I did indeed know what that felt like.
My back felt cold, and then something wet hit the table next to me. And I couldn’t look, because I knew what I would see.
I clenched my teeth to keep from shuddering and reminded myself I’d been injured a thousand times. This was no worse than those injuries, some of which had been very bad indeed.
Then my back started to itch.
“Is that supposed to happen?”
“What? What’s happening?” Qown sounded worried.
“My back itches.”
He exhaled. “Oh. Yes, that’s normal. Just ignore it.”
“Easy for you to say. I promise you if our situations were reversed, you—”
“Shhh. I’m concentrating.”
I ground my teeth together and stayed silent.
After a few minutes, the itch became hot and painful. Just as I started to ask him about it, Qown said, “It’s going to start burning. Don’t worry, I’m just removing the numbing. I’ll do something else about the pain in a minute, but I want to check the nerves.”
I felt a sharp, flaring pain that faded into a tingling. “Did you just pinch me?”
“I haven’t given you permission to move yet. Okay, that … that looks good. Does it hurt?”
I bent forward, stretching my back. Then I twisted. “No. It doesn’t.”
“Fantastic.”
I made a fist. “Uh … something’s wrong.”
Qown looked up sharply. “What? Wait. What’s wrong? You said it doesn’t hurt…”
“Yes, I did, but I also don’t feel any stronger.” I walked over to where I’d discarded my tunic and pulled it back over me before attempting to pick up the shanathá plate. “No, this is still too heavy for me to lift.” I must have looked panicked. I felt panicked. “Qown, my strength isn’t returning.”
He looked relieved. “Is that all? I expected that.”
“What? Didn’t our plan hinge on the idea my strength would return? You expected this?”
Qown pulled over a chair and sat down. He looked exhausted. Apparently, I really was that hard to heal.2 The fact that he’d managed it at all by himself spoke to how his own magical skills had grown. “Janel, you must have realized by this point Xaltorath never cursed you with strength.”
I froze.
He saw my expression and sighed. “Please. Just listen. You were a small girl in horrifying circumstances. Anyone’s mage-gift—what others call a witch-gift—would manifest under such pressure. And yours did. And what you wanted, little girl you, most of all—”
“You don’t know what I wanted,” I snapped.
“I think you wanted to be strong,” he said. “Too strong for your enemies, too strong to fall victim to a demon. That’s what you made yourself, even though physical strength had nothing to do with what happened to you. You became strong because you used magic to make yourself strong.”
I stared down at my hands. “Strong by casting a spell.”
I knew how to do that now. I had become the witch I had always feared my enemies would accuse me of being. That fact didn’t even shame me. But it felt like losing to admit my strength had been my doing all along. Like admitting I had used the demons as an excuse—I’m not a witch, I’m just cursed by a demon.
No. That thinking led to Xaltorath’s logic, her twisting chasms of guilt and recrimination. She had loved to suggest everything I secretly wanted caused everything that had happened. That I only played at being the victim because it absolved me of responsibility or choice.
To which I always reminded her that eight-year-old children don’t have responsibilities or choices.
I could do this. More so, I had to do this. If I couldn’t, then Aeyan’arric would keep right on freezing towns. Kaen’s plans would continue. The situation in Jorat and Marakor would continue to deteriorate. The horrible tainted ore the Quuros wizards had left in the cavern under the Ice Demesne would do as Qown feared—leach into the surrounding water and kill everyone.
Painfully. Slowly.
I shut my eyes as I remembered my childhood. Remembered my fear, remembered my hate, remembered my terror and pain. I felt the rage wash over me and knew that if I wanted, I could channel my rage into destruction and violence so easily. My proficiency at magic would never be anything like Qown’s healing. I felt, through a wash of red, one shining moment of connection when I felt Khored. I heard the screaming crows and felt the God of Destruction standing right next to me so I could just reach out and twist my fist around the red swirl of power feeding him.3
Not yet, little girl. Not yet.
I reached over to the table, picked up a goblet, and crushed it.
“Good,” Qown said, sounding shaky. “Good. Now let’s get you dressed.”
As I stood there, staring at the crushed cup, I noticed the other object on the table: thrown there during Qown’s operation on my back. Blood-side down, leaving a red smear: a large section of red-brown skin, marked with a black pattern.
“Do you have any plans for that?”
Qown looked startled and then appalled. “Yes, I planned to destroy it so there wouldn’t be any evidence.”
“Don’t. I think I have a use for it.”
* * *
We made our move in the middle of the night, or rather I did, since we agreed Qown shouldn’t follow. Qown would help from a distance, using his Cornerstone.
Good enough. Why carry a nonsentient deity in your pocket if you never use it?
I didn’t need a lantern. The caves were dark, but in the three years I’d been studying, I’d learned the trick of making my own mage-light.
I packed the armor into a large bag, each section wedged with dresses, scarves, and cloth to keep it from rattling. Then I made my way down to the tunnels, heading deeper and deeper down until they led to the caves.
I may have mucked things up in this next part.
You see, I hadn’t known the Spring Caves under the palace twisted and branched in quite such a tortuous maze of tunnels, chambers, and precipitous drops. My floating ball of mage-light threw harsh shadows against the walls, and I became turned around. I had no idea which direction faced down—let alone how to make it to Khoreval’s cave, before making my way outside to find Aeyan’arric. I hadn’t been down there in years.
I was lost.
And Qown couldn’t help. Qown had never been down in these caves. He didn’t have a clue where to go.
So not knowing what else to do, I put on my armor (wearing it proved less awkward than carrying it) and set out again, heading down a random tunnel. I was trying with all my might not to fall down a sinkhole, trip and break something, or in general make a bad situation worse.
The armor felt uncomfortably warm, but at least I could breathe fresh air because of the sigil. Qown had given me safety instructions—don’t pick up anything but the spear, don’t remove my helmet. And when I had finished with this whole business, I needed to throw the armor into a deep crevasse and melt it to slag.
I agreed with Qown on taking this poison metal business with appropriate seriousness, but I already regretted losing the armor. The metal alone would have paid my canton’s taxes for several years.