“Does the flavor bring back memories?” he asked.
“It certainly does,” Becka replied, nodding along with him. “What did you want to talk about?”
His expression turned pained. “Must I always have an agenda planned when meeting with my eldest?”
Becka wanted this banter to feel natural. Comforting. But there was a wall between them from her time spent separate from fae territories that neither quite seemed to know how to breach.
“No, but I’m guessing you’re not going to let my earlier faux pas pass without comment. I swear I dropped that bottle of hot sauce by accident.”
“It is on my mind, but never mind the hot sauce. No harm came from it.” He frowned. “Are you aware it has been three months since you returned home for Tesse’s funeral?”
“I’m aware.” She took another sip. A cool breeze blew through, rustling the wisteria and perfuming the air. She took another sip of the water, feeling suddenly lethargic. Perhaps the long day was finally getting to her?
“How do you think you are getting along?” He paused, brow furrowed. He took another sip of tea. “I mean, how are you adapting to life back amongst the fae?”
No one had asked her so directly since her return, and she found it refreshing. “I don’t feel at ease here. At least, not yet. I’m continuing to struggle to control my powers, despite months of training with Astrid. Perhaps if I’d been another illusionist I’d fit in with the guild and the house better, or be easier to train?”
“Astrid ramps up her training as students progress, increasing their challenges as they gain control. Surely you are farther along than you realize?”
Becka shrugged, noticing a surprising stiffness in her shoulders. “I know it’s only been three months, but I don’t think others here see the value in a Null. In my powers. I’m not sure I do either.” Becka yawned.
Vott mirrored her yawn. “You are more than a nn-Null. You are Ro… Rowan,” he stuttered. “The house needs you.”
“I know you say that,” Becka drawled out, her words slurring. “You say that every time. But I don’t think that most of the fae in House Rowan like me. I think they’d prefer if I wasn’t here.”
Did I really just say that with my outside the head voice? What’s come over me?
“Please do not speak ill of your family. You have not even given most of them the opportunity to get to know you.”
“It’s hard to find time when I spend most of my days practicing my gift.”
Vott’s eyes fluttered shut, he slumped over, and then the mug fell out of his hand, rolled along the couch, and hit the deck at their feet with a loud crack.
“Luce!” Becka tried to yell, but it came out as a mumble. The shifter was already there, patting Vott’s cheeks and checking for a pulse. His pallor was shifting into shades of gray as Becka watched through eyes increasingly difficult to keep open.
Luce called out and then pressed a button on a radio she carried at her waist. Fae and shifter guards alike filled the space in seconds.
Becka found herself looking up into Brent’s grave features, his bulk a wide shadow against the stars shining through the roof of the pergola. In the months since her return, she’d gotten used to Brent’s constant presence around her father. The head of Vott’s contingent of shifter guards, the stocky, unflappable wolf was nearly inseparable from her father. Brent was quick to smile, and always made her feel safe and at ease.
She couldn’t remember the wolf shifter ever appearing so angry and scared at the same time. The wrath in his steely blue eyes alarmed her.
“We’re moving you to the infirmary, Becka,” he assured her. “You’ll be all right.”
She tried to answer, but the words came out slurred. Becka tried to stand up, but her limbs flailed in response to her efforts.
In moments she was slung over Brent’s shoulder, her bleary gaze connecting with Luce behind her.
“Stay with me,” Luce said.
Try as Becka might, her world faded to black.
Chapter 3
Anxiety peaked Becka’s heart rate, increasing the pounding discomfort in her head. She’d forgotten something important. There was danger. She’d been here before. Stuck. Unable to move. Trapped.
She heard herself groan but couldn’t move her limbs. The memory of being tied down and helpless shot another spike of adrenaline through her veins, and she jerked and flailed her arms and legs to escape. Was that blood she smelled?
Becka’s swollen tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth and her head throbbed with the force of her heartbeat. Through the cotton filling her ears, she struggled to make out muffled voices.
A light touch pressed down on her shoulder. “You’re safe here, Becka,” came a voice she recognized, but couldn’t place. The world spun around her.
She tried to open her eyes, finally gaining a bit of control over her body. Eyelids fluttering open, she looked up to see Illan standing over her, concern knitting his brows. Looking around the room, Becka immediately recognized House Rowan’s infirmary and its healer, Illan of House Birch. An apprentice worked alongside Illan, but Becka didn’t know her name. She just recognized the healer’s customary long white robes accented with light-blue embroidery.
The upper walls and ceiling of the room had been enchanted to appear as if they were out in the forest, surrounded by pine and aspen swaying overhead in the breeze. An illusory finch flitted by, lighthearted birdsong filling the air as it passed. Additionally, wide windows lined the room, and a few were open to let in the fresh air. Surely most patients appreciated the distracting display, but her head ached at least in part to the presence of the magic around her.
She took a deep breath, which was harder than it should have been.
For a moment, she’d been back in the solitude meditation retreat with Woden. That episode had driven dozens of nightmares, keeping her awake and stargazing until the dawn arrived to chase away the darkness. She’d never feared the dark before, not until the Shadow-Dwellers had found her.
A tremor shook through her limbs at the thought. She worked her mouth, and Illan anticipated her need, producing a small bowl of ice chips. He scooped up a fragment and held it to her lips.
“Try this. It’ll help with the dry mouth.”
He slid the ice chip past her lips, and the refreshing, cool liquid bathed her tongue and freed it from the roof of her mouth. A relieved sigh escaped her and something about the act, be it the water, the cold, or just the interaction, roused her mind into a heightened state of awareness.
After she’d worked the ice around her mouth until it disappeared, Becka tried talking again. “Another?” she croaked out.
He smiled, but there was sorrow in his eyes. “Here you go.”
Becka gratefully accepted the ice chip. Moving her arms around, she realized one had an IV with a bag of something hanging above her on a pole.
“What happened?” Becka asked, her cracking voice a whisper. A foggy memory of sitting under wisteria with Vott flashed through her mind. That awful lapsang tea. Vott’s gray pallor as he slumped over. His mug rolling to the ground. “How is my father?”
Illan fed her another ice chip and then sat down on the bed next to her. He ran a hand over his face, pulling at a light dusting of whiskers which must have taken two or three days to grow.