Even if Erris and I had tried to pretend the kiss had never happened, I don’t think we could have. Some things simply can’t be ignored.
Sometimes I was jealous of Erris winding down and sinking into automatic sleep, because he didn’t have to lie awake at night and think about it all.
The snow came more regularly now, and every morning I woke to windows furred with frost and loathed the thought of leaving the cocoon of my bed, but I used these mornings to work on magic. I would light a candle and draw a thread of warmth from it. Every day I seemed a little better at making heat from almost nothing, and one day I found I no longer needed the candle.
I didn’t want to stop pushing the magic farther by inches. One morning, I tried warming Erris’s key first and using it as a channel for magic when I wound him.
He didn’t let me slip out of his room that day. He caught my hand and smiled. “Look at you, Nim! What’ve you been up to? Pretty soon we can use you to cook toast.”
“I’ve been practicing. It’s easy to want to practice when it’s so cold.” I hesitated. “But I can’t make fire. I haven’t even tried. With what happened to Celestina… I wish I had someone to guide me.”
“You’ve been very cautious so far. You started by moving heat and now you’re learning to make heat, so maybe you can do the same with fire. Move it first.”
“Maybe you’re right. I just don’t want to burn the house down. Celestina will have a fit if I start practicing magic indoors.”
It was snowing that morning, but when it stopped after lunch, I took a lantern out and teased the flame with my gloved hand, trying to connect with its spirit. At first I could still only move the warmth around, and then I realized the fire itself felt a little more fickle. Shy, even. Maybe because I was starting with a mere lantern flame, whereas I’d tried moving the heat with a steady bonfire. Or maybe kerosene fires were simply more difficult to connect with than wood fires. Soon I could “catch” the fire with my mind, but it slipped away if I tried to manipulate it. I must have tried to hold on to it a hundred times before I made any progress. Just as I finally managed to make the accursed thing grow and shrink in some small measure, the snow started again.
I came inside and slammed the lantern down on the counter by the kitchen door and started unraveling myself from my scarf. Violet was at the kitchen table, reading, one stockinged foot tucked under her and the other scratching the cat’s back with agile toes.
“Are you mad?” she asked.
“No, just-I can’t get it right. Well, I can move a candle flame. After hours of trying, I can move a candle flame.”
“If it helps at all, I don’t think you were actually outside for multiple hours,” Violet said in a bored tone, still staring at her book.
“This is serious. I mean, I’ve been working on magic for weeks and I can move heat and I can barely move fire, which is all well and good, but it’s not going to help me fight off a jinn! I don’t know how stupid I must have been, to think I could learn anything useful in one winter. I guess I’ll make the jinn nice and warm, and Erris can talk to some mushrooms-”
Erris wandered in, eyebrows raised, obviously lured by my shouting. “Are you all right, Nim? You’re being way too hard on yourself.”
“It’s just… Well, you’ve been having magic lessons with Violet; is she learning anything?”
“I can talk to mushrooms now,” Violet said, rather sarcastically.
Erris nodded. “I was thinking of a poisonous mushroom army.”
“Are there even any mushrooms growing in the snow or are you two just toying with me? Because I’m in no mood. I just spent hours-or at least, an hour-trying to catch a candle flame, and as soon as I did, it started snowing and I had to come inside.”
“I think you’ve done enough for today anyway,” Erris said, pulling out a chair for me. “Sit down. Have an apple.”
I kneaded my aching head. “I’m tired of apples.” I took a deep breath, knowing I was verging on a tantrum. “I’m sorry, it’s just-I had so much success with the heat magic at first, but moving the candle flame took forever. It’s made me realize how silly this is. I can’t become a sorceress in a few months, no one can.”
“At least it’s something you can do to feel in control,” Erris said.
“Like giving a baby something to suck on,” I muttered. “What will happen when the jinn returns? What if he takes you away from me? You can’t hide in the sea now; it’s freezing out there.”
“I don’t know,” Erris said. “Maybe he won’t come back.”
“I bet he will,” Violet said.
“Violet, one would almost think you fancy the jinn, the way you talk.”
Violet finally put her book down and glared at me. “The jinn was nice to me. He is a person, you know. Jinns have to do what their master tells them, they can’t help it. They’d rather be free.”
I frowned. Jinns in stories were always trying to get free, but they weren’t especially nice about it, and our jinn hadn’t struck me as especially nice either. “Well, whatever his sweet and angelic intentions may be, we still have to consider it a serious threat, because he can’t help it, and I’m sure he will come back, so we can’t be complacent.”
“We’re doing our best,” Erris said. “And you’re beating yourself up over it. I doubt he’ll come back in the dead of winter and risk getting caught in a blizzard. We’ll all work on our magic and see how far we can get.”