Remember the Dawn

by A M Macdonald

  “I am bound to the tenets of the Orange Dawn. That is enough.”

  “You're a zealot, nothing more, and your tenets don't apply to us unless we ask for them. So begone and let me have my way with this wench.”

  “That's no way to talk to a lady.” The woman, still composed, seemed intent to antagonize the Lokka, whose violet eyes flashed.

  “Do not make me put you down, boy. And you, you're twice his age and of the learned House Vo. You should know better. I said break your channels. After, you can go back to your city-homes and arrange another League fight for all I care. You will not do this here.”

  “And I said you have no authority, so get out of my way.” The boy conjured his light-whip, then lashed it toward the woman. Ezai reacted instantly, reaching out and grabbing the light in midair. He caught it, then swirled his arm around to wrap the whip. The boy's eyes widened even further and his jaw dropped, then he snarled. Ezai pulled him by the whip and thrust the boy to the ground, a plume of dust raising from where he fell.

  Searing heat brushed past his ear and he looked over his shoulder. The woman had taken the opportunity while the boy had been distracted with Ezai. She’d focused a beam of starlight from between two hands held horizontal, one over the other and in front of her. The beam missed, streaking past and barreling into a vendor's stall and nearly burning the merchant, wooden planks immediately catching ablaze.

  Ezai gritted his teeth, enraged, and charged the woman. She readied herself against his advance and pulsed another beam towards his incoming frame, but he raised a forearm in front of him and deflected the attack. It dissipated in the air above. The woman didn't get another chance as he crashed into her and knocked her into the stone side of a bridge. She crumpled to the ground, unconscious but alive.

  “The Order be damned, you can all rot under empty skies!” The boy regained his footing, eyes now blazing violet and wisps of smoke curling off his skin.

  “Boy, listen to me, you must break your channel!”

  “You dare try to command me, Dawnman? My father was right about you—about all of you. You are a blight on Celaena, no more, and it is time for you to go.” The boy's words seethed between bared teeth, a spear of light forming in his hands as he rushed, spinning his weapon in a blur. Ezai unsheathed his sword in an eye blink, the sound of sliding steel ringing into the night. His sword—Dawnbreak—had been his father’s. He raised it and blocked the boy's blows, who appeared not to have any martial training and put anger alone behind his attacks. The smell of burning skin invaded Ezai's nose.

  “Break the channel, I beg you!” Ezai cut with Dawnbreak through the lightspear, shattering it over and over as it reformed again and again in the boy's hands. After several unsuccessful swings, the boy stepped back and changed tactics. His weapon faded, and instead his body began to glow bright. The smoke lifted from him quicker, and thicker, and a throb of energy pushed Ezai backwards. He leaned into the starlight’s wind and took steps towards the boy, desperate to end the boy’s channel. But with every step closer, the boy pushed harder, and his glow became brighter. At the center of his body, a swirling ball began to coalesce.

  That thing will consume one of us.

  Ezai's quickly decided he needed to disrupt the connection between the Lokka boy and his star, but the sky remained clear, stars twinkling and not with not a cloud in sight. By force, then. He stepped, the boy now almost within his grasp, and stretched his fingers stretched outward, reaching.

  “No!” the boy roared and pushed harder, eyes violet fire, and the smell of burning grew more intense. Too late. Ezai was too late. The swirling ball, which grew as large as the boy’s chest, suddenly collapsed in on itself and winked out from sight. Cracks of light began to open in the boy, like a horrible puzzle, and beams of starlight escaped. Ezai shielded his eyes with a hand and backed away, no longer able to help. The boy screamed, violet flames now engulfing his body and head, face still visible and twisted in unimaginable pain. With a final cry from the boy, his starlight broke through completely. Then his body disintegrated in a puff of ash.

  And just like that, the night fell silent. Spectators looked on, horrified and unable to speak, likely never before confronted with starburn.

  Ezai squeezed his eyes, aware of the consequences. The death of a singer, no matter the cause, always disrupted the balance. And this was a boy, a Lokka boy, who had tried to kill an Arbiter.

  He turned to check on the Vo woman, but found instead a ginger-haired man kneeling beside her, smiling.

  Father, help me.

  I am going to sing!

  A thrill surged through Ahryn. She was finally going to move past the channel. No more standing in silence, straining to find a connection with the star and link with its energy. No more blinking away the burning in her eyes when they began to mist, like an unrelenting itch. No more holding her breath while struggling to maintain the bond.

  Ahryn trailed behind a procession of aspiring Starsingers as Hecta led them down a rocky path toward a rockier beach. Waves smashed against the island wall to their side, and ocean spray fell down on them until they were soaked. A deep cold permeated her clothing and she shivered. She was used to high winds and thin air atop Sanctus Mount, not the damp chill of the seminary's island, a different kind of cold.

  She wasn't pleased about being taken from the warmth of the fires burning within the seminary's stone walls, where she was able to curl up beside the hearth in her room with the books making up the Doctrine’s First Degree and set her mind to mastering her ability to connect with the Ferai star. She had spent many nights this way, and after sating herself on Doctrine she always turned upwards and gazed through the translucent, sloping roof of the seminary. She'd often locate each of the constellations in the sky and the primary star within, namesakes of each of the Houses. Her family’s star hung in the northwest section of the sky, the spearhead pointed inward as if challenging the others. It was brighter than the others, a twinkling blue dot of paint on an infinite black canvas. Once she located the star, practiced the channel, and established the bond, she would embrace the illumination within until exhausted.

  It had taken many, many nights of reading and practice before she was finally able to hold the channel for extended periods. She'd passed that test of endurance, but even so it remained physically and mentally taxing, as the power of the star raged fierce; the link alone caused her blood to course faster through her veins and muscles to react quicker and more vigorous.

  I am going to sing!

  During the perilous trek down from the seminary, Ahryn braced herself against the rock wall with her right hand, fingers searching for crevasses in the rock with every step along the narrow path carved into the island. But she mostly found smooth surfaces eroded from a millennium of storms. Her left hand grasped for ropes strung between pillars bearing the Ferai constellation, but she found nothing; this was not the Falls, she told herself, though a familiar feeling stayed with her. Every spray of the ocean triggered a memory of climbing next to the great waterfall that poured over Sanctus Mount.

  Two older men wearing the garb of House Vo and bearing the sigils of the hourglass struggled in front of her. Cousins. They had introduced themselves to her when she’d first arrived at the seminary. House Vo was largely distracted and uninterested in politics or niceties, making decisions in a vacuum of practicality. Even so, every representative from House Vo she had ever met had been pleasant enough.

  What were their names again? Gren and Dren? Why are they learning to sing so late in life?

  Behind her, the swarming children of House Lokka in their white uniforms and violet crests gripped each other, afraid to move alone. They had no mountains on their island, calling themselves the lords of the plains, and were unaccustomed to the weather. She snorted and thanked the stars for loud winds.

  Ahryn turned her head to the side and gasped at an enormous figure emerging from the falling rain. A massive hand broke through the storm, fingers outstretched and ready
to grab her. Others noticed and cried out, voices lost in the night, and some jumped back and planted their bodies against the rock wall.

  The hand didn't grab them, remaining motionless. Ahryn suddenly laughed. Monolithic statues of the seven apostles ringed the island, and this was one. She'd seen similar statues many times, of course, but never at night amid a torrential storm. Now unafraid, she peered through the downpour and made out the contours of the statue. She recalled the statues, hundreds of feet high and just as broad, angelic, but each distinct. This one had sharp, angular features, lithe limbs, and nimble fingers. It stood like the statues of the other six apostles—one hand outstretched, grasping, and another pointing to the sky. Each statue's face followed the pointing hand, eyes wide and mouth open; not in fear, but in awe. Symbols of faith.

  She traced the statue's outline down to the rocky beach far below, where a solitary fire blazed. Hecta undoubtedly led them to the fire. The procession finally arrived and aspirants stumbled onto the beach. Ahryn's muscles screamed at her, seizing in the frigid air.

  By the stars, its cold!

  Water soaked through her clothes and her body twitched and shuddered as it tried to find warmth. The Lokka hopefuls continued to huddle together, rubbing at each other's limbs and sharing body heat. Smart, though probably useless in tonight’s torrential storm, the cold and wet insufferable. Her long, black hair blew around her and tangled in the winds.

  Hecta motioned in the moonlight for the aspirants to approach, all twenty of them. She counted eight Lokka; all seemed near the other in age and all wore closed-cropped blond hair spiking from their heads, supposedly to resemble their fields of golden wheat. The Tsac shared the Lokka's zeal for mass reproduction and cultivation of startouched. She counted six, all wearing sleek, metallic-black garments, their constellation a single teardrop. There were three from Rayn, one for each of the triumvirate who ruled their House. The Rayn kept to tradition.

  That left the Vo cousins and herself, a solitary Ferai. She clenched her fists, trying to will away the cold with her inner strength. She must be strong for her family.

  “Startouched!” Hecta yelled over the storm, his voice faint and hard to hear. “You will sleep here tonight.”

  What?

  Incredulity matched the rumbling of shock and discontent from the others. Sleep here, in this storm? “Your stars will protect you, if you ask of them such a thing. Tonight, you must sing.”

  He bowed to them, then turned back to the pathway and began to climb the steps to the seminary. She watched him go with dropped jaw, unable to process the quick turn of events. Two of the Lokka ran after him and attempted to follow, but he reacted instantly and with a fury she had never seen. He spun on the Lokka and his eyes misted pure white. With a single motion, he shoved outward into the air with his palms. The two Lokka were lifted from the ground and thrown backwards.

  “You will sleep here tonight,” his voice projected over the storm with ease. It was not a yell, just loud and fiercely stated. It shook her and she trembled, confused but unafraid.

  He's a singer!

  She’d guessed wrong, believing Hecta a master of the Doctrine in academia only, a shepherd for her own learning. But he commanded a star, though she'd never seen white mist. It was a curiosity she intended to discuss with the Patron, his knowledge of the Astral and the history of Celaena far deeper than her own—deeper that most, even the Vo. Was it due to his connection with faith?

  There was no time for that now. The waves crept farther up the beach, their crashes against the rock wall louder and higher, the spray more violent. Ahryn covered her head with one hand, trying to keep her hair out of her face, and kept her tunic taut against her body with the other. She ducked under the wind and moved to the huddling mass of aspirants. The white cloaks of the eight Lokka flapped about and struck others who came near. The group thought as one, unintentionally, as they converged on each other and sought shelter from the storm.

  “Will you take those bloody things off!” a squared jawed Tsac lad yelled at the contingent. He looked a few years older than her, but much stronger; muscles rippled through his black metallic suit, and his hands, clenched tight in the cold, looked large and powerful. The Lokka eight glared at him, indignant, but all at once made a collective but unspoken decision. They reached to their collars and fiddled with the clasps. The wafer-thin white cloaks ripped away and disappeared into the night.

  Everyone looked at each other, shivering and unsure. Aspirants huddled with their own family members, leaving Ahryn alone on the outskirts of the ring of youths. She turned her eyes to the climb back up the rock wall and to the seminary, but not she could not locate Hecta, who had already disappeared into the twilight.

  She gasped in revelation and turned back to the startouched gathering, then waded into the center of the ring. None noticed her, they were too consumed with infighting and dreading their impending doom. Couldn't they see? She looked up into the storm and was surprised to see a clear sky, bright with twinkling stars, as if they were in the eye of a hurricane.

  There. She located the constellation easily, the Ferai star, which was much bluer than usual tonight—perhaps due to the clarity of the sky? She focused on the star and slowed her breathing, stopping short of holding her breath altogether, and recalled the Doctrine. Her mind recited the chant:

  I am of the stars, and the stars are of me. By starlight I rise, by starlight I fall. Guide me now, Ferai, through the coming umbra. I am of the stars, and the stars are of me.

  The words reverberated within and her vision jumped from her body and blurred, as if her very being rocketed into the sky and tunneled through space. The island and the storm became nonexistent to her consciousness. Streaks of colored light shot past her ever faster, until suddenly she stopped and hovered in an ocean of black nothing. Before her, a blazing blue orb pulsed, enveloping the entire horizon of her vision—indescribably enormous. Wisps of fire flared off the star and slowly drifted into the black. Several other bright stars blazed in her line of sight, each separated by distances beyond her contemplation, yet aligned with purpose. She continued to hover before the bright blue star and stared into its blinding light, feeling it fill every tiny space inside her. She welcomed it like an old friend until it flooded through every inch of her body. Her projected-self floated closer to the star, until she saw nothing except light and fire. And then, when she felt she was about to be consumed by the star, when the light roiled inside her so violently it shook her, she returned to her body and opened her eyes. The edges of her vision tinged with a blue mist, and then she was back standing on the beach amid the storm.

  She’d completed the channel in the blink of an eye and had drawn no attention while doing so. But now she understood. She had sung tonight, but not by hearthfire and book—by open stars and approaching death. No instruction manual provided directions on how to wield starlight, and the Doctrine spoke only of control and focus, of oneself and of the star. Starlight was a celestial fury contained inside nothing more than a person, even a young girl.

  Tonight, I sang.

  Her starlight wrapped into a ball in the pit of her stomach, churning and begging to be released. It screamed at her, pleading to be expelled. She'd never channeled so powerfully before and the sensation scared her. How could she control such power? How could anyone? But many did, and the knowledge alone gave her strength. She focused inward, squeezed, and shaped the ball of starlight, just as she'd read. It worked. The starlight obeyed her and settled from a violent pulse to a boiling rumble. Her breaths remained slow and her arms raised to her sides and stretched with palms faced outward. Carefully, she allowed the ball of starlight to swirl faster. A warm feeling of light coursed through her body, and the agony of the storm began to subside. She craved more and allowed a little.

  Heat exploded within. Her insides burned as if she’d swallowed scalding soup. Despite the excruciating pain, she focused only on the fear at the possibility of losing control. Her father's stories abo
ut singers who had drawn too deep and pushed too far echoed in her mind. She cursed the stars and struggled to find measured breathing and control, unwilling to burn herself alive. Despite the searing, she managed to control her bond with Ferai once again. The heat subsided into a warmth and she sighed. Starlight now flowed through her bodily steadily, shielding her from the night's elements, a surreal experience to be completely warm in the middle of an island under siege by wind and water.

  I'm glowing.

  Ahryn looked down at her body. Wisps of starlight flared off her like the star in her vision. She became a living embodiment of Ferai, singing with the star's light. Only then did she notice the other aspirants’ stares, no longer squabbling among themselves. Some looked aghast, likely disgusted a Ferai had sung before them, but most appeared to be awed, faces mirroring the apostle statues. No one spoke.

  “You must channel.” She didn't need to yell over the winds; her voice projected clearly. Infusing her speech with starlight seemed obvious.

  “Who are you to tell us what to do, Ferai?” the Lokka boy from the training room challenged her, but she didn’t bother with his pettiness, caring only to maintain her channel and her glow. Her parents would have been so pleased to see how far she’d come.

  Ahryn shrugged. “Your star will keep you warm.” She sat in the sand, cross-legged. The light she emanated pushed some of the sand away from her in a concentric ring.

  The Lokka boy stood straight backed with arms at his side, but did not respond. His siblings cowered behind him, grabbing each other in an effort to stay warm, lost in their stupid pride.

  Aspirants from other Houses, less concerned about social status and appearances, spread out and attempted to bond with their stars. As a result, eleven bodies stood in a circle with heads pointed toward the stars, chanting in unison. One by one, eyes filled with mists of different colors as their links with their stars connected: pale-yellows and reds and greens, but still no violet. Those born to House Lokka remained stubborn as starlight itself. Soon the other aspirants began to glow, bodies lighting up the beach as they controlled their star.