Celeste

  If Art was my benchmark, then most of the world would always come up short.

  “…That explains a lot,” I said quietly.

  Lioren glanced at me, something thoughtful in his expression.

  “Aye,” he said. “It does.”

  He tipped his chin forward, eyes on the road. “Sounds to me like you’ve been keepin’ some abnormal company.”

  “That’s a generous understatement.”

  “If it makes you feel any better,” Lioren added, a crooked smile tugging at his mouth, “the Brotherhood isn’t exactly what you’d call average either.”

  I glanced at him then. “I’d noticed.”

  He chuckled. “We tend to attract a certain sort. People who’ve already outgrown the shallow end.” He paused, then added with mock humility, “Some of us more than others.”

  “Is that supposed to be modesty?”

  “Absolutely. I didn’t even mention how handsome we are.”

  I rolled my eyes, smiling despite myself.

  “When you spend too long around outliers, your sense of normal changes.”

  I watched the road ahead, thinking of all the people we’d passed who’d never once touched the kind of power I’d started to think of as ordinary.

  Lioren snorted softly.

  “Course,” he added, “I’m travelin’ with the biggest outlier of all now. Imagine that. Me, in the grand presence of an Aberration. And not just any Aberration – one with two Variant abilities.”

  “I really feel like I ought to bow.”

  I didn’t answer.

  Instead, I let a thread of Ardor gather between my fingers, barely more than warmth, and flicked my hand.

  The pulse crossed the short distance between us and kissed his forearm.

  Lioren jerked back with a startled curse, slapping at his sleeve as a faint wisp of smoke curled up. He rubbed at the spot, then looked at me again.

  “Right,” he said dryly. “Forgive me, mighty Aberration. I’ll mind my tongue in your presence.”

  I looked back to the road, shaking my head as a brief smile tugged at my mouth.

  I wondered what he’d say if he ever found out about Art. I’d like to see the look on his face as Art raised one of those Ice walls in front of him.

  “You sure know how to control that little Light of yours,” Lioren said.

  “Do I?” I said smugly.

  “Aye. I heard you tell Fira that you only awakened recently. But the way you handled those beams in the fight.” He huffed a quiet laugh. “Someone teach ya, or did you just wake up talented?”

  My grip tightened on the reins.

  Saying this much about Art couldn’t hurt, could it? It wasn’t like he was an Ardor Caster.

  “Samuel helped,” I said.

  Lioren’s brows lifted slightly. Did he.”

  “He’s not an Ardor Caster, if that’s what you’re thinking,” I said quickly, before the thought could wander anywhere dangerous. “But he understands control. Said he learned from another Ardor Caster he met once.”

  “Sounds like he’s just as odd as you are if he’s crossed paths with two Ardor Casters in one lifetime.”

  I quickly turned to him, unable to keep the grin out of my voice. “That’s what I said.”

  He looked at me again, amused. “Did you now.”

  “Word for word.”

  Lioren chuckled, shaking his head. “Seems you’ve a talent for findin’ rare company.”

  I smiled to myself, the thought warming my chest.

  So did he.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  “Careful though. Don’t go givin’ Samuel all the credit.”

  “I’m not. But he really was helpful.”

  “Aye, I’m sure he was,” he said easily. “But that control of yours.” He shook his head. “You’ve got a rare hand for it. Would’ve saved me a lot of trouble if I’d been born with half your talent.”

  “You’re a Variant,” I said dryly. “I think you did just fine.”

  “You say that now. But when I first awakened, I couldn’t Cast Water if I was standin’ on the edge of a river on fire.” He shook his head. “Which is a problem, seein’ as Ice won’t listen to you until Water does.”

  I chuckled. “So how bad did it get?”

  “Not as dramatic as you’re hopin’. By the time Ice finally answered me, I already thought I had a handle on it.”

  He flexed his fingers, a faint grin tugging at his mouth.

  “Decided to be clever. Froze the ground where I was standin’ – nice and smooth. Took one step.” He tipped his hand, tracing the motion of a slip. “And went flat on my back like the world had decided it had enough of me.”

  He snorted softly. “Bruised my pride more than anythin’ else – though I still got off easy compared to Elena.”

  “Now this I’d like to hear,” I said, a wry smile tugging at my mouth.

  The corner of his curved. “Aye. She figured Ice out younger than I did.”

  He shook his head, a quiet laugh under his breath. “And managed to scare herself half to death doin’ it. She was haulin’ a bucket up from a stream when she grabbed the rim and the next thing she knew—”

  He mimed the moment, both hands clenching as though they’d caught on the bucket’s rim.

  “Frozen solid. Both palms stuck fast to the metal like they’d been glued there.”

  I blinked. “She just… froze it?”

  “Went to set the bucket down and couldn’t let go.”

  He grinned, feigning an attempt to wrench his hands free of the imaginary bucket.

  “She panicked. Yanked at her hands and only made it worse.”

  “What did she do?” I asked.

  “Stood there,” he said. “Tryin’ not to cry. Starin’ at her hands like they’d betrayed her. Leastways, that’s how she told it.” He snorted. “Took her longer than she’d care to admit, before she realized all she had to do was run Water back through her palms. The Ice then melted clean.”

  He opened both hands in front of him.

  “Can’t say I blame her for panickin’. Ice doesn’t exactly explain itself.”

  I laughed. The image too vivid. Elena frozen in place, glaring at a bucket like it had personally wronged her.

  It was strange, though. Hard to reconcile the version of her with the woman I knew now. I tried to picture her young and flustered. She’d always seemed so composed. Like nothing ever caught her off guard.

  “Believe it or not,” Lioren went on, “she’s one of the sharpest Caster’s I’ve ever fought beside. Almost as good as me.”

  I let out a short laugh.

  “I’m serious,” he said, chuckling. “She saved my life more than once. Quick and quiet as a shadow, in and out of a fight before anyone even knew she was there.”

  I saw Elena again, this time in the clearing. Her fists clenched at her sides, every line of her body screaming restraint. I saw the others too. The way their gazes never left Lioren. Wanting to move, but choosing not to.

  Holding to their code while the fight ground on.

  “She didn’t save you then,” I said, letting the thought slip.

  Lioren was quiet for a moment.

  The road stretched on ahead of us, empty and open, hoofbeats loud beneath our silence. Then he spoke again, his voice lower.

  “They wanted to.”

  I looked at him.

  “Elena. The others,” he went on. “Every one of them wanted to step in.” He exhaled slowly. “That’s why it was so damn hard to watch.”

  I frowned. “I know why they did it. I just… I don’t think it’s right. Fighting beside you for years, then let you face that alone for wanting something different.”

  Lioren nodded once.

  “I know,” he said quietly. “And that’s exactly why I didn’t want you there.”

  I turned to him, startled. “What?”

  He kept his eyes on the road. “Because I knew how you’d carry it. You already do.”

  “You blame yourself for Samuel,” he went on. “For him gettin’ taken.” For not bein’ fast enough. For every step that didn’t go the way you wanted.”

  “Because it is!” I snapped.

  He glanced at me.

  “If it weren’t for me,” I went on, my throat constricting, “Samuel wouldn’t be captured. You wouldn’t have had to face Darius. None of this would’ve happened.”

  “Celeste…”

  I shook my head. “You keep saying I carry things that aren’t mine – but they keep happening around me. How am I not supposed to blame myself when it’s clear I’m the cause?”

  Lioren pulled his reins in and brought his horse to a stop in the middle of the road. I did the same.

  He waited until I looked at him.

  “Then listen to me,” he said. “Because you’ve got one part wrong.”

  Lioren’s jaw set.

  “Don’t’ lay that on them. You don’t understand our ways – and that’s fair. But those are my Brothers. And they didn’t abandon me.”

  I opened my mouth, but he interrupted before I could speak.

  “I wasn’t goin’ to die out there,” he said flatly. “It might’ve looked like it. Hell, it was meant to look like it. But Darius knew exactly where the line was.”

  His hand flexed once at his side.

  “He would’ve pushed me until I couldn’t stand anymore …and then he would’ve stopped.”

  I stared at him.

  “And he pushed me further than he ever would’ve otherwise,” Lioren went on. “Because you were there. Because he knew you could put me back together afterward.”

  The guilt in my chest tightened. “Lioren, I—”

  “No,” he cut in, sharp. “Don’t you start that.”

  He exhaled deeply.

  “The Proving isn’t meant to execute a Brother when he leaves. It’s meant to test him – to see if he’s strong enough to stand on his own once the bond is cut. When the fight is over, the Brotherhood walks away, leaving him there to decide whether he truly is.”

  “They’ll tell you you’re meant to come back. But no one ever does – and everyone knows it. That’s how they let you go,” he said quietly. “That’s their mercy. You walk away with your spine intact… but you’ll never have a place at their fire anymore.”

  I had nothing to say.

  Lioren was quiet for a moment.

  “And then, you stepped in.”

  “You didn’t just help me fight,” he continued. “You changed the outcome.” He met my eyes. “Because of you, I didn’t lose my place.”

  I felt my chest tighten.

  “I beat Darius,” he said.

  His voice was thick. “That means I can face my Brothers again. Drink with them. And stand straight when I do.”

  He shook his head once, moisture bright in his eyes.

  “So don’t tell me none of this should’ve happened. And don’t tell me they failed me.”

  “And don’t you dare think you ruined anythin’. I can’t speak for this Samuel fella,” he said. “But if he’s anything like me, he made his choice same as I did. And I’d wager he wouldn’t thank you for takin’ the weight of it onto yourself.”

  I wiped at my face with the back of my hand and nodded once, quick and small. I didn’t trust my voice.

  Lioren let the moment stand.

  Then he eased the horse forward again, and I followed, the road opening ahead of us as we rode in silence.