He gives the sash another shove, and the window slams shut, the impact rattling through the glass. We both jump. The curtains, stilled, flutter down and make a soft wall between us and the rest of the room. Unfiltered sunlight streams over us. I look at him, and I want to touch the scars that cross the side of his jaw, his mouth. I keep my hands at my sides to stop myself from reaching.
“Was it very awful in the village?”
“What do you think?” He sighs. “The latest rumor is that Clover and I are trying to perform some kind of blood sacrifice.”
I glance toward his bandaged arm. “I mean, they’re not entirely wrong.”
He lets out a tired laugh, then starts to unfold his sleeves and smooth them back down. “I’m sure it delights you to know everyone shares your opinion that I’m a monster.”
I pretend to study him. “You’re not even a very good monster. Really, you need fangs.”
“Fangs?”
“Or perhaps a tail. You could twitch it when you were angry.”
“If I did have a tail, it would be twitching now.”
I can’t help but smile. He’s a monster. He’s a boy. Sad and cross. He parts the curtains and holds them open for me. I slip through the narrow space, and he steps out of my way, looking at my nightdress with a grimace.
“You’re still covered in dirt from last night.” He walks out after me. The room dims as the curtains fall shut behind him.
I look down at myself. My nightdress is filthy, and my hair is tangled, with mud clotted at the ends of my curls. I start to laugh. “Have I infringed on your standards of cleanliness? I’ve not had time to change since we went to the lake.”
“You might want a bath before dinner.”
Unlike me, Rowan is neatly dressed. The bandage on his wrist is the only hint of disarray from last night. An irascible urge comes over me to loosen him. Make him untidy. To step dusty footprints onto his boots or untuck his shirt. Crumple him.
“What’s the matter? Are you worried I’ll ruin your nice clean shirt?”
I grab his sleeve and crush the fabric inside my fist. He catches my hand, horrified. “There’s still blood under your fingernails!”
“It’s your blood!” I fall against his chest, still laughing, warmed by the utter delight of teasing him.
He glares down at me. “You are a complete menace.”
He’s still holding my hand, and I lace my fingers through his. A spark flares through my whole body: chest to ribs to fingertips. Heat stirs beneath my skin, like there’s a garden of bright flowers blossoming in my veins.
Light flickers between our joined hands.
Rowan flinches back, shocked. “You have magic.” He’s guarded, but there’s a surety in his words. “That’s what you did last night. You used your magic against the Corruption.”
By rights that power belongs to me. I shiver, remembering the Lord Under’s words. “I don’t—”
Rowan lifts my hand and turns it palm up, then drags his fingers roughly across my heartline. We both take a breath, and I watch as the darkness uncurls at his throat, along the scars. As the threads of poison lace over him, I feel an echoing pull far down within me.
And the power, the magic, my magic, sparks and burns and burns. Brightness fills the room like a scatter of coals fallen loose inside a stove. For a brief, brilliant moment before the power fades, my hands, my palms, my fingers … they glow.
Rowan clenches his teeth as the darkness spreads across his neck and over his jaw. He closes his eyes, and slowly the lines start to fade.
“Why didn’t you tell Clover you had magic, when she asked you?” He stares down at my hands. “That day in your cottage, if I’d known about this, I would have—”
“You’d have known I was useful to you, just like Arien?”
“That isn’t true. I don’t want to use you, Violeta. I—” He lifts his hand, but I step back.
“Can we please just forget this?”
“I can understand you not confiding in me. But what about Arien? Why have you kept this from him?”
Because it never happened until now. My magic is a distant throb at the palms of my hands, but I can still feel the way it unspooled when Rowan touched me. The sparks that bloomed from my fingers. When I think of it, I want to shove him away—I want to pull him closer. Why has being at Lakesedge—being with him—made this strange, lost power stir within me?
“You can’t tell anyone about my magic. Not Arien, not Clover. I don’t want anyone to know.”