right?” Fear makes my stomach churn. If he asks me to leave, I’ll have nowhere to go.
“Everything’s fine.” He rubs at his face. The ice is gone, but he looks tired. “I just want to make sure you know enough about what’s going on here to stay out of trouble.”
“Trouble,” I echo, remembering all Raimo’s warnings, especially what he said about me being a weapon or an asset in the hands of any wielder. “Trouble is the last thing I want.”
He nods. “I know you have contempt for magic. Many people in the city feel the same.”
“It doesn’t seem that way on the ceremony days.”
“Maybe not for the magic itself, then . . .” Oskar shrugs. “But some are mistrustful of people who can do magic. I’m just saying I understand it if you feel the same. If you mention that around here, though, some will take offense.”
“Are they so loyal to the Valtia and her priests?” The idea is terrifying—what happens if they find out about me? Will they give me up?
Oskar scuffs his boot along the rocky floor. “No,” he mutters. “It’s not that.”
I meet his inscrutable gray eyes. “It’s because some of the people here are magic wielders too.” Like you.
He gives me a small smile, like he’s happy I understand. “Exactly. It’s best not to talk about it, though. Not to call attention to it if you see it.”
“I think I get what you mean.” I clench my jaw to keep the questions from bursting forth.
He’s picking up his hunting tools now, fixing some of them to the leather belt around his waist. “Nonmagical people get along fine here if they leave everyone else in peace. People aren’t looking for a fight.” His eyes narrow for a moment. “Well, most of them, at least.”
I’m dying to ask why none of these wielders are at the temple where they should be, especially because it brings the guarantee of education and three meals a day, of safety and belonging, but I manage to hold back. “So nonmagical people like me should keep their mouths shut.”
He pats my shoulder. “And like me. Just do as I do—you don’t have to keep your mouth shut, but don’t pry into people’s business.”
I stare at Oskar, turning his bold-faced lie over in my head. If I call him on it, he might toss me out of his home—especially because he didn’t want me here to begin with. “Thanks for the advice.”
He pulls his cloak over his shoulders. “I have to hunt.”
I watch his boots shuffling toward the exit to the shelter. “I won’t keep you.”
He’s quiet for a moment. But then—“Elli? My mother said you did an excellent job with the corn yesterday.”
My head bobs up, but he’s already gone. Even so, the strangest sense of accomplishment floods my chest. I’m not useless. I can grind corn, and put on stockings, and tie a kerchief, and relieve myself without an attendant holding my gown up for me. All things I’d never done before yesterday.
Over the next week, I learn to be useful in other ways. Maarika teaches me how to use the loom. She puts me to work using a thick copper needle to stitch a few pelts together. I chop herbs and pluck pheasants and patch holes in the elbows of Oskar’s heavy winter tunic, eager to stay busy in the shelter and avoid the mistrustful stares and general notice of the other cave dwellers. What if the elders are searching for me, as Raimo feared? Would they ever think to look here?
Maarika peeks in on me often, her gray eyes somber and fathomless. She never smiles, but she doesn’t scold, either. If I make a mistake, she merely shows me how to do it right, and she is careful with my damaged hand, patient when I can’t quite manage something. I put all my gratitude into my work. Every night I fall onto my pallet exhausted and hurting but relieved; I wasn’t a burden today. I was useful.
It is a livable life. I think of Mim every day, but the ache grows more bearable. The same is true of the realization that I will never be queen, that I will never feel the magic awaken inside of me—that I am already all I will ever be. Sometimes it even feels like I’m less, especially when my hand burns like it’s been dipped in molten iron, when it’s so sensitive to touch that the slightest brush against it forces me to