Spark of the Everflame (Kindred's Curse, #1)

by Penn Cole

If Teller had heard what transpired at the palace, he said nothing of it to me. Though when I sat in front of the hearth and gazed vacantly at the fire, I felt his curious stare on my back. I supposed my moodiness since I’d stopped taking the flameroot powder had made him wary enough to give me space. The flameroot. The vial of red powder burned a hole in my pocket. My chaotic thoughts circled it like vultures around a fresh kill. That bottle was my anger and fear, my anxiety and resentment—all my darkest emotions in tangible form. When the sky turned black and the men in my family were lost in dreams, I gathered all the bottles in my mother’s supply and slipped outside to the water’s edge. One by one, I hurled the moon-shaped jars into the sea. One by one, they hit the waves and sank forever to a watery grave. Each quiet splash felt like the creaking open of an old, heavy door, its iron hinges rusted from ages of disuse. I said a prayer to the Old Gods to make me ready for whatever lay beyond.