“It isn’t any of that,” their mother assured her. “We wouldn’t even have subjected you to the first test, except that the door requires it. We live here, but we do not control this place.”
“We had to pass through that damn door just the same way,” their father said. “For me, the guardian sounded just like my old tutor, Valensis.”
“It made us choose who would die,” Kate said.
Their father nodded. “The lost city does not admit those who will not put love first.”
“At least not through that door,” their mother said. “And you’ll note that your father does not say quite how long we were in those blasted prisons before we made our choices. But that is not what you want to hear from us. We should tell you why we did not come for you.”
“We couldn’t,” their father said.
“Because the Dowager would have killed you if you had been in one place?” Lucas asked.
“Yes,” their mother said, “but not in the way you think. That night… she had so many people killed, but she did something worse with us. She tried to break the connection that makes us who we are. She tried to poison our connection to the land. She tried to destroy the thing that makes us who we are.”
“I’ve felt it,” Sophia admitted. “It’s like… everything in the land is there for me to touch, and I can draw power from it if I need to.”
Kate chimed in then. “Siobhan had an old sorcerer teach me that all magic is about moving power. He taught me to heal by giving people power, and to kill by stealing it. I’ve felt that connection too. It’s the same thing on a huge scale.”
“It’s the same, and not the same,” their father said. “Some of those with magic understand it, and some of them use it to prolong their lives. An old creature like Siobhan had power because of it. A thing like the Master of Crows has power because of it. They have their connections: Siobhan to her fountain, the Master to his crows. For us, it is different: we are connected to our land and our people. We balance it and we touch upon it, but we must be careful not to take too much from it, not to damage it.”
Sophia had felt that when she had been connected to the land: she had felt the fragility of those connections, and how easy it might be to do damage to them.
“I don’t understand,” Lucas said. “How could the Dowager poison that link when she had no magic? And why doesn’t it affect us?”
“She got another to do it,” their father said. “It took a lot of time and effort to hunt him down and try to make him undo what he did. As for why it does not affect you, I think it was just aimed at us. I am grateful to all the old gods that it hasn’t touched any of you.”
“That still doesn’t explain why you didn’t come to get us,” Kate said.
“Oh, Kate, my darling child,” their mother said, standing and going across to Kate so that she could hug her. “We couldn’t take you with us, and then we lost you for so long. Even we didn’t know where you were hidden, not after you and your nurse didn’t make it to the friends who were to smuggle you out.”
“After that, we couldn’t come back to look,” their father said. “The further we stayed from our land, the more slowly the poison progressed. It gave us time to look for an antidote, but meant we couldn’t come back for you.”
“And there was more. You have seen the future, Sophia. So have you, Lucas.” She made a statement of it, not a question. “You have seen things that will happen, could happen, might happen.”
“Siobhan talked about possibilities,” Kate said.
Sophia saw their mother nod.
“Possibilities, affected by the barest touch,” their mother said. “When Alfred and I argued about going back for you, I saw… I saw the world in ruins, land after land in flames. I saw us dying before we ever found you. When we decided to hold back, I saw the potential for a return to beauty and to peace. I saw you, Sophia, and I saw beyond you…”
Sophia swallowed as she thought about her daughter, Violet, and the visions she’d had of her. She’d seen the possibility of an age of unparalleled peace, and the possibility of something far darker. She’d changed the name she might have given to her daughter just to avoid the second. Could she blame her parents for their own hand on the scales of fate?
“So you left us?” Kate demanded, obviously not as willing to forgive it.
“I wish I could have been there with you,” their mother said. “I wish I could have taught you about magic instead of… her. We had so little time though, and we did not dare to leave the city…”
“So that the Dowager wouldn’t find you?” Kate asked.
It isn’t cowardice to want to avoid a fight, Kate, Sophia sent over to her.
It feels like it to me, Kate shot back.
“It wasn’t cowardice, Kate,” their mother said, and Sophia smiled at the thought that of course their mother would share their talents. “It was the only way that we would get to see you all. The disc… the waiting… do you think I wanted to do that, instead of just reaching out to you and bringing you to us?”
“Then why didn’t you come when Sophia sent out messengers looking for you?” Kate asked. “Lucas came to us.”
“We couldn’t,” their father said. “We couldn’t leave this city.”
“Why not?” Sophia asked.
“The poison,” he said. “Being in a place like this, cut off from the world, was the only way to slow the effects enough to see you. It was the only way to get to tell you all the things you needed to know.”
Sophia swallowed at the thought of that, of her parents having to run not just from the kingdom but from the world to survive. Then one of her father’s words caught in her mind.
“Wait, you said that it slowed the poison being here. Not stopped it?”
“No, my darling,” their mother said. “The poison is still in us, and still working to kill us. Even the brief moment of connection to the world through the doorway sped it up. I wish… I wish for so many things, but there is no time for any of them. Your father and I… we are dying.”
CHAPTER THREE
Sebastian tried to hide his frustration as he talked to Asha and Vincente. Of course, when they could both read his mind, hiding anything wasn’t easy.
“The refugees can’t just stay in tents forever,” he said.
“It isn’t forever,” Vincente said. “Just until the army that threatens us is out of the way.”
“And if they don’t like it,” Asha said, “they can always go back out to face them. They aren’t the ones maintaining a shield around Stonehome. They aren’t the ones hunting down attackers. They should be grateful.”
Grateful to be stuck in tents. Grateful to have lost their homes and their loved ones. Grateful that they had to ask for help.
“That’s not what I mean,” Asha said, and once again, it was obvious that she was deep inside his thoughts.
Sebastian looked over to where Emeline sat with Cora, his daughter Violet cradled in Cora’s arms. Cora seemed happy with her there, and Sebastian was grateful for that, because he’d seen how hurt she was in the wake of Aidan’s death.