Crown of Secrets (The Hidden Mage Book 1)

by Melanie Cellier

  He certainly looked thunderously displeased when Ashlyn brought her mother, the Head of the Wind Workers, to talk to me. She was full of warmth and gracious words, and although I apologized for the disruption I had caused to her own plans, she waved my words aside without hesitation. Her manner suggested that while the king might dislike me personally, politically I was becoming a more palatable proposition.

  Bryony popped up at my side from time to time, but she was as besieged with requests as I was, and usually only had time for a few words before being claimed for the next dance. On one such occasion, when I had taken a break for a much-needed drink, I was watching her disappear back into the crowd when an elderly gentleman approached me. He introduced himself as Ashlyn’s grandfather and asked me to dance. Before I could give him my hand, however, a tall figure stepped from the crowd.

  “I believe this dance is mine.” Darius claimed my outstretched fingers.

  Before I could protest, Ashlyn’s grandfather bowed and stepped back. I gave him an apologetic smile, but his focus was on the prince. Was there anyone in this room who would have gainsaid Darius, no matter how outrageous his request?

  He led me forward toward the middle of the floor without further words. Space cleared around us, no matter how tight the crowd, allowing us free passage. When the first strains of the song sounded, his hold on my hand shifted, his other arm encircling my waist.

  I took a deep breath, placing my free hand on his shoulder and letting him draw me close. Then the music swelled, and he swept me into movement.

  Murmurs surrounded us, but I let them fade away, my attention on my partner. He moved with as much elegance as he fought, firmly leading me without pushing or pulling. In fact, he gave no sign of expending any effort at all. It made the dance truly effortless for me, and yet my breath still came unaccountably fast.

  “You look beautiful.” His usual detached tone robbed the words of any special meaning.

  But when I looked up into his face, my brow creased, I almost fumbled my step. His tone and expression might be clipped and unfeeling, but his eyes burned into me.

  “Th…thank you,” I faltered.

  “I think you may count tonight as a victory.” His gaze didn’t leave mine. “I am honest enough to confess that when you asked for a day to fix the situation, I wasn’t convinced you were capable. But I admit I was wrong.”

  “Does that happen often?” I asked, unable to keep a hint of amusement out of my voice.

  “I generally don’t have the luxury of making mistakes. But you seem to be an exception to all my rules.”

  “Am I?” The words came out more breathy than I had intended.

  “Well, for one, I make a point of never dancing with young, unattached females,” he said.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Well that would explain why we seemed to attract so much attention at the start of the dance. But I’m a foreign princess studying in Kallorway, remember. I was already breaking all the rules.”

  “That’s what scares me.”

  “I’m not convinced anything scares you,” I replied, although I didn’t think he had intended me to hear his quiet words.

  His gaze, which had momentarily dropped away, captured me again. “You utterly terrify me, Verene.”

  It was hard to think when he said such confusing things, not when I was pressed up against his chest and he was looking at me with eyes that seemed to be pleading for something.

  “I can’t imagine why,” I managed to gasp out.

  “Can’t you?” His eyes dropped to my lips before sweeping back up to capture my gaze again. “You have secrets, Princess, and I don’t like secrets. You’re not part of my plan, and you could ruin everything.”

  Indignation pushed through the haze that had descended over my mind. “But you’re full of secrets!”

  A slow smile spread over his face, reaching up to his eyes and transforming him once again. With a smile like that it was too easy to forget my warning to Bryony that he was the dangerous type of attractive.

  “It’s only other people’s secrets I dislike,” he said, and I couldn’t help rolling my eyes at his surprising sally.

  “Naturally.”

  “Naturally.” He repeated the word gravely, but his eyes danced with amusement.

  Before I could reply, his eyes caught on something over my shoulder. The smile instantly disappeared, something hard replacing it, and his eyes no longer met mine.

  The tempo of his steps changed, our movement quickening as he maneuvered me through the crowd toward the edge of the dance floor, although the song wasn’t ending. As we spun, I tried to catch a glimpse of what he’d seen, but we were moving too fast for my eyes to latch on to anything.

  As soon as we reached the edge of the dancers, he stopped abruptly, releasing me so fast I staggered slightly.

  “What?” I asked. “What is it?”

  “This was a mistake.” His harsh tone grated against my raw emotions, and I had to fight to keep from visibly reacting.

  But I couldn’t let anyone see me shaken, not when I knew how many eyes must be on us.

  “It was just a dance,” I said.

  “It’s never just a dance.”

  He inclined his head slightly in my direction and turned on his heel, striding away around the edge of the dance floor. I followed his path with my eyes and saw he was heading toward his brother. But Jareth’s attention was focused on something on the other side of the ballroom—something in the same direction as Darius had looked before his manner changed so completely.

  I followed Jareth’s gaze and saw the king standing by the refreshment table. Someone stood beside him, talking at him, but his attention was on his older son. And even at this distance, the calculating anger on his face made me shiver.

  I looked around wildly and spotted the door just behind me. Making a dash for it, I escaped into the calm and cool of the entranceway. I moved along the wall until I was out of sight of the ballroom before collapsing back against it and sucking in deep, steadying breaths.

  I needed to regain control of myself and do it fast. Because while I couldn’t let my emotions take over in the middle of the ballroom, neither could I afford to disappear for long. Too many eyes were on me tonight.

  When I had calmed enough to resume my social mask, I slipped back through the doors, trying to lose myself in the crowd. But my eyes searched the room against my will. A new song had started, and I found Darius back on the dance floor, this time with Bryony.

  Despite myself, I felt a small barb lodge in my heart. So much for his rule.

  I accepted the next offer I received blindly, smiling and laughing without absorbing what my partner was saying. But gradually I forced myself to resume my usual manner, doing my best to ignore the infuriating crown prince as he methodically danced with every girl in our year, one by one.

  And when I was finally able to collapse into my bed, I did so with the relieved thought that I was so utterly exhausted nothing could keep me awake. Not even the confusing, changeable face that tried so hard to fill my mind.

  I mostly stayed in my rooms the next day, escaping the endless string of goodbyes taking place in the entry of the Academy. When I grew too restless to stay still, I slipped downstairs to the library where I could pace up and down among the shelves. Hidden from sight, I tried to grasp at the peace the library usually brought me, but it proved elusive.

  Darius had begun by saying the ball was a victory for me, but he had ended by saying it was all a mistake. And from the look on his father’s face, it had certainly done nothing to soften the king toward Ardann. The faction that stood behind the crown might seem the most disposed toward me at the moment, but I would do well not to think their support certain.

  And there had been nothing confusing in General Haddon’s clear distaste of both the event and me. The old man had been furious about the reception I was receiving.

  It was hard in all of that to see anything of victory.

  No matter how many
shelves I paced, I couldn’t decide if I had done my goal here more harm or good. I knew I was dwelling so fiercely on the problem in order to avoid thinking about the even more complicated question of my own emotions, but the knowledge didn’t deter me.

  Eventually I gave up, however, and returned to my rooms. I told myself my desire to be in my own suite had nothing to do with the hope that a certain prince would appear in the hidden doorway to explain his inscrutable behavior. But from the way my eyes kept sliding to the tapestry, I wasn’t listening.

  There was no sign of Darius, however. All three meals had been delivered to our rooms on trays, while the servants—who had mostly been given the morning off—spent the afternoon returning the dining hall to its usual state.

  Eventually the inactivity grew too much for me, and when dusk fell, I slipped out of my rooms for a run. The level of activity in the Academy—in both the main corridors and the hidden ones—soon drove me outside. The cold air burned in my lungs, but I welcomed the sensation after the stuffy day spent inside.

  I pushed myself hard, falling into the focused mindset that let everything else drop away except my pounding feet, rasping breath, and burning legs. The last of the daylight faded, but the moon was bright, and I didn’t slow, the activity warming me against the cold of the night.

  Something, some small sound that was gone almost as soon as I caught it, brought my attention back to my surroundings. I tried to place myself. I was sure I had set out to run laps around the main Academy building, but somehow I had wandered off that path and into the gardens tended by the grower students. What had led me here? I couldn’t remember now.

  My steps slowed, something still jangling at the edge of my awareness, telling me something wasn’t right. I remembered to reach out with my new, extra sense and realized I wasn’t alone out here in the darkness. But no sooner had I identified the presence of at least one other person, than my leading foot landed on nothing but air, and I fell forward.

  Chapter 21

  The hole was large enough and deep enough that my whole body catapulted into it. Thankfully the dirt was so freshly turned, my landing was softer than it should have been.

  Gasping more from shock than pain, I took careful stock of the different parts of my body. Nothing felt injured.

  I gazed up the sheer dirt sides of the pit. Only the stars in the sky above were visible. The irony of the situation didn’t escape me. A tiny hole had broken my ankle while a fall into an enormous pit was without notable injury.

  But the panic caught up to me a moment later. Who had left this here? And why? And how was I going to get out?

  I pushed myself to my feet and touched the side of the hole. Dirt crumbled away at my touch. But I hadn’t even attempted to climb out when something invisible hit me hard. My whole body spasmed, sending me back down into the dirt at the bottom of the pit.

  The sensation reminded me a little of the feeling when Tyron’s energy hit me after I worked his composition. But that working had been followed by a pleasant, buoyant feeling as his energy poured into me. Now it was the opposite. Something had latched on to my deepest self and was drawing it out.

  I could feel the invisible force pouring out of me so vividly that I grasped for it with both hands, as if I could stem the flow by physical action. Scrambling to my feet, I spun wildly, but from down here there was nothing to see.

  My energy—my life force—continued to be wrenched out of me, flying into the air and out of the hole that trapped me.

  A shield. I needed a shield.

  My trembling fingers thrust into my robe, fumbling with haste, and I found the pocket that held my most powerful shield. Pulling it out, I tore it, power springing up around me. But it did nothing to stop the draining of my energy.

  Too late I realized I had wasted my shield. It was one against both physical attack and an attack with power, but this was an energy composition. I needed a shield against energy.

  I was sure my father had crafted me one. But with the scarcity of energy mages—let alone energy mages who could drain energy—I hadn’t placed it in one of my most accessible pockets.

  I tried to remember where to find it, but my fingers were trembling from exhaustion now, my brain growing foggy as I lost more and more of my energy. If I didn’t find it within the next several seconds, my life would be over.

  My mind acted out of desperation, reaching out along the sensation of flowing energy, following it back to its source. I could see it in my mind’s eye, my brain creating the scene my extra sense could detect. The stream of my energy ended in a bright pool which grew bigger with every moment that passed.

  “No!” I screamed, the attempted shout made soft with exhaustion. The words swam across my mind in bright letters at odds with the weakness of my voice. “That energy is mine!”

  As I spoke the last word, something changed. The pool bubbled and burbled, and the flow reversed course, energy flowing back toward me instead of away.

  The final dregs of my energy dripped back into me, followed quickly by more. I managed a shuddering breath, wondering why my face felt wet. A moment later I noticed I was lying flat in the dirt. When had I lain down?

  The flow of beautiful energy cut off abruptly. My mind reached for it, seeking the bright source, but it was veiled now, dimmed in a way that was hard to describe. Shielded, my mind supplied.

  The energy moved away from me, going faster and faster until it left the circle of my awareness. Still I lay in the dirt. I had received back enough of my energy to save my life, but standing up felt out of my reach, let alone climbing out of the pit.

  Perhaps I would lie here until morning. I wondered, idly, if I would freeze to death in that time. I seemed unable to muster the proper emotional response to that thought. Had my father provided me with a warming composition?

  How nice it would be, I thought, if I could compose one myself.

  Something niggled at the back of my mind. I couldn’t compose anything. That was one of my deepest truths. And yet—wasn’t that what I had just done?

  What exactly had just happened?

  I had spoken and declared the energy mine…and it had returned to me. Had I just done a spoken energy composition? It seemed impossible, not least because that wasn’t the way energy compositions worked. It wasn’t how any compositions worked. You could block someone else’s composition, or combat it, but you couldn’t twist it mid-working, changing its very nature.

  More time passed, although I didn’t know how much. Should I be doing something to warm myself up? I couldn’t think what.

  “Verene! Verene, are you out here?”

  A hint of unfamiliar desperation colored the otherwise familiar voice. Darius sounded worried. Why was he worried?

  “I’m here,” I called back, my words sounding feeble after the strength of his voice. Could he even hear them? I could barely hear them myself.

  A distant, frustrated growl was cut off by the sound of tearing parchment. The sound brought another thought floating to the front of my mind. Was that the sound I had heard while running? What exactly had led my feet along this precise path?

  But the sensation of questing power distracted me. It butted gently against me, wrapping itself around my length and then disappearing again.

  Well, that was better than the last one, I thought. That didn’t hurt at all.

  Running steps sounded somewhere in the garden, and then a face appeared at the edge of the hole.

  “Verene!” Darius sounded somehow both horrified and relieved. “Are you hurt?”

  “I don’t think so.” My brow furrowed in confusion. “I just feel so tired. So very tired.”

  “Hold on.” He disappeared, and I frowned. I had liked the sight of his face.

  Another tearing sound reached me, and this time the power that found me cupped me gently, bearing me up into the air and lifting me from the pit. It placed me on the soft dirt of the garden bed beside the lip of the hole, and Darius’s face once again appeared above
me.

  “That was nice.” I smiled up at him.

  “What happened to you?” he asked, his voice grim. “What is this?”

  “It appears to be a hole,” I said after a moment of deep thought. “It certainly felt like a hole. But perhaps I’m wrong. My brain seems a little muddled right now.”

  His eyes grew alarmed.

  “Don’t worry,” I said, suddenly desperate to smooth away the trouble on his face. “They just drained most of my energy. But I got some of it back.”

  “They?” The word came out like a snarl. “Who’s they?”

  “Well…” I gave the question an even longer moment of thought. “I suppose it must have been whoever dug the hole. They didn’t introduce themselves, though.” I frowned. “Very rude.”

  Darius groaned. “You’re nonsensical.”

  “Am I? How strange.” Once again I felt there should be an emotion connected with the thought, but I couldn’t seem to locate it.

  “I’m glad you came, though,” I added. “I thought I might freeze to death in there overnight. I don’t think I would have liked that.”

  “Neither would I,” he said, the words a whisper.

  “But how did you find me?” I asked, the question appearing in my mind out of nowhere. “Do you often walk the grounds at night? It’s quite strange of you.”

  He bit back another strangled groan. “No, of course I don’t! And neither should you be! I was looking for you.”

  “But the corridors were too crowded for running.” My voice sounded pitiful. “There was nowhere else to go.”

  “And someone must have known that,” he said. “Someone who was watching you, ready to follow you out here and spring their trap. We can just be grateful one of the servants saw you leave the Academy.”

  “Oh, do you think it was a trap?” I frowned, trying to marshal my thoughts into line. “I suppose it must have been, now that you mention it.”