Song of the Dead

by Sarah Glenn Marsh

  The whispers in the room grow steadily louder and more frantic, like the angry buzzing of hornets. I wish we’d brought Lysander to the tavern instead of giving him guard duty back on the Paradise.

  All night, we’ve been surrounded by people—an entire island full of people—who had no idea, despite being Karthia’s closest neighbor, of the horror that just took place so near their homes. The death of a once-great king. The rise of a new one, a man still more like a boy who believed he could change everything for the better despite not knowing what better looked like, who believed himself to be so much more than what he really was—mad. For all they knew until that sailor with shit for brains opened his mouth, nothing in Karthia had changed, and we had simply come here on a routine smuggling trip. Business as usual for Kasmira and her crew—apart from docking in the daylight, that is.

  Kasmira levels a glare at the sailor, drawing a finger across her throat.

  “What?” he asks sheepishly. “Not like it was a secret . . .”

  I shake my head. It wasn’t his place to share the news of King Wylding’s death. He should have left that up to Valoria, when she deemed the time was right. When she and the rest of my friends were done cursing my name for leaving without saying goodbye.

  “Who’s in charge of Karthia now?” a woman demands. “When will we meet them?”

  “Why should we believe you? Show us proof!” a man bursts out.

  “Who killed the king?” someone else asks. “Tell us what happened!”

  They fire off questions like a volley of arrows, one on top of the other.

  With a deep breath, I push down my anger. Kasmira will disembowel her loudmouthed sailor later, I’m sure—though in his defense, none of us ever discussed how we’d handle sharing everything that happened in Karthia recently. All we can do now is give these people a good first impression of our new queen, Valoria.

  “Look,” I say slowly and clearly to the crowd that’s still trapping me against the wall. “Karthia is under new leadership, it’s true. But it’s strong leadership, and our queen is already making preparations to help Karthia rejoin the world. You have nothing to fear from her. She’s smart, and kind, and interested in learning just about everything. I’m sure she’ll want to get to know Lyris very soon.”

  “Did you kill the king?” someone shouts in response. “Is that why you left Karthia?”

  “Death to necromancers!” an ale-soaked voice adds.

  So much for trying to have a conversation.

  More tavern-goers rush to join those who have already formed a ring around us, trapping us a mere twenty paces from the door. The rancid odors of spilled ale and unwashed men claw their way down my throat, but I’ve smelled worse—the stench of death and the rotting flesh of Shades—too many times to count.

  It seems every person here surrounds us now, with the exception of the old woman by the hearth and a pale young woman who sits with her arms folded, her scarred face half in shadow, watching the proceedings with a glimmer of interest as she twists a braid of white-blond hair through her fingers. She seems so out of place, sweating in her heavy-looking, fur-lined clothing. I can tell at once she’s not a Lyrian.

  Kasmira nudges my shoulder, drawing my gaze away from the strange woman. I meet my friend’s deep gray eyes, which are bright with fury.

  “I didn’t know, Sparrow.” Kasmira spits at the feet of the nearest sailor, who snaps something at her in his language. “Necromancers, illegal?” she continues, her voice taut, though she seems undaunted by the man’s threats. “Of all the stupid things I’ve heard in my nineteen years, this one pisses me off most.” She edges her way in front of me, her dagger clutched in her left hand, trying to shield me from the leering crowd.

  I reach for the wrist of her free hand, trying to pull her back. “Kas, don’t—”

  “I won’t let them touch you,” she growls, shrugging out of my grasp.

  “Fine,” I say softly, “but you’d better not let them touch you, either.”

  Louder, I say to the barman, “You want me gone? I’d be thrilled to leave. Honestly. Just tell your friends to quit blocking the only exit.”

  If he answers, I don’t hear it, because just then Meredy stumbles into me, shoved by a man who towers over her, his shaggy brown hair partially obscuring his green eyes.

  “This fellow just called you something rude. Four times!” she says through gritted teeth, rubbing her shoulder and glaring at the bear of a man advancing on us. “I offered to clean out his mouth, but I don’t think he’s interested.”

  “Forget calling a lawman. I’m gonna gut you wretches like fish and toss you out back with the rest of the rubbish,” the huge man grumbles. A pin of twin emeralds gleams on his leather vest—he’s a beast master, like Meredy, but apparently he’s not above shoving one of his own. His gaze lingering on me, he adds, “Unnatural creature.”

  My face floods with heat. If someone insulted a necromancer like that in Karthia, they’d be the ones filleted and tossed in a rubbish heap—or at least, they would’ve been, before everything that happened with Hadrien. Maybe that’s not how things are anymore. Maybe necromancers aren’t going to be treated like royalty the way we used to be. Either way, I’m more bothered by this man putting his grimy hands on Meredy than I am by anything he’s said.

  I level a glare at him. “I doubt you’re so brave without all your friends behind you,” I snarl. “Want to take this outside? One on one?”

  “You’re a disgrace to the pin you wear,” Meredy adds hotly from beside me.

  The man flexes his fingers, studying us coolly. “I don’t need to fight you. I know I’d win. That’s why you’re gonna bow to me here and now, corpse-loving scum.” He punches a fist into his open palm. A massive fist.

  Thinking of the biting remarks Jax would throw at this man, I miss him with a sudden fierceness that hits me like a stomachache. Careful not to let the slightest sign of pain show on my face, I force myself to gaze into the man’s eyes as I finger the daggers on my belt. I’ve lived through being ripped open by a Shade, through being blinded and left for dead—far worse ordeals than a stranger’s insults. This is nothing to me. He is nothing.

  “I’m not corpse-loving scum,” I say as calmly as I can manage. “I’m Odessa of Grenwyr.” I tug both my daggers free of their sheaths, one for each hand. “And I bow to no man.”

  He flinches, startled, but impresses me by not stepping back. He doesn’t appear to have a knife on him, but he reaches for one on the nearest table. Just my luck—it’s bigger than mine. I slowly lower the daggers. I don’t think I’ll get very far with them, not in this crowd, and much as I want to teach this ignorant man that hands aren’t for shoving, I know when I’m outmatched.

  I hope Kasmira doesn’t try anything too crazy with her dagger, either. Cocky to the point of dangerous as she is, even she can see we’re far outnumbered despite most of her crew trying to make their way toward us.

  The man in front of me lowers his big knife, still glaring. Meredy flicks her hand toward the ground, the Karthian gesture to indicate trash, and clearly it translates just fine to this armed and angry man. I groan. Good thing I haven’t put my daggers away yet.

  From somewhere nearby comes the distinctly awful sound of two heads cracking against each other.

  The man with the big knife looks away, and I follow his gaze.

  Dvora, the Paradise’s first mate, whose raven hair is always pinned in a perfect crown on top of her head, seems to have taken the liberty of acquainting some skulls in an attempt to create a weakness in the wall of Lyrians.

  Someone throws a punch at Dvora, and she catches them by the wrist before their broad knuckles can graze her face.

  The punch-thrower screams.

  As if in response, the crowd’s noise becomes a roar, and suddenly fists, elbows, battered tin mugs, and even rooster pie are flying through
the stale air.

  “That’s our exit,” I murmur, flicking a carrot out of my hair and putting away my daggers. I grab Meredy by the arm with one hand and Kasmira with the other. They both struggle against me, especially Kasmira. She’s busy arguing with an older woman who’s groping for something up her sleeve. Probably the hilt of a dagger.

  “Give it up, Kas!” I tug again, and she comes to her senses, reaching the door a step ahead of me.

  “I’m so sorry, Sparrow,” she mutters, turning to watch our backs. “In all my days coming here, I never realized—”

  “Not your fault,” I tell her firmly.

  As we slip out into the crisp night, Meredy makes another nasty gesture at the man who wanted to gut me like a fish. He nods to a few of his friends, and they rush out of the tavern in our wake.

  “You couldn’t leave it alone, could you?” My heart hammers as I break into a run.

  Meredy’s dark green eyes flash with defiance. “Not after what he said about you, no.”

  “Idiot,” I huff, pushing myself harder as the men pursue us down the lane to the harbor.

  “Corpse-loving scum,” Meredy huffs back.

  We grin at each other for the briefest moment, then run until we don’t have breath left to spare for words, until the melody of Kasmira’s braids tapping rhythmically against her back is louder than the cadence of heavy footfalls behind us.

  We round a bend in the lane, and there, at last, we’re greeted by the generous bulk of the Paradise silhouetted against a starry sky.

  Lysander softly grumbles as we clamber onto the ship, no doubt interrupting his bear-dreams of rivers hopping with fresh salmon. So much for him being on guard duty. Still breathing hard, I lean over the rail in time to watch Dvora and the other sailors from the tavern scramble aboard.

  “It’s a good thing you bought enough coffee to last us a year or two,” I murmur as Meredy doubles over, hands on her knees, and a bag of beans falls from inside her cloak. “Okay, maybe a month or two, knowing us. But I’ll have to find a new favorite snack once it’s gone, because I’m never coming back here.”

  Meredy raises her head, studying me thoughtfully.

  Squirming slightly under her gaze, I feign interest in watching two sailors haul up the anchor. I’m ready to leave this place behind, far readier than I was to leave Karthia two days ago. But some of the excitement I felt at fulfilling Evander’s dream of seeing the world is already wearing off. So far, this world isn’t anything like the one he used to promise me was waiting for us, the one we whispered about late at night on his rooftop.

  Karthia has forbidden travel for over two hundred years. What if all the other places we land are like Lyris? What if we sail the wide world from top to bottom, only to find more fear and hatred of necromancers? I didn’t feel like I belonged in Karthia after the battle, but maybe I was sensing more than that when I decided to escape to the sea.

  Maybe, after everything that’s changed, I don’t belong anywhere at all.

  II

  The Shade darts toward my friends and me on all fours, drooling and snarling as it breathes the human-scented air, a rarity in the Deadlands. Bits of gray, rotten flesh fly off it as it bounds into a field of luminous flowers, gaining ground even as we run our hardest.

  Valoria falls first, as the monster’s bony hand wraps around her ankle and tugs. I spin around and draw my sword, but too late. Valoria’s already gone, and the monster has Simeon and Jax in its fists, shaking their limp bodies as their heads loll between their shoulders.

  Unhinging its jaw, the Shade grinds its razor-sharp teeth in anticipation. It pops Jax into its mouth, then Simeon, as I hack at it with my sword. The monster doesn’t even seem to notice the cuts I’m making. It just keeps gulping down my friends as I sob and slash at it.

  Now it’s got Danial and Kasmira. I thought they’d run ahead to safety when the monster grabbed Valoria.

  I shove my sword through its middle, but of course, Shades don’t have hearts. Black blood leaks from the wound I created.

  The Shade releases a gleeful howl, sending spikes of cold down my back. Gazing into its sightless face, I realize what’s made it so happy: It’s cradling Meredy’s broken body, about to swallow her up.

  With an anguished yell, I pull my sword free, aiming to cut off the creature’s ugly head. But my sword turns to dust in my hands.

  There’s nothing I can do.

  “Odessa!” someone calls from a distance.

  But I don’t look to see who spoke. Instead, I force myself to watch as the monster unhinges its jaw, splashing Meredy’s pale face with drool.

  Just as suddenly as it raises her to its mouth, it drops her. It grabs me by the shoulders, locking the black pits of its eyes on mine, and releases an ear-shattering cry.

  “Wake up!”

  I blink into the deepest darkness, breathing hard, shrugging off the lingering haze of a dream. It’s Meredy’s warm hands on my shoulders, not the skeletal claws of a Shade. It’s Meredy accidentally sitting on my legs, shaking me awake, her breathing quick with worry.

  The Paradise gently rocks as it glides over a swell, headed farther away from Lyris toward open seas, assuring me that I’m nowhere near the Deadlands. That the scariest thing I’ve really seen tonight was the crowd at that tavern.

  “What are you doing?” I mumble, still trying to wake myself further. “I’m all right.”

  “I’m sorry,” Meredy whispers, dropping her hands. “You woke me up with your muttering, and it sounded like you were having a nightmare. I wanted to help . . .” She pulls back, hastily retreating from my cot.

  “Thank you,” I murmur, grateful for the darkness hiding my embarrassment.

  Meredy’s breathing relaxes as she settles on her bed. “Do you want to talk about it? What happened in your dream?”

  “No. But thanks for offering.” Heat rises up my neck at the thought of Meredy hearing what I dreamed, how I couldn’t protect her or anyone else even in a world that exists entirely in my mind. “If I have another nightmare tomorrow, do you think you could—?”

  “I’ll wake you,” she promises.

  Meredy falls silent after that, so I try to concentrate on the rhythm of the sea and the way the wind calls across it, first howling and then pausing, as though waiting for a response that never comes.

  At last, Meredy asks in a small voice, “And if I have a bad dream?”

  I nod, but realizing she can’t see it, I add, “I’ll do the same for you.”

  “Good.” Rising onto her knees, Meredy fumbles with something in the darkness a moment.

  Our single lantern, dangling from a beam overhead on a fraying strap, flares to life. By its ruddy light, Meredy searches for something under her bed and reemerges with a heavy book in hand. “The Baroness’s Secret Heartache,” she reads with a slight grin, cracking it open. Even from a distance, its pages smell like old clothes dragged out of a wardrobe after years of disuse. “I, er, borrowed this from Valoria’s private library of stories King Wylding thought he’d burned. It’s childish. The writing’s clumsy at best. But it’s got everything. Seamstresses. Kissing. Nosy relatives. A missing tea set. And of course . . .” She pauses for dramatic effect, and as I wait eagerly for her to go on, her enthusiasm chases away the last unwanted remnants of my dream. “Murder!”

  “I can’t imagine Valoria will miss it,” I say, grinning for a moment. But thoughts of Valoria quickly become an ache I can’t soothe, and soon I’m frowning again.

  “If you’d like, we can take turns reading it out loud. But be warned, I make up different voices for all the characters, and I expect you to do the same.” She smiles softly. “It reminds me of the plays we used to go to as a family in Noble Park—me, Elibeth, Evander, and our parents. Of course, that was a long time ago . . .”

  I arch a brow. “Plays? Really? I don’t much care for watchin
g others pretend to live—why waste time doing that when you can go out and experience things for yourself?”

  Meredy blinks at me, apparently horrified. “I’ve got to show you what you’re missing!” She seems determined as she turns to the first page and takes a deep breath. It isn’t until the moment of quiet that I realize hearing Evander’s name on her lips didn’t hurt—at least, it didn’t make me miss him any more than I do already. She said his name without hesitation, as if she’s comfortable using it again. Comfortable, and still so strong after everything.

  As she starts to read, I say softly, “You’ve never explained how you do it.”

  She blinks, lifting up her head. “What? Sneak a book away from Valoria?”

  “No.” I run my finger along the worn edge of the cot’s frame. “Stop missing Evander long enough to go on living.”

  Meredy’s gaze grows distant, though she’s still looking right at me. At last, she says, “I’ll let you know when I figure it out. I’m still trying. Believe me, I’m trying.”

  She starts to read again, and this time I don’t interrupt. Her voice washes over me, taking me back to the book’s long-ago version of Karthia, to a time before King Wylding’s rule when merchants from distant lands like Osmana and Yekar came and went freely from our kingdom, offering seeds that would one day grow into Karthian delicacies. Loving and leaving offspring who became part of the vast and varied pool of Karthian bloodlines.

  It makes me wonder about the Karthia we’ve left behind. I doubt things could go wrong with Valoria on the throne, but then, I would have doubted that any Karthians could blindly trust Hadrien, and some did—Meredy and Evander’s own mother among them.

  Just imagining the challenges Valoria could be facing right now makes my breath catch in my throat. I shake my head, refocusing on Meredy’s voice. Right now, the only world that exists is the one inside this cabin.