The most uncanny thing happened: I was accepted. Not universally. Those who lived in the Lady's Stag were wary, but warmed quickly. I had not felt so since before the fire and my displacement. Had not, in fact, ever expected to find such a thing again, after the brief kindness of the were-doomed Dumitru.

  From the journal of Drago? Buh?scu

  They went up a narrow flight of stairs and into a narrow galley where a hearth big enough to sit in dominated a wall. Massive wooden prep tables with a bounty of tools and jars dissected the room into aisles of workspace.

  In the middle of it all, a man in a silk robe much like his own stood with his chin resting in splayed fingers, seemingly deep in thought. Though his name was Calruthian, he bore some of the features of the people of Aur, long dark hair pulled into a messy topknot. Until Dragos followed the girl in. The man looked up, and a sudden smile lit his face.

  “He appears!” He lunged past Katya to grab Dragos by the shoulders, turning him to steer him toward a table with seating. The lassitude of warm water and weariness pulled on Dragos, who barely noticed being pushed into a seat. He shrugged the peddler’s box off and settled on the bench.

  “Looks starving. A warm soup, first, yes,” the man said, and spun away just as quickly.

  By the time Dragos blinked, there was an earthenware bowl sitting in front of him, the leg of a chicken centered in a rich golden broth. The scent caused Dragos's mouth to threaten to spill as he murmured, “Thanks.”

  The man folded his arms with a smugly pleased look and watched with unabashed pleasure as Dragos dove in. Herbs and root vegetables promised to fill his stomach, so he attacked the meat instead. His blood sang.

  Life felt worth living again.

  “This is good,” Dragos murmured, stomach already groaning with the weight, though he’d barely scratched the serving offered.

  “You’re welcome. I am Fane, the stolnic of The Lady’s Stag. And on occasion, the stag,” he grinned, wiggling his eyebrows in a comical way that made Dragos's chest hitch with a chuckle.

  “Dragos. A pleasure, Dominule,” Dragos replied, bowing his head briefly, wet hair dragging off his shoulder.

  Without a thought, Fane reached over and flipped it back, then flicked water from his fingertips.

  “Albino? Albstrig?, perhaps? Forgive the questions. I don’t know when to stop.”

  Fane was not like other people. That much was clear. Dragos couldn’t help but like him instantly, though he couldn’t be more obviously diametric. Pulling his feet up to sit cross-legged on the bench—the cold stone on bare feet caused them to tingle—the wanderer leaned forward to sip hot broth and sighed a steaming breath.

  Katya had disappeared. He didn’t miss her sour presence.

  From somewhere, Fane pulled a large, embroidered linen napkin and dropped it between Dragos's arms, across his bared thighs, with the explanation, “Before a sausage peeks.”

  Dragos spit his soup with a sudden sputter. After a brief coughing fit, he choked out, “I’m wearing something under this robe.”

  “That’s a shame,” Fane replied, then turned and shouted, “No! Pacha! Not my paté!”

  The gray tabby cat from before was on one of the prep tables, nose in a dish. Fane darted over, the soft snap of silk louder than the merry crackling of hearth flame. Dragos stared, having never in his life seen anyone so animated. Not that he could remember, anyway.

  “I knew I shouldn’t have plated it so soon…” Fane moaned, hands up, fingers curled in angry claws that deftly lifted the cat with more gentleness than those fingers promised. He lifted the feline thief to face him. Their gazes locked. One was stern, the other, unrepentant. Fane huffed and set the cat on the floor.

  Pacha glanced up at him and, with a swish of his tail, meandered away like a spoiled boyer who’d gotten away with stealing peasant grain. Fane snorted, watching the cat go.

  “He’s banished, but I promise you he’ll forget in five minutes. Speaking of, the Doamn?’s appointment should have concluded by now. Shoo! Off with you.” Fane’s hands brushed the air in Dragos's direction. “You should never keep a lady waiting.”

  When the traveler didn’t get up quickly, the chef was quick to tug him up and guide him to the stairs.

  Dragos snagged a strap of his peddler’s box and turned to look at Fane with confusion. Inexplicably, he felt like a rabbit caught in a bush, surrounded by predators. Fane’s wolfish grin hardly helped assuage it.

  “Say hello for me. Go.” With Fane’s quick snap turn and light shove, Dragos staggered up the stairs.

  The shadow of Katya’s slim form on a bench outside Viorica’s door explained where she went. When Dragos arrived, his feet were like blocks of ice again. The bath and the soup had helped, but he almost wished he’d put his boots back on. Almost.

  Her sad eyes turned up when she heard the faint creak of a floorboard. Those orbs sat too wide in her head, watching him as one might a ghost floating down a dark hallway. He paused at the door.

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  Beyond it lay answers. The past still breathed in Viorica, remembered. He raised his knuckles to the smooth plane of wood and rapped them twice in meditative succession.

  A moment later, the door flew open.

  She looked different, yet again. Viorica’s hair was down, combed, untangled from intricate twists into soft waves. The sapphire blue robes she wore flowed loose around her limbs, with a thick sash to hold them closed. Darkened eyes glittered, and the scent of wine lingered on her breath when she cried softly, “Do come in!”

  Wine, and something else. Beneath the perfume, buried by incense, another intoxicating scent pulled at him. Viorica smelled... irresistible.

  Once the door was shut, he didn’t know what to say. Caught in her orbit, he simply followed where she pulled him, by presence alone. She glided towards the hearth and folded into a couch, sliding her feet from rabbit fur slippers to tuck beneath her.

  He sat beside her. The peddler’s box came to rest on the floor at arm’s length, its creaking sigh mirroring how he felt. Something soft beneath him, warmth, a full belly. The thaw worked into his ragged soul as he shifted, then grabbed his robes to pull his feet up, sitting cross-legged again.

  Even in this place of warmth and comfort, drafts crept across the floors, nipping at his toes.

  “Dragos,” she sighed, reaching for his hand, holding it between hers. They were impossibly soft and delicate. His mind intruded with another word. Breakable.

  “I’ve been looking since the fire,” he started, though that wasn’t entirely true.

  Viorica shook her head, lips turning down in a charming frown. “It was unthinkable, and yet…” Her expression hardened. The look was for someone else, other than Dragos.

  “It was Necaz, I’m sure of it.”

  Dragos's head tilted, gaze drifting into memory. The Wolf Cohort’s prodigy?

  He blurted, “How could Necaz start a fire that could rage through the school? The heart of Spineback burned so badly that the entry collapsed! I tried to get back into ?oloman?? after the blaze died down.”

  “The smoke woke me,” Viorica said, her gaze as haunted as his but shining with terrible excitement. As Dragos felt. Not once in the two years he’d been gone had he spoken of it.

  No one else could understand. The hearthfire’s scent rewoke the memory. The heat of stone. The burning stench.

  “Same,” he murmured. “I climbed out the air vent. I couldn’t open my door, the latch was already a brand.”

  “The smoke,” Viorica shook her head, hands gripping his tighter. “I thought I’d die before I made it to the main hall. From there, I ran. I never looked back, didn’t dare. I fled down the mountain and…

  “Dragos,” she said, her vision snapping back from the past, fixing on him. Her stare caught him out of his own memories. “There was something pure in that destruction. Something powerful, from the Umbregrin. There was shadow in the flames.”

  It hardly mattered what it was. Either source contained entities that would rend anything in the mortal world if it wandered from one of the spirit-rivers. His brows pulled down. “Did Necaz try to summon something to him? In the school?”

  That was pure madness. The Solomonari forbade that sort of thing. Clearly, they’d witnessed the reason for the rule to exist. Necaz likely died with his folly. And yet… something twitched in Dragos's mind. Memories of the lean, ice-eyed bastard surfaced. His experiments.

  Sister ‘lula’s fascination with him.

  “The main doors fell, the arches with them. I couldn’t get back in to see if anyone survived,” Dragos admitted; the weight of that guilt and helplessness sat heavily on his heart, swollen and aching from speaking of it.

  “We couldn’t have helped them, Dragos. It isn’t your fault,” she murmured. Her hand on his cheek made his skin jump. He twitched back, then stopped himself. His fingers closed around hers instead.

  “I still can’t believe it’s gone,” he whispered, the bleak pressure of loss that had not been dulled enough by time, pushed against his chest, lungs constricted by it.

  Viorica simply nodded, leaning closer. The change in her tone with her next words pulled him out of the darkness inside him. Hope played in the notes of her voice.

  “We’re here and alive, and I’ve built a fine life for myself. Why don’t you stay? I could use a physician. My last got snapped up by a boyer who saw his work and wanted to purchase his services for a trade route. My girls are without a doctor.”

  “I’m no doctor,” he choked.

  He’d almost forgotten what this place was. It was different from others he’d happened by. Never entered, but it was difficult not to notice when a woman flashed her wares from a balcony.

  Viorica tutted and stroked his cheek. “You are what I say you are. We all knew how the Owls learned physic, surgery, and apothecary. Everyone knew Mirel was relentless. It’s good enough for me.”

  “I’d like to find the others,” he hedged, adding, “But I’ll stay the winter. Gladly.”

  Viorica smiled, as if she were pleased. Dragos almost missed the heartbeat of a pause before her response. It hadn’t been what she wanted. She didn’t want a time limit imposed, if he were to guess.

  “What of your own cohort siblings? Your mentor? Don’t you want to know what happened to them?” Dragos asked.

  Even as simple questions tugged at him, he inwardly sighed. Why bother asking things, now? Later was soon enough. His fatigued bones felt like they were all marrow, wobbly and weak.

  “I do,” Viorica murmured, her head tilting in a careless, coy way. “But you found me. Why couldn’t they?”

  He almost said how he had found her, but something inside his gut killed the words on his tongue. It felt guided by more than his cohort’s virtues of wisdom and secrecy. A sense of doubt in this woman before him wove itself into his instincts like the scent of chervil in a field of wild flowers.

  He would not tell her about Zgavra. The zmeu would remain unknown.

  Her gaze flicked over his face, which must have given something away, because her touch floated from his cheek to his lips. Cracked, dry, and yet her fingertip caressed their rough surface.

  “Perhaps I can sweeten the deal. Here, you haven’t slept yet, have you? Come, rest,” she decided, her grip on his hand tugging as she rose. With a deft step, she slid into her slippers and drew him towards the bed.

  Starvation of another sort reared its head and somehow staved off sleep for a while.

  Click the link. -This has been an important message from The Lady's Stag Management.

  Dominule (DOM-uh-nyool): Lord or sir.

  Stolnic (Stol-NEEK): Pantry manager, much like a butler, but with responsibilities regarding the kitchens more than the house and grounds.

  Albstrig? (ALV-streeguh): White witch. Barn owl. A pale ghost or evil spirit.

  Boyar (bow-yaar): Nobleman

  Doamn? (do-AHM-nuh): Lady or madam.

  ?oloman?? (Shoh-loh-MAHN-tsuh): The Dark School, where Solomonari take moroi viu to learn their ways. It rests in the bowels of the Spineback Mountain, not far from the Embrace.

  Umbregrin (UM-bruh-grin) [rolled r]: The spirit river of darkness and entropy. Without balance, it can cause overwhelming despair, blindness, madness, and terrible decay. The dark spirit river. Like the concept of yin and yang, The Umbregrin is the yin spirit river, which balances the pulse of the world.

  Zmeu (zmyeh-oo): Type of Romanian dragon.