Page 17 of The Iron Flower

I shrug, having heard the story countless times, its drama dulled by repetition. “She rode into battle on a giant raven and struck down the demons with a river of Magefire. Then she led my people across a desert to safety. We’ve a holiday every year commemorating her victory, just before Yule—Gallianalein.The Ironflower Festival. The dance just happens to fall on it this year.”

“Hmm,” Jarod says thoughtfully. He looks around. “Well, if you’re going to build a festival around a flower, you certainly picked a beautiful one.” There’s a hint of rapture in his tone, a devotion that’s often there when he and his sister Diana talk about the natural world.

As he studies the Ironwood decor more closely, Jarod frowns. “They had to kill all these trees to do this.” He glances at me, deep disapproval all over his face.

“I suppose they did.” I survey the boughs and the potted trees cut free of their roots, abashed by the way my earth affinity is pulling toward all the dead wood.

Hungryfor it.

“It’s incredibly strange, all this,” Jarod comments. “Why do you Gardnerians build everything to look like fake forests, while you hate actuallivingforests and revel in burning them down?”

“It’s part of our religion.” I shift uncomfortably. “We’re meant to subdue the wilds. They’re supposedly filled with the spirit of the Evil Ones.”

Offense flashes in his eyes. “Charming. Truly.”

I think of the hostile trees. Whispering to me on the wind. Sensing the magic in my veins...

“And you know what’s stranger still?” he asks.

I shake my head and look to him questioningly.

Jarod scans the expansive hall. “Most of the couples in this room do not want to be with each other.”

My brow lifts in surprise. “Really?”

“More than half. It’s awful.” Jarod points out several ill-matched couples in a rare showing of his Lupine senses. Then he points out the many true attractions that run completely counter to how the couples are paired. He gestures toward a tall, slender military apprentice in a slate gray uniform marked with a silver orb. He’s standing next to a pretty, young Gardnerian woman, the two of them with fastmarked hands.

“You see that man over there?” I nod. Jarod then points at another young man—a muscular mariner’s apprentice, his black tunic edged with a line of Ironflower blue. “Those two men, they’re madly in love with each other. I can feel it from all the way over here.”

Surprise flashes through me, and I observe the two young men more closely. Soon, I can pick out a few surreptitious, heat-filled glances. It’s subtle, but there. I immediately think of my brother Trystan, desperately wishing that he was able to love freely, but scared about what would happen to him if he did.

“They’d be thrown in prison if they were found out,” I tell Jarod, knowing he’s probably already sensed my fear for Trystan’s safety.

Jarod’s blond brow furrows. “I don’t understand your people. You take perfectly natural and normal things and write religious laws that state they’re unnatural. Which is absurd.”

Surprise takes hold. “You allow this in Lupine society? Men with men?”

“Of course.” He’s looking at me with a mixture of pity and concern. “It’s incredibly cruelto treat people this way.”

“There’s nothing in your religion that condemns it?” I ask, stunned.Nothing that condemns my beloved brother? Or forces people to hide who they really are?

Jarod studies me closely, perhaps reading my suddenly troubled emotions. “Elloren,” he says with compassion, “no, there’s not. At all.”

Tears sting my eyes, and I have to look away from him. “So, Trystan would be completely accepted for who he is in Lupine lands?” My voice breaks around the whispered words.

Jarod hesitates, an expression of dismay knotting his brow tighter. “Yes. But...he’d have to become Lupine first.”

I throw Jarod a caustic look. “Which would strip him of his Mage powers, since Lupines are immune to wand magic.” I shake my head ruefully. “He’s a Level Five Mage, Jarod. It’s become an important part of who he is. He’d never want to lose that.”

Jarod nods gravely, and anger on my brother’s behalf spikes inside me. “So, there’s nowhere for him to go, then. Nowhere he can be himself and not be vilified for it.”

“Only the Noi lands,” Jarod says quietly, but we both know that the Noi people aren’t likely to welcome the grandson of the Black Witch into their lands. I inwardly curse the cage that the people of both Realms have forced my brother into.

“Do your people have dances?” I ask a tad crossly, frustrated by the wretched state of things and struggling to regain my composure.

Jarod looks out over the hall, his expression edged with contempt. “No. Not like this. Our dancing...it’s more of a spontaneous thing. And the way your people dance...it’s so...stiff.Our music has a strong rhythm to it, and when our couples dance, it’s very close. Not like this. This is like a child’s dance.”

A flush heats my neck as a picture of Lupine couples fills my mind, twined around each other, moving sensuously to the rhythm of the music.

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