by J. F. Penn
Geologists cannot explain why there has been such an increase in earthquakes and natural disasters in the last month.
“After the San Francisco Bay Area evacuation and now this South Pacific disaster, plans are underway to move people out of possible danger zones,” Dr Willow Mackenzie said, speaking from James Cook University in Australia. “It’s a daunting task on a global scale. Tectonic plates all over the globe seem to be rubbing up against a new barrier, shifting in ways we’ve never seen before. It’s unprecedented, but we have a multi-disciplinary team working on mapping scenarios. We can say that this will not be the last natural disaster.”
1
Sienna Farren closed heavy curtains over the tall Georgian windows, blocking out the light. It was raining and the buildings opposite were empty, but she didn’t want any witnesses to what she was about to do.
The open-plan apartment above the map shop in Bath had been her grandfather’s, handed down to her on his death, a casualty of the ongoing war between those who protected Earthside and the Shadow Cartographers of the Borderlands. Sienna hadn’t been in the place long enough to make it her own, or perhaps she wanted to keep it intact in memory of the man she hadn’t known well in life. She felt his presence in the bookshelves filled with his journals and art on the walls that reflected his passion for cartography. And of course, downstairs, in the collection of antique maps and globes, each a portal to those who could travel through. But the toll of magic tainted their promise, the stain of shadow in exchange for the gift of mapwalking — and that price concerned her now.
Sienna walked over to the full-length mirror in the corner of the room and pulled up her long-sleeved t-shirt to reveal her slim torso. She had inherited her grandfather’s pale skin and titian hair and usually her stomach was lightly freckled, but now those subtle hues were lost in tendrils of black that formed patterns under her skin like tattoos of some ancient tribe.
The marks didn’t follow the lines of her veins, but curled into beautiful shapes, almost like ink swirling in water, shifting with the movement of her body and even her mood. Some days they were faint, like the last days of a bruise. She could even make them disappear if she concentrated hard enough. But after a night of restless dreams, the marks had etched themselves deeper into her skin and begun their journey along her arms toward her neckline. These t-shirts would not hide the stain for long and Sienna feared what would happen when Bridget or her father or one of the other Mapwalkers noticed. She didn’t want to face the possibility of what it might mean.
But the dreams were becoming more vivid.
Last night, she had dreamed of soaring amongst the clouds above the Borderlands, darting like a bird into the blue. She heard her name called from the Tower of the Winds in a voice of a thousand thousand souls.
Sienna.
The pull was almost irresistible, a longing inside her that echoed some elemental need. But as she drew closer, the tattooed lines of the city of Bath on her arms burned, a reminder of her promise to safeguard Earthside. She shifted in the air, tried to dive down toward the land below, tried to escape from the voice, but mist gathered about her and skeletal shapes of winged creatures with razor talons swooped close to ward her away from safety, herding her back to the Tower of the Winds. Closer, closer, until she could almost see what lay inside. She had woken with a gasp, heart pounding, sheets damp with sweat, and the marks on her skin had spread.
Sienna traced one of the dark whorls with a fingertip, touching her own skin as if it was a stranger’s body. The marks were beautiful and yet, if anyone knew how deeply she was entwined with the Shadow, she would be sent to the medical wing of the Ministry. There were rumors of it, whispers of a ward filled with Mapwalkers in shadow coma, their bodies etched in black ink. Some recovered, others were lost.
It was the price of Mapwalker magic, a drop of shadow for every use. Those with too much could turn and become a Shadow Cartographer, powerful on the other side of the border but a sworn enemy to those on Earthside.
Or they must remain here, banished from ever crossing again, denied the place that brought them alive, denied the use of their magic for fear of what they might become. Like her father, a broken man, bled of his magic, afraid of the Shadow turning him, scared of it taking what was left of his life, and yet, still, he craved its touch.
But perhaps she was different, perhaps she could remain on the knife edge — but only if she kept the marks hidden. At least long enough to get back over to the Borderlands.
Sienna thought of Finn’s dark eyes, the soft touch of his lips as he woke her from the shadow weave when she had last seen him. What was he doing now? She didn’t know if he was alive, safe but on the run with the Resistance, or dead at the hands of his father, the Warlord, Kosai. She had to go back to find out whether they might have a future together — and to face the voice that kept calling in her dreams.
She pulled down her t-shirt and turned away from the mirror, reaching up to the bookcase for one of her grandfather’s journals. He had traveled widely in the Borderlands, with years of experience as a roaming Mapwalker. His skin had been tattooed with the lines of Bath, as her own was now, but perhaps he had never heard the call from the Tower of the Winds. Or things had changed somehow. The balance undone by the shifting wheel of time and circumstance.
Every day, she scoured the pages of his journals for some clue as to how they could undo what had been done. She kept coming back to journal 24. It mentioned the Map of the Impossible, a way through the space between the worlds. Her grandfather had learned of it during one of his sojourns in the Library of Alexandria, perhaps from the lips of his lost love, the Librarian, but there were no specifics as to what it was or where it might be.
Sienna turned another page of the journal, sensing the throb of shadow beneath her skin. Perhaps today she would find the way back.
Mila Wendell put another log into her tiny wood-burning stove, pushed it deeper into the flames with a poker, and then shut the grate once more. Rain hammered on the roof of the canal boat, making it a snug haven down here below. The smell of cedar wood hung in the air, mingled with the scent of freshly roasted coffee. Everything was as it should be — but Mila couldn’t deny the sense of unease that curled in her stomach.
When Bridget closed the border, there had been a moment of rest, a beat of silence, almost a numb realization amongst the Mapwalkers. They had stopped the invasion, saved Earthside from a devastating plague — but the sense of loss took her breath away, as if they had chopped off a limb. Mila wanted to fling open the gates again and consequences be damned. She had an inkling she wasn’t the only one who felt that way.
Zippy, her golden cocker spaniel, whined a little and nuzzled up to her leg before settling on the rug in front of the stove. He put his head on his paws and looked up at her with patient eyes. Mila knew he would love to be out there running along the towpath, splashing in the puddles. They would go out later, whatever the weather.
She reached down to stroke his soft ears, scratching the places he loved. “Good boy. You sleep there for a bit.”
She stretched as much as she could in the tiny space, raising her arms up so they pressed against the ceiling. The sound of rain on the roof and the smell of wood smoke and Zippy’s rhythmic breath could usually anchor her, but Mila couldn’t escape her sense of restlessness.
Was this truly her home, or would she feel more at ease somewhere else … with someone else? She thought of Ekon, his lithe, muscular body slipping ahead of her through the waters beneath Ganvié Island. The touch of his liquid skin under the waves as they swam together to the sunken tomb with the buried map.
Mila smiled at the memory, a bubble of joy welling up at the knowledge that there was someone else like her out there. Perhaps there were more in other corners of the Borderlands. In discovering the Mapwalkers, she had found a family and a purpose to her life, but in finding another Waterwalker, Mila had glimpsed a possible future. She couldn’t go to Ekon now, but there was something
she could do to feel closer to him.
She bent to the woven rug in the middle of the canal boat and pulled it back, revealing a trapdoor surrounded by a waterproof seal. She tugged it open with a squelch of rubber and looked down into the dark water of the canal lapping beneath. Zippy put his head up at the sound, ears perked, eyes questioning.
Mila reached over to stroke him again. “It’s okay, boy. I won’t be long.”
She slipped off her clothes and sat on the edge of the hatch, dangling her legs for a moment. The water was cool against her skin in the moment of change, but as her limbs shimmered, she became part of the liquid and pushed off to sink below the surface.
As a Waterwalker, she could travel in the spaces between ripples along the watercourses of this world and beyond, her magic turning her into almost another being. But every time she used it, Mila felt that drop of shadow remain. Even now, lying here under the canal boat, she could feel it seep further into her. Each time she turned, it was harder to emerge into the world of air above.
As she sank into the canal, Mila felt a sense of relief, a welcome coolness as her body changed. She was increasingly out of place in the world above and she wondered if perhaps her people had never disappeared, but merely stayed in the water, invisible to those above. Did they become pure liquid after a time?
She had no real knowledge of the bloodline from which she came, raised by a foster mum in the high-rise blocks of East London. There were hints that her father had been a student from war-torn Sierra Leone, her mother too young to keep her. In London, her mixed-race heritage was normal, but here in Bath, her dark skin and almond-shaped eyes stood out. Yet under the water, she shimmered and became all the colors of the rainbow and yet, no color at all.
Mila slipped out from beneath the shelter of the boat into the channel of the canal. She darted up toward the lock, her body reveling in the freedom to move, however brief her time could be here. She gazed up through the green light to the world above, watching as the rain dimpled the surface. It was a moment of beauty but the canal was a tame playground, protected and safe with only a short distance to roam. The only danger was the discovery of her true nature which she kept hidden by her daily routine as a resident of the canal.
But this dual existence was becoming harder to maintain. Should she embrace life on the edge of this elegant city of Bath and truly make her home here? Or was she really a Waterwalker, meant to live under the waves in a land on the other side of the map? She could not do both, for that way, madness would lie in the constant longing for a different life.
A choice loomed ahead, and it would come for Sienna, too. Something had shifted for both of them on the last mission, and Mila sensed her friend was even more torn than she was. They both had one foot on either side of the border and it was slowly tearing them apart.
2
Perry Mercator pulled himself up once more, muscles bulging as he touched the lintel of the door with his chin.
“14 … 15 …”
Sweat ran down his back, his breath ragged as he counted the repetitions, embracing physical pain as the best way to dull the screaming in his mind.
“29 … 30.”
He dropped to the floor and bent over with exhaustion as he fought to regain his breath. Nausea rose in his stomach as his body rebelled at the harsh treatment, hours every day, pushing himself to physical extremes.
For most of his life, Perry’s fire magic had been out of control — sometimes a tiny flame, sometimes an inferno — and yet on the last mission, he had finally found a way to channel it. He had saved the Mapwalker team at the Eagle’s Nest, and in those moments, he had felt most alive. But the stench of burned maps still hung in the air of the corridors of the Ministry, a reminder of how fire had destroyed the very heart of the Mapwalker domain. Fire started by his father, Sir Douglas Mercator, a Shadow Cartographer, a traitor — a murderer.
After the death of the Illuminated Cartographer, Perry had helped John Farren take the body out to an ancient Somerset hill overlooking Glastonbury. Under the light of the full moon, they built a pyre of old English oak and piled up the tattered remains of the ruined vellum and paper maps and burned books, the scraps of what had once been his home.
Perry lifted the body of the old man onto the logs and placed him in the middle of a nest of map fragments, his frame so wasted and thin that there was hardly anything left before the flames devoured what little remained. The Illuminated had always seemed so vibrant, so strong, but clearly, the maps had sustained him. His blood ran with ink and when he relinquished their hold, there was nothing left but a husk of flesh. He had lived many generations For Galileo, his name lost to time, but whoever he had once been, his legacy was certain in the strength of the remaining Mapwalkers.
Perry had started the fire with his magic, kindling the remaining pieces of the maps around the corpse. As the flames rose, he contained its heat and strength, making sure everything was destroyed. The stars shone brightly overhead, the air crisp and chill, and the smoke formed symbols and pathways as it rose, as if the old man traveled through a new map toward the heavens.
Now, weeks later, Perry ached to get back to the fight. The Mapwalkers had stopped the invasion and won the battle, but they had lost so much. Earthside itself was wounded and Perry knew the time ticked away until he would cross the border again. There was no way to regain what they had lost, only a path forward to a different future.
He jumped and hung on the doorframe once more before pulling himself up to start the next set.
“1 … 2 … 3 …”
When he faced his father again, he would be ready.
Bridget Ronan sat at her desk in the library surrounded by a billowing sea of maps. As she reached for the next volume of the Mapwalker annals, the vellum and paper moved with her. She could feel their weight on her body — pressing down against the mercurial flights of her mind.
An anchor some days. A prison on others.
Some days her new role as the Illuminated Cartographer didn’t seem real, and she tried to walk out the door of the library, striding toward freedom, only to be jolted back, held tightly by the maps that wound themselves into her flesh. The ink that now ran in her veins meant she could never leave this place again. She had traveled the world and the lands beyond and yet, she could now only sense it through the maps here in this room. Her world was at once constrained and yet also of unlimited possibility.
After the night of the fire, Bridget wondered if the Ministry was wounded beyond repair. But not all the maps had been destroyed in the flames that Sir Douglas had set, and the memory of many more ran through the ink that now mingled in her veins. In the weeks since, she had questioned her choice many times. But had there really been a choice? The maps could not live without an Illuminated, a Blood Mapwalker, and the death of the old could only mean a new one must be bound to the cause.
John had told her of the pyre he and Perry built under the stars for the old man. How the smoke had carried his spirit away. Bridget wondered if one day someone would do the same for her, whether she would last as long, and whether her name would also be lost over the generations ahead.
It wasn’t clear how long the old man had been the Illuminated, but the line was unbroken, the position assumed and lived with no record of who each had been before. Eventually her own name would be erased. She would only be the Illuminated, tied to the maps for generations to come. Perhaps she would even forget what she had once been.
Memories came to her through the ink, memories held by the Illuminated Cartographers before her, remnants of what they had seen. Bridget understood that each time she accessed them, part of her own life crumbled away, dissolving into the ink.
Some days she raged against her captivity, wishing she had a flame so she could finish what Sir Douglas had started. Other days, she closed her eyes and roamed into the maps, traveling in her mind further than she had ever been able to do in person.
Over the last weeks, Bridget had called for a renewa
l of the map library. She sent requests to the other Ministries around the world, asking for copies of everything they had. She had used funds to buy originals from antique map houses in Istanbul and Amsterdam, needing to build the library back up but also to expand her world once more.
Truthfully, she did not know what she was doing, but she trusted that the maps of the world held everything she needed. There was wisdom in the maps and a vestige of magic in the ink that flowed through her. She just didn’t know how to wield it yet.
Had the old man learned his role from a previous incarnation of the Illuminated? Or did he have to learn as she did from the very beginning? Perhaps her predecessor had not chosen this path either. Perhaps it was only ever unwillingly pressed upon the next.
Bridget sighed and opened the volume of annals, turning the pages and scanning the text as she continued her search for a way to open the border once more.
Suddenly, she stopped, her attention caught by a drawing sketched on the ivory paper. Its bold lines portrayed a figure whirling within a vortex of shadow and light, the face obscured by a silver mist surrounded by drops of scarlet. A faint scent wafted up, a memory of flame. Bridget bent closer to the page to examine the medium and then drew back with a frown.
Ash and blood. Smoke and magic. But what did it mean?
“Look what I found.” John’s voice interrupted her from the outer room of the library and Bridget turned in greeting.
He pulled out a rolled map as he walked around the corner, still limping and bowed, his injuries a permanent reminder of how the Mapwalkers had failed once before.
“It’s Buondelmonti’s Constantinople from 1422. The only surviving map predating the Turkish conquest.” John placed the scroll down on the desk and gently unrolled it. “The Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris sent it over. On loan, of course, but I thought it might brighten your day.”