Traitor's Moon

stay up in their eagles’ nest of a fai’thast, dreaming their strange dreams and handing down proclamations.”
    â€œYou know, in all the time I’ve been here, I haven’t seen much magic used. Where I come from, folks imagine the ’faie throwing it around left and right.”
    Several of Alec’s companions snickered.
    â€œLook around, Skalan,” Artis said. “Do you see any need for magic? Should we fly through the air instead of using our own feet? Or knock birds out of the sky instead of learning archery?”
    â€œThis beer of yours could use a bit of magicking,” a boy laughed.
    Artis gave him a hard look, then wove a brief sigil over their cups. The beer foamed slightly, giving off a strong, malty odor.
    â€œTaste that, then,” he challenged.
    The contents of Alec’s cup were certainly clearer than before. Impressed, he took a drink, but immediately spat it out.
    â€œIt tastes like swamp water!” he sputtered.
    â€œOf course,” Artis declared, laughing now. “Beer has its own magic. It doesn’t need any help, as any brewer knows.”
    â€œAnd so knowing, takes it too much for granted,” said a new voice.
    A grey, wizened little rhui’auros stepped from the shadows of a cul-de-sac next to the building.
    Kheeta and the others raised their left hands and gave the man a respectful nod. In turn, he raised a tattooed hand in blessing.
    â€œWelcome, Honored One,” said Artis, coming out to offer him beer and food.
    The others made room for the old man and he sat down, wolfing down the eggs and bread as if he hadn’t eaten in days and dribbling his beer down the front of his already none-too-clean robes.
    When he’d finished he looked up and pointed to Alec. “Our little brother asks about magic and you scoff, children of Aura?” Shaking his head, he picked up a bow lying near his feet and placed it in Alec’s hands. “Tell me, what do you feel?”
    Alec rubbed his palm over the smooth limbs. “Wood, sinew—” he began, then gasped as the rhui’auros touched a finger firmly to the center of his forehead.
    A cool sensation swept the skin between his eyes, like the kiss of a mountain breeze. As it spread deeper, the bow seemed to subtly vibrate in his hands, reminding him of the time he’d touched a drysian’s staff and felt the surge of power through the wood.
    â€œI feel—I don’t know. It’s like holding a living thing.”
    â€œIt is Shariel ä Malai’s magic you feel, her khi,” the rhui’auros replied, pointing to the Ptalos woman who owned the bow. He motioned for Kheeta to give Alec the knife from his belt.
    Gripping it, Alec felt similar sensations from the metal. “Yes, it’s there, too.”
    â€œOur khi suffuses us the way oil soaks a wick,” the rhui’auros explained. “Everything we touch takes on a bit of it, and from it comes all our gifts. Shariel ä Malai, take up Alec í Amasa’s bow.”
    She obeyed, eyes widening in surprise as the man touched her brow. “By the Light, the khi is strong as a storm wind in it!”
    â€œYou shoot well, do you not?” the rhui’auros asked, noting the collection of shatta on Alec’s quiver.
    â€œYes, Honored One.”
    â€œBetter than most?”
    â€œPerhaps. It’s just something I’m good at.”
    â€œGood enough to strike a dyrmagnos?”
    â€œYes, but—”
    â€œ
He
fought a dyrmagnos?” someone whispered.
    â€œIt was a good shot,” Alec admitted, recalling the strange, dreamlikecalm that had come over him when he took aim at his hated tormentor. His bow had trembled strangely in his hands as he’d let fly, but he’d always put those sensations, indeed even his success, down to the spells Nysander had woven around it.
    â€œLittle brother, when will you visit me?” the rhui’auros chided. “Your friend Thero comes to the Nha’mahat often now, yet for you I wait and wait.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Honored One. I—I didn’t realize I was expected,” Alec stammered, taken aback by this revelation about Thero. The wizard had never mentioned it. “I’ve been wanting to, but—”
    â€œYou must bring Seregil í Korit, as well. Tell him to come tonight.”
    â€œThe Exile no longer bears that name,” an Akhendi reminded