When they went back to the Fair the next day, it was already being set up in a meadow right out of the city.

Differently from her Beilyn, Caloir was surrounded by the woods—a little isle of civility snuggled into the dangerous beauty of nature. It was a smaller than her city, too, the trees forcing its borders, making it so not many people travelled to it to attend the Fair. The places to sleep in the city centre weren't many, and strangers weren't particularly appreciated unless they were part of the team.

Cora's mind was still tied to the kisses she'd shared with Harry the night before, and she was sure her confusion was so evident that he could smell it in the air.

She hadn't dared to talk to him about it when he'd come back to the room, and he'd made no effort to bring it up as well. But while she was tense and puzzled, Harry was acting like nothing had happened—he was a little cold, a little detached, but also magnetically irritating, in that way only he seemed to manage. Nobody would've suspected anything by looking at him. Cora was starting to wonder if she was losing her mind.

He couldn't kiss her like that and then disappear in such a way, it wasn't right. He couldn't toy with her feelings like that. What even was his end goal? Had he regretted it? She was spiralling.

But Harry didn't seem to care, and as soon as they reached the Fair, he left her in Thalia's company and disappeared.

Cora pulled her black cloak tighter around her body, shivering even though it wasn't too cold yet.

The wagons were nowhere to be found, probably hidden somewhere deeper in the woods, but the majority of the people of the Fair were running all around her, setting up stalls, bonfires, and other types of entertainment she couldn't bother looking closer into. On her right, a group of men was moving a long wooden pole around, layers and layers of black fabric on the ground. The Pavilion. It was anticlimactic to see it being set up, that used she was to its presence looming in the corner of her vision every time she went out in the streets.

"I heard you broke something last night," Thalia commented all of a sudden, and Cora turned her head to her.

"I'm sorry for your pin."

Thalia shrugged. "I'll have someone fix it. That, however, was a quite interesting display on your part."

Cora sighed. "I don't feel like it was me."

"We'll wait to see if you do it again. Harry worries that it might've been his own magic reflecting off you, so any training will be useless until you show your talents again."

"Training?" Her attention perked up at the word.

"I must admit none of us here is an expert in training," Thalia said, "usually magic comes to us naturally, and very early on." She tilted her head. "I'd never met someone who didn't know they were magical before. I suppose there's a first time for everything."

"Maybe I'm not, and you're just mistaken."

"No, I do think there's more to you than you show."

Cora frowned. "How do you know?"

"I know things, don't you remember? That's my ability. I read your present and part of your future before, haven't I?"

She suddenly remembered the third time they'd met, the week before. Thalia had sat her down and told her her aunt had been lying to her for her whole life. And then she'd warned her against the fire— the fire she couldn't escape, the one that had enlightened the night sky during the Hazelnut Festival, the one that had almost got her killed.

"Your ability?"

Thalia looked at her attentively with her deep violet eyes. "Every fay has an ability, something they have a particular connection with. That's how our magic works."

Cora gave her an unsure nod, even though she wasn't sure she'd actually understood. "You can't do all types of magic?"

Thalia let out a laugh. "Having more than one ability is very rare, Cora. Most fays have just one."

"How do you discover it?"

"We don't have to, we just know," Thalia replied. "Perhaps the name ability is wrong. Perhaps, the term likelihood would work better. We know what it is because we are like it. We understand its inner workings and because of that we can control it." She paused, before adding something else. "Everyone has an ability, but fays are the only ones that are able to perceive it and therefore utilise it."

Cora stepped closer to her, lowering her tone, her heartstrings taut and ready to snap. "So a human could never learn magic?"

"It's impossible for a human to learn magic. It exists on a frequency they aren't able to see nor hear." She paused and sent Cora an odd glance. "Why don't you ask me the question you truly want to know the answer to?"

"Then how would I be able to do magic?" It slipped out of her mouth before she could stop it.

Thalia stopped walking. "What does that mean?"

Cora sighed. "Look at me," she started, "you all say I'm a fay, or there's something inside me that is, but I look like a human. I am human. So why am I able to do what you say I've done?" Maybe Harry was right. Maybe it'd truly only been his own magic reflecting off her. That made much more sense than the other possibility— that she could be magical.

Thalia sent her a severe look. "The ability comes from inside you, Cora," she said, her tone hard. "Look at Harry. He may have slightly pointed ears, but he easily passes off as a human. I could never do so. And yet he's more powerful than I am. How do you explain that?"

Cora opened her mouth to reply, but closed it again when she realised she didn't have an answer.

"It's not about how you look, but what you are. And you're a fay. Just like me, just like him." She sent her a mischievous glance. "Besides, I think he likes that you look so human."

Cora ran after her when she started walking again, hating the way her heart beat quicker at the suggestion. "Why?" She asked loudly after Thalia, and she turned around, letting her reach her.

"Because it gives him an advantage," she whispered once they were next to each other again. "You're the trick up his sleeve—and you're a more powerful one than he originally imagined."

Cora frowned, and Thalia left for the Pavilion.

"Wait!" Cora shouted as a thought flashed through her mind, and Thalia paused again. "I have one more question."

"I wonder what it is?" Thalia smiled knowingly. "You want to know about Harry."

Cora blinked. Sometimes Thalia scared her. "What's Harry's ability?"

"You already know the answer."

"Do I?"

"You do. It's that one thing he's most alike, the one that calls to him the most... what do you think it is?"

She pursed her lips, thinking about it.

It's that one thing he's most alike.

She focused on Harry, trying to grasp his very essence, that beating core that defined him the most.

Harry was detached, mysterious, even cold, at times. He was magnetic, intense, dangerous. He shone like the stars. Just one stare from him could freeze anyone in their spot.

But despite the cool shade of his irises, the look in his eyes was burning hot, fiery in nature—

"Fire," she whispered, not even knowing why she was so surprised. "Harry's ability is fire."

It was so obvious.

Thalia hummed. "I told you that you knew the answer."

Cora looked away from her, not knowing what to do with her answer, now that she had it.

Harry's ability was fire, so did it mean that he'd only kissed her to help her blow out the candle? Then, that was why he was acting like nothing had happened—because nothing had indeed happened, to him. He'd only meant to help her. That kiss meant nothing, to him. Her chest was aching. She didn't know whether she felt used or tricked.

"I remember him from before he lost his powers, you know."

Cora glanced up when Thalia spoke, trying her best to erase her emotions from her face. The last thing she needed was Thalia discovering her feelings about the moment she'd shared with Harry the night before—if she didn't know already. "You do?"

"He was a force of nature," she said with a nod. "If you're shocked by the things he can do now, you would've been terrified of him then. It was like he could pull down the stars from the sky with a wave of his hand. He set an entire village on fire without even blinking, once, to help some of us escape."

A shiver ran down her spine. She'd been right—Harry's magic was destructive by definition. It stemmed from anger; it was explosive. If he'd flipped out he would've left no one in his wake. At the same time, though, it was odd to think that the person she was describing was the same one that had lain in bed with her and kissed her again and again. It seemed too kind of an act to be mixed up with such a fierce nature.

But the man that had brushed his lips against her neck the night before was the same one that had killed over ten people with only a wave of his hand. And that was nothing, compared to the things Thalia was telling her.

"I believed there would be no end to that power, no boundary, and it was enchanting to see. I'd never seen a fay as powerful as him before," Thalia continued.

"What happened, then?" When had it all ended? Why had it all ended? Cora was relieved he didn't have that kind of power anymore—and felt bad because of it. It felt wrong to rejoice of what was causing someone else pain.

"Something inside him shattered," she replied. "Some of us say he was cursed. That it's the price he needs to pay for the power he once had. After all, an ability like that went against the laws of nature."

Cora furrowed her eyebrows. That seemed a fictional belief. Surely there had to be another way to explain what was going on—a more rational one. "What do you think?"

Thalia shrugged. "I think he's much more powerful than we originally thought he was, and he doesn't know how to control it. I think he's scared of hurting us, and that fear is blocking him. And I also think he could set the ocean on fire, if only he wanted to."

Harry was a force of nature. He couldn't only manipulate fire, he was fire, beautiful and iridescent and just as unpredictable.

They both went back to walking, and soon they were standing next to the dark fabric of the Pavilion. It was hovering in the air, and the men Cora had crossed paths with earlier were holding the pole up while another blocked it in place.

As soon as the tent was up, people started flooding it.

Thalia and Cora were the first to walk inside and stop under the glinting deep blue of its ceiling, but soon enough they were joined by many others as they started setting it up for the performance.

Cora looked around and frowned when she realised that, despite the near entirety of the Fair being inside the tent, a white cloak was missing. "Where's Aster?"

"Harry sent him away as soon as we got back." A winning smile curved Thalia's lips. "Our dinner yesterday was more fruitful than we'd expected."

Cora frowned. "What do you mean?"

Thalia shook her head. "Harry will tell you all about it when Aster comes back."

Cora wanted to know, badly. But she's also been with the Fair enough to know that, if they didn't want her to know yet, she wouldn't be able to find out. She sighed. She felt like everyone else was speaking a different language sometimes, and even though she could catch a word here and there, she remained separated from the world around her.

A man checked the pole wasn't going to move, and then the tent was tightened and pulled taut around it. The ceiling got higher and the room wider, and as the fabric was fixed to the ground the light of day disappeared, and their artificial sky drowned them in blue.

"Rather impressive, don't you think?"

Cora's heart missed a beat. She turned around; Harry was walking towards them, as pretty as ever in his dark blue coat. She blushed and glanced away.

"There are some rips on the side, but we'll have them fixed," Thalia told him with a wave of her hand as he reached them.

All of a sudden Cora could feel his eyes burning right through her, and she didn't have the courage to look at him to confirm her suspicions.

"That would be ideal," he said slowly, the pause in the conversation being enough to convince her to send a quick glance in his direction—one she quickly regretted when she discovered that his attention was indeed on her.

How could someone seem so cold yet be so incandescent? A simple look from him could freeze her down to her bones and set her alight at the same time.

But he didn't talk to her, and as quickly as he'd first paid attention to her, he let her go from his magnetic grasp and glanced at Thalia instead. "I will be going into the city now but please, if anything out of ordinary happens, let me know."

"You fear Count Watillon might try something even after yesterday's dinner? I thought it was meant to..." A quick look at Cora. "Ease any suspicions he had."

Harry gave her a nod. "It was and it worked, but you know me. I do not trust humans. They'll turn on us at the first opportunity they're given."

"We'll be keeping our eyes open as usual, then," Thalia replied. "Nothing will get past us."

"I do hope you're right."

Cora watched the exchange as if it was a game, following the ball from left to right with her gaze.

Without even giving her one last glance, Harry turned around and left, and she could only notice Skat's silvery fur running after him before he was swallowed by the crowd.

"Well, I'd say a most interesting afternoon is ahead of us," Thalia commented. "Isn't Harry such a treasure when he's trying to avoid important conversations?"

She was referring to the fact that he'd kissed her the night before and hadn't said a word to her about it. She felt sick.

She was starting to realise that being around someone like Thalia was both a blessing and a curse.

And maybe she wished she could see Harry pull down the stars from the sky.

A slightly shorter, but much needed chapter. I hope you enjoyed it x
Miki