Nay Raven's Arc

Chapter 4 of 6

Nay wakes with her hands pressed to the floor and no memory of lying down. The ghost she bound last night is still there — she can feel the tether pulling at her ribs, tight and steady. But something is missing. She tries to picture Thorin's face and finds only the shape of him, the bulk and the steady voice, nothing more. Not the color of his eyes or the scar on his jaw or the way he squints when he's thinking. She knows she knew these things yesterday. She sits up slowly and checks her hands. They're not shaking. The magic hasn't slipped. But the cost came anyway. She finds the photograph in the drawer where she keeps her binding notes. The frame is worn leather, the image faded but clear — two figures walking through an alley, stone walls rising on either side. One of them is her. The other must be Thorin. She studies his face in the image, trying to commit it to memory again, but it slides away like water. The harder she looks, the less she holds. She sets the frame on the workbench and digs the gem out of the buried crate. Maybe if she holds it while looking at the photograph, the memory will stick. The gem warms in her palm and pulls at something deep in her chest. She brings it close to the photograph and the ghost outside screams. The sound tears through the air, high and breaking. Nay drops the gem and runs to the window. The ghost is wrapped around a massive flower growing from the rocks below — petals blue and white, glowing with the same light as the bound spirits. The tether between them burns bright enough to see, a line of red fire stretching from the flower to her ribs. The ghost writhes against it, pulling harder than it did all night. She realizes the gem didn't just call to the ghost. It woke something in the binding itself, made it hungry. The flower's petals curl inward, darkening at the edges. If the ghost tears free, it will take the binding with it — and whatever piece of her the magic used to hold it in place. She grabs a rock from the shelf near the door, a dark stone that flickers with flame along its edges, and throws it through the broken window. It strikes the flower dead center. The petals burst into black fire. The ghost shrieks once and dissolves into smoke. The tether snaps. Nay gasps and doubles over, waiting for the cost, but nothing comes. She straightens slowly and looks at the photograph still sitting on the workbench. Thorin's face is there in the image, clear as it ever was. She can see it now — the scar, the way his jaw sets when he's worried. But she knows without testing that if she looks away, it will vanish again. The magic didn't take more this time. It just made sure she couldn't get back what it already claimed. She wraps the photograph in cloth and buries it with the gem. Some things, she understands now, the magic will not let her keep — no matter what she binds or breaks to try.