Page 34 of Ash and Feather

I was not afraid of change or power or anything else.

I couldn’t be. I had no time to think of the past me, or grieve the loss of her, or wonder what might have become of her if she’d survived taking a knife to her heart. I was not a mortal. Not an elf.

I was—as Zachar had called me—a goddess.

He had said it mockingly, but it still resonated. It was simultaneously like a beautiful song stuck in my head and a splinter under my skin that would not stop aching.

It was the first time someone other than Dravyn had called me a goddess.

Goddess.

Did becoming one require me to burn away all that I’d been before? To starve her of oxygen? Every part of her? Or…how did one decide what was meant to stay, and what was meant to go?

I focused on the rhythmic clipping and clopping of Zell’s hooves rather than the questions battering my brain, letting the sound lull me into a restless sort of daze.

On and on we galloped, until Zell suddenly slowed, his head lifting toward the sky.

I knew why he’d slowed. I’d felt it, too: Something powerful crossing overhead, heading in the same direction we were.

“Dravyn is back, isn’t he?” Power surged through me as I said the words, my magic rising and stretching as if just awakened from a deep sleep. Magic that felt both certain and wild, capable and unpredictable.

I wanted more than anything to be near him now, wrapped up in his arms. To feel the magic passing between us like a shared breath, a heartbeat I didn’t even have to think about.

As I stared at the sky, an idea struck me.

I wanted to be near him.More than anything. Isn’t that what Mairu said I needed? A clear vision, a clear feeling about where I wanted to go.

Little else felt clear to me at the moment aside from Dravyn.

He was not a place, but he felt like home, and where could I trust my magic to carry me to, if not home?

“I’m going to try one more time,” I warned Zell.

A shudder rippled through the selakir; maybe a touch of concern on my behalf. But he kneeled without protest and let me slide easily from his back, giving me an encouraging nudge with his nose as I found my balance.

I started the same way I had so many times today: deep breaths, letting flames rise around me and swallow me up, beginning with my fingers.

“No panicking,” I reminded myself.

Bit by bit and breath by breath, I turned once more to flames, and then to smoke, and then tonothing.

Again I was untethered, terrifyingly light and aimless for what felt like several minutes.

Darkness prevailed once more; I still could not see the path between where I was and where I wanted to go. It still made no sense, all this floating in between nonsense. No way of properly mapping it all out, no way of leaving a trail to find my way back to my starting point…

But maybe, just this once, I didn’t need a map.

It felt like stepping off a cliff while wearing a blindfold, but I did it.

I let go.

Chapter 10

Karys

The descent backinto my physical body was less jarring this time—and less painful—because Dravyn was there to catch me.

Or to break my fall, at least.

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