Sweet & Bitter Magic by Adrienne Tooley (best ereader for textbooks .txt) 📕

down at her feet. She had almost forgotten the boots weren’t hers. “I, uh, didn’t think you’d miss them.” She untied the laces, stepped out of the boots, and placed them against the wall where they belonged. Surely Tamsin could conjure her a new pair without much complaining. “There you go.” She smiled guiltily. “You’d never even know they’d been gone.”

Her father let out a laugh, loud and warm in the small space. “No, I suppose I wouldn’t. Tor tells me I was a handful for a time there.” He gave a soft chuckle, which turned quickly into a cough. When he finally managed to breathe through the wheezing, he turned his full attention on her. “Now tell me,” he said, patting the bed beside him. “Where have you been?”

Wren bit her lip. There was so much to tell him. So much he would not understand. She had grown up on their journey, but now, before her father, she felt like a fearful child again. She wanted to assure him she was still his daughter. That she was only a little different, and that it shouldn’t change the way he looked at her. That what she was had nothing to do with the loss of her brother.

But even as she fretted, Wren knew that however her father reacted, it wouldn’t change how right it felt to embrace who she was. And so she sat and told him the truth.

“I’ve been away, Papa,” Wren said, tugging on her braid. “I went to the Witchlands and helped to end the plague.”

Her father stared at her incredulously. “No, you didn’t,” he finally said, his frown deepening. “The only people who can make it through the Witchwood are witches. And you’re not a witch.”

“No, I’m not.” Wren’s nerves returned, stronger this time, so that she felt her fear in her toes. She wished that Tamsin had followed her inside. “But I am a source.”

Her father shook his head uncomprehendingly.

She took a deep breath. “I’m magic.”

He blinked at her, brow furrowed. “Are you sure?”

Wren’s heart sank. “I’ve known for years. Kept it hidden because I didn’t want you to…” She trailed off, her voice breaking.

Her father sat up straighter, his expression weighty with an emotion Wren could not place. “Didn’t want me to what?”

“To be afraid of me,” Wren finished, mouth trembling. “I didn’t want you to stop loving me because of what magic did to my brother.”

For too long, she had protected her father from heartbreak by tamping down her own desires. She had lived to serve him at the expense of herself. That was what he had wanted from her. That was her role as a daughter. And yet, instead of looking satisfied with her sacrifice, her father looked… devastated.

“You kept this hidden because you feared me?” He hung his head, shame radiating from him. “There’s not a thing in the world that could make me stop loving you. That you didn’t know…” He trailed off, staring down at his sheets. “That’s my fault, not yours.” He ran a hand across his face. “I’m sorry, little bird. I’m so sorry that I failed you.” He looked up at her, a sad smile peeking through his scruffy beard. “Things will be different from now on.”

Wren shifted on the thin pallet. “Actually, that’s why I’m here.” She folded her hands in her lap. She took a deep breath. “I’m here to say good-bye. The Coven wants me to train Within, and I want to go.” Her father’s brow wrinkled with confusion. “I’m going to live in the Witchlands,” she clarified.

Her father studied her face, his eyes—the same green as hers, she could see now—boring into her. “And this is what you want?”

The question hung between them. Finally Wren nodded. “It’s what I’ve always wanted.”

Her father placed his clammy hand upon her own. “Then go, little bird.” His smile was small but true. “Go and do good.” He cleared his throat. “It’s high time I did the same. I cannot continue to let the past hold me back. I’m so sorry I let it hold you back.”

They stared at each other, unspoken words filling the space. Wren didn’t know how to say good-bye, and so she didn’t. She kissed her father on the forehead, smoothed his sheets, and left the tiny room, trying not to let him see the way her hands were shaking.

Tamsin was standing in the middle of the carpet, staring at their meager home. Wren came up behind her and wrapped her arms around her waist.

Tamsin folded her arms around Wren’s. “Are you ready?”

Wren extracted herself from the witch and looked around the tiny room. She had spent so many years here denying herself because she thought that was what was expected. What she was supposed to do. She tugged on the tail of her braid.

“Just one last thing.” She pulled the knife from her belt, the delicate, ornate blade stolen from the Orathen hunter in Farn. Her hands were still shaking. She offered the blade to Tamsin, who stared at it blankly.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” Wren held out her braid. Tamsin’s eyes widened in surprise. “Are you sure?”

She nodded. “Cut it off.”

Tamsin stared warily at the knife in her hand. “Can’t I just use magic? What if I slice your neck open?”

Wren raised her eyebrows. “Or you could just be careful and not slice my neck open.”

Tamsin rolled her eyes. “Fine.”

Wren held her breath as the witch hacked and sawed at her hair with the knife until the braid fell limp into her hands. It was heavy. Wren shook her head wildly, admiring Tamsin’s work in the back of a ladle. The tips of her shoddily shorn hair barely brushed her jaw. She couldn’t yank it, could hardly gather it into a tuft to tie at the back of her head. Her hair now looked nothing like her mother’s. It was exactly as she had wanted.

Wren tossed the braid into the fire and watched the weight of the