Page 10 of Fate's Sweetest Curse
We were seated around a narrow table in the back corner of Fenrir’s Charm, the tavern that adepts frequented. Across the street, a raucous clamor of metal and voices came from Fenrir’s Ire, the tavern where knights spent their off time. If I had learned anything in the past two months as an apprentice at the Collegium, it was the willful disconnect between the academic Orders and the weapon-wielding Orders.
“You just like my concoctails because they’re free,” I said.
Uriel threw back the rest of the golden liquid. “That certainly does not hurt.”
In my first week living at the Collegium, I’d made my signature “concoctions to avail merriment” for my new roommates: mixtures of spirits, citrus, herbal bitters, and syrup. While winning friends with alcohol wasn’t the mostgenuinetactic, it did promote bonding. It took only one late night of giggle fits and tales from our trips here for our friendship to blossom (Sani, a scent magician, had traveled from Lothgaim, while Uriel, a touch magician, hailed all the way from central Tuul). Amidst the uncertainty of moving to a strange city and the sudden rigor of my studies, their friendship made my homesickness for Waldron tolerable.
I pointed a thumb over my shoulder, toward the overcrowded room. “I’m going to mingle. Want to come?”
Sani hiccupped, eyes going wide.
“Why would we do that?” Uriel asked.
“Because it’s why we’re here?”
Fenrir’s Charm was currently filled to the brim with professors and apprentices like ourselves for an official gathering put on by the academic Orders. The event was meant to give students the chance to make connections, but the three of us had been rooted in our corner all night.
Unlike knights—who, aside from the Mighty, usually received the bulk of their trainingafterjoining their Order—adepts earned their roles with vast amounts of studying and testing. Even so, only about one in thirty apprentices managed to earn an Adept Oath and access the exclusive knowledge, prestige, and power that entailed.
I was not here for prestige or power; while it would take me only six months to receive my apothecary license, Uriel and Sani’s pursuits of adepthood—with the Order of the Arcane and Archives, respectively—would take years. Gaining a mentor would greatly increase their chances of succeeding.
But Uriel scoffed. “Mingling will not make me a better adept.”
“Connections could help you gain a better mentorship, though,” I pointed out.
Sani bobbed her head. “Hattie has a point.”
Uriel lifted her chin, the hoop in her left nostril flashing in the orange glow of the surrounding sconces. “I do not seeyoumingling,” she said, pinning Sani with a pointed glare. With her shaved head, piercings, and persistent smirk, Uriel was by no meansapproachable—but she was unapologetically herself, which I admired. “Besides,” she added tartly, “my merit is not predicated on my friendliness.”
“You should thank the Fates for that,” Sani quipped.
Uriel gave her a playful shove that had Sani teetering on her stool.
“What about you, Sani?” I asked. “Want to come?”
She wrinkled her nose. “In truth, I’d rather be reading.”
“Weknow,” Uriel quipped.
All three of us giggled.
Sani was Uriel’s opposite, with cautious eyes and birdlike features. While Uriel could pass as a knight if only she carried a sword, Sani looked just as delicate and bookish as the archivists she idolized.
“Well, unlike you two, I’m feeling social,” I said, tossing back the last of my cider—a Maronan brew, too sweet for my taste—before hopping off my stool. I didn’t need a mentor to receive an apothecary license, but Iwashere to learn.
Uriel tipped her empty glass in my direction, as if to say,Suit yourself.
“Have fun,” Sani sang in a teasing lilt, sounding content to watch from her quiet corner.
I flashed them a cheeky grin, then turned, trying not to lose my nerve as I wound my way through the crowded pub in search of a conversation to join.
I might’ve read every book on alchemy I could get my hands on, had been studying herbs since I was a girl, and knew enough magic weaving to turn tinctures into potions, but compared to my fellow classmates—all much younger than me, who’d already mastered techniques I’d only read about—I felt out of place.
Extremely grateful, enthusiastic, intimidated—and out of place.
My self-doubt was probably a remnant of an adolescence filled with guardians, governesses, and tutors all telling me that alchemy was an improper trade for someone of my lineage. No amount of time, distance, or self-awareness had dispelled the constant and unshakable cloud cast by those long-ago voices telling me all the things I wasn’t allowed to love.
Herbology.
