It Ends in Fire

by Andrew Shvarts

  It’s Desmond. He sits alone at a small table, a glass of wine at his side and a loose stack of papers in front of him. I don’t see a better option, so I pull up a chair opposite him. “Hey,” I say. “Is Fyl around?”

  “She was too worn out after Glyphcrafting, so she went to take a nap. You’re stuck with me for now.”

  “How tragic,” I say, and he snorts. “What are you reading?”

  “Oh, these?” Desmond holds up papers, which are covered in dense text. “Transcripts from the latest Senate session. I made my father promise he’d send them to me.”

  I try to read the first page, but the text is so dense and ponderous, I give up almost immediately. “Is this for a class?”

  “No. Believe it or not, I actually enjoy following politics.” He takes a sip of wine, and when he sets his glass down, his lips are purple. “When I got here, I hoped I’d be sorted into Vanguard. But no. Apparently, no matter how much you know or how passionate you are, that Order is only for the most upper of the upper crust, even if your father’s a senator himself.”

  I pause. What I know about the Senate could probably fill a single page, but this feels important. “Your father’s a senator?”

  “Yeah.” Desmond shrugs. “But not one of the important ones. I doubt you’ve heard of him. He’s just a minor Traditionalist from Westphalen.”

  “Traditionalist?”

  Desmond blinks at me. “Good gods, what are they teaching out in New Kenshire? I mean, I knew you were a bumpkin, but sheesh!”

  I feel like Alayne would be offended at that, but I’m more interested in learning what I can. “I don’t suppose you could offer a primer?”

  “Right. Okay. Yeah.” Desmond takes another sip of his wine. “So, there are ninety-nine senators total, from all over the Republic, that make up the Senate. In theory, they’re all supposed to operate independently and represent their regions. But realistically, they’ve split off into factions and formed a bunch of different parties. The Traditionalists are the largest party, with forty-three senators. Their leader, Marius’s father, is the Grandmaster of the Senate, the most powerful member, who sets the agenda and controls the military.”

  “And I’m guessing from the name, the Traditionalists are…”

  “Traditional? Yeah,” Desmond says with a laugh. “When you think of the Senate, you’re probably thinking of them.” He raises a fist dramatically as he speaks in an exaggerated voice. “Conquest and capital! For the glory of the Republic! Honor thy fathers and serve thy Gods!”

  “I take it that’s not how you feel?”

  “My father and I don’t see eye to eye politically, no,” Desmond sighs. “The worst part is, when we talk in private, he’s as critical of the Traditionalists as I am. But Madison’s too powerful, and my father’s too timid. So when it comes down to it, he always votes what the Grandmaster says.”

  Hierarchies within hierarchies, ladders within ladders. “You said there were only forty-three Traditionalists. That’s less than half,” I say. “So why don’t the other senators team up to take power?”

  “Because the rest of the Senate is a damn mess?” Desmond replies. “The closest you’ve got to a real opposition party is the Reformers. They want better treatment of Humbles, an end to wars of conquests, that kind of thing. There’s maybe twenty of them. Then you’ve got the Gods’ Glory party, who want the high clerics to run everything. You’ve got the senators from Sithar and the Velkschen north and the Kindrali Isles, who are just looking out for their regions. Add them all up and you’ve got a group of people who can’t decide what to order for lunch, much less how to be an opposition.”

  He flips his paper over, and I suck in my breath. Because I can’t make out all the words printed there, but I can make out one, clear as can be, big and bold. A name. “How does Headmaster Aberdeen fit into this?”

  “Aberdeen?” Desmond repeats. “He’s ‘The Great Unifier,’ one of the most respected men in the Republic. All the senators look up to him, no matter what party they’re in. He’ll sometimes get called into the Senate when there’s some big debate or complex issue, to offer his wisdom and guidance. He’s famous for his neutrality, for his compassion, for his dedication to the Republic above all.” Desmond has sounded cynical this whole time, but when talking about Aberdeen, even he seems to believe it. “My dad always said that Aberdeen could’ve been Grandmaster if he wanted. But he passed on all of that, gave up all that power, to stay here and teach the next generations. You have to respect that.”

  You very much do not, but I’m not going to get into that now. I’m just trying to square what he’s telling me with the monster I remember, the murderer who sneered into my father’s dying face. Where was his neutrality then? Where was his wisdom, his compassion?

  “Anyway,” Desmond says, folding the papers back. “I could go on all day about the intricacies of Senate floor decorum, but the truth is, none of it really matters. Maybe fifty years ago, there was real democracy, real debate. But it’s all a farce now. Madison and the Traditionalists run everything. And they’re always going to.”

  There’s something new here, a flash of real anger, a hint of turbulent depths. I have to pry more. “And if you were a senator, if you could change things, what would you do?”

  He hesitates a minute, choosing his words carefully, and when he talks again, his voice is low, hushed, conspiratorial. Maybe it’s the wine hitting, or maybe he can sense what I’m getting at, can sense where my sentiments lie. “Look,” he says. “My mother died when I was born, and my father was gone all the time to be in the Senate. You know who that left to take care of me? Brenna, our Humble servant. She was the only person there for me in my childhood. She raised me. She taught me. She took care of me. As far as I’m concerned, she was my real parent.”

  “‘Was’?”

  “Yeah. One day while we were at the park when I was nine, another boy attacked me, hitting me across the head with a rock. He was going to do it again, so Brenna grabbed him and stopped him, knocking him down into the grass. Turns out that was a mistake, because he was the mayor’s son. For the crime of striking a Wizard, Brenna was sentenced to a month’s labor in the mines. She was sixty-five at the time. She didn’t survive.” Desmond’s brow furrows, and rage, hot livid rage, flashes in his eyes. “That’s not who we are. That’s not who we should be. So yeah, if I were in the Senate, I’d change things. Which is why I’m guaranteed to never end up there.”

  “Desmond…”

  He stands up, clears his throat, turns away. He’s realized he’s gone too far, bared too much. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten into that. That… it’s not what I… I should go.” I reach out to stop him, but it’s too late. Head down, he vanishes up the flight of stairs, leaving me alone at the table with his stack of papers and a mind whirring with thoughts.

  For a moment there, Desmond hadn’t sounded like a Wizard. He’d sounded like one of us, a Revenant, full of fire and ready to burn. In the right situation, with the right guidance, would he join the cause? Would he turn on his world, his country, his father? Instinctively, I want to say no. But when I think about the way he looked, the fury in his eyes…

  Marlena sent me down here to make allies. I think I just found one.

  CHAPTER 14

  Then

  I am thirteen when I have my first drink.

  I wait alone, pacing nervously in the sprawling wheat field by our hideout. It’s a warm summer night, the moon a pale crescent overhead. I told Sera to meet at midnight, and it’s already an hour past, and just when I’m starting to think she’s not coming at all, the wheat stalks in front of me part like a curtain.

  “Well?” she asks. She’s wearing a long pink nightgown, her bare feet padding softly over the earth, and her curly red hair hangs down her back in a long woven braid. “What’s this big secret you had me sneak out for?”

  I grin and pull the triangular bottle out from behind my back, its green glass sparkling in the light. “Look
at this. Raspberry sherry. I stole it when we raided the merchant’s manor.”

  Sera blinks. “And what are we going to do with that?”

  “We’re going to pour it on some tulips and make a magical garden,” I say with a laugh. “What do you think we’re gonna do, Sera? We’re going to drink it!”

  “Are you serious right now?” she says, looking around like someone’s going to walk in on us. “No. Absolutely not. Whispers forbade us to drink until we’re sixteen.”

  “Whispers is on a pirate ship five days’ ride away,” I reply. “Come on. This will be fun. I promise we won’t get in trouble.”

  “Oh, really? That’s what you said about dagger-throwing practice and stealing the pies from the market and that time with the masks!” She folds her arms across her chest, but I can see it in her expression, the way her eyes focus on the bottle with curiosity. I know Sera, so I just patiently wait, five seconds, ten seconds, and at fifteen, she clears her throat. “Have you already tried some?”

  “No, silly, I’ve been waiting for you.” I pat the ground next to me. “Look. Think of it as practice. This way, when you turn sixteen and have your first drink of wine with Carlita, you’ll seem smart and sophisticated and not make a mess of yourself.”

  Sera rolls her eyes. “For the last time, I do not have a crush on Carlita,” she says, but she sits down next to me all the same. “One drink. That’s it. Just to try it.”

  “That’s the spirit!” I pry out the wooden cork and raise the bottle to my nose, sniffing it like I sometimes see the older Revenants do. It smells nice, nice-ish anyway, raspberry mixed with the distinct tang of alcohol. I feel a little nervous, but I know that if I show that, Sera will use it as an excuse to back out, so I raise the bottle to my lips and swig.

  It tastes nice, sweet and tart, and then the actual alcohol hits me and I lurch forward, hacking and coughing. “Are you all right?” Sera gasps.

  “I’m fine,” I wheeze out, eyes burning. “It’s just the taste. Kind of like burning. Like I’m drinking the feeling of burning. Like there’s a fire inside my throat.”

  “How is that possibly supposed to convince me to drink?”

  “It’s good, it’s good,” I sputter, pulling myself back up. “It’s like a good burning.” And that’s not actually a lie. The worst of that first swig has passed, and I’m feeling something else run through me, a pleasant warmth in my stomach, a gentle tingle in my hands. “Oh. Yeah. That is nice.”

  Sera raises an eyebrow skeptically, then takes the bottle from my hands. I nod encouragingly, and she raises it to her lips, taking a long, slow sip. I expect her to sputter the way I did, but she keeps it together, just coughing a few times gently into the back of her hand. “Oh, Gods. That’s rough. That’s really rough. Are you sure it’s supposed to taste like that?”

  “Why wouldn’t it?”

  “I don’t know!” Sera stands up. “It feels weird. All tingly in my stomach. Are you sure this is sherry? What if it’s actually a poison the Wizard kept and he just labeled it sherry?”

  “Why would he keep poison in a bottle labeled sherry?” I demand, even though, honestly, that does seem like something a Wizard would do. “I’m sure it’s fine. It’s supposed to taste this way.”

  “Blech.” Sera sticks her tongue out. “Why do adults like this stuff so much?”

  “I don’t know.” I shoot her a mischievous grin. “I guess we’ll just have to drink more to find out.”

  So we drink more, passing the bottle back and forth a few times, later in the night, dropping it halfway. And we have fun. We share funny stories about our studies, Sera admits she absolutely does have a crush on Carlita, and at one point we both have a good cry over everyone we’ve lost. Maybe two hours after we started, the bottle is empty. I sit cross-legged, my cheeks burning, while Sera lies with her head in my lap.

  “We’re drunk now, right?” she asks. “This is what drunk is?”

  “A minute ago, you asked me if birds have butts,” I reply. “Yes, Sera. This is what drunk is.”

  “It’s not bad. It’s okay. I like it.” She blinks, her eyes glassy. “Don’t like how everything’s all spinny, though. I could do without that.”

  I grin, craning my head up to the sky. A soft breeze washes over me, cool and nice against the summer night’s heat. The air hums with the song of cicadas, and the wheat stalks ripple like the surface of a pond. “I like it here. It’s peaceful. I think it’s my favorite place we’ve stayed.”

  “It’s wonderful,” Sera says. “Thank you for this. For this night. For sharing with me. Things are so hectic all the time, so stressful and dangerous… I sometimes forget how much fun we have together.”

  “Well, I never forget,” I say, squeezing her shoulder. It’s funny. Because Sera’s smarter and more studious and more mature, it’s easy to think of her as the older sister. But in moments like this, she just looks so unfathomably young, so vulnerable. “And I’m glad you came.”

  A long silence hangs over us, and in that silence, something changes. When Sera speaks again, her eyes are shut, and her voice is low, heavy. “Do you think we’re going to die soon?”

  “What? No. Why would we die?”

  “Because that’s what Revenants do,” she says. “Like Tasha. Or Baelyn. Or Valay. Sooner or later, it’s everyone’s turn.”

  “Ours won’t come for a long time,” I tell her. “Whispers won’t let us. You know that.”

  The silence lingers between us like we’re underwater. When she speaks again, her voice is barely a whisper. “We could run away.”

  “What?”

  “You and me. We could run away.” Her head’s turned to the side, like she can’t even meet my gaze. “Right now. Grab the money from Whispers’s stash. Steal a pair of horses from the stables. Ride into town, buy passage on a ship, be gone by sunrise. They’d never track us down.”

  I suck in my breath. I can’t tell if she’s joking or if she’s serious or if this is just the alcohol talking. “What would we do?”

  She rolls over, and now she looks at me, right at me. “I don’t know. Sail somewhere nice. Maybe the Kindrali Isles. Maybe farther. Find some little town and hide out there. If they have a library, I could be a scholar, and you could work in the town watch. We could get houses side by side. We could meet people and get married and have kids and our kids would play together. We could be happy.”

  “Sera, are you being serious?”

  “Yes. No. I don’t know.” She breathes deeply. “Yes. I am. I mean, we could do it. We could live. Just… live.”

  I close my eyes. Because I want it. Of course I want it. Of course I’ve fantasized about it thousands of times. When I dare to think of myself happy, dare to even consider the idea, a quiet, peaceful life with Sera is all I can picture. There’s nothing I’d want more.

  But then I think of our parents. I think of our father screaming as the flames swallow him. I think of our mother’s body, still, shattered, her chest a sunken ruin. I think of all the other Humbles out there, all the people struggling and bleeding and dying under the Wizards’ reign. And I feel that hate inside me, that anger, that bloody, screaming rage. I’d never be happy with a peaceful life. It’s like I have this toxin in me, this black ink of hate running through my veins, and I have to do what it wants, no matter how much pain it brings me.

  “We can’t,” I tell her. “You know we can’t.”

  “I know,” she replies, rolling to the side. “It was just a nice dream.”

  I hold her until she falls asleep.

  CHAPTER 15

  Now

  Just when I’m settling into a routine and starting to get a handle on life at Blackwater, the weekend hits, and Fyl is at my door, pounding away. “It’s the weekend, Alayne! Come on! It’s time to go out!”

  All I want to do is lie in my bed and read a book in peaceful solitude. But Fyl keeps banging away, so I grumble to the door and throw it open. “Go out where?”

  “When the school
week ends, everyone heads down to the Barefoot Archer. It’s a pub in the Humble village. They’ve got drinks and music and dancing and everything.”

  Going to a pub for drinks and dancing with a bunch of Wizards sounds worse than death. “I’m really tired, Fyl,” I try. “I think I’ll skip this one.”

  “Noooooo,” she pleads. “Please? It’ll be so much more fun if you’re there. And everyone’s going.”

  I wince, because those are the absolute only words that could convince me to go. I’ve already made myself suspicious enough. The last thing I want is a bunch of my peers sitting around, speculating about my absence. Besides, Fyl’s giving me the big pleading eyes, and I still need to work on making those allies. “All right. Fine. I’ll go. But I’m not going to stay long.”

  “You absolutely will,” Fyl says, grabbing my hand and dragging me out.

  Desmond and Tish join us as we leave the house, and the four of us walk together on a long, winding trail to the north. I’m wearing my uniform, but everyone else is all dressed up: Fyl’s in a sharp blue gown, Desmond’s wearing a brown suit, and Tish is wearing a sleeveless Kindrali robe, its fabric a lush deep purple, and a delicate golden circlet across their forehead. Fyl wasn’t kidding about everyone going there. There are groups behind us and in front of us as far as I can see, all making the same trek. The Humble village is nearly forty-five minutes away, our trail winding through dense forest. It’s a dark night, the moon mostly hidden by clouds, but I can occasionally make out shapes amid the trees, wooden towers with swaying ropes, odd little huts, even what looks like a set of cages. “What is all that?” I ask.

  “Some of it is for classes, I think,” Desmond offers. “In our second year, we get much more hands-on with magic. They’ve got courses for us to practice on, that kind of thing. I think there’s even a Balitesta arena.”

  “And some of it is for the professors’ research,” Tish adds. “I heard a rumor that Professor Calfex is trying to make a Glyph that can let her meld together different creatures. I heard she’s trying to make a killer wolf-bear.”