Page 37 of Steeling Light
His arms are around my waist. Wings so large they have to be from a dragon hold us aloft. Dozens of fleshy vines hang from his waist, keeping the trough suspended where I held it. And he’s smiling. “Ainslee, you need a bath. You look like a chimney sweep who wasn’t told that the fire was still lit.”
“I…” I whisper, and everything goes black.
Chapter 20
The Moonlit Pools are most commonly visited by new lovers, their unique effects amplifying a budding connection. Yet, the true secret to their popularity is that they are not aphrodisiacs; they simply bring out the truest desires within a person.
~Countess Alyth Corvanne, A Visitor’s Guide to Selithar
Rhion
Gods, I can’t believe she carried that trough. A normal Steel soldier would have struggled with it, and she’s only half-blooded. For the hundredth time, I wonder whose bloodline she’s from because whoever her father is, he would certainly be an asset as a soldier.
She’s burned everywhere. Her clothes caught fire, and she must not have even noticed. The burns are bad, but the scalding is worse. There are pieces of her skin, especially along her arms where she was holding the trough, that have sloughed off completely, and her muscles are showing.
If she didn’t have House of Steel blood in her, I’d be worried she wouldn’t survive this. With her bloodline, I know she’ll survive, but without medicines that I don’t have, she’ll be forced to live with scars that will cover her entire body. She’s lying on a bed at the inn she just saved, stripped bare as I examine her wounds. The door is barred, and I know what I have to do.
I pull out the bag of spellstones I keep with me at all times on the offhand chance that I need them. Kept in a tiny bag, the silver stones that are barely larger than a bead hold the magical essence of a fallen Steel soldier. I personally collected these from the men and women I lost during the Shattering. They’re the last five Steel spellstones I know of. Every other soldier had been left too long after their death to collect their essence.
I pour them into my hand and hold them to my lips. Softly, I mutter an awakening incantation, one of the first bits of enchanting I learned as a child. The magic inside them stirs, yearning for purpose. It’s not very much, and it certainly can’t help Ainslee, but I can use it to do something no one has ever done before. At least, I hope I can.
That bit of magical power outside my body can create a bridge that the rest of my power can cross. My powers allow me to do things only my father can rival in the manipulation of the physical body.
I take the smallest breath from the air around the spellstones, and for the briefest of moments, their power is both inside and outside me. Without breathing, I whisper a command, and the magical essence flows from the spellstones into Ainslee’s mouth.
With every bit of control I have, I reach across that bridge. I can feel every burn, every charred bit of flesh, and the powers of the Prince of Steel take control, ferreting them out and shifting them into healthy flesh. Every single wound heals in the blink of an eye as my power is siphoned from me into her.
Her eyes flash open and center on me. “Rhion,” she says, and her voice is like a caress. I’d been terrified I couldn’t heal her. I’ve never done anything like that before.
“I’m here,” I say and run my hand along her cheek. “You’re okay now.”
She blinks twice and says, “I feel strange. Rhion, what did you do? My body feels… odd. Like it’s not mine.” She looks down and sees that she’s completely naked. She immediately covers up with her freshly healed arms.
I turn away from her. “I’m sorry. I needed to take off your clothes to heal you. Your pack is at the foot of the bed.”
There’s a bit of shuffling around as Ainslee gets up and goes to her pack. Then she stops and says, “Wait. How did you heal me? I was burned. Badly. You… You’re the Prince of Steel. You can’t heal anyone.”
I glance over at her, and she’s still standing, her clothes balled in a hand as she stares at me. This time, she doesn’t cover up. “How’d you heal me, Rhion?” she demands.
“Spellstones,” I say. “I… I used spellstones to create a bridge between us, and then I used my powers to heal your wounds because, for that brief moment, your body was my body.”
Shock covers her face. “That’s… that’s not possible. Is it? Steel powers can’t work on anyone else. Can other people do it? How’d you learn to do that?”
I chuckle at her barrage of questions, but my eyes can’t help but roam over her body, truly taking it in for the first time. She notices, but she doesn’t turn away. “I don’t think anyone else has ever done it before,” I admit. “Most Steel powers can’t heal effectively. I can do things others can’t, but the real thing that limits how often it can be done is the scarcity of Steel spellstones.”
“Could you do it again? If someone was hurt, could you heal them?”
I shake my head. “I don’t have any more spellstones, and I don’t know anyone who has more.”
She sighs and frowns. She’s obviously considering something, but she doesn’t speak her thoughts. Instead, she walks across the room, her clothes still bunched in her hand. Reaching up on her tiptoes, she presses her body against mine, and she kisses me. Not the passionate kind that we had that night at the Pools, but one of tenderness, of soft feelings. “Thank you,” she whispers.
Then she steps back, and says, “Now turn around so I can get dressed. There’s a difference between being naked after someone saves and heals you, and being naked and awkward trying to put on my pants.”
And this time, instead of feeling uncomfortable, I chuckle as I turn around. The sound of her clothes moving makes me hungry for her, for the things that her eyes had whispered of that night before I left.
But I know I can’t push for anything more. Today is the day that she’s supposed to talk to Maerlix. That means that by tonight, she’ll probably be leaving Selithar.
And our month of happiness will be over.
