Light of the Heavens

XXXI. Blood in the Open

Vassa woke to a familiar smell, though one she had not enjoyed for a very long time. Her eyelashes fluttered as her eyes opened, body still aching from some of Sethon's blows. There, sitting on her bedside table, was a white porcelain vase holding brilliant crimson moss roses. Their thorns were so many on their stems and so thick that it could sometimes look almost mossy. Vassa recognized them instantly, a northern flower out of place in this southern kingdom. The smell was delicate and comforting, a reminder of long baths in her precious privacy with petals floating in the water, of late nights tending to her moonlit garden beneath the soaring towers of the Winter Court.

Dawn was barely breaking outside the window and Vassa knew without turning her head that Seben was already studying hard at her side table, nose buried in a weathered tome. She could sense flickers of Seben's preoccupied thoughts at the corners of her mind, close enough for the young woman's celestial aura to soothe her nerves.

"Where did these come from?" Vassa asked, reaching out to stroke a petal with a delicate touch.

Seben jerked out of her scholarly reverie. "Oh!" She took a second to collect herself, embarrassed. "Adéla said I could take a few from the gardens here at the Pharos. I thought you might like something pretty."

Vassa's lips tugged into a smile behind her mask. "You should be careful, Seben," she said softly. "In the north, flowers carry a language of their own." She moved her hand away from the moss roses, sitting up and looking down at the images of flowers burned and cut into her palms. The old scars were in the image of a more classical rose. Moss roses had a fuller scent, one she much preferred.

"So what do those mean?" Seben asked.

"Love through terrible adversity." Vassa stretched with the grace of a cat, stifling a yawn. She turned her eyes towards the young woman. Something dangerous twisted in her chest when she caught Seben's dark eyes watching her with fascination.

The young woman immediately dropped her gaze. "Adéla mentioned something like that," Seben said. "I just thought they were pretty."

Vassa considered whether she wanted to know what else Adéla might have mentioned to Seben about gestures to make. As much as she liked the blood mage, Adéla was sometimes an agent of chaos, particularly if left to her own devices for too long. Whatever the case, it was still a nice gesture. "I appreciate the thoughtfulness. They are quite beautiful."

Seben looked like she wanted to say something, but bit off the words before they could leap off her tongue. She gave breath to different words. "Zdislav mentioned there's going to be a party here at the Pharos. Like a court function, but just mages and their spellguards. I think Adéla wants us to come."

The masked woman zeroed in on Seben's subject change like a master archer honing in on the target. "What do you mean to say, Seben?"

"I—" Seben took a deep breath, a frown furrowing her brow. She sighed once and then all the tension left her. "It doesn't matter. Can we talk about something else?"

The mental calculation that went into Vassa's response was almost staggering, as she weighed every ounce of possible consequences for pushing too hard on Seben versus the unintended consequences that might result from whatever the young woman was really thinking. "Seben—"

"I'll tell you when I'm ready, Vassa," the young woman said resolutely.

Vassa reminded herself that Seben was her ward, not her pawn. It was a lesson difficult to grasp sometimes with how Lysaerys shaped and molded her, but she was trying to be different. "As you wish."

Seben blinked, startled by the sudden acquiescence to her pronouncement. "Really?"

The masked woman laughed, a welling of amusement and relief that loosened the tense knots in her shoulders. She still felt stiff and beaten, however. That would need a bath. "Is it so impossible to believe I might honor your promise?"