When She Reigns

by Jodi Meadows

  There was too much of a risk of hurting my allies. My mother.

  Within the hour, we’d accumulated fifteen wagons, drawn by thirty horses, and another quintet of horses to pull the first dragon’s platform. And then we rolled north on Revis Avenue—all one hundred and forty people who’d joined me. My army, Gerel announced.

  Safa. Over a dozen girls had escaped from Idris, but when people found out these were the last children of Idris, families took in the others without question. Only Safa remained with us, refusing to be separated from Aaru ever again.

  One hundred and five dishonored, including Naran.

  Altan, unfortunately. Some people didn’t care that they weren’t invited.

  My friends and sister, of course.

  Twenty-seven people from Flamecrest, who just wanted to help.

  Then there were the dragons, although the seven we’d taken from the empire had flown off to reunite with the others, so that left LaLa, Crystal, and Kelsine, who were only permitted to come because I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving them behind.

  As we rode through Flamecrest, LaLa curled up in my lap, pressing her nose into my stomach every so often, while Kelsine was resting on the floor of the wagon, her brown body leaned against my legs like she needed constant reassurance of my presence.

  Gerel and Chenda drove our wagon, while seven of us sat in the back—Ilina, Hristo, Zara, Aaru, Safa, Altan, and me—bouncing every time a wheel caught in a rut. It was jarring and uncomfortable, but better than walking through the crowded streets of Flamecrest.

  Altan sat closest to the driver’s bench, so that he could give Gerel and Chenda directions when necessary, but for now, he faced the back, answering a thousand questions.

  “How did you get out of your closet that night?” Hristo asked. “You were bound up.”

  The warrior shrugged, but his gaze slid over to Aaru, whose face turned hard with resolve.

  “I let him out,” Aaru said, tapping his words as well. “Mira told me she had a dream about girls in boats, and I thought it might be Safa”—he glanced at her, sitting next to him, and he smiled warmly—“so when I could speak again, I gave Altan what he wanted: information about the treaty, the spies, and Paorah. In trade, I asked him to find Safa, if she was really out there.”

  “You should have told us,” Ilina said.

  Aaru tapped Ilina’s words, too, and it was then I noticed Safa following the quiet code, rather than listening.

  “I should have,” Aaru acquiesced, his eyes flickering to me. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking clearly at that time.”

  I’d long ago forgiven him, even though I hadn’t understood why he’d released Altan. Now I did, and I forgave him once more. He had a sister again. He wasn’t the only Idrisi left in the world.

  “Tell me more about Paorah’s plans.” I turned to Altan. “You said he intends to rule a new world.”

  Altan nodded. “He knows his designs against the empire failed. I don’t know how. Maybe he has spies of his own. But he immediately changed his mind about the will of Anahera. The Great Abandonment is as inevitable as it’s ever been, but now she doesn’t want them to be conquerers. Instead, if the sacrifice is made correctly, then the Great Abandonment will finish and there will be a new world in place of the Fallen Isles—one he will rule.”

  Ilina gaped. “So he’s going to kill people to ensure that happens?”

  “As soon as the eclipse begins,” Altan confirmed.

  The thought made me ill. I turned to Zara and made my voice strong. “I won’t let anything happen to Mother. She’ll be safe.”

  My sister gazed at me with resignation in her eyes. “You can’t promise me that. But I believe you’ll try.”

  Scouts rode out ahead of us—a pair of dishonored—while the wagon jostled over a bump in the road; I held LaLa tight against me, wishing I were riding like the scouts, or flying.

  I forced my thoughts back to our plan.

  We’d go in, capture Paorah, and rescue all the people he intended to sacrifice. Then I’d take the first dragon and . . . that would be it. The gods would lie back down. Paorah would be prevented from sacrificing people in his wild belief that a new land would form out of nothing.

  I’d be a dragon.

  While I brooded, the conversation shifted. Ilina and Zara mused whether our mothers would be real friends after this, at last, while Hristo glared knives at Altan.

  Across from me, Aaru and Safa sat close together, tapping back and forth about everything that had happened since they separated. He was smiling, his whole manner soft as he gazed down at her and the quiet code she beat against her knee.

  ::Even before you were arrested, I was coming and going from Grace Community.:: Safa grinned up at him, her gaze flicking to his hands every so often—checking to see if he was going to say anything. ::I found other girls with the Voice of Idris, and during my visits, we taught one another how to use it—how to control it. I made sure to warn them to keep it a secret.::

  A mixture of annoyance and appreciation spread across Aaru’s face. ::I hope you were careful when you practiced. That was dangerous.::

  ::More careful than you. You got arrested.:: She smirked, but the expression didn’t last. ::But yes. We were careful. And after you were arrested, I understood how dangerous it was to be a girl with the Voice of Idris. If they arrested you, a boy, for speaking in the square, what would they do to us?::

  The wagon bumped over another rut, and the sandstone buildings grew farther apart as we moved out of the city. Ahead, a long road bent around plateaus and crags, with brittle scrub the only plant life I could see. The city had grown up all the way out to the edge of the desert, and then stopped.

  Above, the sky was huge and black, strung with starlight and clouds of pink and blue darkdust. Even without the moons, the heavens were bright enough to cast shadows across the ground.

  Aaru’s attention stayed on Safa. ::What then?::

  She heaved a sigh. ::I told everyone to find boats and stock them with food and water, like you did with mine. We were scared, but we didn’t have a choice anymore, so we agreed to meet on the river and sail to the ocean. It wasn’t easy, but we were just in time. The earthquake began as we were escaping the island.::

  “How—” Ilina started over in quiet code when Aaru directed Safa to look. ::How did you avoid getting caught in the undertow?::

  Safa’s eyebrows went up, as though she hadn’t expected someone else to know the quiet code, but she went along with it. ::We used the Voice of Idris to still the water around us. We sat in our boats and waited, and when it was over, we decided to sail to Khulan. That was where we’d planned to go from the start.::

  How incredible they’d managed to escape just in time. And fourteen of them, all isolated until now, with no experience with anyone who wasn’t also Idrisi. That took immeasurable courage.

  Safa continued. ::We were just in sight of Khulan by the time Altan found us. He said he would take us to you::—she looked at Aaru—::but first, he needed to find some people in Lorn-tah.::

  Altan hadn’t moved from his place at the front of the wagon, but now his head was leaned back far enough that he could stare at the sky. If he noticed anyone talking about him, or looking at him, he didn’t show it.

  Strange how Safa didn’t seem to hate Altan. She probably didn’t know how he’d tortured Aaru.

  Well, Aaru would tell her if he thought she needed to know.

  ::I’m proud of you for leaving. That was brave.:: Aaru squeezed Safa’s shoulder, and the way he looked at her was enough to break my heart. He’d feared everyone he’d loved on Idris was dead, but here was Safa, against all the odds. ::What about Mother? What about our sisters and Danyal?::

  Safa went still, then shook her head. Quickly, she glanced over the clattering wagon to see if Ilina and I were still watching, and she moved her quiet code to the back of Aaru’s arm, where no one could see.

  I looked down to where LaLa was curled in my lap, and
Kelsine rearranged herself against my leg, but from the corner of my eye, I caught the way Aaru’s shoulders slumped and his expression went carefully blank, as though she’d confirmed his worst fears. Whatever had happened to the rest of his family . . . they were all gone.

  As our caravan continued through the desert, Aaru and Safa kept the rest of their conversation private, and I turned my thoughts inward again. To the Great Abandonment. To the Fallen Gods. To the dragons.

  Would anyone even understand a new covenant with the gods? Maybe I should tell them what was going to happen, but I couldn’t risk them stopping me. If it was the only way to help my people . . . I’d do anything.

  I shivered, even though the air was warm.

  Ilina touched my arm, her quiet code coming soft against my skin, hidden from anyone’s view. ::Are you all right?::

  I raised an eyebrow, and she inclined her head toward Aaru and Safa, who were still talking privately.

  ::Fine,:: I tapped back. ::I’m glad she’s here.:: And I was. He was devoted to his family, and he’d always intended to go back to them. I had no idea how he’d thought the two of us might continue to be together—or if he’d even considered that it might be difficult—but after Idris had risen, it hadn’t mattered anymore. There was no going back home.

  But now Safa was here. She knew his history, his world, his hopes and dreams. She was a sister he’d chosen, which meant that whatever happened in the next few hours, he wouldn’t be left entirely alone. I could take comfort in that.

  Still, the selfish part of me wished he would pay attention to me, too. If I was about to turn into a dragon for the rest of my life . . .

  It was still my choice.

  I picked up a noorestone from the floor of the wagon and let its energy flow through me, burning away the knot building in my chest. With all the hope I’d passed on to others, I wished I had saved some for myself.

  A FEW HOURS later, when the stars were wheeling away from midnight and the caravan was quiet with the sounds of people resting—saving their strength for whatever was to come—I began to sense the Archland Ruins. Or, rather, the noorestones embedded there.

  They were one thousand two hundred and three pinpricks of light against the darkness of my thoughts, glowing brighter with every moment. Warm humming set into my bones, comforting in its harmony. There was something deeply right about these crystals, the fire they contained, the way they felt connected to the island itself.

  In the driver’s seat, Chenda and Gerel spoke in low tones to each other, though most of their conversation was lost under the clop of horse hooves on the packed-dirt road. Altan had his arms crossed, his head tilted back, and his eyes closed, but I doubted he was sleeping. Maybe he was reconsidering every move he’d made to bring him here. I certainly couldn’t think of a good reason not to toss him out into the desert. Aside from perhaps needing another person who knew how to use a weapon.

  I sighed, letting my attention drift through the wagon a little more. Zara and Ilina both leaned on Hristo’s shoulders; his eyes were closed, but his breathing didn’t have that slowness of sleeping; he, too, was awake and waiting. And across from me, Safa had curled onto the bench, and now she was using Aaru’s lap as a pillow. Through the dimness, he looked at me and tapped, ::Do you feel them?::

  The noorestones.

  I nodded.

  ::Are you afraid?:: he asked.

  Of course I was afraid. Every moment of my life was terrifying these days, but it helped to know that we had so many people who believed in this cause—who believed I could affect the decisions of the gods. People had believed in me all my life, but only because they’d been told to, never because I’d done anything to deserve it.

  Now was my chance to prove that their faith in me was not misplaced.

  I was the Hopebearer. I would give them hope.

  But before I could figure out how to put all of that in words, or if there was even any point in telling him, an enormous bang rocked the road in front of us.

  A thousand things happened at once:

  Fire bloomed from the packed sand, blindingly bright against the nighttime desert.

  Horses shrieked and lurched away from the explosion, toppling wagons in their effort to escape.

  Everyone threw themselves into motion, drawing weapons as they leaped free of the wagons.

  New explosions burst from the ground around us, confusing everything.

  LaLa and Crystal launched into the air, while Kelsine gave a long, low whine.

  Hristo lunged for me, pushing me to the floor of the wagon to protect me from falling debris.

  But none of it mattered. The explosions were merely a distraction, a net meant to ensnare us. Because while we were all struggling to make sense of the noise and fire, Paorah’s blue-jacketed soldiers swarmed in with darts, and one by one, we all went down.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  THE DARTS MUST HAVE HELD A SEDATIVE, NOT A POISON, because I awakened just as the sun crested the horizon, bathing the desert in a million shades of gold and red, contrasted sharply by the deep pockets of shadow that stretched from plateaus and ridges. Light shot through the delicate stone arches that stretched from rock to rock. Dragon’s breath bridges, they were called, because people said Drakontos sols had carved them from the stone a thousand years ago.

  Whether or not that was true, they were beautiful, and the effect of the sun shining through these grand windows was the first thing I noticed upon opening my eyes.

  The second was that we’d been brought to the ruins.

  I wasn’t ready to move yet, and my hands were tied over my head anyway. I couldn’t see the shape of the structure with my eyes, but I could feel it in the noorestones humming all around me, showing me more than I’d know about this place otherwise.

  Though smaller than the domed ruins where we’d freed the dragons, the Archland Ruins had an elegance all their own. Graceful spires soared into the purpling sky, glittering with bright crystals. A building stood in the center, just big enough to hold a few dozen people, but whatever its purpose was, I couldn’t fathom.

  Finally, I registered that I was lying on a floor, smooth after all these centuries of stinging desert wind. I’d been positioned on the eastern corner of the portico, and breathing to my right indicated at least a few people had been dumped up here with me. Were their hands tied up, too? Probably.

  Voices sounded: people whispering and praying, but one rose above them all, coming from somewhere ahead of me, off to the right. The front center of the portico.

  “It is Anahera’s will that we make these sacrifices. The death of these individuals means new life for Anahera’s chosen, and that is us, my friends. We have faithfully served our goddess of destruction since the beginning of the Fallen Isles, and we will serve her during this end, too.”

  My heart stuttered as I recognized the voice: High Magistrate Paorah.

  He’d been waiting for us.

  He’d been planning for us to come, planning to capture us, and planning to use us as part of this sacrifice. What else would solidify his reign over a new world, but the death of the representatives of the old one? Never mind that the goal was to make the islands stay.

  Paorah continued speaking, his voice as deceptively soft as the rest of him. “I saw the Great Abandonment coming decades ago. Before anyone else was worried about the number of dragons still living in the Fallen Isles, I began breeding programs in an effort to bolster their numbers, because I knew that we would need all the dragons to entreat the gods on our behalf. But I was dismissed. Ignored. Patronized, when people felt kind about it.”

  Dregs of the sedatives still slithered through my veins, but I forced myself to focus on my surroundings. Blue-jacketed guards stood watch around the ruins, scanning not just the crags and cliffs, but the people who’d gathered here.

  Slowly, I turned my head to get a look at the people next to me. The movement hurt—everything hurt—but I kept my motions steady and careful; hopefully, no one
would notice.

  Aaru was by my side, his eyes already open. I kept my voice low, only for the two of us. “Are you all right?”

  He gave a small nod. “Just woke up. We were ambushed.”

  I bit off a groan, trying not to wonder what had happened to those scouts. They’d been killed, probably. Or captured before they could return to warn us.

  Beyond Aaru, I could see Gerel, Ilina, Chenda, Safa, Hristo, Zara, Altan, and several others I recognized from the caravan of dishonored and the port. Still more seemed to have been laid out in the wagons, not enough of an annoyance for Paorah to put on display.

  He was still talking, still addressing the people gathered before him.

  “I was a young man at this time, and no one listened to me.” Paorah’s voice tilted, like we were all supposed to empathize with him. “So I developed a new plan: I would convince the other governments of another danger—an immediate danger. The Algotti Empire. The threat of imminent invasion encouraged cooperation, but I knew that spirit would only last so long, and then the Great Abandonment would be upon us.”

  A shiver ran through me, because I could see it. I could understand his frustration, knowing the Great Abandonment was coming but being unable to convince anyone of the danger. But to separate oneself from everyone else, to use fear to motivate rather than hope and love . . . That was the difference between him and me.

  “So I made more plans,” he said, “covering every possible scenario. I struck bargains with our enemies. I arranged to destroy an empire and build one anew. I did everything within my power to fight for the survival of the Fallen Isles, but when my scholars returned from their studies of The Book of Destruction, they offered a different interpretation of Anahera’s will—one I hadn’t been prepared to hear, and still shocks me. But that is why we are here today.

  “The Great Flame Anahera is a goddess of life and death and life again. She is the light of Noore, the goddess of beginnings and endings.” The high magistrate sounded rapturous, his words ringing across the desert like a prophecy. “Though it is counter to everything I set out to accomplish in my youth, I’ve embraced Anahera’s will, and I urge you to do the same.