Just waiting.
Like a savage predator poised in the shadows of my soul, it lies eager and alert. Glowing eyes alight on me, wings of burning gold tucked against its body like flames. It looks at me, and I look at it, but it’s a bit like going through a tunnel. I’m not sure where its sight begins and mine ends, how long the stretch lasts between the bright pupil, or if the two are even separate at all.
I feel my lips curling, relief filling me. Because the beast—the fae—in me isn’t something to be feared. It’s me. It always has been. I feel that now.
And my power, it’s not some uncontrollable force, nor has it dried up. It’s there, like an eternal fire of gilded flames burning in the center of my soul. I feel my magic just as I feel the beat of my heart. It’s in my veins, coursing through my limbs, simmering beneath my skin. All I need to do is reach out and take control of it.
When I open my eyes again, a sense of calm has washed over me, because this time, I know what to do. It’s instinct.
I stoke the flames of the beast’s wings, and the gold drips down through me. I don’t try to pull or panic, I don’t try to force it or inundate myself with doubts.
I simply call to it with my newfound voice, and it answers.
The smile widens on my face when I feel the familiar warmth beneath my skin. A second later, my palm goes slick. I let out a whoop when the gold streams out of my hand and starts to gild the floor, merging with the frozen puddle before me.
I look up at the timberwing with a triumphant smile. “I did it!”
The beast blinks at me, and I don’t even mind that it doesn’t look impressed, because I’m too excited that I finally managed to use my magic on command while fully conscious and in control.
I immediately celebrate by yanking off my other glove. I press my palms against my leggings, my shirt, my socks and boots, elated, ecstatic, feeling like for the first time ever, I can celebrate my own magic.
When I’m gilding my gloves, a clap sounds behind me, and I whirl around in surprise. Slade’s there, leaning against the wall of the cave, looking offensively sexy. No person should be able to look that effortlessly good in the light of dawn.
But I’m sure glad he does.
He’s wearing unlaced boots caught over low-slung pants and a wrinkled shirt with its sleeves shoved up his forearms. He’s not even wearing a coat, like he rushed out before pulling one on.
He stops clapping, his hands slipping into his pockets, while the grin on his face and gleam in his eye make my stomach flip. “Well done, Goldfinch. I knew you could do it.”
CHAPTER 41
AUREN
“Try and pull it back in,” Slade tells me.
His back is resting against the cave wall—a wall that’s now gilded in sweeping waves that mimic the veins of fluorescence surrounding us.
Argo, Slade’s timberwing, is here too, just as he has been for the last four days. He never approaches or growls, but instead keeps a keen eye on me and my gold—or acts completely bored by my presence.
My brow furrows in concentration from where I sit in front of a rock formation at the back of the cave, my gold cascading over the dark stone like a slosh of paint dripping over the top. I try to pull it back into my hand that rests on the pointed tip, but no matter what I do, the gold keeps spreading down.
“I can’t,” I tell Slade with frustration, my fingers stretched and bent over the stone, glutinous gold dripping from me.
My hand is shaky, the rest of my body tired from the strain of control I’ve been practicing non-stop for several hours already. Since Slade first followed me and saw me finally have a breakthrough with my magic a few days ago, I’ve been dragging him up here from dawn until dusk to help me practice.
I’ve learned a lot in a short amount of time. Like the fact that I can’t make new gold during the night. That power is still purely tied to the day. Yet I can control any gold around me during nighttime, just like I did back in Ranhold.
“Alright, take a break. Breathe.”
“I don’t want to take a break,” I say stubbornly, my mouth pinched as I stare at my ornery gold. “I want to get this.”
Slade drags a foot up to lean an arm over his knee, looking casually sexy from where he sits across from me. “I know you do. And you will. You’ve done amazing work already learning control. Take a breath, and then try again.”
Nodding, I relax my strained fingers and shake them out a bit as I let out a centering breath. Every day, Slade has been helping me master the new facets of my magic. I quickly realized that my confidence boost of calling up my gold-touch again was just the first step. I have so much more to learn and experiment with, and a lifetime of old habits and thought processes to undo.