The Crow Rider

by Kalyn Josephson

  A wall of earth rose before him in defense, exploding as the lightning made contact. A second Sella stepped up beside the first.

  My mind raced.

  Shroud us, Res.

  The tree’s shadows enveloped us. I’d meant for him just to conceal us, but I felt the ground ripped away beneath my feet. The world turned, blurring to black. A second later, it re-formed. Except we were no longer at the edge of the wood.

  Res had teleported us to the glowing tree.

  The portal’s light had changed, growing darker, forming shapes with heads and arms and legs. It was the doorway between our world and the prison—and it was opening. It brightened in a burst of light. Then a hand reached out.

  “Destroy it, Res!” I yelled, lifting my bow to catch the blow of a Vykryn’s sword. Wind funneled past me, striking the soldier in the chest and sending him flying into the pond. I turned, nocked an arrow, and released it at Valis. He discharged a flame that incinerated the bolt in a flash, then moved to Razel’s side, defending her.

  Confusion pulsed down the cord. Res didn’t know what he was doing any more than I did. But Estrel had said that the shadow crow’s power had created that prison. Maybe Res’s could reseal it.

  The flames sparked by Res’s lightning licked around the far side of the island.

  When we teleported, it felt like space opening, I told him. Try closing the space in the tree.

  Resolve pulsed through the bond. I fell back, bow lifted to defend him. Ericen moved to my side. He’d taken down the remaining Vykryn, leaving only Shearen and Razel among the Sellas.

  “Stop them,” Razel ordered.

  Shearen didn’t move. He was staring at Ericen as if he’d never seen him before. But Valis stepped forward, the other Sellas around the edge of the clearing closing in.

  Power burst free of Res, lightning erupting in the sky. Valis’s fire snuffed out like a candle flame. Something pulled at me along the cord, Res’s power tugging at me as he consumed massive amounts of it.

  The tree’s light flickered.

  “No!” Razel screamed. The air shifted, as if space were collapsing in on itself. The island shivered and fell still.

  The light went out as the prison doorway closed.

  I seized Ericen’s hand, pulling him close to Res. Exhaustion echoed through our bond.

  “I know, I know,” I whispered. “But you can do this.”

  The shadows curled around us. Razel lurched. Then the darkness whisked us away.

  We tumbled out of the shadows just beyond the forest’s edge. Res stumbled, letting out a weak caw. This was as far as he could take us.

  Ahead, the shrine sat bathed in a pool of moonlight, the door wide open.

  “This way!” I yelled. We sprinted for the shrine. Inside, the second door was already open, the strange road visible beyond.

  I shoved Ericen in after it. “Don’t look down. Don’t step off the path.”

  “What path?”

  “Go!”

  Ericen lurched forward, Res and I on his tail. The same disorienting feeling as last time threatened my senses, but I pushed forward, and we burst into the Eselin shrine. I paused, turning back.

  “I know you’re tired,” I told Res, “but we can’t let them follow us. Can you collapse this like you did the prison opening?”

  Res trilled softly. I backed away, feeling his power surge. Exhaustion pulled along the cord, then something else. I lurched slightly, gasping, and Ericen reached out to steady me.

  It felt like the opposite of that day in Caylus’s workshop when I’d pushed the magic free of Res. This felt like he was pulling from me.

  Beyond the road and through the open door, the Sellador shrine began to shudder. The air shifted. The ground churned, the stone of the building crumbling. Then it collapsed.

  The road dissolved in a flash of light. When my vision cleared, only stone filled the doorway we’d come through.

  I fought to catch my breath, a new tiredness rolling through me that mirrored Res’s own.

  “We can’t rest,” I said. “We have to warn everyone about Razel.”

  Outside, voices echoed from the upper corridors. How long had we been gone? They would still be searching for Ericen, sure the prince had escaped for some nefarious purpose.

  I stepped forward and nearly stumbled, but Ericen was there. A Jin soldier spotted us, calling for help. Another soldier jogged down the hill, but a second form shot past them both.

  I caught Kiva before she could knock me to the ground, barely registering her touch before she’d pulled back, demanding, “Where in the Saints’ name have you—” She stopped, having noticed Ericen.

  His gaze landed on Kiva, and he smirked. I barely had enough time to step in front of her, digging in my heels to keep her from shoving past.

  “What are you doing here?” she demanded of him, then to me, “What is he doing here?” Her voice was wild, her eyes alight like the glint of flame against steel.

  “Not now, Kiva,” I said, my voice dead. “I need to talk to everyone. Now.”

  Kiva shook her head and kept shaking it, and it was only then that I realized how pale she was, how tired looking.

  Unease crept up the back of my neck, my gaze lifting to the compound at my back. It was deathly quiet.

  “Kiva, what’s going on?”

  Her lips parted to respond, then snapped shut. She was still shaking her head.

  There was something sprinkled across her uniform. Pinpricks of red, like bloody mist.

  I swallowed hard. “Kiva?”

  “One of the mercenaries escaped,” Kiva said, her voice hoarse. “He attacked Elkona.”

  Twenty-Four

  The world turned. I stared at Kiva, not really seeing her, a single word resounding in my head like a funeral drumbeat.

  Dead dead dead dead dead dead.

  My jaw worked, but I didn’t have the breath to form words.

  Distantly, I heard Ericen ask, “What happened?”

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know,” Kiva snarled. She lurched forward.

  The motion snapped me from my daze. I slipped reflexively between them, barely aware of my body moving. Kiva’s heat, her fury, pressed against me, suffocating. I felt dizzy.

  “He’s been with me the entire night,” I said.

  “That doesn’t mean he wasn’t involved in the attack,” Kiva said. “Couldn’t you tell during the fight, Thia? They were targeting her. He probably fed them information! How else did they know who she was, that she was here? He’s the reason she’s barely holding on!”

  “Right. And then I stuck around to take the blame in hopes of being executed.”

  Ericen’s flippant tone sparked something inside me. I shoved him back a step, surprise flitting across his face. “This isn’t a joke! I don’t know how to convince them you weren’t involved.”

  “Are you so sure I wasn’t?” he sneered. “It is, after all, in my blood. To lie and trick and betray.”

  “You were trapped in a prison cell and then with me the entire night. I know you weren’t involved. I—” I stopped, facing Kiva. “Did you say barely holding on? Is Elko still alive?”

  “For now,” she replied grimly.

  * * *

  The mercenary had missed Elkona’s heart, but only just.

  We’d joined Auma in the apothecary’s quarters, where she sat beside her sister’s bed, grim-faced and with all the coalesced tension of a storm ready to break. Her shirt was stained red with the mercenary’s blood. Apparently, she’d cut him down a second too late.

  Elko was pale, her face wrought with pain even in her sleep.

  Kiva rubbed Auma’s back, the motions gentle. Whatever distance had grown between them when she’d learned of Auma’s deception, it was gone now.

  Ericen had stayed under guar
d, though I’d convinced them to put him in a spare bedroom rather than back in the cells. Or rather, I’d ordered them to, and, surprisingly, they’d listened.

  “Can you heal her?” Auma asked hoarsely.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Res’s sun crow powers aren’t as strong as his others. He should be able to help, but he won’t be able to restore her entirely.”

  A soft golden light rose from Res’s feathers. It flickered as he struggled to maintain the power. He bowed his head over Elko’s wound, letting the light wash over her.

  When he stepped back, Auma adjusted the bandages carefully on Elko’s shoulder, revealing a wound that looked days old. A more experienced sun crow would be able to restore Elko’s lost blood and knit muscle and blood vessels back together, but with Res’s help, she’d live.

  I shook my head, standing so quickly, I knocked my chair back. “I’m sorry. This is all my fault.”

  “What are you talking about?” Kiva stood too, her expression clouding.

  “Onis betrayed us,” I told her. “He told Razel about the alliance, and now the rebels in Ira are dead.”

  Auma’s head snapped up.

  I kept talking, knowing if I stopped, I’d never say the words. “He must have told her the Jin princess was in Eselin too. And the mercenaries, they came through the road.”

  “Slow down, Thia.” Kiva placed a hand on my shoulder. “What in the Saints’ name are you talking about? What road?”

  Taking a deep breath, I told them everything.

  * * *

  By the time I’d finished explaining, Auma’s expression had grown so grim, Kiva suggested I give her some space. I immediately sent a message to Queen Luhara and King Galren asking for an audience. Everyone needed to know what had happened.

  Then I found my way back to my bed and climbed under the covers, shutting the world out. Res lay down beside the bed, one wing draped over me in comfort and protection, and in the darkness of my cocoon, I wept.

  Samra’s crew was gone. The Jin rebels were dead or captured. The murderous Sellas were free, and they were working with Razel to destroy my family, to destroy Res.

  After all the work I’d done, after all the alliances I’d forged, none of it mattered.

  We were hopelessly outmatched.

  We could not win this war.

  A dark cloud enveloped me, that familiar weight hanging a chain across my shoulders and about my neck, drawing tighter with each breath.

  When my bedroom door opened, I didn’t know how much time had passed since it’d closed. I recognized Kiva’s steady stride and the clap of Sinvarra against her hip, but I didn’t want to face her.

  Res trilled softly, and then the covers were jerked off, flooding my eyes with light. I peered up at Kiva, her face a hard, pained mask.

  “You’re mad,” I croaked.

  “You’re short,” she replied. I blinked, and her brow rose. “Sorry, I thought we were stating the obvious.”

  I winced but clung to the opening she gave me. “I’m not short. You’re just tall. And mad.”

  “And hungry. But there’s a short, girl-shaped problem between me and the kitchen.”

  “I play this game with Res. Be better than the crow, Kiva.” Res nipped at my fingers, and I snatched my hand away, sitting up.

  Kiva half smiled, but it quickly died. “At least the pigeon doesn’t lie.”

  “Omit occasional information,” I corrected halfheartedly.

  “Lie.”

  “Forget vital facts?” I tried, my guilt sinking deeper and deeper inside me.

  Kiva raised an eyebrow, looking about as impressed as Estrel the first time I’d fired a bow.

  I sighed. “I’m sorry, Kiva. I should have told you when I found the note. I knew what’d you say and—” I hesitated.

  “And you didn’t want to hear it,” Kiva finished. “Because you knew I’d be right.”

  “I didn’t know that,” I snapped. “Ericen isn’t a danger to me. He’s—” I stopped, on the brink of saying something I wasn’t quite sure I was ready to put into words.

  Her expression darkened with each word until she looked ready to knock me upside the head. “He’s dangerous, Thia!” She threw up her hands in frustration. “You trust too easily.”

  “And you don’t trust at all! You didn’t trust Caylus either. And Ericen, he… Ugh, that’s not what this is about! I’m trying to apologize.”

  Kiva drew a sharp, deep breath and let it out slowly. “Why do you think I’m here, Thia?” she asked through gritted teeth.

  I deflated, the answer coming immediately. “For me.”

  “For you,” she agreed. “So let me be here for you. You don’t have to do this all alone.”

  “I know,” I said softly, burying my face in my hands. “I ruined everything, Kiva. So many people are dead because of me, and now more will die.”

  She dropped onto the side of the bed, wrapping me in her arms. I leaned into her. “It isn’t your fault,” she said. “What Onis did is his responsibility, not yours. You can’t let your guilt destroy you. You’ve worked too hard to get where you are, and I need you too much.”

  I held my breath, the familiar words I’d once spoken to her slowly working away at the coiled tension in my chest.

  “You’re my family, Thia, and I’ll always be here for you,” she said, and I held her tight. Res hopped to our side, his massive wings enfolding us in warmth and silk, and for a moment, I let myself believe that everything would be okay.

  “You’re my family too,” I told her, lifting my head. “Which is why I need you to trust me. I know you don’t like Ericen, but you also don’t really know him. I do. Trust me, Kiva, even if you can’t trust him.”

  She let out a heavy breath. “Fine. But if he so much as looks at you funny, I’m skewering him.”

  I grinned.

  * * *

  A message arrived from Queen Luhara that she’d convened a council meeting in an hour, and I tried to prepare myself to face my friends and all the people who’d placed their faith in me and tell them that it was all for nothing.

  Kiva had gone back to sit with Elko and Auma, only after I’d promised her I wouldn’t go back to sleep. Res, however, had made no such promises and promptly sprawled across the entire bed in a heap of slumbering feathers.

  Feeling aimless and dreading the coming meeting, I followed the corridor around to Ericen’s guarded room. He called me in when I knocked, ignoring the looks the guards gave me as I entered.

  The prince stood by a row of arched windows on the far wall, looking out over the expanse of vineyards that blanketed the rolling hills at the back of the compound before they jutted sharply into the Calase Mountains.

  “I never thanked you.” He turned at the sound of my footsteps, his expression solemn. “Thank you for coming for me.”

  “Of course. I don’t leave my friends behind.”

  He stepped toward me, and suddenly, it wasn’t the looming meeting and threat of war that made my stomach flutter and my heart beat erratically. A gentle breeze tugged at my hair through an open window, soothing my hot skin. I tried to focus on its cool touch, but all I could think of was the disappearing distance between us.

  When the prince slowed less than a hand’s width away, I found my throat too dry to speak. A depthless intensity shone in his gaze, strong enough to hold me aloft if the floor dropped out beneath me.

  The thought struck me still. I’d come after Ericen because he was my friend, because I’d abandoned him once before and I refused to do it again. But I’d known all along that wasn’t the whole truth.

  You cannot be afraid to see what you see.

  There was a question in Ericen’s blue eyes. Blue as the ocean bathed in sunlight, blue as the sky on a clear Rhodairen summer day—a sky I wanted so badly to fall into.

&nb
sp; So I did.

  My lips found his, soft and questioning at first. But when he tilted his head down to meet me, and I felt the urgency behind his touch, I let go and fell.

  My hands were in his hair and at his neck, and I pressed up onto my toes to reach him. The rough calluses, earned from years of blood and steel, brushed across my face and along my neck with a quiet tenderness. I felt his fingers tangling in my curls, felt them tracing lines of fire across my skin. I lost all sense of time and place, of the loss and fear and pain, and of the future that likely held more of them all.

  Then a gentle tug, like someone shaking me awake. Res pulled again along the cord, questioning where I was, what I was doing. A slight flush filled Ericen’s pale skin as I pulled back, his fingers brushing mine.

  I sent a reassuring wave back to Res, my cheeks burning.

  Ericen smiled. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time.”

  “Pretty sure I did it and you just followed along,” I replied. His smile quirked into that one-sided smirk. I brushed the edge of his hand. “We’re convening to discuss our next moves an hour from now. I want you to come with me.”

  That little furrow appeared in his brow. “Why?”

  “Because if you can give the alliance helpful information, they might believe you’re on our side.” And maybe, just maybe, he could help salvage our situation. Whatever insider information he could provide on Illucian battle tactics and plans for their attack on Rhodaire might help us.

  Ericen was silent. He returned to his spot at the window, eyes set on the landscape beyond. He’d broken from his mother’s hold, and he’d turned his back on Illucia to help me, but he hadn’t gone so far as to give up secrets and information that would work against them.

  I stepped up beside him, waiting.

  “I’ve spent so long trying to be who she wanted. Someone who would make her proud.” He closed his eyes, letting out a slow breath. When he opened them again, he looked resolved. “It’s time I did what’s best for myself and for my people.”

  I squeezed his hand. “I’ll be right here.”

  He clasped it back. “I know. Do you have a plan?”