Page 6 of Kingdom of Locks

“Honeysuckle! Throw me my rope!”

With a grimace, Mama Gail hid the stolen tome, then moved to the opening. “You forgot to say please,” she called out irritably.

“Don’t upset him,” pleaded Aurelia. “It’s not worth it.”

Her mother lifted her hands in surrender, stepping back to allow Aurelia to approach the window.

As Aurelia moved forward, she pulled at her braid. Mama Gail helped her, and between them they soon had Aurelia’s dark tresses free of the complicated plait into which her mother threaded them after their visitor left every night. Unrestrained, the hair was much longer, pooling around Aurelia’s feet in many loops that made it hard to move without tripping. Not even glancing out of the window, Aurelia gathered her hair and threw it over the metal hook she had used to lower herself to the floor. Except this time, she threw the rest of her hair out the window, wincing slightly as it pulled against her scalp on its journey down to the ground far below them. She didn’t need to prompt her mother to help—they were too practiced at this routine. Both women looped Aurelia’s locks around their elbows with quick, expert flicks, making sure that their arms would take the weight of their visitor rather than Aurelia’s scalp.

“All right,” Aurelia called out, hating the quaver in her voice. The next moment, she felt the tug indicating that the enchanter had transferred his weight from the ground to her hair. Bracing her feet against the wall of the tower, she held the tension in her straining muscles as their visitor pulled himself, hand over hand, up her hair.

When a well-known form appeared in the window, Aurelia had the fleeting thought—not for the first time—that if she let go at just the right moment, he’d fall, perhaps to his death. She brushed it aside, ashamed of herself, as a tall man climbed through the window and into the tower.

“Good evening,” he said, straightening.

The two women just looked back at him, taking in his closely cropped dark hair, fine clothes, and general air of authority. He raised an eyebrow at their silence, his gaze settling on Aurelia.

“Where are your manners, Honeysuckle? Anyone would think you were raised in a hovel, instead of this luxurious dwelling.”

Aurelia could feel Mama Gail’s anger beside her, and she felt the usual surge of irritation herself at the stupid name the enchanter had given her. But both women knew perfectly well that their lives would be much easier if they didn’t goad their captor. The last thing either of them wanted was to endure one of his hypocritical lectures.

“Good evening, Master Enchanter,” said Aurelia quietly, using the form of address he insisted upon from her.

“What brings you to ourluxurious dwelling, Cyfrin?” Mama Gail asked curtly, apparently not placing quite as high a value as Aurelia did on keeping their visitor’s feathers unruffled.

Cyfrin narrowed his eyes. He never failed to take offense at Mama Gail’s refusal to recognize his right to visit them, or his ownership over the building in which they lived.

“I’m in no mood to argue with you tonight, crone,” he sneered.

Fortunately Mama Gail wasn’t as easily offended as the enchanter was, and she simply rolled her eyes. Aurelia would have copied the gesture if she dared. It was absurd to call Mama Gail—not much older than forty, and glowing with health from the tip of her copper-haired head to the soles of her worn slippers—a crone.

Cyfrin turned to Aurelia, his eyes raking over her unrestrained hair. A flash of approval passed over his face. Nothing else about Aurelia ever elicited that reaction, and she took no pleasure from him directing it at her hair. If she had her way, she’d slice the whole lot off before bed that very night.

But Cyfrin didn’t see her impractically long tresses as a nuisance.

“Ah, my Honeysuckle,” he said, a caress in his voice that made Aurelia’s skin crawl, even though she knew it was directed at her hair rather than her. “If you could only feel the potency of the power that leaks from you. It’s breathtaking.”

“She can feel it, all right,” said Mama Gail dryly. “She’ll hardly be able to hold her head up soon. It’s too heavy for her.”

Cyfrin ignored her. Stepping up to Aurelia, he stooped and picked up a loop of dark hair. “Shame about the color,” he sighed, for what must have been the hundredth time. “It was supposed to be as golden as honeysuckle, like your mother’s was.” He shot Mama Gail a nasty look. “It was golden when I adopted you. I still don’t understand how it changed.”

Aurelia’s mother rolled her eyes. “How would I have changed her hair color? Many babies start with pale hair only to have it darken.”

But Cyfrin had turned back to Aurelia, uninterested in Mama Gail’s words. “Shame,” he repeated thoughtfully, clearly talking to himself. “Golden hair would have been an excellent foil for mine.”

Aurelia blinked in confusion. She had no idea what he was talking about, and her eyes slid to Mama Gail, seeking clarification. What she saw made her stomach clench uncomfortably. Her mother, who usually made a point of never showing a hint of vulnerability in front of their captor, looked deeply uneasy. When her gaze moved to Aurelia’s, she quickly sent her a reassuring smile, but it was too late to hide her initial reaction.

“Well,” said Cyfrin briskly, apparently unaware of their silent exchange, “no sense in wasting any time. Let’s get to it.”

Aurelia turned around obediently, so that she faced away from Cyfrin. She felt the familiar sensation of his hands tangling through her hair, and suppressed a shudder. It felt so soothing when Mama Gail ran her fingers through her daughter’s hair, whether to gently work out the knots, or just to comfort her after a difficult day. But when Cyfrin did it, it made Aurelia’s skin crawl.

Although perhaps that was the magic.

As soon as he grasped her hair, the enchanter began to mutter. The language wasn’t one Aurelia knew, but she recognized the odd phrase from her and Mama Gail’s clandestine studies of magic. Not that she needed to know the details to understand the concept. Cyfrin had been pouring his magic into her hair every night of her life for as long as she could remember. She knew from rifling through his own notes that she now carried more power on her person than a hundred enchanters combined.

If only she had the magic in her blood that would allow her to access it. But Mama Gail had assured her regretfully that no one in her family had ever had magic. Aurelia had made her peace with the unpleasant fact that she was nothing more than a passive vessel. The routine was so familiar that she’d barely thought about it when she was a child. But lately she’d been growing increasingly uneasy as she considered what Cyfrin’s plans might be for his accumulated power, and what her role in those plans would require from her. She didn’t need specifics to know she wanted no part of any scheme of his.

After several minutes, Cyfrin stopped muttering and released her hair, giving it a fond pat as it fell back into place.

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