Page 80 of Wings of Ebony
Magic wielders are encouraged to practice spells in an environment with flame-resistant, incombustible, etc. walls, as misfiring a spell often ends up in literal fire (a translation complication between the close meaning of the words). Do not attempt new spells in the vicinity of precious objects.
Oh, now they tell me.
“Ah!!” Flames dance from Bri’s fingertips and she’s beaming. She wiggles her fingers. “I did it. Jon’ye’s spell!”
“Told you!” We do a handshake thing I’ve been teaching her.
“I mean, I knew it,” she says.
“Knew what?”
“If you could do it, of course I could.”
Huh? I mean, Iamnew here. Maybe that’s what she means. I wait for her to say more, but she’s back eyeballs deep in studying.
CHAPTER 26
AASIM IS AHEAD OFme following Bati deeper into the mountain, down a set of stairs carved into the rock. The farther we go the colder it gets. I told Bati on the way here that the cuff speaks to me, like it has something to say, and he didn’t laugh, actually. He had said two cuffs, a pair, were forged by the village Elders.
“But to hear their message, you may need both together,” Bati had said. “And we have its pair in the bowels of our lair.”
“The Chancellor is the ‘magic-giver,’ I say. “Zrukis and Dweginis worship and follow him because of it. And the magic was never his?” This is still so hard to believe.
“Never,” Aasim says, firelight casting an orange glow on the silver in his locs. “He took it from us… somehow…”
He and Bati share a look, but I miss what it means.
“And then he stored it in the onyx he found here. Onyx sticks to magic really well. One thing’s for sure, as much magic as he expends imbuing onyx on Designation Days, he has to be refilling it somehow. No way anyone uses magic—”
“Stolenmagic.” Bati chimes in.
“Exactly—that often without a problem.”
They share that look again and I shift on my feet. There’s something I’m missing. “But h-how did he do it? Was your history written down anywhere? As proof to show people?”
“Our complete history, I’m afraid, we do not know in great detail,” Bati says. “Only what those of us who made it here can remember. And no, it wouldn’t be written, would it? Who expects their history to be erased?” Our procession deeper into the cave halts and Bati has a far-off look. “I do recall pieces of conversations I picked up from my own father when I was a boy.”
Aasim sets a hand on his shoulder.
“He was not one of the lucky ones,” Bati continues. “He was too old to run and never made it here. The Elders, though, they knew much, but many of them perished of the Sickness before the Chancellor even came.”
“And the ones who didn’t?” I ask.
Bati glances at my cuff. “That’s a whole other story for another time, I’m afraid. Why don’t we keep going, shall we?”
So many questions. So many things I don’t understand. I can see words are on the tip of Bati’s tongue, like he’s wondering how much to say. What to tell me and when.
“Please go on. I want to understand,” I say.
He looks to Aasim, who nods in response. “Understand me now, child, I was very young. The wisps of what I remember being told are no more than cobwebs pulled to pieces over the years.” He sighs. “We grew up in secret. Not here of course. Out there on our land, where the stars shone down on us at night and the sun coated our backs in sweat during the day. Our tribe was small but advanced, gifted with magic of the gods themselves. We knew there wereothers on the island, but we kept away from them so they wouldn’t know about our abilities, what we could do. Wars have been fought for less. We cloaked our piece of the land in a veil of protection, making it impossible to find us unless you knew we were there. And no one did. For generations. Until…” He steadies himself on the rocky stairwell.
This memory unsettles him. Scares him even.
He goes on. “The other tribes on the island had heard whispers of a brown-skinned magical people, I would bet. But no more than a myth, lore to lull children to sleep at night. But when the humans came from th-that place you are from…”
“America?”
“Sure. Strange objects floated in the sky at times late at night. And one day a group of men showed up scouting, hunger in their eyes. We came out from our veil and banded together with the other tribes on the island to get rid of the scouts. But by then the damage had been done. The human visitors were gone, but the other tribes saw we were no myth, saw what we could do. As a gesture of peace and friendship, we extended our cloaking veil to shield the entire island, so no one—unless they’d already been here—could find us again.
