by Amy Ewing
“Kandra,” she said, and her voice was infused with the steady thrum of her magic. “I’m going to show you something.”
She held up a glowing finger. Even though they had spent so much time together, and grown so close, they had never blood bonded. And this would be no ordinary blood bond, Leela knew. But Kandra would have to see that for herself. She would have to make the choice.
Kandra stared at her bright blue fingertip for so long, Leela thought she would balk and refuse. But she kept her hand and her gaze steady.
Please, she thought. Trust me.
At long last, Kandra raised her own finger, and as the two lights touched, Leela felt Kandra’s magic enter her, and though it was older than hers, wise and compassionate and crippled with grief, Leela once again felt her own magic was stronger. It wound around Kandra’s heart and she gasped as Leela held up the memory mirror inside her mind and showed her.
Sera.
Sera standing on the prow of a ship, gazing up at an unfamiliar night sky as the wind whipped her hair about her face. Sera’s form emerging from the pool of water surrounding the tether, her cry of joy at seeing Leela, her explanation of where she had been, her tales of the planet, her struggle to find the tether and return home. Sera’s smile, Sera’s voice, Sera Sera Sera.
“She’s alive,” Kandra gasped as the connection broke. “She’s alive.”
She collapsed into sobs, her hands clutching her face. “Leela, I am sorry,” she said, through jagged breaths. “I did not . . . I could not . . .”
“I know,” Leela said.
“What is this power you possess?” Kandra said.
“I ate the fruit,” Leela said, and Estelle let out a shocked cry. “I did not know what it was,” Leela explained. “Only that the doors told me to.”
“What doors?”
“The doors to the temple. Sometimes they form symbols that I can read.” Leela felt embarrassed all of a sudden, like she was bragging when she did not mean to.
Kandra and Estelle were staring as if they had never seen anything like her.
“Mother Sun has chosen you,” Kandra said. “Leela—”
“Elorin has read them too,” Leela said quickly. “And you yourself just admitted to reading Sera’s name on the obelisk. The symbols are not a declaration of a new High Priestess. They are for everyone.”
Kandra reached out and clasped her hands. “That may be true, but look at all you have done. You have freed Estelle. You have given me back my Sera.”
“I don’t have Sera yet,” Leela said. “But I will find a way to bring her home. That I promise.” Her stomach twisted with guilt. “As much for myself as for you and her other mothers. I miss her desperately.”
Kandra laughed and tears sparkled in her eyes. “There is no shame in wanting something for yourself,” she said. “And this is the second time you have brought me back from the brink of despair. If anything, I am indebted to you.”
Leela was about to protest when Estelle gave a great shudder.
“It is starting,” she choked. “I have stayed too long away. I can feel it . . . I have to go back.”
“No,” Kandra said. “No, you mustn’t go back there.”
Estelle touched her on the cheek. “I will die if I don’t.”
Her knees buckled and Kandra caught her before she hit the floor. “Help me, Leela.”
Leela supported her on the opposite side and they hurried out of the dwelling, Estelle stumbling between them.
“You are not meant to leave the birthing houses,” Leela whispered as they approached the sacred circle.
Kandra snorted. “I am not bearing another daughter until Sera has returned to this City. If Mother Sun truly did bless me, she would understand. As my orange wife once said, she is a mother, first and foremost.” She glanced at Estelle, whose breathing was becoming more and more ragged. “And you could not have gotten her back alone.”
They reached the Moon Gardens faster than Leela thought possible, and had to walk in an awkward fashion to get Estelle down the curving stairs. Kandra’s reaction to the Sky Gardens was much the same as Elorin’s had been.
“I thought I believed you,” Kandra said. “I saw this in your memory, but still . . . what is this place?”
“I don’t know, but the High Priestess is killing it,” Leela said. “Those gardens did not used to be so withered.”
They found Estelle’s stalactite—Leela helped her out of the robe, not wanting to leave any evidence behind. They gently slid Estelle back into the viscous liquid that contained her magic. As she slipped beneath the surface, Leela whispered, “We will come back for you. Tell the others if you can. We will free them all.”
Then she sealed up the opening. As she stood, she found Kandra staring at her, and a blue light was burning in the depths of her eyes.
“Leela Starcatcher,” she said. “What a marvel you are.”
24
WHEN SHE AT LAST CRAWLED BENEATH HER COVERS IN the dormitory that night, Leela had a dream.
She was walking in the Night Gardens, past bushes of solemn gray roses and beneath the boughs of nebula trees, their black leaves heavy with clouds. A will-o-the-wisp floated in front of her and hung there, its eerie blue light pulsing like a heartbeat.
“Hello, Leela,” it said, though it had no mouth and the words seemed to come from inside her, from the very depths of her heart. And though she knew it was strange, that will-o-the-wisps did not speak, she was not afraid.
“Hello,” she replied. “What am I doing here?”
“Remembering,” the will-o-the-wisp replied. “This is where it all began.”
Leela saw the dais then, and the ghost of the crowds that had gathered on the day that Sera was sacrificed. Sera herself was in full color, almost more vivid than she had been in reality, her hair starkly blue, the bracelets at her wrist vibrant purple and green and orange. Leela could sense the moonstone pulsing beneath her robe.
“I was lost for so long in the night, searching, searching,” the will-o-the-wisp said. “I could not find my children and I mourned for them. Oh, how I mourned.”
Though none of this actually made sense to Leela, her dream mind seemed to understand it.
“I am sorry,” she said. “That must have been so hard for you.”
“But a bond of love and an act of pure courage lit up my sky like a meteorite,” the will-o-the-wisp said. “Where once there was only blackness, I again saw stars. The sun rose at last and the moon waxed and waned and I heard the bubbling of the Estuary and the singing of laurel doves and I knew I could find my way home again.”
“Home.” Leela nodded in agreement. “How sad for you to have lost yours for so long.” Then she frowned. “Where did you come from?”
She had never known a will-o-the-wisp to have a home or a family, much less children.
“From nowhere and from everywhere,” the will-o-the-wisp replied. “But from love most of all. I come from within you, and within Sera, and each and every Cerulean heart in this City. My love is made tangible in a form you know so very well.”
The star pendant rose up in Leela’s mind, and suddenly she was wearing the necklace she had given Sera, as she never had in true life. She gripped the dream stone in her hand and felt an overwhelming connection to her best friend, as if Sera’s heart was contained within it.
“Do you know where Sera is?” she asked.
“Yes,” the wisp replied. “And she is in grave danger. There are forces at work on the planet that wish to clutch her in their claws and never let her go. You must help her, Leela. You must help her show them.”
“Show who what?” Leela asked. “I am only trying to bring Sera home.”
“Home is not always what we think it is when our journey begins,” the will-o-the-wisp said. “And it can change along the way. Home is ever shifting, because it is not truly a place. It is a feeling.”
Leela wasn’t sure what she meant by that. “But I miss her,” she said.
The will-o-the-wisp glowed brighter. “You will see her again,” it said. “But my children have forgotten who they are and it is time they remembered. It is my fault—I was broken with grief and I let this City drift out of my sight. By the time I recovered, I could not find it.”
“Why not?” Leela asked. She felt as if the will-o-the-wisp should be capable of anything.
“It stopped moving,” the wisp said sadly. “If the City does not move, I cannot see it. And it has been still for so very, very long. There was a dark time when I worried I might never find it again. Little lights winked out one by one and my love was too far away to be made tangible anymore.”
“The moonstone,” Leela whispered, and the dream stone grew hot in her hand. “That’s why it stopped appearing. Because you could not find the City.”
The will-o-the-wisp shuddered in a way that Leela took as a nod. “But it lives in the City still,” the wisp said. “It cannot be destroyed, only hidden.”
Another image came to Leela, an unfamiliar one, of a fountain being torn apart out of fear.
“Why?” Leela asked. “Why would she hide it?”
The wisp did not need to ask who Leela spoke of. “She is consumed with guilt. She thinks she is doing what is right. But it has been too long. She thought she could withstand all those years, thought she could be strong enough to protect the City. But it is not protection. It is desperation. Her time has come to live in my light and love, to let go and allow the change she so desperately fears to happen.”
“How can she live in your light and love after all she has done?” Leela asked.
“She is my child,” the wisp said. “Just as you are. All children make mistakes. It is not for me to reject but to forgive. And her story is not over yet. There is still time for redemption.”
Leela did not quite agree with that, but felt it best not to say anything. The wisp was far older and wiser than her.
“But if she destroyed the fountain, then why not the statues or the obelisk?”
“Even she would not destroy the images of my daughters,” the wisp said. “And the obelisk, too, is sacred. But all other pieces of my love have been locked away. They are yearning to be touched once more, to be owned, to be connected.”
“But I don’t know where they are,” Leela said miserably.
“Ah. That I can help you with.”
The will-o-the-wisp floated toward her, so close Leela felt its heat, and before she could cry out or back away, it floated inside her. And suddenly, she was at the top of the temple spire, at the place where Sera always loved to perch and watch the stars.
“Look inside,” the will-o-the-wisp whispered from within her heart. “See beneath the glitter and the gold. And then make a leap of faith.”
Leela saw a flash of gold-silver-blue that she knew was the tether, then she felt the terrifying sensation of falling, and space was all around her, and the underbelly of the City swam in her vision and she woke up drenched in sweat.
Heal them, the will-o-the-wisp’s voice echoed in her ears. The dormitory was quiet around her, the gentle breathing and light snores of the novices the only sounds.
Leela stayed there, stock-still, replaying the dream in her head. She could not have been asleep for very long—it was still dark outside. She wondered if she should wake Elorin, but some instinct said this moment was for Leela alone. For the second time that night, Leela crept from her bed and out into the Moon Gardens.
She gazed up at the temple spire, silver in the moonlight.
Sera did this all the time, she reminded herself. But the sensation of falling in her dream was still thrilling through her limbs, and she found she could not move, her body locked in panic.
See beneath the glitter and the gold. And then make a leap of faith.
That’s what the will-o-the-wisp had said. Though Leela knew in her heart it was Mother Sun who had spoken to her, she could not bring herself to form the thought. It felt too large, too scary, too significant. So she focused on the task instead.
The glitter and gold must be the spire. And in order to see beneath it, she would have to climb.
She used the eave above the dormitory door to heave herself up, the way Sera had always done. The outer wall of the temple was shingled in sunglass, and she gripped its ridged surface with her fingers and toes. The first few moments were sheer terror, but soon Leela found herself developing a rhythm, moving her feet first, left then right, and letting her hands follow. And slowly, she inched her way up the cone of the temple until she had reached the top. She was breathless, sweat dewing in her hair and trickling down her back, but she felt a rush of triumph as well. If only Sera could see her now.
She stared at the spire, wondering exactly what she was meant to do. She ran her fingers over its smooth surface, feeling the sharp point of it, then searching at its base.
She gasped as her fingers ran over a thin piece of metal that wrapped halfway around the edge where the spire met the sunglass.
It was a hinge.
Leela grasped the narrow point of the cone in one hand and pushed. The spire fell open, and though Leela had been told what to expect, she still stared in shock at its depths.
The space beneath the spire was filled with moonstone.
She could not see how deep it went—some pieces looked to be parts of the fountain, broken and shattered, but others were carved into shapes, doves and snails and beetles, while some were set in jewelry like Sera’s necklace. There was a thin decorative cuff of moonstone within her reach, its ends gilded with sungold. Leela picked it up—it felt warm in her hand, and a tingle of magic glimmered up her wrist and into her arm as she slipped it on. It shone against her skin like it was happy, as if it had always meant to live there and had finally returned home. It was hers, Leela was sure of it, though she sensed a different owner, a faint whisper of some long-dead Cerulean who had once worn this bangle on her wrist. And she suddenly understood what the wisp had meant when it said moonstone was yearning to be touched, to be owned, to connect. It was a piece of Mother Sun’s love and every Cerulean left her own imprint on it.
Leela wondered where the moonstone in Sera’s pendant had come from, and what life it had lived before she had found it on the Estuary’s shore. And how had she found it, come to think of it? If moonstone stopped appearing, where had that particular stone come from?
She would not find the answers all the way up here, though. Leela carefully replaced the spire and began the long descent back to the ground. Her arms and legs were aching by the time she reached the bottom, and she quickly slipped the cuff into the pocket of her robe. She could not wear it, but she would keep it on her person at all times.
Only after she snuck back into the dormitory did she think she should have gotten a piece for Elorin as well. But, she reassured herself, the cache was not going anywhere, and she could always go back up to the spire another night.
The sad tolling of a bell from within the temple woke Leela almost as soon as she had laid her head on her pillow.
Novices were rousing themselves and looking around the dormitory in confusion. Leela met Elorin’s eyes across the room and Leela could tell they were both wondering what had happened.
Leela managed to slip her moonstone cuff into the pocket of a fresh robe as she changed. She and Elorin gathered cushions to lay out for the incoming Cerulean, but the temple was too crowded to talk. She could tell Elorin was bursting to know what had transpired with Kandra and Estelle during the night—and probably wondering where Estelle was now. Leela was dying to tell her everything, about the dream and the will-o-the-wisp and the cache she’d found.
Once the City had gathered, the High Priestess emerged onto the chancel and crossed to stand at the pulpit. Leela saw the moonstone in her circlet with new eyes, a fresh appreciation for its power.
“My children,” she said, spreading her arms wide. “I fear I have grievous news. The sleeping sickness has returned to our City. And it has afflicted our most vulnerable member
. Plenna Skychaser has fallen ill.”
The shocked gasps and cries of despair felt muted in Leela’s ears. Plenna. Of all the Cerulean the High Priestess could have chosen, she had to pick the only one who had become pregnant. It felt impossibly cruel, and yet Leela sensed there was some reason behind it. The High Priestess did not choose who she trapped in stalactites by chance.
“We have survived the sickness before and will survive it again,” the High Priestess said. “But for now, I feel a time of fervent prayer and meditation is needed.” The moonstone in her circlet seemed to stare right at Leela and her heart swooped, her stomach churning. “Mother Sun,” the High Priestess prayed, bowing her head. “Help us in our time of need. Keep this sickness at bay, and release Plenna from its fatal grasp. All we do, we do in service to your light and love. Do not abandon us now. Show us the way. This we pray.”
“This we pray,” the congregation echoed.
Leela tried to sense if she could actually feel her magic being siphoned away, but if she had not noticed it for eighteen years of her life, why would she now? She slipped her hand into the pocket of her robe and squeezed the cuff.
I have my own moonstone, she thought. And I know what I need to do with it.
Perhaps she had always known, ever since she realized it may have been her pendant that had saved Sera’s life.
The City prayed, until the sun began to set and the moons and stars painted on the vaulted ceiling became limned with gold. Leela found herself gazing at the Altar of the Lost, the great sun dotted with teardrop-shaped stargems. She remembered the day, so long ago, when she had prayed to Mother Sun and the gems had turned to tears. That was the day she became friends with Elorin.
It all must stem from the Great Sadness, she thought. That’s when everything changed. She should have been more judicious in her use of the circlet. She should have tried to see if she could go back all those centuries and read the High Priestess’s memory from that dark time. She recalled the story of Wyllin and the forming of this tether. Elorin had wondered about its truth just as Leela did. Who knew if the High Priestess had chosen Wyllin for some dark purpose the way she had chosen Sera?