Forge and Fire

by Ripley Proserpina

  “I can give you the answers you need.” He looked from Taras to the others and finally to Tatiana. “Come with me. The rest of you, if you want to know why Korolevstvo is changing, you’ll come as well.”

  “No!” Tatiana shook her head and crossed her arms. “No. You’re going to barbecue Fedir and then feed him and Taras to sharks.”

  Kopala continued to stare at her. “I can bring you to the human you replaced.”

  Stomach dropping, she held on to Grisha harder. “You’re lying.” But he wasn’t. She couldn’t say how she knew, but she knew. The words coming out of his mouth now were nothing but honest.

  “You know I’m not.”

  It was what she wanted. “But my—Fedir. Grisha, Shubin, and Taras. You’re going to hurt them.”

  “I can’t say for sure what will happen to them if they join you.” There it was. The ring of dishonesty. Funny how when he spoke she could feel it. It was like a string attached to her ribs and when he lied, she felt the tug and it was hard to draw a breath.

  “They will be hurt.” She answered for him.

  “Very likely.”

  “And killed.” At her pronouncement, Kopala’s entire body seemed to freeze. Except for his eyes. They flicked toward Fedir.

  No. They would have to stay here. Or go to their homes. But they couldn’t come with her. Another thing occurred to her as she made the decision: wherever this place was Kopala wanted to take her, it had both the real Tatiana, and someone who wanted to hurt the men who’d saved and protected her.

  Against her back, she felt Grisha draw in a breath. They may not have been human, but they were alive. Sure, Grisha turned into the wind, but then he turned into a man. Right now, he held her in his arms and offered her comfort.

  In the short time she’d known them, she’d come to care for them. “I wish I understood time here,” she said aloud, though not to anyone in particular. Her heart told her that Taras and Shubin were as important to her as Grisha and Fedir, though she’d known them half as long.

  Kopala stared at her, bewildered, waiting for her to enlighten him, but she didn’t owe him an explanation.

  “The girl who I replaced, she needs help.”

  Kopala let out a sigh and nodded.

  “Help I can give her.”

  “I can see the resemblance. Just barely,” he said, not answering her. “When you first arrived, you were so thin. Your bones—” He touched his cheeks. “They pressed against your skin like it was going to peel away. I could see the veins at your temples.”

  “You followed us.” Grisha seemed to bristle. His arm stayed locked around her waist, and she got the sense that he wanted to pick her up, turn into wind, and race away.

  Kopala nodded. “And the human… she looks nothing like you. She’s majestic. Regal.”

  No one would ever describe Tatiana that way. His words implied that the real Tatiana had had a good life. Or at the very least, she’d been treated well and her basic needs were met.

  Something must have happened to change all that. Maybe it was the same thing that happened to Korolevstvo.

  “I have to go,” she said.

  “No, Tatiana.” Grisha made her face him. He bent at his knees to stare into her face. “Something isn’t right. You can feel it, can’t you?”

  “I can.”

  Fedir’s wings shot out behind him as if he couldn’t control himself. “If you go, I go.”

  “I don’t know why I feel a pull, but I do.” Taras stood straighter. “I can’t let you go alone.”

  “Absolutely not,” Tatiana replied. “Which leaves us at an impasse.”

  “Who is in the most danger?” Shubin asked Kopala. “And from whom?”

  Kopala opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He shut it with a snap, swallowed, and tried again. “I can’t say.”

  “Grisha.” Shubin turned to the man who still held her shoulders. “If Tatiana goes with him, so must you and I.”

  “Korolevstvo is messed up,” Tatiana said.

  The ground shook, but she ignored it. “Careful,” Kopala warned.

  “No,” she said, anger making her vision tunnel. She couldn’t bite her tongue. “No. I won’t stop. I don’t understand this place. You hurt each other. The place hurts you. I thought this world was supposed to heal me. Make me better. But it takes away the things I care about, just like the human world.”

  In hindsight, she would recognize she was having a hissy fit, but at the time, she was just so pissed. It wasn’t fair. Things were supposed to be better here.

  But they weren’t. There were just new problems in an unfamiliar place.

  The world was silent, even the river seemed to slow, as her words disappeared into the air.

  Then all hell broke loose.

  20

  Taras

  The last time Taras had seen Korolevstvo react so fiercely to someone’s statement, he’d still had a tail.

  All around them, the earth heaved and shook. The river roiled madly, water spinning in a dozen different whirlpools. His body covered itself in scales automatically, and he had to fight the impulse not to jump back in the water.

  He bent his knees to keep from falling while he tried to locate Tatiana. She’d been right next to him a moment ago, standing like a queen, her black hair flying around her head as the wind swirled and screamed.

  There. She was on her hands and knees, fingers curled against the pavement that gave her no purchase. In front of him, the ground split open and a huge rush of water and steam burst through the crack. The heat burned him, and he jumped back.

  “Tatiana!” Grisha stole the words out of his mouth. He couldn’t say why he remained with her, or why he’d saved her life twice, but from the moment he’d locked eyes with her, he’d had no choice.

  Steam and dust poured from the gash, blowing toward him so hard he had to put his head down and close his eyes. Crawling was impossible. The best he could do was hold on.

  It would be safer in the water. He could dive down so deep where it was dark and still, and where nothing could touch him. But he didn’t.

  Grisha’s voice disappeared in the wind. The roamer had probably escaped into air.

  No. He watched the girl too intently to just hightail it out at the first sign of danger. A blast of steam hissed through the cracks, hotter than the last one.

  It was like Korolevstvo was finally letting out its anger, which ran so deep it would split all the way to its core.

  Taras’ scales burned. He couldn’t see them, but he could feel them. He imagined they turned to ash, flaking away, and it suddenly occurred to him: he wasn’t going to survive this.

  But something covered him. Something heavy and cool that made the whole world go dark. Opening his eyes, he saw Shubin next to him. Over their heads he held his coat. Like a shield, it blocked out the heat and dust.

  “Thanks,” Taras said. What was going on here? Feia didn’t help each other without expecting something in return. Taras never took action without considering all possible outcomes that could come back and bite him.

  Except with Tatiana. He hadn’t thought then. He’d acted.

  “Don’t think too hard about it,” Shubin said, apparently reading his mind.

  The quake centered beneath their feet, and Shubin lost his balance. The corner of the coat lifted and the air streamed through. Shifting, he reached for the edge, but as soon as the air touched him, it burned.

  “Don’t move.” Shubin directed.

  Was he crazy? The best they could do was try to ride this out the way he rode the currents in the river and hope the ground didn’t open beneath them.

  It did.

  Taras tumbled forward, face first into the heat. Yelling, Shubin grabbed him. Sweat beaded on the miner’s dark face and then something lifted them. The coat fell away from them, but Taras grabbed it, clinging to it as they flew into the sky.

  “Give it to me!” Fedir yelled. The man flew beneath them and Taras let it drop. Catching it easil
y, Fedir shot forward, the coat streaming behind him like a cape.

  Up high, the air was cold. The contrast between the super-heated air and the wind made his body start to shut down. His eyelids closed despite trying to keep them open.

  Shubin grabbed him. The miner was a furnace, and heat seeped from his hand into Taras’ body. “Don’t fall asleep.”

  He didn’t want to. “Tatiana.”

  The hand around his arm tightened almost painfully. “I know.”

  “We have to go back.”

  The wind roared, sweeping his voice away with it. The roamer held them up, had rescued them, but he wasn’t happy about it.

  Taras craned his head back toward the ground. He could see nothing but white, roiling steam pouring out of the ground.

  And his river boiled. Eyes on the green and brown water, he saw one form after another float to the surface. Grisha was following the same path as the river.

  Korolevstvo was killing them. Part of the danger of this world was offending the place that had given them all life. But he’d never seen it kill so unapologetically. And indiscriminately.

  The creatures of the water had done nothing; they weren’t part of Tatiana’s rant.

  He couldn’t look.

  From the corner of his eye, Fedir put on a burst of speed. His wings flapped hard against the wind as he tried to gain altitude and reach them. One wing looked injured. It moved with less grace than the other, the movement jerkier as if hindered from making one continuous motion.

  Finally, he reached them, his face flushed and lips tight. “Have to turn around.”

  The wind picked up, pushing Fedir away so he had to struggle back to them. “Dammit Grisha! Look where we’re headed!”

  Taras lifted his head, squinting at the horizon when his eyes teared. What was that?

  A wall, made of something he couldn’t identify, reached from the ground to the sky, blending with the clouds. It was black, textured and blotted, like a physical manifestation of night.

  “Grisha!” Shubin said. “Stop.”

  They’d have to risk it, and it seemed Grisha had come to the same conclusion they had, and they tumbled to the ground. Taras shut his eyes as his stomach roiled. But the crash he expected never happened. He hit the ground, but it was a dive from the shore to the water.

  Pushing himself to standing, he turned to face Shubin. There was a whoosh of air and Fedir appeared next to him and then, finally, Grisha.

  The man’s face was covered in sweat, his clothes torn and his eyes… The roamer’s soul was in his eyes, and it was in torment.

  21

  Tatiana

  As a blast of steam erupted from the ground, Kopala grabbed her and threw her.

  Like a fucking football.

  He took her arm, whirled her around and let her go. She was a human projectile, hurtling over the surface of Korolevstvo toward God knew what.

  There was a brief flash of green and brown as she cleared the river and then she was dropping toward an angry orange gouge in the ground.

  What the hell was she supposed to do? Bend her knees and roll when she hit the ground? But that never happened. There was a burst of air and two strong hands plucked her from the sky and set her on the ground.

  Kopala’s eyes burned into hers. “Get ready.”

  Fuck. Even though she knew what was coming, there was no way to prepare for the sudden speed. Her internal organs pressed against her spine as Kopala flung her again.

  Unlike when Fedir held her, or Grisha surrounded her to fly her across the world, Tatiana could barely make sense of her body in space. One second her eyes opened to see the concrete and pavement, and the next she stared up at the gray sky.

  Comparing herself to a football was wrong. She was a sock in a dryer, spinning, rolling.

  The same burst of air struck her face, and Kopala grabbed her again. Her arms ached where his hands dug into her, as if he’d bruised her right down to the bones.

  She waited for it. The next jerk and nausea inducing launch, but it didn’t come. He held onto her, and she realized she was swaying.

  Her brain was still bouncing from one side of her skull to the other.

  “We can’t stay here.” He tugged her, but she dragged her feet.

  “Wait.” Fedir, Shubin, Taras, and Grisha weren’t here yet. They had to give Grisha and Fedir time to fly Shubin and Taras.

  Orienting herself, Tatiana studied where they’d landed. It looked different from anywhere else they’d been.

  First off, there were trees. They were bare, stretching like fingers toward the sky, and all around them were piles of snow.

  Which was funny, because it wasn’t cold. Her fingers skimmed the trunk of the tree and she studied their tips, rubbing them with her thumb. “Ash.”

  “Yeah,” Kopala answered. His hand had fallen away from her, and now he just stared at her.

  “The others are right behind us.” If she knew which direction was behind. After all of her tumbling, she had no idea which way was forward and which was back.

  “No, they’re not.”

  He didn’t know them. Fedir transformed into an owl, for crying out loud. They’d be here. And when they appeared, she’d apologize.

  Stupid, stupid. She was just so mad! Kopala cornered her, leaving her without options, and she’d railed against the position she found herself in.

  “They’re not coming,” he said again when she didn’t respond.

  Tatiana glanced at him. He watched her, his head tilted to the side, reminding her of Fedir.

  “What?” she asked, running out of patience.

  “Why don’t you answer?” He moved closer, and she stepped back.

  “They’ll come.”

  It was the answer he was waiting for because he shook his head and pushed his shoulders back. “You don’t know Korolevstvo. Maybe a generation ago they’d have survived its anger. But not anymore. It’s too wounded, too poisoned.”

  His words made her study their surroundings a little closer. Poisoned. “You don’t know them.” She spoke aloud the thought she’d had earlier.

  “I don’t have to,” he answered. “I know Korolevstvo. I know who guides and controls it.”

  Her retreat had brought her back against one of the trees. Ash rained from its branches, and she sneezed. Her arms, her fingers, everything was ash.

  “What is this?”

  “A thousand feia. Korolevstvo itself.” Kopala touched a tree, pressed his palm against it and closed his eyes. “A cemetery.”

  His words sent a shiver through her body. “For real?” God, she sounded like an idiot.

  “Yes.” His voice was harsh and he glared at her. “These are my friends. My family. The air. The water.”

  “Air and water don’t burn,” she said quietly.

  He held out his hands, wiped them together and then held them out to her. “Everything burns.”

  “My friends are coming.”

  “Your friends are dead,” he spat. “Just like mine. Your thoughtless words killed them. Steam burst from the earth and it burned them alive. The flames burned every bit of air the roamer transformed into and the bird wasn’t fast enough. His feathers withered and smoldered, and then he turned to ash like everything else. You think I didn’t see it?”

  The wrongness plucked at her heart. He was telling the truth, and not… But which part was false?

  “And now there is no reason not to come with me.” He said the last part smugly. Arms crossed, back straight, he looked every inch the prince the others had called him. Despite the fact that she could see every shade of blue in his eyes, he was distant. Cold.

  A shiver traveled the length of her spine. “No.” She held his gaze, not letting herself look away. “You’re lying about something.”

  He grabbed her, and she cried out. His fingers hurt where they dug into the bruises he’d left before. “You’re hurting me.” He hurt more than her body though. His words were hurting her heart with the proclamation tha
t the people she’d come to care about were dead.

  She hadn’t killed them.

  She couldn’t have. “Did I?” She spoke to herself, and he didn’t even bother to answer. Like it was so unimportant. They were so unimportant.

  Rather than engage with him for another second, she took off. She surprised him—that was the only reason she was able to get past him.

  It was pointless, trying to outrun him. He’d thrown her miles in seconds and then caught her.

  He was playing with her.

  Ahead of her was the edge of the forest. Concrete structures, one-level high with narrow, out-of-reach windows, spread out as far as she could see. If she got there, she could hide.

  Cold air rushed from behind her, surrounding her and then there he stood. A tall, blond, angry statue. “Don’t run.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do.” She was out of breath, frustrating her. He’d said the ash was his friends, so at one point, he’d actually had some. He had to understand that she had no choice but to run. She had to find them. “I have to.”

  His face softened before he shook his head. “I can’t let you go.”

  He was so confusing. First he was after Fedir. Then Taras. Now her? He was like a bird, distracted by a shiny object on the ground, ignoring things like continuity and making sense.

  She had to make sure the others were okay. And if they weren’t, then she needed to help them. It was a physical impulse, her legs wanted to move, her heart pounded in her chest, readying her. Her family and the real Tatiana would have to take a back seat to this new imperative.

  Ignoring him, she jogged toward the buildings again. His footsteps shuffled through the ash behind her. “Tatiana.”

  “I’m going,” she said.

  “You can’t.”

  He’d said that, and she could. She was. His warm hand wrapped around hers and dragged to a stop.

  He spun her until she faced him and then, still holding her with one hand, squeezed her neck with the other. His thumb pushed against her pulse. “I’m sorry,” he said, right before her vision went dark.