Driannthenes and Jaccobius took me back to the camp. They escorted me to the healing tent where Adaline waited alone inside, weaving bandages. Drianthenes made his excited announcement, and Adaline smiled, though I could read the trepidation in her eyes. I felt myself shake with adrenaline, and I clung to that sense of clear determination I’d had against the tree.

  I knew what was right. I had to hold to it. Drianthenes gave me a knowing smile. From everything I’d observed, I suspected he could reach the surface layers of my emotions, probably not further than that. I gave him a grim nod.

  “Can I be alone with my sister, Your Excellency?” I asked. “There are some things I want to talk to her about. To- to prepare. She knows more about this than I do, and maybe she can help me.”

  Drianthenes nodded magnanimously. “Of course.”

  He squeezed my shoulder as he left, and Jaccobius shadowed him quietly in exiting.

  I let out a shaky breath and turned to Adaline. “Have you ever been a part of one of the sacrifices before?”

  “We’re all a part of it,” she said. “We dance and weave the spellwork together, and they drain the blood for each of us to drink. But I’ve never been chosen to- never had the honor of doing the capturing or killing myself.”

  “Oh.” I said. I still felt faintly lightheaded, though the air was thicker here than on the Sacred Abor’s mountain. “Good.”

  I sat heavily on the floor of the healing tent, which was thick with blankets. My head was still spinning, and my heart beat hard. There were too many things to think about.

  “Are you making more bandages?” I asked. “I swear I just saw Maggie doing that.”

  “It constantly needs to be done,” Adaline said. “We enchant them and rub them in ointment, then use them for everything. What did Drianthenes say to you?”

  I didn’t know if we were ready for that. “Where’s Maggie?”

  “Helping with a birth for one of Drianthenes’s cousins,” Adaline said, “who absolutely refused to come to the healing tent. Sorceresses who carry pregnancies are basically seen as Saints, so Maggie can’t very well order her to come like a human. I can handle things here.”

  “You can keep track of me,” I noted.

  In my mind things were coming together more. Adaline had spoken lightly of pregnancy, with a practiced air of neutrality, but under that I sensed a level of… bitterness? Distaste?

  “Oh, it’s mostly about having someone trained in the Healing tent in case of emergencies. You’re not such a priority now that you have the initiation binding,” Adaline said with a glance at the “tattoo” on my neck. She pulled down the sleeve on her wrist to flash her own tattoo. “You’d have to leave the camp on foot, which would be difficult and trigger Drianthenes’s wards.”

  “Is that how they caught our father?” I asked. “When he tried to escape?”

  Adaline froze, her hand stopping mid-weave, holding the thread tightly. “Who told you that?”

  I blinked. I knew I probably felt more distanced from the deaths of our parents than she was, they were like strangers to me now, but I hadn’t expected a reaction like that.

  “Maggie did,” I said. “Was it a secret?”

  “No, I just,” Adaline stumbled and caught herself, shaking her head. She spoke calmly and clearly, though she avoided my gaze. “No, it’s no secret. Of course you’d deserve to know. It’s just… people don’t talk about it much here.”

  I watched her carefully and spoke quietly. “Did Drianthenes kill him?”

  “Drianthenes rarely kills anyone,” Adaline said. Her voice was neutral, but her hands still held the thread stiff, nearly shaking, the tips of her fingers turning blue. “Other people do that for him.”

  Ah. We were truly in dangerous territory here.

  “Drianthenes doesn’t hear everything in the camp,” I said. It was a statement, not a question.

  “No,” she agreed. Her hands began to move again, slowly, bringing the pattern of the weave together once more.

  “So why are you afraid to talk about this?” I asked.

  There was a falter in her movement. She still didn’t look me in the eye, focusing on her work, though her voice came out strong and clear.

  “Something can be dangerous to say even if no one can hear you.”

  I could understand that. It was dangerous for our mother to teach us magic in the dark of our house, even if no one outside could hear us. It was dangerous when I first said aloud that I was a boy, even if it was to a quiet, empty room. It was dangerous for me to say Adain’s name, even when no one could hear.

  “Sometimes it’s necessary to talk about dangerous things,” I said. “Do you know how the suppression tattoos work, Adaline?”

  Her fingers twitched as she flinched back sharply, twisting the thread in her hands into a tangled mess. She stared plaintively down at the mass of threads.

  “Oh, Gods,” she said. Then sighed. Carefully and slowly, she began to untangle the mess. She didn’t say anything else, didn’t meet my gaze, just kept working to undo the knot in her hands. I watched her, silent and intent.

  The minutes stretched on and I began to feel my own knot, in my throat ,before she finally spoke.

  “All the tattoos are done by Maggie,” Adaline said. “And Maggie’s taught me everything she knows. My skills lack only experience and practice, not knowledge. Even then, I can usually find my way through rituals and experimentation.”

  So she could, probably. Even if it was too dangerous to say aloud.

  “Experimentation?” I echoed, because I didn’t like the sound of that when it came to an enchantment that touched my tattered magic.

  She looked up at me with steady eyes before turning back to her work. “That’s how I put together the werewolf enchantment. I experimented on each small part, piece by piece with temporary ritual magics, until I got the result I needed. I’d use Maggie’s medical paint and we’d run through each variation. Increasing size, growing fur, transforming hands, then arms, then shoulders. Sigils for heightened senses already exist, at least.”

  I nodded, familiar with those. They were useful and common among the Mage Division. I’d toyed with the idea of making myself a magnifying spell to better my eyesight, and planned to do one sometime down the line.

  Remembering Maggie’s warnings last night, I glanced around nervously.

  “Does Maggie have them?” I asked. “I think she heard part of our conversation last night.”

  Adaline’s mouth twisted in irritation. Her shoulders tensed a moment as she thought about it, then relaxed. “She does. She really should be busy at least a few more hours this time. Even she cannot spy across the entire camp while helping a woman give birth.”

  I nodded, feeling the tension in my own body lessen. I didn’t know what Maggie would think of our conversation, but I doubted she would like it.

  “So Maggie knows the werewolf sigils, as well?” I asked.

  “Oh.” Adaline’s mouth twisted up for just a moment in a fleeting grin. “No, she said firmly that she was too old for that nonsense, and didn’t like me doing it so much either.”

  “What ‘we’ was experimenting, then?” I asked. “Who else has heightened senses in the camp?”

  “Oh, some of the women, maybe Calenthe, though she barely helped out at all,” Adaline said airily. “But I’d know if any of them were in range to hear us.” She tapped her own nose. “I have my own tricks, Izak. Maggie is the only one who can truly get past me.”

  That wasn’t as reassuring as she might think. I sat back on my heels, frowning. Thinking.

  Adaline studied me out of the corners of her eyes. She must know what I’m doing, why I’m asking these questions. But she didn’t seem willing to confront me about it. Was any thought of escape too dangerous to talk about directly? One part stuck out at me.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  “Calenthe helped you?” I asked. “Doesn’t she hate you?”

  “She didn’t always,” Adaline said. She sighed. “Calenthe was a closer friend to me than Sarai, once. We were the envy of all the other women. Sarai was Maggie’s other prized pupil, though, and she helped me more. That’s how we really met.” A light smile played on her lips. “Sarai was the best at the magic related to the senses. I think she got a bit of that Drianthenes talent for mental magic, for all that women are only meant to be good at domestic Alteration magics.”

  I could tell how excited Adaline was to talk about it. It was a bit of incredibly complex magic that it sounded like she half-invented, no matter what secret records the Heirs had of old Imperial magic. I bet not many here appreciated her brilliance in something uncomfortably far from “domestic magic.”

  “I wouldn’t count healing as a domestic magic,” I said absently. My own thoughts were scattered. “So Sarai is also a shape-changer?”

  “Oh, no, it was Theo who really helped me crack it, he was the only one who understood everything the way I did. We took notes and studied the texts endlessly, he was my assistant-” She had been lost in the telling, but she faltered again

  She was silent for a moment, finishing off the end row of the bandage she was working on and beginning to roll it up again. Her eyes were shadowed. The air was thick with emotion and I had never felt more like an awkward outsider.

  It hit me, then, looking at Adaline’s clenched jaw: no matter how troubled the history between Adaline and Theo was, they had a history. They had spent years together and knew each other much better than I knew either of them. They had been growing older with my parents as I lived within the walls of the Mage Division, trying to forget them.

  I closed my eyes. I couldn’t deal with this right now. Unless I was interested in committing a human sacrifice and delaying Nalei’s rescue further, I had to keep focused. For all its absurdity, the dynamics and danger of the Heirs was incredibly real.

  I opened my eyes and found Adaline staring at her open hands. She’d put the bandages down and was just… staring. She was a force of nature here, but right now she looked lost.

  “Ada,” I said softly. “Do you actually want to be here?”

  She looked up at me abruptly. Her face was horribly blank for a moment, but then faltered into a forced smile.

  “Where’d you dig up that nickname from?” she asked. “You’ve been acting like we’re acquaintances with the same parents this whole time.”

  “Well, that’s because we don’t really know each other anymore,” I said. The truth of her words made my chest ache, but it was an old ache and unimportant right now. “But I do want to get to know you and I want you to learn about me, like we said. But I don’t want to get to know you over the dead body of a stranger.”

  She only looked away from me again, her hands still empty and open before her.

  “Why not?” she asked softly. “I’m a murderer. I’ve drank the blood of sacrifices and I killed members of the Hands. The humans weren’t even a threat when I was the Beast.”

  “You were angry about the death of your mother,” I said, trying to be as gentle as I could, “and you were trying to rescue your friend.” I let my voice drop. “I killed once before, for the Division. It didn’t feel right. It didn’t make me feel loyal or good. I don’t want to do it again, and, honestly, I don’t think you do either.”

  She raised her chin to look me in the eyes then. “How do you know I don’t?”

  I leaned in closer. “Because we’re the same. Ever since I got here, you’ve reminded me of myself. You’ve told me that the Division doesn’t truly care for Mages, and maybe they don’t, but then the Heirs of Empire doesn’t care for women. You’re trapped and you’re playing this game to pretend you have power, but when push comes to shove you must give everything you have into pretending to love a man who could take it all away in an instant. This isn’t what you want.”

  She narrowed her eyes, leaning in closer to me in return. Her hands were balled into fists in her lap. “And what do I want, then? How do you know anything about women when you rejected being one?”

  “I did that because I had to.” I leaned back now, my hands in an open gesture. “Not power or games. The Division always saw me as strange and suspicious for it, and now, if the Heirs found out, I don’t want to know what they’d do. I transitioned because I had to acknowledge myself somehow or break, but I thought I had to try even harder to make up for it. I didn’t realize I could do what made me happy instead of trying to make up for what I was. Now it’s too late for me, but it’s not too late for you.”

  Adaline didn’t lean back. Her eyes were still fixed on me, watching me raptly. I knew she was listening. She wanted to know how the story ended.

  “Why is it too late for you?”

  I breathed in and out. Everything I was saying was true, but I needed her to believe me so badly it almost felt like a lie. I met her eyes and tried to lean into the emotions I felt, to let go of the thinking, to let a part of my soul shine through so she would keep listening. I needed to tell the truth, because I needed her to help me.

  “Adain, my best friend, my-” I cut myself off, not knowing how she would react to the details here. It was so second nature to filter out the unneeded parts of my experiences that it didn’t even feel like a lie. “My roommate. The only person I really, truly cared for after I was recruit- after I was taken. He kept trying to tell me that other things mattered more than appealing to the Division, but I wouldn’t listen. We drifted apart. He died in a magical accident, and I could have- I didn’t-”

  I stopped and just shook my head, letting my gaze finally drop as I squeezed my eyes shut. It still felt too strange to let myself cry in front of someone. “I can’t bring him back. But Sarai might still be alive.”

  “Izak, you’re saying-” Adaline began, but then cut herself off. “We’ll be allowed to go on the mission once Drianthenes decides it’s necessary.”

  I managed to swallow back my tears in desperation and anger, so I could look up and meet her gaze. “And when will that be? After this next sacrifice is done? After he accelerates whatever ritual you’re talking about to get ahead of the Hands? Weeks? Months?”

  “Well,” Adaline said. She was the one who looked away now. “It might be sooner, if he decides the information Theo had was too important.”

  “And even if he authorizes something like that, he thinks Sarai is dead, and they don’t care about Nalei here. Will they be a priority, rescuing them and keeping them safe? Or will it be about wiping out the Hands and whatever info they have, and screw the consequences?”

  Adaline threw her hands in the air in a motion of frustration. She kept her voice from getting too loud, to keep it in the tent. But the angry helplessness bled into her words: “And what do you expect me to do!?”

  I leaned forward. “Is there any way we can rescue them?”

  She glanced up at me, over to the tattoo on my neck, and back to me. Her voice dropped into a near whisper and she leaned in close. “If we tried to leave, Drianthenes would cut off our magic. We wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

  Interesting. Not a denial of our ability to escape at all, instead worry about what would happen if we got out. No matter what Maggie or anyone else said, Adaline believed that it was possible to leave.

  I dropped my own voice to match hers. “I’ll have my magic back in two weeks. I made a deal with Maggie, in agreement for being cooperative.”

  “You- oh!” Her eyes darted to the tattoo on my neck again, and she put a hand out over the mark, not touching my skin. I could see the magic shift inside her, though she didn’t cast any spells. “Oh. I see.”

  Her voice was thoughtful when she leaned back. She was nodding to herself, and that gave me hope.

  “You do?” I asked.

  “You should try to be sick and nervous after dinner,” Adaline said. There was a calculating look in her eyes. “Eat as much as you can. Try to make yourself throw up. If you do it anywhere near Friedrich he’ll have you rushed away. That’s all I’ll say out loud.”

  I nodded. My only choice was to trust her. “Okay.”

  “And don’t think about this,” she warned. “Think about the sacrifice. Think about your nervousness. Think about how gross it is to see me act romantic or how scared you are of Drianthenes, but not this. Think about Adain. Think about anything that will…”

  She trailed off, frowning as she searched for a word.

  “Anything that will distract me?” I suggested.

  “Yes,” she said, “especially emotionally. Anything that will create emotional noise. Emotions are the most evident things.”

  I nodded, my heart beating hard in my chest. I felt like I was nothing but emotions, so that shouldn’t be too hard.

  “I need to go finish the bandages before Maggie gets back, or she’ll wonder,” Adaline said. “It’ll help me think, anyway. You should try to sleep or something.”

  “Sure,” I said. I couldn’t imagine anything less possible than sleep. Still, I went off to curl up in one of the mats as Adaline turned back to her bandages.

  I laid down on the soft mat and felt my heart beat so hard that I could feel it in my teeth and toes. My mind was all anxious white noise.

  “They wouldn’t kill you for secretly being a girl, you know.”

  Adaline’s voice made me jump. She spoke softly, but her voice carried in the small tent.

  “What?” I asked, genuinely baffled.

  “You said if the Heirs found out…” she trailed off and shook her head. “They wouldn’t kill you. You’re a talented Mage. They’d probably just marry you off. They did it to a couple of girls a few years ago who they found them dallying together, they married them off as second wives to two different men. They weren’t the nicest of men, but they weren’t killed. So they probably wouldn’t kill you.”

  Her own voice sounded unsure in her reassurance. I didn’t tell her that this actually sounded much worse to me than a clean death. Now the anxious fog in my brain had another horrible future to think about. Another horrible way things could go wrong.

  “Oh,” I managed. I glanced up at her from my sleeping mat, but she was looking away. “I wouldn’t risk it, still.”

  “Ah,” she said. “Fair. I’ll, uh, keep thinking then.”

  “Yeah, I’ll… meditate,” I said awkwardly. “Silently. To heal my magic.”

  “Righ,.” she said. “Right, I’ll just… I’ll just be working on bandages.”

  The tent descended into desperate, awkward silence.

  I closed my eyes and found my thoughts spinning, far from the quiet I needed to meditate on the magic within me. Guilt, hope, fear, shame, determination, anger. My mind flicked between memories of Oblivion Isle, memories of Adain, and memories of the huge, beautiful tree surrounded by blood red grass. Drianthenes’s cold eyes. Adaline’s terrifying reassurances about what the Cult would do to me.

  I hoped Adaline knew what she was doing, because she was the only hope I had.

  It took a long time to clear my mind for meditation. Shamora used to tell me I would be better at meditation if I took the time to touch on and look through each of my feelings and concerns instead of shoving them away, but she didn’t understand how good I was at mentally tidying away the things that weren’t relevant.

  I managed meditation eventually.