Page 36 of A Fate Unwoven
She’d beenso closeto escaping her fate. To escaping the gilded prison the Ehmar heir had waiting for her.
Now she was planning to step into it willingly.
A part of her had wanted to deny what Venysa had said. To turn back around and take up Casimir’s offer of freedom. But she’d known by the renewed strength of the bond between her and Dimas that the first Fateweaver wasn’t lying. Before, the connection had been weak and easy to ignore. Now it felt like a fist around her heart, its grip growing tighter the harder she tried to deny it.
And so, once the storm had passed, she’d dragged herself through the forest, the rustle of leaves and the constant hum of the Fateweaver’s magic in her bones her only companions as she made her way back to the abandoned, decrepit village she and the smuggler had passed just the day before. It was the first place she’d thought of when her plan began to form; it was identifiable if one asked around, but still secluded enough that she’d be putting no civilians in danger should something go wrong.
She’d never been here before, but the small huts and the stone well in the center of the village reminded her fiercely of traveling through the villages back in the Wilds. Had this place once been filled with people gathered around campfires, telling stories to bring them hope? Had it been abandoned due to the unforgiving storms this close to the Frozen Wastes? Or, as was the case with some of the smaller villagers in the Wilds, had the Empire’s Fist slaughtered its citizens for practicing the Old Ways?
If the broken shrine Lena had come across in the home she’d taken shelter in was any indication, Lena guessed it was the latter.
She’d sat beside that shrine, her hands folding around a small, splintered idol of Sister Læda as she’d stared up at the stars through the hut’s cracked roof.
Her mother had once said that when a person died, their soul found its way to a realm just beyond the living world, where it would watch over those it had left behind until it was time for it to return in the body of another. Lena had always held on to the belief; for the first few months after her mother had died, she’d spoken to her spirit every night. She’d lost the habit as she’d gotten older, as the harshness of life in the Wilds and the ache of not hearing her mother answer back had made the act too painful.
“Mada.”
The word had come out quietly, a whisper lost against the rustling of leaves. “Mada, if you can hear me … I’m scared.”
Lena had waited for the memory of her mother’s voice to respond, for the warnings that had been with her all her life to echo through her mind, but there was nothing but silence.
Lena was alone. She would always be alone.
Not always,her own mind had replied.Not if you break the bond.
She knew her mother would understand. That if it were Kelia Vesthir who had a chance at freeing the Fateweaver from the empire’s control and creating a better life for her people, she wouldn’t hesitate. And so, Lena couldn’t either.
If there was a way to break her bond to Wyrecia’s heir, then she was going to search for it. She was going to do whatever it took to earn her—and her people’s—freedom. But if the ritual really was buried beneath the imperial city, then Lena could think of only one sure way to get to it.
She was going to have to become the Fateweaver.
It was her only choice. As Fateweaver, she’d be inside the palace itself. She would have access to the Fateweaver’s chambers and a direct link to the emperor. Lena didn’t know a lot about rituals, but in the old stories, both the emperor and the Fateweaver had been present when the bond had been formed. It stood to reason, then, that she’d need the Ehmar heir there when she tried to break it.
All her mother had ever wanted was for the people of Wyrecia to have hope. For them to believe in a world where the only thing with the power to alter their fate was the choices they made. She’d dedicated her life to it, carrying the old stories with her from village to village. And when she’d died, Lena had made a vow to carry on that work. To fight for the world her mother believed in, no matter how much easier it would be to give up and accept her fate. It was why she’d run when she’d found out she was the next Fateweaver. Why she hated the magic coursing through her veins. Not because she feared it, but because she feared what it would make her become.
Breaking the bond between an emperor and a Fateweaver wouldn’t rid her of that magic, but the emperor would no longer be able to control it. To controlher.
And maybe, without the power of the Fateweaver on their side, the Ehmars’ reign would finally come to an end.
It was a risk. But it was one her mother would have taken. And so when she’d felt the prince’s consciousness at the edges of her thoughts, Lena had done the one thing she’d been trying so hard not to do.
She had let the prince in.
It had been … different than the other times he’d triggered their connection. Stronger. Before, she’d caught a glimpse of his surroundings, too. This time, it was as if the prince was in the small run-down home with her, looming behind her like a shadow. The sensation had been so strong she’d had to curl her fingers into the ground to stop herself from turning to look. Thankfully, the prince hadn’t lingered in her consciousness for long.
When it was over, Lena had forced herself to her feet, the pain behind her eyes making her stomach churn. Her legs had given out by the time she’d stumbled into the hut, and she’d had just enough sense left to slam the door shut behind her before the world went dark.
Someone was calling her name.
She recognized the voice. The way they overpronounced thenin Lena. Consciousness returned to her in jagged pieces. The hard earth beneath her body. The dull ache in her head. The memory of the prince’s presence inside of her mind.
Lena shot up, and the person hovering over her cursed as they stumbled back, boots scuffing against the wooden floor. Instinct had her reaching for a blade that wasn’t there.
“Lena, it’s me!”
She paused, the last of the exhausted haze clearing from her eyes as the stranger drew back his hood. As she took in the familiar shape of a bow-like mouth and the warming gaze of hazel-green eyes.
“Finæn?”
