“I peed my pants,” he cries to Grandpa Archie.
“That’s all right, little fella! I think I did, too!” Grandpa replies before climbing the thick trunk to pull Duggie-Sky into his arms. Grandpa leaps down and leads the boy to clean up in the shelter of the unharmed trees to the west.
While the Olearons and humans, along with Luggie, pace and talk at the base of the avalanche, I stay put. The Star has caused too much pain on Jarr-Wya. I curse it. I damn it for how it might separate my family, even after my cancer has claimed me. I blame it for ruining my future with Luggie—for ruining everything.
I know I’m having a teenage temper tantrum. I can’t help myself. Plunking down within the divided barricade, I press my eyes closed. I wish the Star away. I pray for a happy ending for those I love, even if that means a happiness I will never know.
I feel my cancer symptoms flare up. The headache threatens to split my skull as if it were this barricade cracking at Luggie’s command. I curse cancer. How evil it is that even now, when I have bigger things to worry about, it must show its nasty face and reduce my body to a helpless collection of organs and bone. My illness humbles me when what I need is to be strong.
I wobble to my feet. After scooping two rocks into my hands, I throw the first. The distance it travels is pathetic. The second makes it a hair farther. My frustration needs an outlet. Too much hangs on the fragile divide between oblivion and life. I pick up another black stone, toying with it in my hands, bracing my muscles to let it fly.
I don’t know where the strength will come from, but I refuse to sit idly by and let others fight and die for me.
Chapter 10
Archie
The Olearons take stock of the surviving supplies. The only satchel of food belongs to Lady Sophia, who escaped the cave clinging to what she values most: a stockpile of vulai greater than anyone anticipated, however small it is now after Ella’s party. Archie watches the woman outstretch her arm with a hand to halt Nameris, insisting she carry the remaining bread and wryst drink for the company. The frustration on Nameris’s face is thick, and the two squabble within his pocket of fiery light.
Azkar shakes his head at what is left. “Five squares of vulai, half a flask of ellag currants, and three vials of wryst, barely enough of the healing drink to strengthen a third of our company,” he bemoans.
The only serious injury—most are plum-colored bruises and shallow cuts—is to Ardenal’s arm. The place where Azkar cauterized the wound with his flame now blackens, burned to a flaky crisp. The wound stretches from mid-forearm to just above his elbow. The charcoal flesh has little give, and Ardenal winces as he stretches.
“Is that safe?” Archie whispers to Tessa. “What the Olearons did? Was there any skin left to burn, or was it just muscle they torched?”
Tessa shrugs helplessly. “I didn’t get a good look at the wound,” she says. The guilt of fighting Ardenal while he carried her out of the avalanche shows itself as the woman gnaws on one filthy fingernail. “My nursing skills seem like child’s play out here,” she continues in a murmur. “I wish there was more I could do.”
Archie puts a comforting arm around Tessa. “It looks like he’s in pain. And that’s saying something. He’s usually the first to put on a brave face.”
“That’s Arden’s way. Never ask for help. Never confide in anyone. Just like all those months before he left. He wrestled with Ella’s illness all alone, though he didn’t have to. It was our pain to bear, to share and spread the weight between us.” Tessa spits out a fingernail.
Archie and Tessa watch Ardenal join the Olearons who scavenge the debris for salvageable supplies. The tall lean bodies flex as they lift and toss warm boulders, newly settled at the broad slope of the wreckage. Each one ignites their fire, emblazing them from their boots to three feet above their Mohawks. Their eyes, remaining black, appear like haunting, scathing embers as they search.
“He needs rest, Archie. He’s going to strain the wound. Can you make him stop and sit down?”
“I think that message would come better from the nurse. From his wife.”
Tessa bristles at Archie’s words and she does not reply. She marches toward the eight Olearons that light up the foot of Baluurwa like a ring of bonfires at midnight, leaving Archie alone with his thoughts. “Thank goodness the mountain’s deserted. We certainly fail at ambush,” he says to himself.
Duggie-Sky startles Archie as the boy appears at his side. Archie curses, then bites his tongue. “You scared me, little fella. Why not spook Nameris instead, or Lady Sophia—she’s always up for a good laugh—or save it for the bad guys?” He regrets his words immediately.
“Bad guys?”
“Yeah, you know … well, uh, you never know who we’ll meet out here.” Archie grimaces.
Duggie-Sky ponders Archie’s words, his round brown face flashing with conflicting emotions before he settles on courage. “You’re right, Grandpa.” His voice reveals a trace of his childish drawl. “I chose this name for a reason. Duggie-Sky. After the Douglas Skywarrior.” He looks down to his T-shirt, where a grey airplane carries a cartoon superhero barely visible through the grime and stains from their treks across Jarr-Wya. “I want to be a hero—”
“Oh, my boy—”
“And this gift chose me.”
“Yes, but—”
“So I’m going to use it for good! Not evil. Not even scaring Lady Sophia!”
“That’s a good choice, little fella.” Archie regrets every idea he has inadvertently planted in the child’s mind. He worries what blunders will tumble out of his mouth if he keeps blathering on. “Time to rest, my boy. Come up here.” Duggie-Sky disappears as if erased, then reappears in Archie’s arms. The old man gently rocks the boy, who has grown quickly since the Atlantic Odyssey crashed onto the island.
Archie’s eyes search for Ella. He spots her. She is sitting on the forest floor, in a shadow of rock. She does not meet his eyes, which Archie has learned means she wishes to be left alone.
Archie sighs. While the boy in his arms grows and flourishes, his granddaughter wanes. Ella was always stubborn, in all the best ways, she once told him, but Archie wonders if her strength of determination is enough to get her to the Star, to find her cure, before … he refuses to think of that end. He resolves never to share this fear with Ella. If she believes she’ll make it and she sees that I feel the same, together we’ll succeed. Together we’ll do whatever is needed to save her and Jarr-Wya. It’s the only way.
THE Lord declares to the company that they will mobilize at dawn.
For some, sleep is unescapable. Olearon warriors take shifts, watching the tree line and mountain. Others in the company are wide awake though off duty, like Nameris, whose gaze never strays from the Lord. The ruler of the Olearons appears to be frozen in the quiet place between slumber and consciousness, his eyes partially cracked while his breathing is deep.
Those who do rest sleep through the uneven crack and pop of lightning and thunder, sounds that have become background static for Archie. He barely hears it. Suddenly, however, a noise scratches through his wandering, worrying mind. It is Ella.
“Eeeeweeahhh!” she screeches, so loudly that her broken voice carries up the slope of Baluurwa and echoes back to them. Ella stands, her face a pale sheen that matches the wide whites of her eyes. One trembling hand points up through the tentacles of the floating earth islands above, into the black expanse where the color of the lightning dissolves into stars.
Archie leaps to his feet, startling Duggie-Sky from sleep, and the boy’s first word is “Woooow.”
A planet melts into view through the dark sky. It is perfectly round with three bands of blue encircling its emerald-and-purple speckled surface. It nears Jarr, slowly growing and becoming clearer. Archie can now see that the blue rings are spinning around the planet in a seamless whirl; his only clue to this motion is the variance in their hues.
As if rising out of black water, a smaller planet begins as an outline o
f silver, then takes on form. This planet is of ombré hues, tangerine fading to sunflower yellow.
The two planets are connected, Archie realizes when he squints. It is as if a rubber band has encircled both and been pulled taut between them. The light contained within the connecting band throbs vibrantly, pulsing as it rotates through violet, dusty blue, and pine green. In this shifting channel between planets, black flecks like dead stars pass from one sphere to the other, traveling in both directions.
Archie notices Tessa and Ardenal stand to flank Ella on both sides. Luggie is behind her, bracing her waist. Their mouths hang open. All in the company gaze at the weight of the atmosphere above, which has taken on such density and gravity of meaning that no one speaks for quite some time, lulled in an awestruck trance.
Nameris is the first to give voice to his awe, “The old rumors are true. What we believed as myth is now painted with a magnificent brush before us. A Naiu-rich world connected to its derivative.”
“This is how it began with the Star. A great sight in the sky, dazzling us, came to mark the sunsets till our doom,” rumbles Azkar. “We mustn’t be fooled by this beauty. It is an omen of our impending destruction.”
“Why are the planets pulled toward Jarr?” Lady Sophia asks.
Azkar spits. “It’s the Star. Is it not obvious, human?”
“We must flee home! Back to the glass city,” Kameelo whispers timidly to his eldest brother. “To say goodbye to our mother, to come together and burn as one before our end.”
Azkar’s expression does not betray sympathy for his sibling. Instead, his jaw clenches and his muscles flex.
“No one here will return to the glass city.” The Lord’s voice is flat. “Fear is not our mission, warrior.” The Lord scowls at Kameelo, who drops his head. “We came here to wipe out what threatens our lives, our families, our home. Now is the time for bravery. Now is the time to die for our seas, our shores, and all that we love. For peace. I do not, however, believe death is our fate. No. The Star is not my Lord. We will see the light of the sun once more, when all of this is finished.”
The Lord falls silent. The ferocity on his features melts to dread. The company sees what happens before they hear it. The connected band between the two nearing planets breaks apart like a fractured bone; there is a ground-shaking snap a breath later. Now all cover their ears. The dead and blackened stars scatter from the river of color like spilled sand. The blue rings of the larger planet wobble and collide. They bash into each other and into the landmass, dislodging chunks of green and violet. These pieces ricochet off one another until they are clear of the debris. The broken planet cascades through the dead stars and fragments of itself until it slices its smaller orange derivative into two uneven halves.
The sound of the collision a moment later is the crinkle and stretch of resistant metal, and the smell, which arrives immediately after, is first rich with benzene, like mothballs and gasoline, then stronger still with a gust of rotting fruit and burning rubber. Finally, everyone’s nostrils fill with the odor of morning, earth, and dew. It is the only peace that lingers after the carnage in the sky. What was once two brilliant, connected planets look like table crumbs swept into a corner of the galaxy. Finally, the sky overhead is still.
Chapter 11
Archie
Run to Baluurwa. Ascend now!” the Lord orders. “Our mission is at our doorstep. We must act before we are watched so casually in someone else’s sky.”
The company grab what meager supplies they dug out of the rubble, and climb. Ella waves away her parents, leaving Tessa bookended by Ardenal and Captain Nate. Kameelo forfeits flight to take Lady Sophia’s hand and carry her satchel of vulai bread.
“Want me to carry you, little fella?” asks Archie, but Duggie-Sky only grins.
“No thanks, Grandpa.” The boy vanishes from Archie’s side and materializes twenty steps ahead.
Ella leans heavily on Luggie. They both wear their travel sacks, though in truth they rarely take them off. Archie sprints to them and is struck by Ella’s state—weary and even more pale than before. He begins to slip off her sack, wishing to give her bony shoulders a rest, but she screeches, “Awwek!” which Archie can tell is a firm no, and he takes her arm instead.
The debris in the air—Baluurwa’s dust and the slowly settling, finely ground planet powder from above—amalgamates into clouds in what should have been a morning sky. The moon still glows, subtly illuminating the blackness with pockets of silver. The Olearons lead by their light. The stratus clouds fan out in long wisps. The storm, which the company had ignored as they watched the catastrophe in the sky, now whips their hair and stirs the clouds like blown silk scarves. The cloud cover tangles around Baluurwa the Doomful, ensnaring it in an ominous haze of white.
The company climb frantically and slice their fingers on the warm black rock. Scaling the avalanche rubble is precarious, as many boulders balance on shifting edges. There are several narrow misses. Luggie does his best to wield his power over the stones, but he is inexperienced and lacks the strength of an adult Bangol. Luggie’s youth, Archie reflects, wasn’t spent guided by a nurturing hand but beneath the thumb of a cruel father. Archie encourages the young Bangol as best he can and takes Ella on his back, as he had Lady Sophia when they fled the landslide. He barely feels Ella’s weight, which mirrors that of Duggie-Sky, nearly a decade younger than the girl, though the boy has grown in stature and maturity significantly beyond any normal human four-year-old.
Ella’s weight had trailed that of her peers since the cancer grew bold and hungry. The bones of her face still hold their pretty shape—she has round cheekbones like Tessa’s, a freckled nose, and a bewitching smile. Yet now her cheeks are hollow and the skin beneath her eyes is the pale blue of a winter shadow.
Archie clings to Ella’s meatless legs, mere skin and bone, and she tightly clutches his neck. With a steady foot, he lunges from one boulder to the next, dodging slipping silt and shifting pebbles as the clouds swell to a damp fog.
“When you come across a tunnel, holler!” Nate calls to the company through the mist.
“We have passed the cusp of the avalanche,” replies Nameris. “We should find the lowest rung of tunnels at any moment now.”
Azkar growls as his boot slips. He spits. His deep black scar twists the skin from his left eye down to his collarbone. “We welcome trouble by scaling Baluurwa by this wicked light.”
“The sun may never come,” Junin answers in a motherly tone, though she appears only as an orange glow in the fog. “The moon is not terrible. It grants us what it can.”
“But it cannot bestow warmth to our young in the city, those who have not yet mastered their flames,” retorts Nameris, ever the pessimist. The thin Olearon shudders. “Or gift us with the Naiu our crops need to flourish.”
“True,” Junin says calmly. “Though I am thankful for the moon nonetheless. And as for the children, we will be their warmth.”
“If we survive this,” grumbles Nameris, climbing on.
The Lord speaks next. “There is no time for caution. You are all right, but none of our woes will be eased unless we proceed with ruthless determination. We must find the Star and roast it.”
Archie cannot tell which Lord is speaking. He regrets that he did not have more time in the cave to initiate conversation with the Maiden.
Suddenly, an unfamiliar voice cuts through the Olearons’ debate. The voice is high and ringing, reverberating like a bell, but is also low and gravelly. Female. Angry. At its sound, the company halt and stand motionless in various poses of ascent. Their breath is caught in their throats as their ears prick into heightened awareness. The white cloak around Baluurwa, moments ago an annoyance as they climbed, is now a crippling vulnerability.
“You will not harm the Star!” The voice slices through the fog, bouncing off the icy rain that begins to fall. “You will not harm the Star!” The voice enunciates each word, carefully, deliberately.
Through the wind and ra
in and mist emerges, ever so slowly, a face. It is silver, though Archie cannot tell if it is just a trick of the moon. The eyes are blue cut by fiery red lightning and edged in black. The woman scowls. Her long eyelashes grow into feathers that reach above her ears. Her hair is brown and blond, braided and long, and hangs past her navel. Her lips are glossy, pale, and twisted into a grimace.
The wind twirls the mist around her. Great reaching antlers sprout from her temples. They are polished bone and woven with coils of gold at their tips, extending their magnificence. Across her right breast and shoulder she wears a carved-gold shield, perfectly fitted to her feminine form. Ever so slowly, she reaches behind her and, from sheaths strapped to her back, retrieves twin daggers.
“The Star is our only hope,” she says, and again her voice reflects a duality of hate and love: hate for the haggard company before her, love for the Star. “I will protect it with my life.”
The storm beats back the cloud, and the woman can be seen plainly. She’s taller than me, Archie realizes. She wears no shoes. Her gown is formed of strips of fabric. They are ruby-hued and braided over one shoulder. The gown is carried by the erratic wind, revealing pieces of silver and black fabric and patches of chameleon hupper fur, which changes with the color of the flickering lightning overhead.
The Lord steps forward. “What is your name, Steffanus?” he asks evenly.
“Wouldn’t you like to know!” she replies sharply. Her daggers are at her sides, but Archie notices how her thumbs stroke the gold hilts, decorated with tiny leaves, as if she channels all her loathing into her hands, ready to strike.
“Her name is Tanius.” A small girl steps out from behind the Steffanus.
Tanius turns and bares her teeth at her. “Get back, now!” she orders the child, but the girl ignores her and marches forward, smiling.
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