My cheeks hurt, and as I bring my hand to my face, I realize it’s because I’m beaming, the kind of smile I rarely—if ever—display. It only makes me grin brighter, and now it’s Hawthorne’s turn to look up and down my body. His smile disappears and his expression heats, eyes burning with a fire that makes me want to squirm. He takes a step closer to me, his own large hand reaching for me before dropping it.

“Look at that. You’re a good teacher,” he murmurs, voice low and throaty—intimate, I think. It’s the voice of a lover in the dark, praising and assessing and seductive and wicked all at once. I imagine that voice whispering dirty things to me, words I’ve never fantasized about as something inside my chest flutters.

“Good,” I say, and the word comes out breathless and lilting. “Keep practicing.”

With that, I turn, walking away from him before I forget who his father is, keeping my eyes locked on the mist barrier as a reminder of everything I’ve lost at the hands of his kingdom. I make it all the way to the edge of the cliff, half a mile away, before my emotions are fully locked away again behind my own misty wall.

When I return from my walk, Hawthorne is fully engaged in his training. He continues to create and destroy the phenomenon of lighted mist, losing himself in the exercises for nearly an hour, while I admire his dedicated practice. He clearly enjoys training his magic. That’s something we have in common.

With nothing else to do, I run through my own magical exercises, calling aether and releasing it. All a study in measured control. Remarkably, my magic somehow feels lighter and easier to conjure today. The heaviness I’ve felt lately is nowhere to be seen. I chalk it up to finally having a real plan to take down the rebels. We stay like that for a while, side by side, comfortable in the silence. Finally, when it seems Hawthorne can complete the exercise with ease, I say, “Good job. You’ve mastered it pretty quickly.”

“It’s all because of you, witchling.” His features beam back at me.

I blush. Trying to cover my reaction to him, I narrow my eyes and say flatly, “Are you actually combining them, or just channeling both at the same time and using their proximity to make the mist look lit up?”

He winks. “What’s the difference? This is more progress than I’ve made in centuries. And I find that the appearance of magic is sometimes just as powerful as the magic itself.” To prove his point, he surrounds us in another misty glow.