. There was no telling what became of Merlin.
Drawing in a slow, steady breath, the young sorceress pulled her free arm out from beneath the covers. A dusky blue aura filled the room until an uneven hunk of ice had formed in her palm. With a whip of her wrist, she flung that ball at the shutters, her aim true. The sunlight poured into the room, and she felt a brief jump against her side.
When Adelia looked down again, she confirmed that Merlin, the boy, was gone. In his spot, only his clothes remained—with a sizable lump remaining beneath the shirt. As the girl moved to a better vantage, that lump stretched through the garment until two golden eyes peered out at her from the top.
“Hello, Merlin,” Adelia said.
The cat stretched his black paws out of the shirt, and when he sat up, it pulled down past his head. A smile stretched across Adelia’s face as she reached out to scratch behind his ears. She didn’t realize how much she missed the sound of his purrs until she heard them once more.
“I’d forgotten what you looked like,” she teased. “So handsome.” When she didn’t receive so much as a meow in response, she averted her gaze, as though she’d told an awful joke. Adelia stared out the window, reflecting on the prior days.
As she contemplated the choices that led them there, Merlin hopped off the bed. The cat spun in a circle by the door, finally squeaking out a meow. That sound was more powerful than the sorceress remembered, and she felt compelled to rise from her bed.
The moment Adelia opened the door, her little cat bolted from the room. She rushed outside to follow him, but he was gone in an instant. She watched him make his way through the courtyard, escaping out the western exit, toward the gardens.
“Back to catching butterflies, huh?” she muttered. Adelia tapped her fingers on the stone railing and set out to follow her furry friend.
As he watched his apprentice make her way th
rough the courtyard, he swung the door open. “It’s time,” he bade his companion.
“Mister Camlann, what will others think of you, sneaking me out of your chambers like this?” Lucinda teased.
“I’d rather them believe whatever fantasies you have swimming in your head than what we’re about to do.”
The sorceress nodded her head, knowing well the trials the sage must have gone through in her absence. “So you gained no ground with your guest?”
“None,” Gaston admitted. “Thoro is nothing if not resilient. And without the use of his hands or his tongue, getting answers is becoming tedious.”
A smile made its way to Lucinda’s face. “You aren’t able to do it, are you? You thought you could embrace the darkness, but you can’t.”
The sage sighed. “How am I supposed to do worse to him than he’s done to himself? All I would be doing is heading down a path that would corrupt me. I need a different plan, Lucinda.”
“Let’s see if we can come up with one, shall we?”
Gaston offered a nod of his own and led the sorceress down the rest of the corridor, until they reached his bedchamber. Before she could add any lewd remark, he raised his hand and tapped on the brickwork outside. After those hollow notes were played, the wall at the end of the corridor slid aside. “Hurry along now,” he bade.
As they entered the hidden passage, the wall closed behind them. The sage did not notice as his companion dropped something on the ground and gave a subtle wave of her hand.
*****
That time, it was Merlin who trailed the young lady. Adelia and the cat entered the keep before the sun rose to its zenith. The aspiring sorceress relied on treachery to coerce the feline, but she was sure he wouldn’t care, even if he did know better.
A butterfly, composed entirely of ice, drifted around in the air, its path bent to Adelia’s will. Every time the cat drew close, she whisked it away. Before long, they were heading up those stairs from the courtyard.
“Come along now,” she said. “I’m sure Master Camlann will want very much to know you’re back to your old self.”
When she knocked on the door to the study and received no response, she let herself in. Not a living thing remained within, except for the bluebird on the windowsill—the one Gaston occasionally joined in song.
Adelia furrowed her brow before spinning her finger, sending that butterfly up in the air, just as Merlin leaped for it. Together with the concocted insect, the pair pressed farther down that corridor, until they arrived at the door to the sage’s bedroom. His pupil raised her hand to knock upon it, when she noticed something peculiar in the corner of the hall.
There, a beautiful sunflower—miniaturized as it was—grew in that darkness. Upon closer inspection, though, Adelia realized it was, in fact, made of crystal. She plucked it from the stone and noticed there was something inside it as well. Three small stones had numbers carved upon them, with little dashes between them.
Adelia shrugged and stood, turning her attention back to the door to her master’s room. As she neared the wall, though, a subtle hum reverberated from the sunflower. Confused as she was, the young sorceress stepped back, and the hum ceased. Another step forward and—
The truth was laid bare before her. The brick closest to the sunflower was the third from the ceiling and the twelfth from Gaston’s door. A glance inside the crystal confirmed it: the first number was a three, the second a twelve.
The sorceress pressed the stones in the order the flower displayed, but she was still shocked to see the wall at the end of the corridor slide open. Everything was dark there except for the faintest glimmer of light.
Adelia looked back to find her furry friend with the butterfly clasped in his hands. Merlin licked the insect’s icy wings, preoccupied beyond distraction. The girl laughed and moved on without him, into that mysterious hidden passage. She was inside just long enough to realize it led to stairs that descended toward a distant source of light. Then, without warning, the secret door closed behind her. She stifled a gasp but could feel the fear creeping up her spine.
Familiar voices were heard, almost out of reach. With nowhere to go but forward, she set out toward them.
*****
The man from Ippius perspired as though he were melting. The fire that surrounded him was enhanced by the magic of the two arcanists, who had their private conversations just out of earshot.
Thoro sat in the center of the large, subterranean room, bound to a chair with more leather straps than he could count on his fingers and toes. Despite his considerable suffering, he refused to give in to his captors. As those two magicians agreed on the next course of action, the prisoner focused on something else that dwelled just in the shadows.
Gaston approached and bent to one knee, wincing when it popped. “Whenever you’re ready for this to stop, all you need to do is give in. Your stay here doesn’t need to be unpleasant, but I need to know why you attempted to harm my friend.”
A deep, steady laughter erupted from that man. He shook his head as he locked eyes with the sage, even as sweat dripped down from his brow.
With a sigh, Gaston rose and waved his hand. The fire in the room diminished, except for the lanterns in the four corners of the room. Lucinda stepped forward and enacted a new enchantment. A thick layer of ice rose from the floor, encasing Thoro’s feet. She kept casting until it reached the bottom of the chair, and his lower body was encased in that frigid shell.
For a long while, the assassin from Ippius refused to acknowledge that cold. He sat in silence while his two torturers stared. Even as his skin turned a few shades paler, even as the perspiration that marred his brow dissipated, he refused to budge.
Then, suddenly, his expression changed. He looked as though he was begging for sympathy—for pity.
“It’s working,” Lucinda said.
Gaston remained skeptical. He narrowed his eyes and scoured Thoro’s expression. “No, it’s not,” he said. “He’s just appealing to someone else.” The sage turned and looked to the shadows of the stairwell.
Adelia stepped out of the darkness once she had been spotted and waited for the verbal assault she was bound to face. She noticed Gaston’s trepidation—his shame. He turned to Lucinda, who offered an apologetic nod. That was all the explanation he needed.
When he turned back to his protégé, she was drawing closer to the prisoner. “Miss Kreegan, step away,” he bade. “Though he’s restrained, he’s still dangerous.”
“He cut out his tongue, didn’t he?” Adelia asked. “But he’s still here.”
Gaston bowed his head. “We’re trying to get information from him.” That shame was warping the sage’s voice into something the girl had not yet heard.
“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “He could have drawn the blade across his throat, but he chose his tongue. That means he expected to survive whatever ordeal he’d have here, but he didn’t think he could trust himself not to speak.”
For the first time since Thoro’s capture, the sage of Forsynthia could see concern in his prisoner’s eyes. Adelia cast a scornful gaze toward that man.
“Miss Kreegan,” the sage warned as she lifted her hand. “Don’t do something you’ll regret.”
“I won’t regret this,” she promised. “This is the way things ought to be.”
Thoro shook in his chair, fighting against whatever enchantment Adelia weaved. A white light flashed out, and the other two arcanists looked on in confusion. Thoro stopped thrashing and stared at Adelia with wide eyes.
“What have you done?” he asked.
Gaston’s jaw dropped, and Lucinda smirked.
“She’s given you back your tongue, fool boy,” the enchantress said.
“He couldn’t ignore the pain long enough between bouts of whatever magic you sent his way,” Adelia explained. “But with the ability to speak while his punishment is ongoing…”
Her mentor swallowed away the lump that had risen in his throat. How could he have ruine
d the innocence of the girl he had meant to protect? He looked to the older sorceress for advice, but she was no longer at his side.
“Lucinda?” he asked, when he saw her at the stairs.
“You needed another arcanist to help you get your answers, Mister Camlann,” she said. “You’ve got her.”
Gaston looked to his pupil and noticed the emotion she carried. There was determination, yes, but it sat upon so much else. Curiosity, fear, guilt—anger? So much was present there he did not know fully what to make of his apprentice. There was darkness there, but perhaps no more than what was within him. Perhaps it was just enough to survive in the harsh world they lived in.
“All right, Miss Kreegan,” he said. “Let’s see what information this man has been hiding.”
Afterword
I wanted to take this opportunity to thank you, the reader, for taking this journey with me. Tellest is a magnificent world, but it wouldn’t be so without you. As you can likely guess, this isn’t the end of the story for Adelia, Merlin, Gaston or Lucinda.
Believe it or not, a review on an eBook goes a very long way. If you enjoyed this tale, I’d be eternally grateful if you left some kind words for other readers to find this growing literary universe. If you enjoyed the words I scrawled on these pages, consider this: your words are priceless.
To find more information about the world of Tellest, please visit www.tellest.com for sneak peeks, our newsletter and supplementary information.
May your life always be an adventure,
Michael DeAngelo
***Don’t forget, you can get a free copy of the novella, Awake, by signing up for the Tellest newsletter. You’ll receive a reader copy within 24 hours—my way of thanking you for being awesome!***
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Transformed (Ancestral Magic Book 2) Page 14