The Royal Wizard by Alianne Donnelly Page B

while, Nia sat there, cradling his head, as her tears slid down her cheeks. She mourned him as she would a true brother. Saeran was amazed at her compassion. Kneeling in the snow beside her, he touched her shoulder.
    As if awakened from a dream, she looked at him with fire burning in her blue eyes and said, “Huntsmen did this.”
    She brushed off his touch and moved the wolf off her lap, pushing to her feet.
    All at once, the sky became dark with storm clouds. Thunder rolled in the distance as she walked into the woods, and Saeran pushed to his feet to follow.
    “Nia!” he called after her. Anger trailed in her wake, so thick it choked him. A terrible wind picked up, lashing at her robes, but the branches that hindered Saeran’s progress bent out of her way to allow her passage. Within moments they reached a clearing. By then the sun was gone and the forest was pitch black, yet somehow he could still see her. She almost glowed in the darkness, drawing his eye, his only guiding star in the unnatural night.
    Nia reached her hands to the sky and lifted her face to it. Saeran felt magic wind around her like a cloak, twisting around her arms. She spoke a series of words, reached higher.
    When the rustling started anew, Saeran raised his blade. They were surrounded by the sound of it, and there were too many to fight by himself. “Nia,” he tried again, but she didn’t answer.
    To his left something exploded out of the bushes. Saeran turned, dagger at the ready, but what landed at his feet was a piece of meat. Dozens more came flying out, all of them piling together around them.
    When the last of the carcasses fell, Nia lowered her arms and faced him, her eyes sparking with terrible light. “Your huntsmen did this,” she told him, furious red lights flashing around her. “They were all around, in every corner of the wood. Just tossed on the ground for any beast to feed on and die.” She gritted her teeth as tears slid down her cheeks. “The poison tore through their bodies and it took days.”
    Rage simmered in his veins. He saw from Nia’s reaction that she could see it in his eyes. “Show me,” he said tightly.
    Nia weaved her hand through the air between them, drawing on the red light and pulling it in. Mist following her movements until it formed a circle. She said a word of command to make it glow like a torch and in its depths images took shape. Four huntsmen argued in the woods. Saeran knew them. They’d brought in a great boar only yesterday, boasting of the hunt’s thrill. Telling him he’d have loved it. In the vision their words were drowned in silence, but their meaning was clear. They had just evaded a pack of wolves. The forest was full of them; they could not step foot past the creek without hearing their howls. But hunting them was forbidden unless they attacked livestock, and that had not happened in too many years to count. For the safety of Frastmir and its inhabitants, they proclaimed loftily, something had to be done.
    If there were fewer wolves, they mused, there would be more game for them to hunt, more mouths to be fed with such bounty. In truth, they thought only of the people. But disobeying the order to spare the beasts was punishable by a lashing and imprisonment. Two of them had wives and children to feed, one was courting a shopkeeper’s daughter, and the last was quite sought after by the tavern wenches. None of them could chance being caught.
    They looked from one to the other, each weighing his comrades and all alighting on the same idea at once.
    All it took was a wild boar or two, a vial of poison, and a sad shake of the head when the palace guards asked after the day’s trophies. No one had to know.
    With a swirl of black smoke, the vision changed and Saeran found himself in the castle, looking at the huntsmen’s drunken faces. Their beards were greasy with food and their hands filled with meat. One took a bite from a succulent pig’s leg and threw the rest to the dogs. They