The Crow Rider

by Kalyn Josephson

  And for some reason, she looked like she wanted to skin me alive.

  “She doesn’t look pleased to see me,” I muttered.

  “I wasn’t,” Samra remarked. “And she has more reason to hate Rhodaire than I do.”

  Estrel cast her a flat look, and to my surprise, Samra drew back as if she’d been chastised.

  If Caliza were here, she’d know exactly what to say to quell Elkona’s fury. Or at least funnel it into something productive. My instinct was to return her glare until one of us had to blink.

  Instead, I turned back to Estrel. A thousand words gathered in my throat. I had so many questions, so many things to tell her, that I didn’t know where to start. So I began at the beginning, telling her everything that had happened in Illucia. Except as I spoke, Estrel seemed to withdraw, curving away from me. She grew stiffer with each word I spoke, like an injured soldier waiting out the latest wave of pain.

  When I reached the discovery of the other eggs, she went incredibly still, as if my words were a spell and even the shallowest breath would break it.

  When I told her about Res’s other abilities, she nearly dropped the drink she’d been clutching like a lifeline. “All of them?”

  “All of them. And it gets weirder.” I told her of Ericen’s claim about the Sellas. “Maybe it’s all connected,” I finished. “Res’s powers and the Sellas.”

  “This has nothing to do with the Sellas,” Estrel replied sharply.

  I’d expected her to deny the ancient creatures’ existence, to say they were gone, not confirm Ericen’s outlandish claim. From Samra’s expression, I had a feeling she’d known too. Ericen hadn’t lied to me. Somehow, the Sellas were still here, and for some reason, both Estrel and Samra had known.

  It was yet another question, another secret, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask just yet. I thought I’d lost Estrel, and now that I had her back, I didn’t want to fight with her again. Because I knew I would. The hurt, the anger—they sat inside me like hot coals. There were so many things she’d kept from me, her survival most of all, and I was afraid of what she might say if I asked.

  Some of those questions could wait. Others changed everything. So I forced the next words out between clenched teeth. “Ericen told me that Razel is working with the Sellas. Did you know that too?”

  Estrel paled, her hand closing around her cup. “It sounds like the prince likes to talk about things he doesn’t understand. Ignore him, Thia. He’s lying.”

  “Like you lied?” The words were out before I could bite them back.

  Estrel recoiled, her lips pressing in a firm line. I waited, expecting her to explain, but she said nothing. She looked worn. Exhausted. As if the answers to my questions were weights too heavy to carry.

  “Estrel’s right.” Samra cut through the tension between us, forcing the conversation back to Ericen. “Illucians lie. It’s what they do.”

  “Why do you all keep saying that?” I threw up my hands. “He’s the only one who told me the truth about their existence. What good does lying about this do him?”

  “It gains him your trust,” Kiva said, my raised voice having caught her attention. “It gains him you.”

  Something about the way she said it made me momentarily unsteady. I gripped the edge of the table, centering myself. “And then what? He tricks me into traveling all the way back to Illucia and straight into Razel’s open arms? He’s a traitor!”

  “Or he forces you,” Kiva said. “We don’t know that bounty isn’t a ploy. It’s exactly like something the Illucians would do. And if it isn’t, then delivering you to his mother would clear his name.”

  I snorted harshly. “He could have taken me in the forest. He didn’t need to make up stories.” Stories that were apparently more than stories.

  “But Razel has more pieces on this game board than we do, and we can’t let our guard down just because you refuse to see the darkness in someone,” Estrel said.

  “I’ve seen it just fine,” I growled. “But there’s more to him than that.”

  I had to believe that. I had to believe war would not be his legacy, as it would be his mother’s.

  I had to believe there was hope for peace.

  “Perhaps you can put that faith to use.” Auma leaned forward from a whispered conversation with a servant. “The prince claims he has important information, but he’ll only tell Princess Anthia.”

  “No,” Kiva and Estrel said at the same time.

  I stood. “Where is he?”

  Auma rose on silent feet. “Follow me.”

  * * *

  Kiva insisted on coming. I expected Estrel to do the same, and though she eventually followed us, she’d looked hesitant to do so. I’d never known her to hesitate over anything.

  I left Res in Caylus’s care, and we set off along a twisting cobblestone path that ended in a squat, rectangular building on a lower terrace. We entered a long hall with several closed iron doors across one face. Along the opposite wall, silent and still as hunting jungle cats, stood hooded Trendellan monks.

  Trendell’s army wasn’t large, but it was incredibly capable. The monks were a small sect, raised as warriors and assassins from a young age. But where Illucians worshipped war and bloodshed, the monks approached mastering their skills as steps toward fulfillment. I’d been fascinated with them for years.

  Auma led us to one of the closed doors. I frowned as Kiva crowded after me. “I’ll be fine,” I said.

  Kiva’s hand fell on Sinvarra. “I know you’ll be fine, because I’m going to be right there to run him through if he tries anything.”

  “And I’ll just cower in the corner while you do that,” I replied drily, earning an annoyed look from her. “Stay here.”

  Auma nodded to one of the monks. They unlocked the door before returning to their place along the wall with hardly a sound. I pushed the door open.

  A single sona lamp hung from the ceiling of the small room, its light consumed by the shadows at the edges. It was enough to illuminate Ericen, who’d been bound to a chair with his hands behind his back. He looked uncomfortable but unharmed.

  He smirked. “I don’t suppose you brought dinner?”

  Rolling my eyes, I closed the door on Kiva’s murderous glower and leaned against it, folding my arms. “Drop the act,” I ordered. “Or I’m leaving.”

  The words had my desired effect. Ericen’s smirk vanished, the threat behind his eyes evaporating like mist on a hot day. His shoulders caved as he settled deeper into the chair, but the arrogant air didn’t entirely dissipate. It never did, but something still seemed off about him. A little…wild.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d come,” he said.

  “I followed you into a forest alone at night,” I replied. “You think I’m afraid of facing you tied to a chair?”

  He shrugged, the action pulling his tunic tight against his broad shoulders. “I wasn’t sure they would let you come,” he clarified.

  “You should know me better than to think I’d let that stop me.”

  He grinned. “Oh, I do.”

  His words reached deeper than I expected, dragging their claws along something inside me.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, settling into the familiar comfort of our back-and-forth.

  “Just that I like to think I know you rather well.”

  “Really. What do you know?”

  He leaned back in the chair as much as his restraints would allow, his gaze ensnaring mine. “I know that some part of you, beneath that façade of peace and harmony, wants war.” I started to protest, but he pressed on. “Because just stopping Illucia won’t be enough for you. Just stopping my mother won’t be enough. You want to tear her apart for what she did. You want to make her suffer.” He smiled that wolflike smile of his. “You want revenge.”

  I stared at him, his pale gaze
turned hazel in the orange lamplight. My words stuck in my throat, my thoughts tumbling as I struggled to parse my feelings about what he’d said. Yes, I wanted revenge. I’d promised Samra I would make Razel pay for what she’d done, and I meant it.

  But would I pursue that at the cost of peace?

  The anger inside me was a constant simmer, simply waiting for a breath of fuel to ignite into an inferno so hot, it could consume anything in its path.

  And Ericen could see it.

  Some part of me knew he was looking for common ground, growing that connection that had always strung between us in hopes of rekindling my trust. But that didn’t make what he’d said wrong. I’d ordered Res to destroy those Illucian ships without hesitation, and they wouldn’t be the last casualties of this war at my hand.

  “What’s the point of this?” I asked. “In the forest, you said you had something else to tell me about the Sellas. What’s this got to do with any of that?”

  “Nothing at all,” he replied. “I just don’t like seeing you lie to yourself. You have every bit the potential to become a monster as I do.”

  His words stole my breath. They made me feel raw and exposed, and I was thankful for the shadows the dim light provided.

  “What do you want, Ericen?” I asked hoarsely.

  He studied me without answering, a look on his face I couldn’t decipher. It was careful, considering, as if wondering how much further he could push me until I cracked. As if wondering if he wanted to.

  I glowered back at him.

  At last, he replied, “You have Sella blood.”

  “What?”

  “One of your ancestors was a Sella,” he said. “I think it’s why your family’s blood is the only thing that can hatch the crows. It might even be related to why Res can use the other abilities. I don’t know. All I know is that my mother was supposed to deliver you to the one she’s working with after you hatched the crows, and now that you’ve escaped, she’s desperate,” Ericen continued. “Desperate enough to attack Trendell.”

  This was the information he’d promised in exchange for talking to me.

  “If they give you up, she’ll stay her army,” he continued. “But if they don’t, it’s reason enough for her to finally strike Trendell.”

  If that was true, it meant my meeting with the king and queen would hold even more weight than before. If I failed to convince them to ally with Rhodaire, would they turn me over to Illucia to protect themselves?

  “Could she sustain that?” I asked. “She had to draw troops from Jindae and the Ambriels just to attack Rhodaire. She couldn’t fight a second war spread so thin.”

  “She might not have a choice,” Ericen replied. “The Sella she’s working with is dangerous, Thia. She still wants you to hatch the crows, so when all this is over, she’ll have an army to deal with the Sellas if she needs it. But they want you now. Her deal with him is precarious. You know the stories. They don’t like to have their bargains broken.”

  The stories from Saints and Sellas came floating back. Tales of cruelty and power, of spilled blood and broken bones at the hands of a people too old, too inhuman to feel remorse for what they did.

  And Razel intended to set one loose against Rhodaire.

  I folded my arms. “But if my Sella blood is why I can hatch the crows, and Razel has a Sella working for her, why can’t they just hatch the crows for her?”

  “That’s what I asked,” he replied. “Apparently it’s a power that was gifted to your family and them alone. I don’t know more than that.” Concern tightened his brow. “All I know, Thia, is that you’re in far more danger than you think.”

  Sixteen

  By the time we left the building, the sun had set entirely, but with so many lights still on in the streets below, the darkness blanketing the city felt faded. It reminded me of being on the upper levels of the castle in Rhodaire, looking out over pockets of life during a quiet night. Before we transferred everything downstairs and blocked the levels off after Ronoch.

  We made it all of a step before Kiva blocked my path, her expression expectant. I relayed my conversation with Ericen, mostly. I left out how it began, how his words had cut straight through me, and focused instead on what he said about the Sellas, Razel, and the possibility of war.

  “He said Razel is desperate enough to attack Trendell,” I finished.

  “The king and queen won’t betray you to Razel,” Auma said.

  Estrel folded her arms. “You have no idea what they might do if they’re desperate to protect their kingdom.”

  “I’ve been the king and queen’s ambassador for half a decade,” Auma replied, calm as ever. “I do.”

  I rounded on Estrel. “Tell me about the Sellas. Is Ericen right? Do I have Sella blood?”

  Estrel averted her gaze. “Just let it go, Thia. Please. It doesn’t matter.”

  “You mean you don’t want to tell me,” I shot back.

  Her mouth opened, then closed, an uncertainty in her dark eyes that I didn’t know how to respond to. I’d run through a hundred horrible scenarios of what my reunion with Estrel would be like. I’d imagined finding her blissful and happy, not having spared a thought for Rhodaire or me these last few months. I’d imagined finding her broken beyond repair. What I hadn’t expected was this…uncertainty.

  Seeing her doubt herself was almost as painful as knowing she’d abandoned me.

  “Please, Estrel,” I said. “I need to know.”

  She sighed softly. “A long time ago, a queen of Rhodaire married a Sella defector. It was he who gifted our people the crows and gave your family line the power to hatch them. Infuriated by his betrayal, the Sellas declared war. All six kingdoms united to defeat them and, with the help of the shadow crows’ powers, sealed them away.”

  Just like Darya’s story, except the Sellas were locked away, not killed.

  “The Order was formed, a group dedicated to keeping the existence of their prison hidden so no one might find it. To that end, past members removed as much knowledge and information about the Sellas from the world as possible. We kept a lot of it, but most of it was destroyed, the remnants passed verbally within families along with membership in the Order. Samra is also a member, as was your mother.”

  “And you never told me?” I asked. Was this why my mother had closed the Sella temples in Aris? To further hide their existence?

  “It’s such an old story, Thia. It should never have mattered.” She shook her head. “Besides, it wasn’t your burden to bear.”

  Something in her gaze told me she still felt that way. I wanted to tell her she was wrong, but the words felt petulant on my tongue. If she couldn’t see that I was not the same girl she’d left behind, then she wasn’t going to listen to me when I said it.

  “Is this why Res can use all the abilities?” I asked. “Because of my Sella blood?”

  “I believe so. Like all traits, it’s stronger in some people than others. Res isn’t the first crow to bond a royal who ended up being able to access more than one power.”

  “What?”

  “Your heritage is no small secret, Thia,” she said with a sigh. “If your family’s enemies had known, it wouldn’t have taken them long to deduce where the power to hatch the crows came from.”

  And once they knew, they would have tried to kill us or use us, just like Razel.

  “Most crows who exhibited more than one power would choose one to focus on and ignore the rest to keep up the charade,” Estrel continued. “To be honest, we don’t fully understand it. Your bond with Res is different from normal riders. Stronger. I’ve never heard of one being powerful enough to use all eight though. Your family’s Sella heritage must be strong in you.”

  I shivered at the thought. I didn’t want to be part of their legacy of cruelty and violence. And yet hadn’t I joined it already? Broken ships and screaming soldiers
flashed through my mind.

  As if sensing my thoughts, Estrel squeezed my shoulder gently. “There’s a weight that comes with that sort of legacy, Thia. You aren’t one of them though.”

  I shook her hand off. “How would you know? You’ve been gone. You have no idea who I am now.”

  The hurt that flashed in her eyes made me flinch, but I didn’t take the words back. She let her hand drop.

  Spinning about, I followed the cord between me and Res back to the terrace table.

  * * *

  We were shown rooms on the top floor of the uppermost building. It was by far the grandest, with windows of colored glass imported from Jindae and delicately painted carvings of small foxes ducking in and out of long vines of ivy, drips of color against its rose-gold face.

  Garlands of flowers and ribbons bedecked the whole complex for Belin’s Day, and bowls of fresh fruit covered every surface, sweet-smelling candles casting soft light through the halls.

  My room was spacious and drenched in textures, from the silken sheets and cotton pillows piled high on the massive bowl-shaped bed, to the luxurious softness of the deep blue carpet, to the sheer layers of curtains hanging over a doorway that led to a balcony overlooking the city.

  Res cawed merrily beside me, skittering across the floor and launching himself upward in a flurry of feathers. He settled into the cocoon-like bed, draping his head across a pillow, and drifted to sleep without a moment’s hesitation.

  I could already tell I wouldn’t be so lucky.

  My skin felt hot, my body jittery and sore from my injuries, and my mind couldn’t hold a thought long enough to dissect it. It leapt from mystery to mystery, problem to problem, from the Sellas to Ericen to the looming alliance meeting.

  I ended up wandering the gardens. The night air was warm, the walkways lit by hanging lanterns. Soft tendrils of contentment slipped down the connection from Res, even in his sleep, and I latched on to them, letting them wash over me. I wondered what he dreamed about.

  “Food,” I muttered.