I swallowed hard.
That’s because I don’t feel ready. Or worthy.
“All we’ve done is clean this place,” she continued, her gaze knowing.
“Spit it out, Mac.” She was beating around the bush. I knew her well enough by now to be able to spot it.
“We chose you as leader because it was the obvious choice. You saved this place. And I’m not saying you’re being negligent in your duties or anything, just that I’ve noticed you shying around that chair like it’s going to bite you.”
I drew in a deep breath and approached it slowly, running my fingertips over the smooth wood. “I don’t even know what I am. Or the extent of my magic. How can I possibly be qualified to lead?”
“We believe in you,” Mac said. “You need to believe in yourself, too.”
Easier said than done.
“Anyway,” she continued, “this whole magic thing is a journey. You don’t need to be perfect right now.”
Journeys had beginnings, and I felt like I didn’t know what mine had been. I had no idea where my magic had come from. Not my father. My mother?
She’d died shortly after my birth, so I had no memories of her.
Pain sliced through me, and I scowled. I’d long since stopped thinking of her. It brought more harm than good.
But now that I was faced with my future and so much responsibility that I didn’t feel ready for, I wished I could speak to her. Ask her about my past and who I was. What I was. Especially with my magic, which had been more stubborn lately. I could mostly control it, but not entirely. And new powers kept popping up.
The raven swooped inside, distracting me from my thoughts. This was the most I’d ever interacted with the bird, and so I followed it, cutting through the empty front room that gleamed from our recent deep clean. The bird flew up the stone spiral staircase, and I ran after it, taking the steps two at a time, with Mac pounding behind me.
My heart raced as I stepped out into a second-floor room that we hadn’t yet started on.
“Is it just me, or is this exciting?” Mac asked.
“It’s not just you.” Something was happening—I could feel it.
The bird flew to a dusty old box in the corner and landed on the wooden top. It turned to me, eyes glinting, then pecked at the wood.
“Well, if that’s not a sign, I don’t know what is,” Mac said.
“Yeah.” I approached the box, a strange tingle of awareness racing down my arms. As I neared, the bird hopped off.
Magic radiated from the box, buzzing and bright. A chill raced over my skin as I reached for it, the bird’s keen eyes on me.
What the heck was in here?
2
Carrow
Tension tightened the air around me as I rested my fingertips against the lid of the wooden box. It was fairly large—roughly a meter by a meter—and looked old. Really old. The layer of dust on the surface was thick, and there was no lock.
“Go on,” Mac said. “I’m dying over here.”
I nodded, my breath coming short. It felt like something momentous was going to happen.
Quickly, I lifted the lid. Dust billowed out, and I coughed, blinking frantically against the sting.
Finally, the plume cleared, and I looked down. Fabric filled the box, folded and dull. It had probably once been a brilliant blue velvet, but it was now faded and worn. The lace that edged the sleeves was yellowed and fragile.
I frowned. “A dress?”
Mac joined me, peering down. “There might be more.”
I removed it from the box. The fabric felt heavier than it should have, with something bulky moving around in the middle of the folded pile. “I think you’re right.”
I set the dress back in the box, since the interior of the container was the cleanest spot in the room, then rummaged around inside the fabric. My fingertips closed around a heavy object, and awareness shot through me. My magic flared, and though I didn’t get a vision like I normally might, I felt the connection as I pulled it free. The object looked like a stamp of some kind—the old-fashioned sort that was used to press a blob of wax on a letter. A seal, they were called, with an emblem carved on the business side. I raised it up and inspected it.
There was an ornate symbol, along with a single word: Rasla.
“Huh.” I shook my head. “I knew it. We’re connected somehow.”
“You are?”
“Yeah. I can feel it. My magic is going off like alarm bells.”
“What do you see?”
“Nothing, which is rare. Normally, I’d get a vision. And I should be, but something is blocking it. Or maybe my magic is just being stubborn. It’s seemed a bit wonky lately.”
“You’re connected to Rasla, though?”
“Somehow. I knew my obsession wasn’t random.”
“True that. No one would be interested in that miserable bastard unless they had good reason.”
I put the seal in my pocket and reached back into the pile of fabric. My fingertips touched the leather binding of a small book, and I drew it free. As with the seal, the book pulsed with magic. A connection zipped between me and the volume, a fizz of magic that lit up my mind.
An ornate golden clasp locked the book tight, making it impossible to open. Protective magic swirled around it. “I don’t think we should try to open it without a key.”
My power struggled to work, trying to read information from the object in my hand. I got a flash of an image—a woman wearing the dress in the box. She looked sad. Terrified. And there was something familiar about her.
I tried to focus on her face—did she kind of look like me?—but her image faded away. Frustration seethed through me.
Damn it.
I opened my eyes, staring down at the book. “There are answer here.”
“About you and Grey?”
“About everything. My past, definitely. I can just feel it. My power is screaming. And she might have looked a bit like me, which was weird. But the book isn’t showing me anything else.”
Mac held her hand over the lock for a second, then hissed and yanked it back. “Definitely don’t break the lock.”
“That was my thought. Feels like a strong enchantment, huh?” I looked at the clasp, unable to find the lock hole. There were three other tiny holes, though. “Must be a really tiny key.”
“Yeah.” Mac leaned over the box and picked up the dress, gently shaking it out. I watched, hopeful that a key might fall from the folds, but once she’d fully withdrawn the dress and shook it out without finding anything, I leaned over to look into the bottom of the box.
It was empty.
“Damn.” She met my eyes. “I can start searching the rest of the boxes.”
I looked at the piles of dusty, battered crates. “I doubt it’s in here, but we need to search them anyway.”
“My thoughts exactly.” She wiped a finger through the dust on the box. “But first, I want to get rid of this. It will kill us if we disturb all of it.”
My nose itched with an oncoming sneeze, as if agreeing. “Maybe Seraphia could work on the book in the meantime. She’s got to have a trick for getting into locks like this.”
“Great idea. Library should open any minute.”