She pressed her ear to the door, hoping that her aunt hadn’t shielded it against sound as well, luckily, it seemed Silver hadn’t moved far away from the door before she’d been caught by Keenan.
“She’s not fully mature yet.” Asha heard Keenan say.
“She’s only a few days away at my best guess.” Silver replied. “At the moment she’ll be subject to every impulse her rebellious teenage self can come up with. I didn’t sign up to deal with this phase of her development, hence she’s staying right where she is.”
“Romana’s going to kill us.” Keenan muttered. “I don’t suppose we can glamour her for a few years? Pretend this never happened?”
“Glamour can’t affect general size.” Silver dismissed the idea. “We could cast an illusion of a little girl on her, but the moment anyone waved their hand over the illusion’s head, they’d realise that she was really far taller. Asha has to tell her mother the truth, and Romana will see that as Asha not wanting to spend time with her. There’s going to be a deep rift of hurt between them now if Asha can’t come up with a convincing lie.”
Asha stopped listening and strode across the room, landing face first on the bed with a groan of frustration.
A week later, and her confinement still hadn’t ended. She’d tried everything possible; her yelled suggestions through the door were quickly dismissed by her melodramatic aunt who picked holes in every lie she came up with. She’d banged on the doors and slammed at the shields covering the window. Heck, she’d even tried to slip past Lena at mealtimes.
Nothing she’d done had gotten her any closer to freedom, and she quickly began to resent the wings on her back, useless as they were. She’d tried to hover around the room, but her muscles were underdeveloped, and she’d only ended up causing herself pain as she tried to put her whole weight onto the previously unused wings.
Now, she sat slumped against the door, her wings safely encased in the slots on her back, contemplating ideas. One of her tutors had once told her that ideas were a cheap commodity, what people really needed were good ideas, and even more, the ability to discern good ideas from the cheap ones. That would have been a cool power to have, she thought, staring at the folds in the velvet drapes on her bed. Unfortunately, though she’d been able to summon stutters of the increased strength, speed and senses that her mother and aunt had, she hadn’t yet come up with any brilliant magical powers.
“Why can’t I tell her I asked to grow up so I could get my powers?” Asha yelled through the door, not expecting a response to her half-hearted idea.
She was surprised when the door to flew open, shoving her across the room as her aunt strode in.
“It could work.” She mused. “It’s a childish motive, and by that I mean that it’s purely selfish and curious.” Asha felt the sudden urge to flinch under her aunt’s haunted glare.
The one thing she could say about her punishment was that it had hurt Silver almost as much as it had hurt her. Her aunt had remained in the fortress for the full length of her confinement, rejecting each idea, snorting at every single escape attempt. Asha could see the bruises under her eyes from the lack of sleep as she paced back and forth. Even angry as she had been, she could still recall the time she’d watched through the keyhole as Keenan came and lifted a sleeping Silver from the hallway to carry her to bed as if Asha’s volatile, bloodthirsty aunt was a delicate princess.
Silver ceased her pacing abruptly and turned to grab Asha’s wrist, feeling for the pulse that from her studies of the elves, Asha knew grew faster when immortality set in.
“You’ll be fully mature in the next few hours.” Silver informed her. “You will bathe, put on something appropriate to meet your parents in and meet me in the hallway in two hours’ time. Any deviation from these instructions, any flicker of those wings, will earn you a one way ticket back into that room and you will not leave until you are into your third century, am I clear?”
Asha didn’t doubt the promise in Silver’s words.
“Crystal.” She replied, keeping her head bowed and her eyes down, hoping Silver took the sign of submission for what it was, a half-apology which she wouldn’t ever speak. She couldn’t apologise for what she’d done; she didn’t regret it. She hated that her actions would hurt her family, and her mother would feel left out, but she loved her wings and finally not looking like a child anymore.
Silver left and Asha hastened to obey. She hated that her aunt just expected the argument to be over with the issuing of a few orders. Nothing had been resolved; there were still the echoing feelings of annoyance, guilt, anger and pain.
She snorted as she paused in her search of the wardrobe. What had she been expecting? The Silver Eyed Wytch didn’t explain herself to anyone, nor did she apologise for her actions. There was something to envy about being able to do that, about being able to strut in with authority, slam down anyone who came against you and walk out having owned the place.
She shook her head; that much power over people may be tempting, but her mother had always said absolute power tainted a person and came with a price. In Silver’s case, the price was her sanity.
When she met her aunt, Silver was standing stoically by her door, her weapons decorating her like glinting testaments to her skill. She caught Asha staring at them and snorted.
“Your decision just meant it’s going to take even longer before I let you touch anything bladed.” Silver informed her.
“So does that mean I can use clubs and whips?” Asha asked hopefully, earning a look of distain as she followed her aunt through the caves and out of the front doors of the fortress where two dark horses waited for them.
“Your decision to wear armour,” Silver began, as they swung up into the saddles. “Was that a result of my telling you to wear clothes appropriate to meet your parents?”
“It was a decision to show them who I truly am.” Asha replied. “I’m not a little girl anymore; dressing like one won’t help with the shock.”
“Wear a cloak.” Silver ordered. “Your mother will accuse me of corrupting you as it is. It’ll escalate to brainwashing you if she sees you wearing leather armour.”
Asha nodded, and her wytch clothes morphed till she wore a long grey travelling cloak.
“You are fond of the colour of your wings then?” Roan asked as he rode up beside them his face obscured by a hooded cloak. “I’ve been told Keenan and I are to come along to testament on my sister’s behalf should your mother believe she has allowed some demon to control you.”
Sure enough the platinum haired fey halfling rode up seconds later giving her aunt a single shared glance that spoke more than a simple kiss of greeting ever would. Silver responded by reaching out briefly, as if to touch him, then drawing her hand back at the last moment. Keenan smiled at the gesture, finding some humour in it that only he understood, and pulled up the scarf round his neck to cover his nose and mouth before pulling up a hood over his hair.
Silver pulled her hood up and rode off with Keenan riding next to her. Roan gestured for Asha to follow and came side by side with her.
“We need to have a chat about you using my words in arguments with your aunt.” He said with a smile. “I’m sure that if Keenan wasn’t there I would have been suffocated in my sleep by now.”
“But you’re the only one who talks to me about anything.” Asha replied with a grin. “Who else am I supposed to use against her?” She pulled up her hood so that everyone in the party was disguised as they rode through a portal to appear in the familiar pine forest surrounding Morendor.
“I don’t care who you use against her, as long as it’s not me.” He said. “I’m beginning to think my sister loves me a little less every time she sees me talking to you.”
Silver shot him a glare over her shoulder that shut them both up. “Silence,” She ordered. “There’s a risk to taking this road during the night.”
As she spoke, Asha caught sight of demon birds circling overhead and knew that Silver was being paranoid.
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They rode for a few minutes more before they came into a clearing where her parents stood, accompanied by two wytches.
“Keep your hood up,” Silver’s mental voice broached no argument.
“You came, good.” Silver dismounted and walked towards them. “We have a problem.”
“Is Asha alright?” Her mother looked pale with worry.
“Oh, I’m sure she feels fine.” Silver retorted. “She’s bloody insane. Which of you told her she could make a deal with our parents and get anything she wanted? Because that is who you should blame for her situation.”
“Situation?” Romana clutched Marten’s arm.
“Asha, come here.” Silver ordered.
Feeling guiltier than she ever had in her life, she did as she was asked, dismounting and shuffling towards Silver’s side, pushing her hood back.
“Is this some kind of joke?” Marten asked.
“Your daughter,” Silver began. “Thought it would be fun to summon her grandmother and ask to be old enough to use her powers so she could find out what this important destiny everyone was telling her about was.” She waved her hand at the result.
Asha lifted her eyes briefly to see the flames licking her mother’s skin flicker wildly. Her father’s face was gaunt.
“Asha? Tell me this isn’t true.” Her mother pleaded.
“Sorry, mama,” Asha said. “I was already bad at fitting in anyway. None of my friends were as old as I was really, and the older wytches thought I was a child. I didn’t fit in, and everyone on the Isle said I had a great destiny ahead of me when I came into my magic. Grandma Kate said I could have my powers, but I’d have to grow up a lot faster, so I said yes. I don’t regret it.”
But instead of glaring at Asha, Romana focused on Silver, her eyes lit up from within with fury. “You were supposed to be watching her!” She yelled in fury, “She was just a girl!”
“I was pretending to be a little girl so you would be happy.” Asha yelled back, moving to step in front of her motionless aunt. “Aunt Silver figured me out and started treating me like I was more intelligent, but you wanted me to be your baby mama, so I was.”
Her mother’s face alternated with grief and anger and most of it was directed, wrongly, at Silver. Asha moved hesitantly towards her mother, putting a contrite look onto her face as she understood how to diffuse the situation completely.
“Please mama, don’t hate me. I didn’t want to make you upset.”
The words worked and like magic Romana’s face changed to one of complete understanding and compassion. Asha was enveloped in a huge motherly embrace seconds later.
“It’s not your fault.” Her mother whispered.
“Yes it is.” Asha refuted. “I asked Grandma Kate to have my powers, she told me the price and I accepted it. I lied to you for months, letting you think I was that young mentally when really I was far more mature for my age than you gave me credit for. I did all these things, and I don’t take them back. Aunt Silver had nothing to do with it; it was simply at hers that I asked Grandma Kate.”
Romana was silent, but Asha doubted she was truly listening to any of the words she had said. Over her mother’s shoulder, she could see her father looking at Silver, and knew there was some kind of mental conversation going on there.
“This was not part of the deal.” Silver began, “So I came here to offer you the chance to have her back with you for a month before she begins her Dark Coven training.”
“That will not be happening.” Gaillean’s voice appeared an instant before he teleported into the clearing.
Her mother let her go to round on the wild looking Ancient. “Why the hell not?” She retorted. “I’ve just lost the ability to spend my daughter’s childhood with her.”
“Because she is to go to the Dark Coven for training before she goes back to the Light Coven.” Gaillean retorted. “It must be.”
“I’m sick of you telling us something must happen and not giving us a reason for it!” Romana replied. “Kate made me swear to give her to the Dark Coven when she was old enough; she made me swear not to give her any prejudices and to let her spend time with Silver. I’m sick of your interference! Aren’t you supposed to be observers?”
Gaillean shrugged. “Calm yourself, daughter. You know we only direct you when necessary.”
“My child, my baby was aged by fifteen years and is about to be taken from me for another goodness knows how many and you say you only direct us when necessary!” She let out a bitter laugh.
“You think you are the only one to have to watch while things you hate happen to your child?” Gaillean asked. “Do you think Kate and I enjoyed watching your childhood? Do you think I enjoyed watching Silver’s?”
Her mother had the good grace to look put in her place.
“Your sister did everything in her power to stop Asha,” Keenan spoke up. “I was in the room with her and didn’t hear Kate say anything to Asha out of the ordinary. The moment she collapsed Silver was in there to hold the blade to Kate’s throat and demand she stop whatever she was doing.”
“Your sister and mother are not to blame.” Gaillean reiterated. “Asha is at fault for everything.”
Well wasn’t that putting it kindly? Asha wanted to snap at them for blaming her on principle. When her mother’s shock subsided she was going to get confined to her room for all eternity.
“Can she not spend even a few days with us?” Marten asked Gaillean. “Her powers haven’t emerged yet, where is the harm?”
“Five days.” Gaillean granted. “After which, if she is not returned directly to Silver, there will be consequences.” He made the words so threatening that Asha didn’t even want to ask what those consequences would be. “I don’t want to be contacted about this matter again.” He disappeared.
There was a fragile silence, ended when her mother took her hand, “Come Asha, we must make the most of the time given to us.” She said sadly.
They left her aunt standing there in the clearing, and as they left Asha used her position at the back of the procession to give Silver a discrete wave from atop her horse.
Chapter Eleven
LAW OF LOGIC
Kate entered the council room with dread in her heart. She sat on her throne, looking sideways towards Marigold and Marta, who greeted her with cordial nods, though she knew both would have hugged her in welcome, had their company been any different.
Everyone else had already arrived, and so Kate was surprised when Gaillean suddenly left, returning with an incredibly irate looking Silver who took her place standing by his throne.
“Council is in session.” Marcus noted. “We are gathered to discuss the crimes of our niece, Silver. Ellamae has charged her with deliberate deception, and has named Kate and Gaillean her accomplices. She will now present her case.”
Ellamae, not content with sitting, stood up and glared across the room at Silver. “Thank-you Marcus,” She began in that high, cold voice of hers. “I was disturbed by the lack of progress shown by our niece in the hunt for the radicalised children of Llewellyn, so naturally, I went to investigate. I found my powers blocked by Gaillean’s shield, preventing me from observing her from my world and so I travelled in secret to Kate’s world and discovered something I think you shall all find very interesting.” Kate wanted to vomit, she knew what Ellamae would have found. She knew her sister would know now, not only about Asha, but about the other half-Ancients. There was no way they were leaving this council room without a war being declared.
“Objection!” Isaac called. “You just admitted to breaking the Council’s agreement with the Silver Eyed Wytch, and with deliberately concealing yourself to access a world that was not your own without permission of its watcher. You did so with no proof of any wrongdoing. Ellamae, that is against the law.” He looked towards Marcus.
“What he says is true.” Marcus cautioned, “Ellamae, do you submit yourself for punishment after your accusation?”
“I fully understand the c
onsequences and accept any discipline you deem fit.” She replied. “May I continue?”
Marcus waved a hand.
“I found our niece in her home, accompanied by her cousins, Issart’e and Dukran. I remained, and discovered she promised them freedom from us if they helped her deliver Maria to us in their place.”
“Is this true?” Marcus asked, and Kate cringed backwards in her seat.
Silver stepped forwards so that the light from the skylight illuminated her face in harsh lines.
“It is true.” She replied.
“What do you have to say for yourself?” Darren asked his tone curious.
“I searched their minds,” Silver replied. “Neither of them are radicalised by power, nor do I think they ever have been.”
“And Kate and Gaillean were the ones who brought the distressing news to us that all of Llewellyn’s children were unstable, were they not?” Ellamae asked of the room, and Kate’s stomach sank as Corrina and Llewellyn responded eagerly. “Brothers and sisters, I put before this Council my belief that the Silver Eyed Wytch was responsible for Gaillean’s deceit, and he used his influence over Kate to force her into compliance.”
Kate’s eyes narrowed as she saw what Ellamae was doing. All along she’d believed her sister to be the ultimate Council member; cold and unfeeling. When in truth, Ellamae felt one thing, hatred. And all of it was directed at Silver.
“She is offering me this new story if I allow Silver’s torture and then death.” Gaillean informed her mentally. “She realises the consequences of us being the masterminds of it will cause war and her goal is to avoid it by pinning everything on Silver.”
“Will you accept her offer?” Kate asked, knowing the answer.
Gaillean noticeably stiffened. “How can you believe I could watch my own daughter suffer and die before me, Kate?” He asked. “Have you forgotten who I am? Have you forgotten how we made all of these lies to keep Silver, Romana and Asha safe in the first place?”
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