Princess of the Sword Read Free

“I’ll give you the spell, then tell you two ways to undo it. One takes a handful of words; the other a single word only. I wouldn’t use the second unless you’ve absolutely no other choice.”

    “Why not?”

    “Because it will release all your power at once, much like a dam bursting. Everyone for miles will feel the echo of it.”

    She swallowed with difficulty. “And alarm bells will go off?”

    “Probably in the throne room of Tor Neroche,” he said dryly. “So please, be ginger. Now, the spell is laid thus—”

    “Aren’t you going to do it for me?” she asked in surprise.

    He hesitated. “I could, but I don’t think you’d care for it. You have power enough to use the spell successfully on your own.”

    “But if I make a mistake, we are lost.”

    He closed his eyes briefly. “All right, I’ll see to it. But stop me if you find you can’t breathe, aye?”

    She nodded, but she couldn’t help but think he was underestimating her ability to endure things that were difficult.

    Or, at least she did until he started weaving his spell.

    All her power, the power she’d spent weeks denying, then yet more time trying to accept—all that power didn’t so much leave her as it was drawn into itself, then dropped down into some fathomless well. She looked over the edge of that well, fearing she had lost what she had never wanted but had so recently come to appreciate, but there it all lay, shining there in the dark like a treasure that was so lovely and so desirable, it almost brought tears to her eyes.

    She had to pull away mentally from the sight. She was appalled to find how accustomed she’d become to that sparkle of magic cascading through her veins. It was the same sort of magic that whispered through the trees and sang as it fell down onto the ground like sunlight in her grandfather’s garden at Seanagarra.

    It was beautiful.

    She looked up to find Miach watching her silently, his eyes full of what she’d seen.

    “If your grandfather could see your face right now,” he said quietly, “he would weep.”

    She took a deep breath. “I never intended . . . I didn’t realize . . .”

    “Not all magic is evil, Morgan, is it?”

    She shook her head, because she couldn’t speak. She could only go into his arms, hold him tightly for a moment or two, then step back before she gave into the urge to display some womanly emotion that wouldn’t serve either of them. She waved him on to his business without further comment. She would think about magic, and mages, and other things that unbalanced her later. For now, ’twas best to do what had to be done.

    Miach gave her both ways to undo his spell, and she memorized each faithfully. She didn’t hear him say anything on his own behalf, but she felt his power disappear as surely as if he’d snuffed out a candle—or dropped all his magic into a well and then capped it.

    She wasn’t too fond of that last image, truth be told.

    “Let’s go,” he said.

    She nodded, then turned to slip through the shadows with him, giving no more thought to what she was doing than she would have any other offensive. They would be over the walls, find what they needed, then be back outside the keep before any of the mutterers inside were the wiser.

    The outer walls of Buidseachd were relatively easy to scale, though very high. Heights didn’t bother her, so she didn’t trouble herself over them. She dropped onto the parapet with Miach, hid in the shadows as a sleepy sentry shuffled by, then followed him as he wound his way through towers and passages and up and down stairs. She didn’t ask him where he was going, and he didn’t volunteer any information.

    Bells weren’t ringing—save the one tolling the hour that almost sent her tripping into Miach’s back—and students weren’t pouring out of their bedchambers with spells of death on their lips. Perhaps they would manage their business after all.

    They passed others, but those lads seemed to