Phoenix Flame

by Sara Holland

  In the wildlands, or here on Earth, I think.

  Graylin exudes calm, the characteristic Fiorden stoicism, but I can tell he’s anxious by the way he fidgets with his wineglass.

  “Willow is interviewing all the Byrnisian delegates from the summit,” Graylin goes on. “Of course, she’s not making it obvious what she’s doing, but that means she’s slower to get answers. So far she says no one appears to know what the Silver Prince might be planning.”

  “Do we think they’re telling the truth?” I ask. “The Byrnisians, I mean.”

  Graylin tilts his head at Marcus, who is the one to answer. “We can’t know for sure. I figure we can run two scenarios, one where they’re honest and one where they’re not.”

  Hearing that makes me sad. We never used to ask these kinds of questions, not me or Marcus or anyone. We used to trust the delegates unconditionally—that they meant well. At least I did.

  “I hadn’t realized the extent of dissent against the Silver Prince in Oasis, and in Byrn more generally,” Graylin says, his long, dark fingers drumming the stem of his wineglass. “Of course we know about the nomads, who have never accepted the Prince’s rule and are therefore shut out of Oasis. But from the Byrnisian correspondence I have in my library from around the time of his ascension, it appears that there are some who didn’t entirely support his rule, even among those who elected to renounce their magic and stay in Oasis.”

  “Hmm.” Marcus runs a hand through his curly hair, leaving it to spring back higher than before. “That’s good for us, right? Whatever he’s planning to do, the fewer people behind him, the better.”

  “It could be good.” Enetta speaks for the first time. Her voice has a brittle quality. “Or it could mean that absent the responsibilities of the throne, he will feel free to do whatever he wishes, whatever all this”—she waves her hands over the pile of papers—“is.”

  “We know he wanted control of Havenfall,” I say quietly.

  I remember what he said that day we fought in the tunnels. His vision for the inn. Not just a crossroads. A throne room. For all the Realms.

  “We still control the doorway,” Marcus says. “I’ve spoken to Sal about bringing more security in, but even with the team we have now, no one’s coming into Havenfall who we don’t let in. It’s a bottleneck.”

  The words of Brekken and Cancarnette earlier this evening whirl together in my mind. Magpies. A knight who journeyed across the worlds. “What if he does have another way in?”

  Marcus’s mouth turns down at the corners. “Then why would he need Havenfall at all?” he says heavily. “And it’s not as if we can go search the whole world for the Prince, especially when that would mean leaving the inn more vulnerable. I think it’s best that we stay on our guard here and hope that whatever he was trying to do, he’s given up.”

  A suspicion is forming in my head. I know I should probably keep it to myself until I’m more sure of things, but I can’t stop myself from giving voice to it.

  “It seems like a big coincidence,” I say. “That everything with the Silver Prince happened just as the soul trade was coming to light.” I look around the table; Marcus, Graylin, and Enetta are all looking intently at me, but I can’t make much of their expressions. “What if he’s involved with it somehow? I’ve been wondering how the silver traders moved their goods between the worlds without us knowing.” I take a deep breath. “We probably should have been watching more closely, but still … it doesn’t seem likely that all the souls and the silver came through Havenfall, does it? Maybe there are other openings, passageways between Fiordenkill and Byrn and Solaria. Or even in other places here on Earth.”

  I turn to Marcus, wanting his support, wanting to be believed. He, more than anyone else, knows how important this is—in general, because it’s the right thing to do, and to us, our family. Nate—my brother—was a victim of the soul trade. And he might still be alive. But I don’t want to spend all our efforts on Nate—it would be all the more devastating, then, if we didn’t find him. Plus, the problem is way bigger than just one Solarian. Still, I can’t stop myself from hoping.

  “Maybe if we look into the soul trade, we’ll learn more about the Silver Prince too,” I finish breathlessly.

  Marcus’s expression is carefully neutral. “Then we run into the same problem. As horrible as the soul trade is, we don’t have the numbers or the resources to root it out. Not when it could be literally anywhere. If I could stop it, I would have already.”

  “But we can narrow down where to look.” I glance at Enetta. “I was talking to Lord Cancarnette earlier, and he said something about magpies. People who collect magical artifacts. That must have something to do with the trade, right? If we got their names, if we investigated them …”

  “I’ve heard tell of the magpies too,” Enetta says. Her voice isn’t harsh, but it isn’t exactly warm either. “But the rumors I’ve heard point to powerful people in our country. Influential ones. And relations with Havenfall are strained enough as it is. The Fiorden delegation will not appreciate being asked by the Innkeeper to spy on their own, as a favor to Solarians.”

  My breath sticks in my throat. I want to argue, but I know Enetta is right. Half of the Fiordenkill delegation left the summit early a few weeks ago, angry and afraid because they found out a Solarian was on the grounds and I hadn’t told them. An unprecedented early departure, and it was my fault. I want to remind Enetta that they were never really in danger from the Solarian—Taya wouldn’t have hurt anyone—but that isn’t the point. The keeping secrets and telling lies is where I went wrong.

  “I know how important it is to stop the soul trade,” my uncle says gently. “I’ve been fighting it for years. But the Silver Prince is the more immediate threat. He almost killed you, Maddie.”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  It’s hard to keep my voice even as the memory creeps in. But as scary as it is that the Silver Prince is now our enemy—and it’s extremely scary—that’s not what’s been weighing on me these past few days, not what’s been keeping me up at night.

  Taya. Nate.

  Graylin is the one to turn to me now. “What you’re saying makes sense, Maddie,” he says. “And I think we all agree that we must end the soul trade and save the captive Solarians. But we can’t do any of that if the Silver Prince takes over Havenfall.”

  I bite the inside of my cheek. He’s right. They’re all right. I know this. But that doesn’t make it feel any less urgent. And I can’t shake the deep-down feeling that it’s all connected, the silver and the souls and the Silver Prince.

  Without Havenfall, we won’t be able to save anyone. Yet I hate the idea of just hunkering down here, constantly on the defensive, with no way to learn more or do anything except build walls around us. In two weeks the delegates will be gone, and with them any chance of finding out what they know. It makes me feel trapped, makes me feel like a little kid again, my knees pressed against the cupboard door while my mother and brother fight for their lives outside.

  “We’ll work on it, Maddie, I promise,” Marcus says softly. “We won’t let it go on forever. But first we need to deal with the Prince. We’ll make sure Havenfall is safe, and then we’ll take down the soul trade. Forever.” He holds my gaze. “Deal?”

  I nod. “Deal.”

  But I’m screaming inside, and it’s an effort not to bounce in my seat with nerves. Whenever I have a free moment, I resolve to myself—whenever Marcus doesn’t need me to strengthen our defenses against the Silver Prince—I’ll research the soul trade and make a plan, so that when the Prince is dealt with, we can strike immediately against the traders.

  But … I don’t know where to start. I’m just one person. And even if I had all the resources of Havenfall at my disposal, even if the people here were willing to follow me like they do Marcus, I still couldn’t search the whole world. The only place I know to be frequented by the soul traders is the antique shop outside Havenfall where the Heiress used to meet up with h
er contacts. But I blew her cover by following her there and getting captured, so she’s out of commission as a double agent. And when Graylin, Willow, Sal, and the Heiress returned to the shop later to rescue Sura, the Solarian girl who was being held there, the traders were gone, the shop abandoned. They were just going to let her starve.

  The next morning at breakfast, I fill a tray and bring it upstairs to Willow’s room, where Sura has been sleeping on the couch. When I knock and go in, Willow is gone—off to attend to the duties of a day at the peace summit—but the little Solarian girl is sitting quietly at the big desk by the window, working on a coloring book.

  After the Silver Prince’s attack, we sent all the human staff home for their own safety. I worried that there was no one to watch Sura. Willow’s been swamped trying to manage the inn with a skeleton crew, and there are no extra hands on deck to babysit the kid who’s suddenly appeared in our midst. But she’s as quiet and well behaved as anyone could ask for, spending most of her time holed up here with picture books and crayons. I’ve tried to gently talk with her about what happened before we rescued her—hoping for some lead on the traders—but whenever I’ve asked, she’s clammed up, and I don’t want to push her.

  She looks up and waves shyly as I come in.

  “Hi, Sura!” I bring the tray over to her and set it down—full of toast with butter and strawberry jelly, chocolate milk, a couple of hard-boiled eggs. “Can I hang out with you for a sec?”

  She smiles and nods, and I sink into the armchair in front of the dark fireplace. Outside of checking in on Sura, it’s just a relief to be up here in the quiet. Without the staff, I’ve been doing a lot more chores for Willow—grocery runs, coordinating delegates’ schedules, helping out with dinner. I don’t mind it at all, but the silence and stillness is nice too.

  “What are you working on?” I ask her after I’ve had a few sips of my coffee.

  She tilts up her coloring book and shows me. It’s a scene from that Disney Rapunzel movie, I think. The page shows a little girl in a poofy dress, holding hands with her mother, a dark-haired woman, as they look out the window of their tower.

  Mom. Her face fills my mind like a lightning strike. With everything that’s been going on in the last few days, I’ve scarcely thought of her, painful as that is to admit. For ten years now, she’s been sitting in prison, only a nominal part of my life—and now she’s on death row, convicted of killing Nate. But she’s innocent. I always knew she didn’t kill him, but until a few days ago, I’d never known what actually happened or how mixed up she was in the soul trade. She was one of the safe houses for the enchanted artifacts Marcus smuggled out of Havenfall, away from the trade. She knew Nate was a Solarian, and she protected him. Until the day when she couldn’t.

  “Sura,” Sura says, pointing to the figure of the girl that she’s colored to look like herself, with light-gold-toned skin and brown hair. She points next to the woman’s figure. “And Feya.”

  I don’t know who Feya is, but I hope the coloring book doesn’t include the twist that the mother in the movie is the villain. Thoughts of Mom keep swirling around my head. Ever since that horrible night, since she’s been in jail, she’s tried to convince me that the public narrative is true; that she did kill my brother. Why would she do that? To protect me from the people who took him? To stop me from going and looking for him? She must know something.

  And slowly, a plan forms in my mind. Something I can actually do.

  4

  At dinner, I ask Marcus to let me go visit my dad in Sterling, and Marcus agrees more readily than I expected. But I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. My excuse—that I didn’t check in with Dad while I was occupied with the Silver Prince—is true. And since Mom’s been in prison, Marcus has always been scrupulously careful to stay on Dad’s good side. We both know Dad doesn’t love the fact that I spend my summers at Havenfall rather than doing something normal or useful, like summer camp or a job in town. But even when I went to Havenfall this summer without clearing it with him first, he didn’t get angry with me. He and Marcus have both been careful not to tear our family apart any more than it already has been, and I’m grateful for it.

  Tonight it’s a relief to skip the dancing. After we eat, I go up to my room to pack while the Elemental Orchestra’s music filters up from below. My heart beats fast in anticipation of movement, of seeing Dad. Then Mom.

  Of course I didn’t tell Marcus the whole plan. I had already filled out the visitor form on my laptop in my room last night, hunched over the screen in the dark. Mom must have some information about the black market, and I need to tell her I finally know the truth about Nate. Maybe now she’ll finally open up to me. Maybe now the life will come back into her eyes.

  The next day, I wake up stupid early—so early it’s still dark outside my bedroom window—and Marcus drives me to the bus. We don’t talk much on the way there, and when we pull off on the road shoulder that serves as a bus stop, Marcus parks the car without speaking. Outside, the world is gray and misty, quiet except for a few lonely birds chirping, their songs muffled in the fog. We sit in silence for a few minutes—neither of us have had our coffee yet. But then Marcus surprises me by drawing in a big breath, like he’s about to make a speech.

  “I’m sorry we can’t do more about the soul trade right now, Maddie,” he says. “I know it’s important to you. It’s important to me too.”

  He falls silent, waiting for me to reply.

  I want to say it’s okay. I understand, but the words stick in my throat. I get that we have to stay alert and keep Havenfall safe. I get that it’s not likely the Silver Prince has decided to just give up after we chased him back to Byrn, no matter how much we all might hope. But I still haven’t wrapped my mind around the idea of just sitting and waiting for something bad to happen. Thinking about it makes my body fill with nervous energy. Suddenly every cell in my body wants to run, fight something, take action.

  The bus to Denver appears over the ridge, trundling stolidly through the morning mist. Marcus turns in his seat to look at me. His face is tired, haggard, the stubble dusting his jaw matching the shadows under his eyes.

  “Does your dad know you’re on the way?” he asks.

  I nod, and the silence stretches as the bus gets closer. I get the sense that Marcus is waiting for me to reply further, but I don’t entirely trust myself to speak without saying something snarky or giving my plan away. I’ve never gone to visit Mom during the summer before. If Marcus finds out that’s in the cards, he’ll put two and two together and figure out that I’m trying to dig up more dirt on the traders.

  “Be careful, Maddie,” he says. “I’ll see you soon.”

  The bus lurches to a stop at the shoulder, providing a welcome distraction from the bubble of emotion suddenly swelling in my throat. I lean over to give Marcus a quick hug and then hop out, my backpack with two days’ worth of clothes and snacks feeling weirdly light on my shoulders. I usually don’t come down off this mountain until summer is over. It feels kind of wrong to do so now, like I’m abandoning the inn. I look over my shoulder, hoping to see the shape of it above me on the mountainside, but Havenfall is shrouded in fog.

  “Do you have pepper spray?” Marcus calls after me.

  I have to swallow a laugh. Whatever dangers might be waiting out there for me, I doubt pepper spray will be much of a weapon against them. But I know Marcus is just trying to be helpful, so I call “Yep” over my shoulder and pat my hoodie pocket where my key chain is. I wave to him as the bus doors hiss open and I climb aboard.

  The driver—I think it’s the same old man who drove me to Haven a month ago, though it feels like several lifetimes—smiles at me as I hand him my printed ticket and look down the aisle of the near-empty bus. Only a middle-aged woman sits near the front, sleeping with her head against the window and a backpack full of what looks like camping gear next to her. I find a seat halfway down and wave at Marcus once more through the window as the driver executes a careful, lumbe
ring Y-turn. Then we’re off.

  The ride passes in a dazed blur. I only got a couple of hours of sleep last night, so the steady rumble of the bus lulls me quickly into a doze, despite the uncomfortable seat. When I come awake again, the sun has risen and the road leveled out; we’re in the plains again, nearly to Denver. I text Dad an update.

  Then, from the bus station in Denver, I grab an Uber to the mobile home park. It’s a splurge I usually wouldn’t make—usually it’s bus or bike or walking—but I feel antsy and anxious to be indoors, to be safe. I remember the sick, sinking feeling that hit me when I first realized the Silver Prince had tricked me, that he was an enemy and I was in danger. Now, knowing that he may have found a way to travel outside Havenfall, it’s as if that feeling has leaked like radiation and poisoned the whole world. I’m acutely aware of an edgy, sharp fear, as if at any moment the Silver Prince might pop out from behind the scrubby bushes along the side of the highway and engulf the car in flames.

  That, along with the typical pit in my stomach that I always get on the journey back from Havenfall—ten years of accumulated anxiety kicking in, telling me that soon I’m going to be back at school, back in the routine, the Murder Kid alone and lonely and judged.

  Finally, we pull up in front of my dad’s house. My stepmom, Marla, has coaxed the yard that was once just dry dirt and cinderblocks into a thriving vegetable garden. Dad makes decent enough money as a mechanic, but after Nate’s death—what we thought was Nate’s death—and Mom’s arrest, the press came after Dad hard, even though they’d already been divorced for years at that point. It got so bad that he sold his house and traded it in for one he could put on a truck bed, so that whenever someone sniffed out his address, it was no problem to just up and go. But he hasn’t moved for years now. Not since meeting Marla, not since settling down here and establishing a garden, a routine, a life.