Realm of Ruins

by Hannah West

  While Ander and Glisette locked each other in a duel, shouting and deflecting Old Nisseran spells, Jovie lurched toward the safety of Prosper’s shield. But I couldn’t let her slip away so easily. I latched on to her braid, tearing a thick lock loose. She screamed and wrenched to face me, yelling the first few syllables of a spell that would have turned my blood to lead. She truly had studied elicromancy with a purpose, but her reflexes weren’t swift enough to match her knowledge. One of Kadri’s arrows pierced her neck and bright blood issued forth.

  Neswick lunged to catch his daughter and pulled her behind the safety of Prosper’s shield, urging her to heal herself before the wound turned fatal. Her hand frantically found the shaft of the arrow amid the slick fountain of blood, and her flesh began to mend.

  “Take him to the Master,” Neswick commanded his daughter. Her healing skin broke the arrow and shoved it out of her throat as easily as it had gone in. Gasping, Jovie stumbled toward Mercer.

  “Wait!” Prosper cried, the crimson stain on his shoulder growing. “Heal me!”

  But Jovie scooped up Mercer’s elicrin stone, which she’d dropped in the scuffle, and pressed it into Mercer’s hand so she could spirit him away with her, materializing and leaving only the dismembered bit of bone and flesh from his finger behind.

  I roared into the subterranean shadows, the agony of loss wrecking its way through me.

  A wail of wind whipped through the dungeon, snuffing out the torches, catching the slick moisture on the stones to form icy pellets that tore at my skin.

  “Valory!” Glisette called. She bared her teeth and trembled with the effort of using her gift at half force while holding a shield against the bright spells that lashed out of Ander’s elicrin stone. I ducked my head, fearing that one of the spells Neswick was clumsily spouting might actually work. As Kadri’s arrows bounced off Ander’s impenetrable form, I threw myself toward the two figures illuminated in the darkness by the barrage of spells. At exactly the right second, Glisette let down the shield to let me slip past, raising it again just in time to thwart Ander’s crystal-clad fist as he slammed it down.

  “Go back through!” Glisette called over her shoulder. “I can’t hold the shield for long. I’ll be right behind you.”

  Kadri and I whipped around and took the stairs three at a time. Daylight and fresh air had never felt so precious as when we emerged from the bowels of the palace and reached the gate leading to the river. Stealthy, silent, Kadri jogged alongside the roaring water and kicked open the cracked door to the palace, where a guard lay on the scarlet stairs, two green-and-black arrows sunk in his chest. As Kadri stopped to rip them out, a shape shifted in my peripheral.

  Kadri nocked an arrow before I could even look the oncomer in the face. But when I recognized him, I stayed her arm. “Wait!”

  It was Knox—Knox the Neutralizer. All three of us froze. Knox’s expansive chest rose and fell, every breath the cusp of a life-altering decision. The dilemma—her or me?—passed openly over his features. Then he tendered a brusque nod so subtle that one could argue it had never happened.

  “Come!” I yelled, and Kadri and I started in the direction of my chamber, where the portal awaited.

  FTER Glisette scampered through, the passage to my room shrank behind her, barely shutting out a final blast from Ander’s elicrin stone. Glisette panted from the pursuit as the portal packaged its immense magic into the carved wooden jewelry case.

  Our breaths heaved in the quiet. A thin layer of colorless smoke idled overhead.

  “Mercer told us the truth about his vision,” Kadri said after a stunned moment had fled by. “He thought you would return sooner. He was afraid you would put yourself in danger, so he went back to find you.”

  I clamped a hand over my mouth. “He’ll die because of me—”

  “No, he won’t,” Glisette said. “We are going to do what we set out to do, and save Mercer in the process.”

  “I thought you two would have left,” I said, barely managing to get the words out in full voice.

  Glisette bent to pick up the box and handed it to me. “What Mercer did was wrong. But we have no choice. We must go on as though nothing has changed.”

  “Mercer may have deceived us, but he would die to save any one of us,” Kadri agreed. “And I know you can kill Valmarys. I don’t need a prophecy.”

  I wept—out of loss, out of joy, out of utter desperation for this journey to be over.

  Kadri pulled me close and held me still against her. Glisette joined in, but instead of embracing us, she clamped her hands around both of our napes and leaned in close. “We finish this now or die trying,” she vowed.

  “Are we ready?” I asked, palming tears away and holding up the box.

  They set their jaws and nodded.

  I opened the latch again. Within seconds, the road to Darmeska stretched before us. Beyond rolling slopes quilted with autumn hues and evergreens, white and silver crests jutted into a cloudy sky. The vast fortress city hunkered in the folds between the foothills and the mountains with their fog-ringed peaks.

  We stepped through, our soles rustling over crumpled leaves and pine needles.

  It seemed Valmarys had refrained from ravaging the land he’d chosen as his domain. What did that mean for the citizens of Darmeska, Grandmum among them? Were they safe, as Ander believed, or wanted to believe? Or did they dwell in the darkness of terrors more insidious than fire and flood?

  It seemed we ought to have one night’s rest, nestled in the wood like little hatchlings before daybreak would shove us from our perch. But every thought of Mercer enduring further torture lit me with urgency.

  When the portal closed, Kadri swung her quiver off her shoulder to count her sparse remaining arrows. Glisette dropped her pack to comb her hair into a braid. I’d managed to scoop up my clothes on the way out, and now ripped off Jovie’s dress with the spite of scraping manure off a boot.

  While I shrugged into breeches and a tunic, my imagination populated the road ahead with guards and blights. A sense of hopelessness fluttered over me like the first snowfall of a long, brutal winter to come. Darmeska was an impenetrable fortress, or at least, it was intended to be. And beyond facing servants of the Moth King—blights, Summoners, unwilling souls he might have forced to do his bidding as Tilmorn had forced us to do his—we knew precious little of how our enemy operated. One day he was playing games with Ambrosine, plucking delicately at the seams that held Nissera intact. The next, he was a tempest, burning the forest, his rampage tinged with impetuousness.

  “Tilmorn accounts for a large portion of his power,” I said aloud as we set off down the road. I dug into the pack Rynna and the fairies had filled, finding brightly colored fruits, bean pods, and bread. I had to be at my strongest to storm Darmeska. “We know that, at least.”

  Looming rock walls soon closed in on either side of the passage. As they towered ever higher, I felt ill at ease. I scanned the ridges on either side, expecting to see living shadows among the boulders.

  “There’s someone lying in the road,” Kadri said, readying her bow. I tore my eyes from the ledges and saw a lifeless body sprawled across the path ahead.

  “It could be a ploy,” Glisette said.

  “Stay back, Kadri,” I said. “It might be diseased.”

  Kadri nocked an arrow while Glisette and I paced cautiously forward.

  The man in the road was dead. The grainy dirt held a dark brown splotch of blood and the air smelled foul. As we neared, I could see a bloodstain darkening his tunic. Two streaks of white war paint formed the image of a moth stretching from eyes to jaw. Surely his assailant had left by now, but it was worth a glance around. An enemy of our enemy might be someone worth meeting.

  But all I found were more victims. A few slumped against the rock face, their blood trailing like rich brown paintbrush strokes. One of their severed heads had rolled into a ditch. All of them bore the same white war paint.

  A figure dressed in black separated fro
m the trees up ahead. Kadri’s bowstring creaked snug—until she recognized her brother.

  “Rayed?” she said, letting her guard down as she darted to greet him, but I lunged to restrain her.

  Rayed held both arms high in surrender, but his sword hung ready at his belt and he paced steadily toward us.

  Glisette’s brows shot down over her eyes, one of them sliced through with a gleaming pink scar.

  Kadri struggled free of my grip. “Rayed, why?”

  “I know I have amends to make,” he said.

  “And why should we give you the chance?” I demanded.

  “You may never pardon me, but…” He unbuckled his sword belt and took a few more steps to present the weapon to me. “I offer my sword to your service.”

  I took the opportunity to relieve him of it, scanning the foliage for signs of a ploy. I saw nothing but turned inward to stoke my power, just in case. “Explain yourself,” I said, cradling the sheathed weapon. “Give me good reason not to use this against you.”

  He faced Kadri, remorseful, and she looked ready to launch into his embrace.

  “The day after we arrived in Beyrian, Prosper Ermetarius threatened Kadri.” Rayed’s eyes were red as he turned to her. “They threatened to torture and kill you, to dump your dismembered body in a ditch. No one had ever spoken to me like that, dared to describe such brutal and beastly acts….” He shook his head as if to be rid of the memory. Mercer’s tormented cry filled my thoughts. I believed Prosper could be as vicious as he had advertised to Rayed.

  “I thought I had the gall to kill anyone who dared threaten my family. But when it came to it, I was too afraid to defy him.”

  “You could have told someone,” Kadri said. “He would have had his elicrin stone confiscated, regardless of status—”

  “Don’t be so sure. For years, I suspected that Prosper was installing people loyal to him on the Realm Alliance and the Conclave. But I didn’t have proof, and wouldn’t have known how to expose him. I had no idea which of my colleagues might act at Prosper’s pleasure. So I obeyed him. What he asked of me didn’t seem terrible…not at first.”

  Unwelcome pity poked holes in my resolve. Kadri’s large brown eyes swam with regret.

  “What did he want?” I asked. “Your vote to extend the age of surrender?”

  “That, and to plant seeds of doubt about Mercer, then convince you to leave in a hurry that morning. I didn’t know they were going to kill Brandar. His death rattled me, but I still obeyed out of fear and tried to stop Mercer from leaving with you as they asked. When Kadri returned to Erdem, I was relieved; I could tell the Realm Alliance the truth, even if it meant sacrificing my life. But Kadri’s maid suspected she had gone after you instead of leaving on the ship.” He looked at his sister. “So I pursued the blights hunting you. I didn’t catch up until your wounds from the ambush slowed you down. Then I knew the actions I’d taken to save Kadri had only put her in harm’s way.”

  “We found your pin at the summer cottage,” I pressed.

  “By the time I arrived, Prosper was there with his men, stealing your supplies. I tried to kill him, but he overpowered me and took me prisoner. He was so certain that his men would kill you that he took Calanthe and left without even waiting to see what happened.”

  “He had no reason to think we’d escape Tilmorn,” Glisette said. “We barely did.”

  “Prosper materialized away, leaving his elicromancer guard to kill me. But the guard saw my grief and showed me mercy, dragging me with him for days as he tried to work up the nerve to get rid of me. I convinced him to release me. I came here to wait for you, but I long ago lost hope that you would ever walk down this road.” He looked at Kadri again. “I’m so sorry.”

  She leapt forward and threw her arms around him. They embraced until Rayed stepped back and asked, “What’s become of Mercer?”

  “He was taken captive,” Glisette answered, so I didn’t have to.

  With a lump in my throat, I clenched the scabbard. “We’ve all made mistakes.” I thrust the weapon back at Rayed. “And we all must redeem ourselves.”

  A breeze stirred the trees, a breeze that smelled of smoke and the distant nip of snow.

  * * *

  From the next hilltop, we could see the city. Though I had visited Darmeska many times, staring at the mountains from afar made my knees weak. They were enormous, infinite, dense with hidden pathways and eternal secrets. Their crests pierced a morning fog that didn’t seem to mind the spurts of harsh wind.

  The city stood against a mountain, a mighty fortress with age-old cliffs at its back. A bridge cut across a ravine to the massive gates. In Callista’s time, this had been the city where elicromancers gathered, feasted, prepared for battle, passed on their stories. Now it was the home of mortals who revered the history of their magical ancestors—but not enough to brave the Water and repeat it.

  Except for the sentries dotting its ramparts, the city looked the way it always had. But a lofty sash of fog drifted away, severed by a muted sunbeam, to reveal a metal tower of fantastical proportions, looming over the monumental fortress like a specter.

  My heart raced. The tower somehow looked more ageless than the mountains from which it sprang, an overbearing, otherworldly parasite. The tower was truly elegant in its detail, with spires, peaked arches, and glass panels that threw light in sparkling prisms.

  “Oh,” I breathed, craning my neck to glimpse its highest spire.

  “As close as I’ve dared go, I can’t tell if there’s life behind those walls,” Rayed said.

  “Why build on top of a sprawling city only to exterminate all of your subjects?” Glisette pointed out.

  “True. The sentinels are mortals,” Rayed went on. “Expendable in Valmarys’s eyes, no doubt.”

  “There are so many of them,” Kadri said, certainly thinking of how few arrows bounced around in her quiver. “Around the wall, at every balcony, every tower. We’d need an army, we’d need ten armies—”

  “Just to lay siege to it,” I marveled. “Let alone storm in and take over.”

  “Then perhaps it’s a good thing we don’t have ten armies,” Glisette said mischievously. “We don’t need to lay siege or kill every soldier. Valory just needs to get inside. I think we can do that.” She sighed. “Don’t look at me like that, you’ve had plenty of time to prepare yourself for this.”

  I thought of Prosper striking Mercer across the face after he was already wounded beyond recognition, of Mercer’s swollen lips forming my name. Tendrils of power came to life inside me. Each pang of longing I felt for him was a strand of muscle I would flex to crush Emlyn Valmarys.

  “Are there any secret entrances?” Glisette asked.

  “It was built to be impenetrable,” I answered. “It’s fortified with magic too, even more so than the palaces in the capitals.”

  “I see,” Glisette said. “Well then, I need to get closer and see if there’s water in the ravine.”

  “Wait! Is this it?” Kadri asked. “Shouldn’t we discuss strategy beyond getting Valory in there?” She jabbed a finger at the tower, and the angle of the gesture somehow made the task seem more preposterous.

  “There’s no getting around the fact that we’re only four people,” Rayed declared.

  “Essentially, try not to die, Valory,” Glisette said, retying her golden hair. “We came all this way for you after putting faith in a farce, so don’t embarrass us.”

  Sensing we could preamble for eternity to avoid going anywhere, I steeled myself and started down the hill, passing into its shadow. I curbed my speed by dashing from tree to tree, hoping to obscure my approach. The others caught up near the base of the fortress, where a stone bridge spanned a deep ravine and led to solid wooden gates set in a massive stone wall. I had only ever seen the gates wide open.

  We stopped within a mad-dash distance of the bridge. “Lie down and brace yourselves,” Glisette said, her elicrin stone brightening.

  A fierce, freezing wind carved
over the slope, catching our tunics, tearing leaves and branches off trees, and making the trunks sway and groan. I lay prostrate while Glisette’s wind sliced over us. I dared to lift my head, cheeks stinging with windburn, so I could see what she accomplished.

  Glisette’s whole body shook as she drove a powerful wave of frozen water into an arc over the gate. For a quiet moment, there was a sparkling wall of ice, a magnificent sculpture rivaling the tower in its artistry.

  But Glisette yanked her hands back, tearing away the ice sculpture, and with it the gates as well as an enormous chunk of the brittle wall, opening up a path to the stone bridge, which she left intact. The rubble crumbled into the ravine with a deafening thunder.

  I could see commotion, people inside the city walls rushing to find the source of the damaging power. White-painted servants of the Moth King peered into the distance. It encouraged me to see so many survivors—men, women, and children. It meant Grandmum could be alive. It meant there was hope.

  “Impressive!” called a deep, smooth voice. I sat up and turned to see Theslyn trotting downhill toward us, Rynna beside him. Their faces were ashen, the hollows under their eyes deep. Their hair was a dingy black, but I could see streaks shaded with auburn. Their journey through the wastelands had taken a toll on them.

  “I suppose we’re stronger than our excuses implied,” Rynna said before any of us could comment, extracting a gorgeous, elaborate knife from her belt. Theslyn wore a bow and quiver stacked with arrows, more than a dozen of which he offered to Kadri.

  Cries from the city made me snap my head around. A few brave Darmeskans had dared to cross the bridge, but guards had sent arrows piercing their chests. The victims toppled, one stumbling off the bridge into the expanse.

  Kadri and Theslyn each nocked an arrow in unison and took aim at the Moth King’s archers. They let their arrows fly, striking down the two posted nearest the bridge.