I knew the path like the lines on my palm, yet I still glanced back now and then. Sometimes I could swear a tall, broad-shouldered figure was shadowing my heels.
I pressed myself behind an ancient tree—but found no one tailing me. Only my own paranoia refused to leave its mistress.
"Ria, don't be afraid! I'll protect you!" Lil sprang from the basket and wobbled ahead on trembling paws.
"You see those glowing cords too?" I hurried after my brave familiar.
At last, someone to talk magic with. Since my nurse died, the loneliness howled like a wolf. The witch's gift had become… alive.
"Uh-huh! That's the world's lifeforce," he chirped, biting a chunk off a plump blade of grass. "In my world—crunch—the veins have no outlets. They can't wrap the earth. Everything's smothered under something called concrete. It's all gray, and people are jumpy—you wouldn't believe. Here I've only seen small stones so far, but it looks like you're marching the same direction."
"And in your world—are women also ordered to marry by some elder's decree?" The thought of Theo in Micheli prodded the raw wound of my anger, betrayal, and hurt.
"No idea. I didn't live there long!" Lil seemed to shrug. "But in the house I was born, the girls didn't listen to any ancestral advice. Wouldn't get up in the mornings, talked to their friends till deep night. Utter lawlessness!"
If only I could have that kind of 'lawlessness,' I sighed.
We'd arrived.
"See those white flowers? We need to pick them carefully, without scattering the pollen. My nurse's notebooks say a brew from these lets you sleep less but wake more rested than without it."
I swear on my curls—Lil nodded. He rose onto his hind legs and got to work with professional precision.
Teasing each other and taking turns sharing bits of our lives, we filled an entire basket with blooms. A brook murmured nearby. I used to live by the sea, and I'd missed the sound of water terribly.
"Did you know your power opens best if a witch bathes in a clear spring under the full moon?" the little creature asked, studying me. I must have been wearing my homesick, water-hungry face.
"No. And how do you know that?" There it was again—Lil all but shrugged.
"I don't. But your magic does. Did you forget your magic summoned me into this world? I'm basically the voice of your power. Admit it—you couldn't have found a better candidate for the job."
I nodded—no need to hurt his feelings. Honestly, I could list a dozen creatures better suited to the job than him. But his sheer confidence? I admired it.
I checked the clearing again. No one. I slipped out of my clothes and waded into the running water. The stream feeding the river was shallow—waist-deep in places—but wide.
Back in my duchy, everyone swam in water cold as a blade; we learned it with our mother's milk. Here, moonlight scattered across the surface, turning it secret and impossibly beautiful.
No wonder I surrendered to old and new sensations. I paddled lazily, let my mind empty. Memory took me back to childhood—loved and safe.
Lil stayed on the bank, nibbling the juiciest blades of grass. I'd drifted far from shore and now stood, arms spread as if to embrace the night. That was how I took my moon baths—everything inside me renewed. Light seeped into my skin, soft as a caress, and I tilted my head back in gratitude, smiling at the night's power.
Maybe that's why I didn't hear my familiar's warning cry before he dove behind the trees.
"Good evening, my lady. Not cold, are we?" A mocking male voice drifted over the water.
I froze like a rabbit before a boa. My eyes flew wide. It took me a beat to remember I should cover my chest; once I did, my hands snapped over the offending curves.
"So you are cold…" the man tilted his head, amused. The irony skimmed over my skin and woke a stampede of goosebumps. Or was it not the irony at all?
He wore a black coat and black trousers, silver buttons playing with the moonlight.His hair, slicked back as always, and that sly look turned Theo more and more into a predator's silhouette.
I don't think water had ever scalded like this. I hugged myself tighter, but there was no hiding my… generous assets. Never in my life had I wished for a smaller chest more than now.
Because the self-assured Inquisitor had sunk his gaze into me like teeth—ready to swallow me whole if I gave him the chance. Without looking away, he began to unfasten his coat. Testing my nerves on purpose.
Absolutely not. If I allowed that kind of insolence, I'd never respect myself again. Relations between a young woman and a man weren't condemned in any principality—if the man declared serious intent. This brazen one had none toward one young witch. He only wanted me off balance, vulnerable.
My head whipped, eyes raking the bank. My clothes lay under the old tree—too far. Lil was likely trembling somewhere in the grass. My thoughts spun in a panicked reel. What do I do?! I would not let an unmarried man step into the same water where I was bathing bare as the moon. My reputation? Hardly mattered when you're alone in the whole wide world. But showing the new mayor—and Inquisitor—where the lines are? That mattered very much.