Hi again!

Rewritten chapter 2! Thank you again to everyone who reviewed! Yall the real MVPs. And a special thank you to Ice, goddess among betas.

Chapter 2 - Rossy

"What in the gods' names is a god-toy?"

The boy in the green shirt continues to laugh, slapping his own stomach with a dirty hand, which draws my attention to his tunic. It's emblazoned with a three-pronged lightning bolt.

I scowl at him.

"Okay, okay," he gasps. Tears edge his eyes and I start to wonder if he's having some kind of convulsive fit. "I'm sorry. I guess you don't call yourselves that. It means, like, you don't live in a court. The gods own you."

Something about his tone makes me defensive. "Nobody owns me, I just work for the gods."

He rolls his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. What's your name, god-toy?"

I grit my teeth. "Ross."

"Well, I'm Graie. I was supposed to be named for my life-force but I only demonstrated last week," he explains. "Luckily, it turns out my life-force matches my name pretty well, so how's that for a blessing from the Starlaxi? I'm not going to tell you what it is, though. Otherwise you might have a tactical advantage."

The stream of gibberish provokes a blank stare from me.

"Do you have life-force?" Graie squints. "I forget if god-toys…"

I fold my arms and opt to ignore him. I think he likes saying things I don't understand. "I was kind of in the middle of something before you came along and attacked me, so if you don't mind, can you go away?"

"Can I go away?" Graie exclaims. "This is our territory! You're the trespasser. You should be running back to your gods before I wallop you with Hurricane." He pats the pommel of whatever's in the scabbard at his waist. "Sir Hartef taught me how to stab yesterday, so watch out. He also showed me how to get into the Trace, and I'm super advanced already. Regular prodigy, he said."

I eye him skeptically.

"No, seriously, watch!"

Graie puts his hands together and closes his eyes. I stare. Nothing happens. Time for me to run while he's distracted, I think. Then Graie's eyes snap open and he gasps.

"Oh sh—dang, you need to go right now," he hisses, already moving forward to shove me into the bushes behind us. I jump back at his movement, and then backpedal into the bushes.

"What? What's wrong?" His sudden shift in demeanor makes my heart jump. Is it that not-human man thing? If he knows how to fight and he's getting scared… Even though I know it's stupid, my brain's decided every spooky story Zem's ever related about the horrors deep in the wild is now true. As Graie shoves me deeper in the bushes, I feel my breaths come more shallowly. That same buzzing feeling is starting up in my chest again.

"We've got company," he whispers, then even more quietly, I think he says something like, "I've always wanted to say that."

"Who?" I breathe, trying to peer over his shoulder. Which isn't hard because as I've said, he's about the height of a modest donkey.

I can see two people ride on horseback into the clearing, but it's hard to make out their outlines through the leaves. They dismount, and a moment later, I hear,

"Graie, come out. We can see you." The low, rich voice sounds a little exasperated.

Graie swears, hustles out of the bush backwards, then turns on his heel and waves. "Heeeeey, Sir Hartef! And Queen Bluelianna." I peer at him, watching as he sweeps into a bow. "I'm not having much luck hunting. I…"

He trails off, and I lean further out of the bushes, trying to catch sight of what's going on. One of the new figures in the clearing turns his head and looks directly at me. I clap my hand over my mouth to muffle my dismayed squeak, and retreat further into the bush. It's a bit late for that, though.

"God-toy, you might as well come out as well," the man calls.

Swallowing my dread, I step out into the sunlight and take stock of the two people in the clearing. The big brawny man that I'm assuming is Sir Hartef is clothed in the same style of tunic as Graie, though his is a deep forest green. He's probably in his thirties or forties, with a thick golden beard framing his handsome, dark face like a lion's mane. Both he and the woman next to him stand in front of enormous horses; not the shaggy-hooved drafthorses of the gods' farm workers, but actual destriers, muscled and built for distance and combat.

The second person in the clearing makes me forget myself for a second. She would be remarkably tall if she wasn't standing next to the towering-Sir Hartef, and her posture is ramrod-straight. I'm left with no doubt that she was the one Graie was bowing to; when she turns to look at me, her eyes are such an arresting blue that I'm tempted to dip into a bow as well. There's something about her, some kind of force of presence that I can't put a name to.

What I can put a name to is the bizarre, glimmering symbol in her forehead; it's a star, iridescent and perfectly even in its lines and proportions. Jewelry? Paint? I stare at it. Curls of smoke-gray hair cradle her austere features.

"You should probably bow," Graie whispers as I freeze next to him, staring at this odd woman. "That's the queen of Thundria!"

The queen of what? I bow anyway, and as I come up, I see she's regarding me with eagle-sharp eyes.

"A young god-toy on our land," she says. Her voice is surprisingly low, edged with a little more of a rasp than Sir Hartef's. "Curious. What is your name, boy?"

"I'm Ross." I find myself wilting under her intense attention. She steps toward me, eyes narrowing with interest. "Um, and… what's your name?"

"Queen Bluelianna Star," Sir Hartef answers for her as she stalks a little closer to me.

I shrink more.

She stops about an arm's length from me, though I can practically feel some kind of regal power-ness radiating off her like a heat wave which makes me want to back up more; she's just staring me down like I'm a puzzle she's trying to solve. Then she cocks her head.

"You have life-force." Her brow furrows, then when my blank stare makes its encore, she amends, "Magic, rather."

"Magic?" I echo. Okay, I knew that sticking your hand in a furnace and not pulling out a charred, melty version of it isn't exactly… normal… and then there's whatever happened at breakfast, but… "Magic's not real; not for humans."

I hear a slide of metal, and a moment later this queen has a sword pointed at me with the kind of loose, deft grip that makes me think she knows how exactly to run me through with it. I yelp and stagger back, then my back hits a tree. The scrape of the bark just makes more panic override my senses.

"Stop! Stop!" I shriek, still futilely throwing my shoulder against the tree like it's going to be pushed aside if I can just shove hard enough. Maybe if a crazy lady wasn't pointing a super-sharp sword at me I would've thought to just step to the side and then hightail it into the bushes. As it stands, I just scramble to flatten myself against the tree as she keeps the sword level with my chest. "Please!"

Zem was right! She's going to kill me! I think as she doesn't move a muscle. Panic thrums through me, the buzzing feeling from earlier coming back with a vengeance.

I hold up my hands, praying for the fire to make a reappearance, and shut my eyes tight as heat roars up in my chest, then shoots out my fingers.

Then from nowhere at all, a freezing blast of air buffets me, stinging my cheeks and handily extinguishing all the heat at my hands and in my chest. I open my mouth to scream when the sword runs me through, eyes still tightly shut even after the gust subsides. I realize a moment later that I'm holding out my shaking hands for nothing. When I open my eyes, the queen's sword is gone, back in her scabbard.

"What…" I manage.

"You're a fire elementalist," the queen announces with no preamble. "It may only come out when you feel that your life is in danger, but there's life-force in your soul all the same."

Magic is real and I have it. I'm suddenly wishing I took Prin up on her offer of cold gruel, because I'm feeling a bit faint.

"But how can he—" Graie exclaims, and shuts his mouth readily when Sir Hartef holds up a hand.

"You're an unusual god-toy, Ross," she says.

"Th-thank you," I stammer.

"How old are you?"
"Twelve. Um, Your Highness." Is it 'Your Majesty?' I shoot a look at Graie, who looks very interested in our proceedings all of a sudden.

She nods. "Very well. I have an offer to make you."

My gaze skids from her to Sir Hartef, who looks both surprised and confused. What… is happening?

"Listen before you answer," she begins. "And take as much time as you need. I believe you should join our court."

I blink at her.

Sir Hartef's mouth drops open over her shoulder. The queen's gaze is steady, though.

"You would train as a squire with Graie and others, mentored by a knight of our court," she continues. "You would be taught to harness your life-force, to fight, to hunt, to ride, and to defend. You would live independently from the gods and be able to choose your own path in your life."

I open and close my mouth. Things in my brain are not connecting properly. Finally, I breathe, "Why?"

The queen's eyebrows flicker up. "Why? Because I believe… you are meant to come to Thundria."

Meant to? I falter. Like, destiny?

"Think on it," she says gently, and retreats to stand beside the agape Sir Hartef. Graie's similarly bewildered-looking. "This is not a choice to be made lightly. But your elementalism proves you as no ordinary god-toy; do you truly believe it is your fate to tumble until you cannot move?"

I don't really consider my future very often. There's nothing to consider, just a few decades of acrobatics stretching out in front of me until I either don't pull off a trick and break my neck, or retire and start teaching the next employees. A different option… Freedom, an idea so dizzying and unattainable that I've never even thought to reach for it, suddenly branches out from that path. More than indenture. A more reasonable part of my brain holds up its hand. But what is she getting out of this? Why would she want me to join her court?

I peer at Graie. He's staring right back at me, dumbfounded. Well, he doesn't exactly look tortured and tormented.

"I have to think about this," I finally say, looking back at the queen. What about Prin? We're all the family we have left. I can't just run off and leave her behind, right?

"Of course." The queen nods, and without even looking at him says, "Sir Hartef will return tomorrow morning for your answer."

Sir Hartef straightens a little, frowning, but doesn't argue.

"I… okay…" I swallow, my mouth feeling suddenly dry. That's not much time at all! Queen Bluelianna turns and, in a movement so graceful it would make Prin jealous, boosts herself up the side of her massive gray mount and swings a leg over the saddle.

She sends one last long look my way, then nudges the horse's flank with the heel of her boot and sets a leisurely pace back into the trees.

Sir Hartef also gives me a once-over. From the purse of his lips, I'm getting the impression the queen didn't run this past him before she gave me this chance. Eventually, he sighs and says, "The queen doesn't make this offer lightly, young man. Life in Thundria requires just as much blood and sweat as working for the gods, but… you'll be free. Think on it, and I will return tomorrow."

I just sort of stare at him and limply return Graie's parting wave as the two of them mount Sir Hartef's horse. They disappear into the foliage after the queen, and I listen to the sound of their receding hoofbeats until I'm left with only the birdsong and my own pounding heart.

What… just happened?

I look up at the sun shining through the trees and close my eyes, feeling the breeze on my face for another moment, then turn and start walking back toward the wall.

She called me a fire elementalist. And she was talking about the same life-force thing as Graie; that must be their word for magic.

I breathe out slowly, feeling warmth tingling in my ribcage like soot in a chimney. They could teach me to use this magic? I would be... free. What would that even mean?

The wall looms in front of me, its stone dull and gray, a sharp contrast to the bright life of the forest. I look back at it one last time, remembering the strange, red-haired creature I followed, the hiss of the leaves bursting into flames under my chest when Graie tackled me, the gleaming star in the queen's forehead, the way the sunlight coloured Sir Hartef's dark brown cheeks golden, and the blue glitter of the queen's eyes as she said You'll be free. More of a world than the day-to-day monotony of the gods' manor.

I take a running start and slot my feet between the slats of the stone, then launch myself over it and back onto the gods' lands.

Where Prin is waiting. Planted on the garden path before me, with her hands on her hips and her eyes blazing.

"Oh… hey," I say.

I wonder if she has fire elementalism too. She looks about ready to burst into flames.

"Where in the gods' names have you been?!" she demands, driving her fingers through her hair like she's going to pop open her skull and show me how many worried thoughts she's been having. "I saved you lunch! And nothing! You were over the wall!"

"I have a lot to tell you."

She looks at me like I've lost my mind, but I find us a place to sit in the garden as she continues her tirade, and try to gather my thoughts. Despite my efforts, it comes spilling out in a half-coherent, tangled story about sticking my hand in an oven, nearly killing her this morning, running off into the forest to practice, getting attacked by some half-wild forest boy, meeting Sir Hartef and the queen—Prin interjects to point out what ridiculous names they have, and I fire back that her own name is hardly standard—and finally, the offer they made me.

"To live with them?" Prin's eyes round. Her temper with me for disappearing without notice for an hour has simmered down, taken in by the tale. She's always had a weakness for big, dramatic stories about dragons and knights and damsels and that sort of thing. I guess they had to come from somewhere. Thundria.

"Yeah," I finish quietly, voice almost ragged from relating the whole thing.

"Wow." Her brow furrows. "And what are you going to do?"

I look at her, swallowing hard, and try to gauge her state. She's a few years older than me but tries to act like she's decades more mature. It's always made it harder for me to guess what she's thinking.

"I don't know. I can't just…" I wave my hand uselessly. "Can't just leave."

"Isn't that what they're offering?"

I wish I could run my hands through my hair. Damn hat. "I guess so. But wouldn't you…"

She tilts her head back, brown plait slithering off her shoulder. The odd streaks of white gleam like rivulets of milk in the sun; I can't remember if she got it from Mom. "I'd miss you, Rossy, but…"

I sit up straight like I've been burned. I can't be burned anymore, though, can I? It's hard to remember if I've ever been burned. I never hung around the kitchens much. "But what?" A confusing flurry of emotions follow that. Stomach-jolting realization that leaving might be possible, shock that she wouldn't immediately tell me it's a terrible idea, maybe a little sadness that wouldn't be totally broken up if I left forever…

She looks back at the manor and her jaw sets in the same mulish stubbornness that comes out of me sometimes, too. Usually in the morning. "But if you've got a better chance, you should take it."

"You think those people would be better than the gods?" That comes as even more of a shock. She's usually the first to jab my shoulder for speaking rudely about the gods.

Prin purses her lips and looks me straight in the eye, with the kind of somber expression that makes me feel like I'm about to hear something I might not want to. "Rossy, I wanted to keep it from you. I didn't… didn't want to make things worse than they had to be."

"What are you talking about?"

She puts her hand on my shoulder. "This isn't a good life, Rossy. Mom wasn't happy with the gods, either, and I'm… I'm just trying to make the best of it for both of us."

That same sense I felt before, of not even wanting to consider the future because it would make me upset about the things I can't have, comes back with the force of a storm.

"I want better for you," she says quietly.

"But what about you?" My voice finally comes back, incredulous. "If you hate it here too, you shouldn't have to stay! I'll tell them to bring you."

She shakes her head. "I can't do that, Rossy. There's… there's more going on than you understand."

I hate that; feeling like she's keeping secrets from me because I'm too young and stupid to get to know what's going on. "I don't care! You should come with me."

"I can't."

I slap my palm on the marble bench at my side. It's not a very satisfying show of defiance. "Then I won't go at all! Not without you."

My sister smiles sadly again and moves the hand on my shoulder to wrap her whole arm around me. "I want you to. You'll be happier there, Rossy. And it'll make everything easier for me to bear if I know you're safe."

My lip trembles, but I press them together and take a deep breath. "But I'll be able to visit you, won't I?"

Prin shrugs with one shoulder. "Maybe, if they say it's okay. Don't do anything to make them kick you out though, okay? Best behaviour, like performance days, and you'll be fine."

And just like that, I've agreed to leave my whole world behind.

I tuck myself into my cot alone that night, looking up at the small window where the crescent moon is glowing. Thundria. I shape the word with my mouth in the darkness. Thundria with Graie, Sir Hartef, and Queen Bluelianna. I huff a little laugh, even though there are tears balancing in my eyelashes. Silly names. Maybe they'll give me a silly name too. Like Orange… Orangeo. Prince Orangeo of Thundria. Another laugh comes out, sounding more like a sniffle.

I roll onto my other side and look out into the dim glow of the hallway, leading deeper into the manor with all its servant hallways and dining halls and libraries and… the women's quarters, where Prin's sleeping. Tomorrow, I'll go with Sir Hartef, and they can give me a silly name and teach me how to use fire magic or whatever. But one day, I'm coming back for Prin and getting rid of whatever's standing in her way and we'll be free together. Whatever it takes.

Thank you so much for reading chapter 2! I really hope you enjoyed it and for any returning readers, found this to be an improvement haha. Leave me a review! It always means a lot.

~Akila