Page 11 of The Bound Mage
“I’m actually here to help you.” The female lifted a shimmering swath of amethyst fabric. “I brought you a dress for dinner.”
“Dinner?” Araya echoed. All of her meals so far had come on trays left outside her door—somehow always still piping hot no matter when she discovered it.
“Yes, dinner.” The female swept by her without waiting for an invitation, moving to hang the gown on the door of the wardrobe. “Someone brings you food. You eat it. Sometimes you even talk to your friends.”
“I don’t have any friends here,” Araya said warily.
“Not yet,” the female replied, hanging the dress with practiced ease. “But I thought you might want something nicer to wear. And maybe a little help getting ready.”
Araya’s gaze narrowed. “Did Ilyana send you? Or Loren?”
“Oh, no.” The strange female laughed, tossing her head back. “They’ll both be terribly cross when they find out I dropped in on you. I’m sure you’ve noticed, but they both seem to think they know what’s best for everyone.”
Despite herself, Araya smiled.
The other female grinned. “You can call me El,” she said, throwing herself down into one of the chairs by the fire. “Come on—sit. We don’t have to get ready yet, and I want to knoweverything.”
It wasimpossible not to like El.
Despite Araya’s resolve to keep her guard up, she found herself reluctantly drawn in by the fae female’s easy charm. El had immediately made herself comfortable in one of the padded armchairs, draping herself over it as if they had known each other for years. She chattered nonstop and laughed easily, filling the quiet room with a warmth Araya hadn’t realized she was missing.
And somehow, without even meaning to, Araya found herselfenjoyingit.
“And you worked?” El asked. “Inthe Aetherium? I’ve never heard of a fae female being allowed to do that before.”
“Well, it does require special permission…but I wasn’t the only one,” Araya said. “There was a whole workshop full of us to imbue amplifiers—but I stopped when I was bonded.”
“To a human mage,” El said, sitting up a little straighter and eyeing Araya with unabashed curiosity.
Araya tensed, twisting her fingers into her skirts. “It wasn’t like you’re thinking.”
“No?” El’s green eyes widened. “Then whatwasit like?”
“We were…friends first,” Araya said slowly. “Of a sort. He sponsored my apprenticeship—kept me out of the slums. Bonding is an arrangement that benefits us both—one I could have refused if I wanted to.”
“And yet you’re here—a world away from him.” El studied her, her expression unreadable. “Did you love him?”
Araya’s throat tightened as a flicker of memory surfaced. Jaxon’s grip, the press of wood under her cheek as she begged him to stop. But he hadn’t. He’d?—
“Araya?” El asked softly.
“I don’t want to talk about this any more.” Araya stared at the fire, fixing her gaze on the flames.
“Alright.” El studied her a moment longer, the warmth in her green eyes dimming. “You must have questions of your own. This is your chance—ask me anything.”
Araya opened her mouth—then closed it. She had a thousand questions, most of them too revealing to ask outright. But if El was willing to answer them…
“People keep saying it’s dangerous outside the castle,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “Why? What’s out there?”
“Oh, thezal’vorr.” El shuddered dramatically. “They’re animals—or they were, before they were twisted by the shadows. They’re most active at night, but you could run into one at any time if you stray too close to where the shadows thicken.”
Araya only barely managed not to roll her eyes. Fae might not be able to lie, but it didn’t make them immune from superstition. Maybe the Veil itself was dangerous…but the mists that rolled off of it? The fae in the New Dominion blamed them for everything from illnesses and disappearances to bad luck. As if poverty, starvation, and the strict rationing of magic weren’t the obvious culprits.
It was just easier to fear the dark than to face reality.
Still, she nodded, schooling her expression into something neutral. “Good to know,” she murmured. “Does anyone else live here?”
“At Ithralis?” El raised her eyebrows. “No one reallyliveshere anymore—except for you, Loren and Thorne now I guess. Everyone else is in Lumaria?—”
