Quill of Thieves

Chapter 4

"Do you think it hurt terribly when their tongues were cut out?"

Matthias's jaw twitched, but he otherwise remained motionless at his post by the entrance to Treason's Tower. Astrid sighed at him and twisted the braids into place atop her head. The frigidity of the tower slid across her exposed neck, her skin prickling with goosebumps. She rolled her shoulders and tossed off her heavy cloak. Her copper band contracted against the cold and squeezed her upper arm. Astrid had long ago determined that the best part of her lessons with the Scribes was when they released her arm from that blasted prison band.

Even if it was unnerving to watch their tongueless mouths form silent words.

"I imagine our Scribes can't speak, not because of their loss of tongue, but perhaps from the screaming that damaged their vocal cords when they were punished for their treason," Astrid said into the silence with half-a-glance at Matthias.

Still nothing.

Well, then.

Astrid flexed her fingers and shut her eyes. Her focus centered around her copper band where her veins pulsed in rebellion against its trapping. As she focused, the doused power in her stomach fluttered in response. She pulled her focus closer and heat swept up into her chest. The copper band tightened at the rising flame, but Astrid pushed back. Though magic had been stolen from the kingdom's lands, alchemy still thrived in Halorium, and it was Halorium's most notorious alchemist who had created Astrid's cuff from a mineral found all the way in Lake Holalethe near the Gem Mines of Galandreal. It didn't really extinguish Astrid's powers, not completely; instead, it trapped the magic and sent it into a slumber from which it took all of Astrid's control to awaken.

But Astrid had been acquainting herself with the inner workings of her magic for years, and as her cuff gripped her arm so tightly that her fingers went numb, Astrid barreled down deeper, stroking a command into her power's sleeping mind.

I am your master!

Matthias muffled a sharp sound of surprise as a sudden wind swept through the cracks of mountain stone and into the tower with a shrill shriek.

"You insolent little—"

Astrid grinned against her clamped teeth and pushed further. Her thread of wind whipped the braids from its crown of golden hair. A wild burst of laughter caught in her throat as she raised her hands out on either side of her, spreading her fingers wide so the wind could fill the spaces between them. Her cuff warred against the beckoned power, but she could barely feel its burning clamp. With a final push, a metallic thump echoed against the tower's walls. Matthias swore as his captain's helmet flung itself from his shorn hair and fell onto his booted foot.

The sound jarred Astrid from her focus. The cuff regained control and shoved the elements down, down, down. The wind retreated so quickly that her hair was still half-raised even after it was gone. Astrid sucked down a shaky breath but kept her shoulders from slumping as she spun towards Matthias with a pointedly smug expression.

"Well, that certainly got your attention."

He never gaped at her show of magic, which was a little insulting, considering she was the only one left in the kingdom to be able to wield such power. As such, she knew it wasn't Matthias who hummed in a low, guttural sound from the tower's entrance.

Astrid turned towards the doors.

Two Scribes stood there in robes of tattered gray, the edges frayed and unraveling. Despite the fact that they were captured traitors to the crown and had conspired with the Academy during the Great Purge to hoard all the magic left in the lands for themselves, Astrid always felt her spine straighten in the solitude of their presence. One of them was bald, his oval head as polished as a freshly laid egg. Astrid wondered if he had possession of a blade or if the scars that patterned his scalp had been another consequence of his treason. The other, a woman, had graying curls that wound around themselves into matted knots over her thick shoulders.

Serah, the woman, roamed her silvery eyes down Astrid's small but regal frame. She huffed a breath of air as if what she found was unimpressive and wove a hand through the air, her fingers swaying as if caught up in a storm. Wind, the motion said.

Astrid inclined her head; it had been the element of Air she'd called upon to spite Matthias. This high up from the ground, the wind was the closest element to her. After all, there was a reason these two captive Scribes were kept in the tallest, most enclosed tower of the fortress. Scribes understood the elemental magic of the lands, but without the land, what did they have to call on? Not to mention that, before the Purge, Scribes could only harness the elements with the aid of the Authors who travelled with them, who could capture elemental threads into their Monvertas, the land's power woven into parchment with ink of blood.

But all the Authors were dead.