Page 126 of The Shadow Wand

PRIVATE FOREST

ELLOREN GREY

Sixth Month

Valgard, Gardneria

Lukas and I enter our Sealing reception under heavy guard. Two Level Five Mage soldiers stride before us, four keeping close to our heels as we enter the estate’s huge glass-enclosed arboretum. Anxiety, sharp and acrid, burns through my chest, my sense of mortal threat so all-encompassing that it’s beginning to feel like calm.

Lukas holds tight to my wand hand and I cling just as tightly to him, keeping our magic fused in a shield over my lines as we step into the greenhouse-contained forest. Countless trees are spread out before us, the path beneath our feet seamlessly cobbled with gleaming obsidian stone. Deep-green light emanates from emerald glass lanterns hung from the trees’ branches and mottles the indoor forest with an otherworldly latticework of shadow and verdant light, the scene undeniably beautiful.

But nothing can dampen my turbulent unease.

My deeper well of magic roils with volatile force just under the shield Lukas wove around my lines, battering relentlessly against it. Lukas’s strong magic sizzles over my power like a densely woven net, holding my power firmly at bay and protecting me from the storm of magic in the room as the diffuse miasma of power emanating from the surrounding high-level Mages strains to get in.

But still, Lukas’s shield isn’t able to protect me from one of the most dangerous things in this whole estate.

Myself.

Because my hunger for wood has grown savage.

My hand tenses around Lukas’s to stave off my shockingly ramped-up desire to grab hold of every piece of wood my eyes light on.

Every branch.

Every tree trunk.

The Ironwood frame of the arboretum.

Everywand.

Vogel’s changed my power in some intrinsic way; I’m sure of it. When he touched his Shadow Wand to my hand and invaded my lines with his terrifying magic, he quickened my fledgling ability to sense power and made me more vulnerable at the same time. If I release my hold on Lukas and his power, I can feel Lukas’s shield begin to degrade like a net unraveling as the power around me pummels in.

I keep a tight grip on Lukas as I glance around the arboretum. My leaf-patterned skirts swish around me, glittering in the emerald light, the smell of greenery lush on the air. I’m surrounded by a decadent variety of trees, some of which I’ve never seen before but have envisioned when touching their wood, now suddenly magnificently before me in all their branching glory.

Rainbow Eucalyptus trees from the Salish Islands with color-striped trunks.

Dragon’s Blood trees with dramatically upturned crowns.

Uriskal Beech trees draped in gauzy moss.

Lukas and I pass under a grove of Alfsigr Wisteria trees in full bloom, their fragrant silver flowers hanging down in pendulous, emerald-tinted clusters, the trees so beautiful they make my heart ache, even in this dire situation.

With their roots pruned and cut off from the wilds, these trees have no hatred emanating from them. Only a palpable curiosity and a gentle murmuring as I pass, like the feathery brush of a light wind.

Dryad.

Remorse takes hold as I think of the small tree from the Sealing ceremony and its rush of love. How it embraced me as a Dryad only to find itself in the clutches of tree-killing monsters. The nightmarish memory of Lukas exploding the miniature tree makes me wince, and I have to battle back the rise of a disorienting conflict.

I glance up at the branching wisteria canopy, suddenly struck by the realization that it would be the perfect place for an assassin to hide and creep over me through the tangle of limbs. Thierren said he’d tell Lukas about the attack, but did he?

We near the edge of the forest and my chest tightens.

Lukas meets my fraught gaze with a look that reads,Are you ready?I tighten my grip on him and nod.

We emerge from the trees, and applause breaks out as we’re faced with a huge green-lit crowd of Mages who all rise to their feet and call out congratulations as we stride down the center aisle. They’re gathered around multiple tables that fill the luxurious open space at the western edge of the arboretum. An orchestra is assembled just behind the crowd and in front of the greenhouse’s huge glass wall, a dance floor just before it.

The tables are covered in raw silk dyed a rich forest green and set with cut-glass goblets and gleaming black china. Candelabras fashioned from small polished trees stripped of their leaves stand in the center of each table, their candles magicked to send out a green-fire glow.

---