Chapter 142 Sisters and Affinity
Chapter 142 Sisters and Affinity
The carriage rumbled beyond the last markers of Avalon city and onto the lean country road, its wheels humming softly as the city decreased behind them. Frost still adhered to shaded places, although the sun burned strong enough to glisten on the silver of the hedgerows and set the bare branches glinting like wire. Inside the carriage, warmth lingered—wool cloaks, cushions, the faint scent of citrus oil from a maid’s gloves—but excitement kept it from settling.
Lissette leaned forward, bracing herself against the window frame to peer out, as if the landscape itself might reveal Caelen’s intention. Aureline sat opposite her, hands folded carefully in her lap, her posture composed but eyes shining with the questions she had been controlling since the gates closed behind them.
“I still don’t understand how he knew?” Aureline said at last, her voice, thoughtful rather than accusing, was hushed so the maids did not hear. “Not just that I have an affinity, but what it feels like when it stirs. Most people don’t notice the whispers of affinity until it overwhelms them. Even then, they only notice my pain.”
Lissette smiled, a flash of pride she didn’t bother to hide. “That’s because Caelen listens to the whispers of the world. He watches. He notices the things everyone else rushes past.”
“That doesn’t explain how he understands,” Aureline pressed gently. “Or why he’s so certain.”
The carriage wobbled slightly as it took a bend. One of the maids laughed softly at something the other had murmured, then fell silent again, content to let the young ladies speak. Outside, the land opened into fields and scattered groves, winter-bare but not lifeless. Smoke rose in the distance from farmsteads. Life going on, unaware it was being quietly reshaped.
Lissette hesitated, then drew a breath and leaned in close to share a secret.
“It was him,” she said. “For me, I mean—my affinity. I didn’t know what it was, only that things… happened. Ice when I was angry. Stillness when I was afraid.” She glanced at Aureline, eyes earnest. “He helped me wake it properly. Gently. On purpose.”
Aureline stared at her.
“You mean, he helped you to wake it fully?” she whispered.
Lissette nodded. “He said it wasn’t about forcing it awake. It was about giving it somewhere safe to dwell.”
The words hung between them.
“That shouldn’t be possible,” Aureline said after a moment. “Based on everything I have read, you can not awaken without a master, with the same affinity. Or years of training. Or—” She stopped herself, a faint shiver running through her. “That sort of power frightens people.”
“I know,” Lissette said quietly, yet pride was in her voice. “Mother knows about it. That’s why she’s careful about what she allows him to do. That’s why she’s angry half the time.” She smiled, a little crooked. “But Caelen never frightens me. He makes things… make sense.”
Aureline looked down at her shaking hands, flexing her fingers as if testing them. Concern crept into her expression—not fear, exactly, but the awareness that she was going to meet something vast and not yet understood.
The carriage slowed.
Trees closed in around the road, their branches knitting overhead. The air changed—cooler, cleaner, threaded with the scent of damp leaves and old bark. When the carriage came to a stop, the door was opened by one of the guards, and sunlight spilled in.
Ahead, the woods opened into a small clearing.
Caelen stood near its center, his white cloak catching the light where it filtered through the branches. Around him, a handful of the White Company waited at ease—not rigid, not relaxed, but alert in that quiet, watchful way that spoke of discipline earned rather than enforced. And slightly apart from them, leaning on his staff as if he had always belonged there, stood Brother Renn.
Aureline’s breath caught.
“A priest,” she murmured. “And soldiers.”
“They’re here to make sure no one disturbs us,” Lissette said lightly, though her eyes flicked to Caelen, gauging his mood. “Not to watch.”
Still, Aureline’s heart beat faster as she was helped down from the carriage. The ground beneath her boots felt different—springy, alive. The trees here were older, their roots thick and visible, winding like sleeping beasts through the earth.
Caelen stepped forward to greet them, catching sight of Aureline with her maid by her side. His face relaxed, the tension fading. He dipped his head to Aureline, then to Lissette—a little gesture, careful but friendly, not cold at all.
“I hoped you’d like this surprise,” he said.
Aureline looked back at him, studying his face. After a moment, she nodded. Excitement and nerves tangled up inside her, causing her to shiver, and there was no telling one from the other.
“I think,” she replied, “that I’m about to learn why you brought me here.”
Brother Renn smiled to himself, as if at a thought only he could hear, and the woods seemed to lean in—listening, knowing his only role was witnessing the will of the Veils.
Caelen helped Lady Aureline get comfortable in her chair with practiced care, adjusting the wool blanket at her knees and checking footrests without fuss. His hands were warm, steady, unremarkable in motion, yet deliberate in intent. When she was settled, he took the handles and began to guide her toward the shadowed edge of the trees.
After only a few steps, he glanced back. “If you will permit it, my lady—only one maid from here.”
The words were gentle, but they carried weight.
Aureline turned her head slightly, studying him. The forest ahead seemed to breathe, branches knitting together like fingers. She looked to her maids, who hesitated, then one of them asked softly, “My lady… is it well, with only one?”
Aureline did not answer at once. She sensed the air here—cooler, cleaner, threaded with something that made her chest ache in a way she could not name. At last, she said, simply, “Yes. I trust Avalon.”
That was all.
The maid bowed her head and fell in behind, while the other attendants and guards withdrew at Caelen’s quiet gesture. Only two others remained, Lissette walking a pace behind with Brother Renn, who leaned on his staff and said nothing, his eyes bright with something like anticipation.
As they moved deeper into the trees, Aureline noticed the disturbed ground.
It had been prepared by someone.
Roots trimmed back, stones set firm and level, the earth packed smooth enough for the narrow wheels of her chair. Nothing crude or obvious—only careful shaping, as though the forest itself had agreed to make room for her passage. The realization tightened her throat.
Caelen slowed, then bent slightly so his voice reached her alone. “If you trust me,” he said, “close your eyes. What I wish to show you lies just ahead.”
Her fingers tightened on the arms of the wheelchair.
Trust. That’s what she kept turning over in her mind, trusting a boy who hadn’t really grown up yet. Trusting a boy who commanded a troop nobody could quite pin down—trusting a place that seemed older than any promise she’d ever made.
In the cold air, her leg ached, as always. Years of pain, slow steps, teaching herself to keep going instead of dreaming about something better. She remembered how Lissette believed—full of light, almost reckless. Then there was Caelen, steady and sure, never raising his voice but somehow convincing anyway.
All right then.
She shut her eyes.
Behind her, Caelen spoke up to the others. “We’re going into the gorge. Watch your step—and don’t say a word unless I tell you to.”
The ground dipped under her chair, then smoothed out. Time started to feel strange, stretched, as if she was trapped in the space between one heartbeat and the next. Aureline counted each breath, each thump in her chest. There was water somewhere—far off at first, but getting closer with every step. The air warmed up, thick with the smell of moss and something green fighting its way through the grip of winter.
Suddenly, her maid let out a sharp gasp.
Aureline’s eyes flew open a sliver—only to hear Caelen say quickly, almost gently, “Please. Just a moment more.”
She forced herself to obey.
Five minutes passed—or perhaps only one. At last, the chair came to a stop. She felt Caelen bend, heard the soft click as he set the brake. His steps retreated.
“All right,” he said. “Now.”
She opened her eyes.
Before her lay a narrow gorge cut deep into the earth, its stone walls draped in ivy and fern so thick they seemed painted on. Warm water pooled and flowed in terraces, mist rising in silver veils that caught the light filtering down from above. Green—deep, living green—thrived everywhere, defying the cold season beyond the trees. Birds flitted among branches still heavy with autumn leaves. The air hummed, low and resonant, like a held breath.
Aureline felt it then, not just with her mind, but in her bones.
This place knew her, and she was welcomed to it.
The green that she had always admired, the power that she had always sensed but never touched, enveloped her, inviting and forceful. It was as if a cloak of peace fell onto her shoulders, weighted yet proper.
As Aureline’s awareness grew stronger, she sensed it in her bones as her leg started to hurt.
A familiar pain, sharp and insistent, flared along her thigh and knee. She sucked in a breath and clutched at it instinctively, fingers digging into the wool.
Caelen was beside her at once. He placed a hand on her shoulder—firm, grounding. “No,” he said softly. “Don’t hold it back. Let it bloom.”
The words echoed.
‘Let it bloom.’
None of it made sense. The pain grew sharper, pulsing and impossible to ignore. Every part of her wanted to shove it down, squeeze it into something she could handle.
But she didn’t.
She just let go.
The pain flared hard and sharp, all at once—hot, overwhelming—then suddenly broke apart, opening like a flower pushed open by sunlight. Lissette caught the change first: air moving fast, a thrill that sparked through her. She turned and spotted Bella leaping ahead, light flickering around her, eyes bright with joy.
Aureline's surprise flared as she perceived the fairy, her face filled with shock and delight as a small blue fairy danced and spun in greeting.
Bella hovered before her, radiant and somehow familiar—and then, beside her, something else emerged.
Not child-like or playful.
A spirit of bark and leaf and root, tall and fierce, eyes glowing with the deep green of growth after fire. Life and nature entwined; unyielding, unstoppable yet filled with deep possibility and warmth. The pain vanished as abruptly as it had come, leaving behind warmth, strength, and a sense of completeness so profound it stole her breath.
She felt the connection and understood.
This was her affinity.
Not fire, not earth, not weakness or loss. Growth! Renewal! The never-ending drive to live and to make life.
Tears spilled down her cheeks, unbidden, as awe and relief tangled together. She laughed once, softly, in disbelief. She felt the warmth and the vast power of the living world itself.
From the edge of the gorge, her maid saw none of this.
She only saw her lady trembling, tears streaming suddenly, freely, and then something impossible.
Aureline rose.
She stood, slowly at first, then fully upright, weight balanced, no hitch, no favoring of one side. She took a step. Then another.
The maid cried out and rushed forward. “My lady—please—you mustn’t—”
Aureline turned, steady on her feet, eyes shining through tears. “I am not in pain anymore,” she said, the wonder still thick in her voice. “I am… whole.”
The maid faltered, staring, fear and hope warring on her face as her lady took another step—sure, unburdened, alive.
And the grove seemed to breathe its approval.
Caelen spread a blanket at the edge of the dry stone, careful to keep it clear of the damp moss and the trickle of water that threaded the grotto. The fabric darkened where it touched the soil, but no one minded. They settled easily, too easily, thought Aureline, for something that would have felt impossible only hours ago.
Lissette laughed first, bright and unrestrained, pointing between the two fairies as they circled one another in delighted competition.
Bella spun in the air, flinging arcs of frost with a child’s glee. Wherever her hands swept, ice bloomed at each gesture; delicate spirals, tiny towers, crystalline leaves that caught the light and shattered it into rainbows. The other fairy answered not with cold ice, but with life. From bare stone crept green vines unfurling, slender saplings pushing up as if they had only been waiting for permission, small white and violet flowers opening their faces to the steam-warmed air.
“Show-offs,” Lissette declared, though she was smiling too hard to mean it.
Aureline watched, hands folded in her lap, wonder softening her features, until she went very still.
Out of the greenery, a thin winter squirrel emerged.
It paused at the edge of the leaves, nose twitching, eyes bright and curious. Slowly, cautiously, it approached the taller fairy. The spirit knelt without fear, lowering its brow. The squirrel pressed its forehead there, fur to bark.
Something passed between them.
The squirrel’s coat thickened and darkened, growing plush and lustrous, every hair catching the light. With a sudden burst of energy, it scampered forward, straight up Aureline’s leg, scrambling over her skirts and settling on her shoulder. It rubbed its cheek against hers with possessive affection.
Her maid yelped and surged forward. “My lady—!”
Caelen lifted one hand. “Easy,” he said lightly. “Looks like she’s been adopted.”
The maid froze, torn between duty and disbelief.
Aureline laughed, breathless and astonished, lifting a tentative hand to stroke the squirrel’s head. “I think… I think it likes me.”
Caelen tilted his head, a faint smile touching his mouth. “Forest princess,” he said, almost to himself.
Lissette whirled on him and smacked his shoulder. “You never called me a forest princess.”
He winced theatrically. “You were more of a… storm princess.”
She narrowed her eyes, “I like that… storm Princess,” then turned slowly toward Aureline, something mischievous igniting there. “Now you must do it,” she said.
Aureline blinked. “Do what?”
“Sing,” Lissette demanded, bouncing on her heels. “Sing! Like in the stories. You know—the ones where the princess sings, and the forest listens.”
Aureline laughed, shaking her head. “That’s just a story.”
“Do it!” Lissette insisted, voice rising with thirteen-year-old certainty. “Do it, do it!”
For a moment, Aureline hesitated. Then she stilled, eyes unfocusing as she reached for something inside herself. She began to hum—a low, gentle melody, familiar and old. When she found the words, her voice carried them easily, a song of wind over the valley, of grasses bending and standing again.
The grotto moved to listen.
Birds gathered, first one, then another, alighting on branches and stone. They chirped softly, then more boldly, weaving their voices into the tune. The squirrel remained on Aureline’s shoulder, utterly content. A rabbit crept from behind a fern, hopped past Lissette’s startled gasp, and settled squarely in her lap.
“Oh,” she breathed, frozen. “Oh, I am not moving.”
Brother Renn clasped his hands together, eyes shining. “Praise the Veils,” he murmured. “This is how it was meant to be.”
When the song ended, the air seemed to sigh.
Caelen reached into his pack, drew out a small clay jug, and pulled the stopper. He handed it to Aureline. “Drink,” he said quietly. “You’ll need this.”
She accepted it without question, still glowing, and took a careful sip as the forest, that was somehow hers now, in some quiet, undeniable way, kept watch.
The cool fluid ran through Aureline, spreading both at once like spring water and like a fire deeply banked within the fireplace. She was refreshed by it, while being warmed from the inside out, relaxing parts she hadn’t known could be tight, knitting together something quiet and invisible.
Aureline let go of the jug, shocked into stillness.
In front of her, the spirit of life moved nearer, observing the container in silent inquiry. The girl’s mouth moved, forming an uttered truth rather than a name – that is, a truth that she knew.
“Verdant,” she whispered. Not yours, but what you are.
The spirit nodded, receiving the name as if donning a cloak. It moved towards the jug and extended its delicate hand. With an elegant flick of its fingers, a drop of liquid floated up out of the opening of the container, hovering in the shadowed atmosphere.
Verdant drank.
The drop disappeared, and light seemed to pulse within the spirit. It glowed deeper and richer, as if the light had sunk farther below its surface and was pulsing through its very essence like sap within the trunk of a tree.
Bella reacted immediately.
She flew towards the jug with a series of bright, chiming trills. As she grasped its sides, her wings spread a shower of frost-light, and she tipped it towards herself to drink. Her own glow blazed brightly, and her movements became wilder and more joyful. A stream of clear bell-tones bubbled out of her—unadulterated happiness, tinged with slight imbalance.
“Lissette,” Caelen moaned.
“I know! Lissette leaped after Bella, cutting off her approach to the jug. “Don’t do that! You will become drunk on it!”
Bella whistled indignantly.
“No,” Lissette said firmly, though she was grinning. “You already sparkle enough.”
Bella crossed her arms and puffed, resulting in an outpouring of small snowflakes that gently landed on the ground below.
Aureline observed this with giggles that threatened tears as she held the jug in her hands. The grotto was more alive than ever before; it seemed like it had woken up somehow and so had she, feeling it deep inside her.
A stillness enveloped the grotto as though it had just taken a breath. Steam lazily floated around while leaves whispered quietly, and even the birds were content with listening instead of singing. It seemed to be peaceful until Lissette, who could not seem to know when to shut up, spoke up.
She kneeled with Bella in her arms, producing an angry ringing noise, and the bunny resting on her other side, seeming quite willing to become her captive. With a raised chin and a commanding pose, she looked at Aureline with complete assurance.
“Now, you are my sister!” she declared.
Aureline blinked. “I—what?”
“I always wanted an intelligent sister,” Lissette continued briskly. “But all I got were brothers. Two of them. One tries to fix the world, the other broods about it.”
Aureline stared at her, momentarily speechless. The idea that Lissette of Avalon—bright, fierce, unmistakably noble—would claim her so easily made something warm twist in her chest.
Before she could respond, Lissette waved a hand dismissively. “To be clear,” she added, “you are my younger sister in affinity, which is much better. We will be the best of sisters.”
She paused, considering. “Unless you have terrible taste in men. But I suppose even that can be forgiven.”
Aureline burst out laughing—genuine laughter, deep and unguarded. She shook her head, tears threatening again. “You do realize,” she said, “that I am four years older than you.”
Lissette scoffed. “Age is irrelevant.”
“It is not irrelevant,” Aureline insisted, trying, and failing, to sound stern. “I am, by every reasonable measure, the older sister.”
Lissette tilted her head, eyes sharp. “No! I awakened first.”
“That does not—”
“And,” Lissette continued, undeterred, “I declared it. Therefore, it is settled.”
Aureline opened her mouth, then closed it again. “That is not how logic works.”
Lissette smiled sweetly. “It is when you’re right.”
Bella chimed approvingly, and the rabbit thumped once, as if voting.
Aureline laughed again, surrendering at last. “Very well,” she said. “But only in affinity.”
“Excellent,” Lissette said brightly. “Then we are agreed.”
She adjusted her grip on Bella, who immediately tried to wriggle free, and added with solemn authority, “Now come. Sisters have much to do. And you will need guidance.”
Lissette wasted no time.
She settled herself cross-legged on the blanket with the air of a scholar claiming a lectern, Bella hovering indignantly at her shoulder and the rabbit still resolutely in her lap. She cleared her throat—loudly.
“Right,” she said. “Lesson one.”
Aureline lowered herself opposite her, still smiling, still half-dazed by everything that had just happened. “You are truly doing this.”
“Yes,” Lissette replied. “And you’re very lucky it’s me. Anyone else would make it boring.”
Aureline bit back a laugh. “Very well, sister-teacher.”
Lissette nodded, satisfied. “Your affinity is you,” she began, tapping Aureline lightly on the knee. “It’s not the fairy. The fairy is not doing the work. She ?”—she gestured to Verdant, who inclined its head with slow, solemn grace—“is your partner. Your guide. She shows you the way, but you have to walk it.”
Aureline frowned slightly. “Then why does it feel like she’s… doing things without me asking?”
“That’s because you haven’t told her what not to do yet,” Lissette said briskly. “It’s like giving a very powerful toddler a garden and no instructions.”
Verdant shimmered faintly, unoffended.
“You have to learn how to will it,” Lissette continued, leaning forward. “Not wish. Not hope. Will. Inside here.” She tapped Aureline’s chest, then her own. “That’s where it starts.”
Aureline absorbed this quietly. “And you learned all this… how?”
Lissette waved a hand. “Trial. Error. Mother yelling. Brother panicking. Ice everywhere.”
Aureline’s eyes widened. “Ice everywhere?”
“Oh yes,” Lissette said cheerfully. “I froze an entire room once. Walls, ceiling, furniture. Slippery disaster. I also made an ice block taller than me.” She smiled with pride. “And I can make tiny chips of ice.”
“What for?” Aureline asked.
Lissette’s grin turned wicked. “Shoes.”
Causing mild chaos, Bella chimed approvingly.
Aureline laughed. “I see.”
“But you,” Lissette said, pointing decisively, “are different. I use water. Moisture. Cold air. I take what already exists and tell it to behave.”
She spread her hands, palms down toward the moss and stone around them. “You deal with life. Living things. Growth. Recovery. Change.”
Aureline followed her gaze, watching a small shoot unfurl near the edge of the pool. “That feels… much larger.”
“Yes,” Lissette agreed promptly. “It is. Which means you must be very careful.” She paused, then added brightly, “But also very exciting.”
“So how do I start?” Aureline asked.
Lissette leaned back, considering. “First, you stop being afraid of hurting something. Life knows how to bend. Second, you listen—not with your ears.” She tapped her temple. “With the part of you that noticed this place before you ever stood up.”
Verdant drifted closer, leaves rustling softly.
“And third,” Lissette concluded, lifting her chin, “you practice. A lot. Because the more you grow, the more you can do.”
She smiled, fierce and fond. “And I will help you. Obviously.”
Aureline looked at her—this bold, brilliant thirteen-year-old who spoke as though the world simply rearranged itself to match her certainty—and felt something steady settle inside her.
“I think,” she said slowly, “that I am very glad you decided I was your sister.”
Lissette beamed. “Of course you are.”
She stood, scooping up Bella and the rabbit, and declared, “Lesson one complete. Tomorrow, we see what kind of forest you want to make.”
The grotto hummed softly around them as the outing closed—not with thunder or triumph, but with laughter, warmth, and the quiet certainty that something extraordinary had only just begun.