Into the Fire

by K. Gorman

  She shrugged her backpack off her shoulders, slid it down her arm, and slumped it next to a pillar. The light of ten thousand burning names moved across her skin. She joined the backpack, stretching her feet down the steps that led to the center. Pulling out another tissue, she leaned against the pillar’s smooth, square base.

  Her head ached. Memories swarmed within it. She closed her eyes. Through her eyelids, she saw the glow. She crumpled the tissue in her hand and put it on the floor next to her.

  She had a lot of time to kill.

  *

  After a while, Mieshka began to hear beeps. A headache settled into her left temple with a slow throb. Her breath was ragged, nose stuffed, eyes dry and itchy. She rested her forehead on her knee, hoping the sound would go away.

  Instead, it grew louder. She heard footsteps.

  Ignoring her headache, she lifted her chin and strained to hear over the fountain.

  A woman’s voice called up the entranceway. Mieshka’s eyes shifted to follow it.

  “Buck, what the hell? In here?”

  She stiffened. A faint shadow spread out on the entrance’s floor. It was a large shadow. The beeping sound grew louder.

  “That’s what it says,” the man’s voice—Buck, she assumed—sounded right beyond the doorway. Mieshka edged closer to her backpack, sliding her hand around its straps just as he walked through the door.

  He was big. That was the first thing she noticed. The gun at his shoulder was the second.

  Her fingernails dug into a tissue.

  As he stepped in line with the pillars at the edge of the shallow pit, she took a breath and forced herself to relax. Hadn’t she decided to face her fears?

  She looked again, trying to ignore the gun. Though she recognized the military crew-cut she’d become familiar with among her mom’s friends, he was cast in silhouette on the wall behind him, which obscured his features from immediate view. He paused by a pillar, hunched over something in his hands. After a moment, he looked up and searched the room. Mieshka cringed as he found her by the pillar.

  Stomps sounded in the hallway. Where Buck had been subtle, the next person was not.

  “Really? It’s probably just fucking with—” The woman, a smaller, slighter person, though even in the quick glance she got Mieshka noticed the muscle on her arms, almost ran into him. Mieshka saw her follow Buck’s gaze. “Her?”

  Buck took a step forward out of silhouette. The shoulder holster was a shade lighter than his shirt. The tempo of beeps increased like a persistent alarm.

  “Jo, why don’t you give Aiden a call?” Buck’s voice was low and calm. He stared at Mieshka from across the pit.

  “Right-o.” Jo turned on her heel and disappeared through the door.

  The man stepped into the fountain’s light. They watched each other. Beeping filled the silence.

  She didn’t think people made a habit of walking around Lyarne’s subway system with guns and beeping machines—the school board certainly didn’t—but it was clear that the call Jo was making was because of Mieshka.

  What the hell?

  “Hi,” he said.

  “You have a gun,” she said.

  “I do.” He lowered his hands.

  “Are you a soldier?”

  “Was.”

  For some reason, that made it better. She’d had enough of soldiers today. Apparently he had too, if he wasn’t one any longer.

  “So was my mom.”

  He didn’t speak, but his gaze dropped to the small pyramid of crumpled tissues at her side. They practically glowed against the dark floor. The beeping continued. As if suddenly remembering it, he glanced down at the thing he held.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “It’s a bit complicated. Mind if I sit?”

  She pulled her backpack closer.

  “Who are you?”

  “We work for the fire mage.”

  Just because they had guns did not mean they were bad people. She knew that, but she had to keep reminding herself. Her mom had carried a gun, but a gun had also killed her.

  Lyarne had strict gun control laws. If he carried, his claim was probably true. If they worked for a mage, they could likely carry any weapon they pleased.

  She shoved her backpack down the steps to make room at the base of the pillar. Buck took the hint and, slowly, maneuvered down about a foot away from her. She scooted over to create more space between them, feeling the pillar’s edge on her shoulder.

  The beeps changed into a continuous tone as he sat. He fiddled with the device in his hand until it became silent. It was a dull black, about the size and shape of her dad’s TV remote, although lacking visible buttons. A slip of light slid along its edge.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  In answer, he offered it to her, and she took it. Its surface was cold and smooth as glass. She flipped it around, holding it farther into the light.

  Was it some sort of touchscreen? She couldn’t see anything on the surface, and it didn’t react to her touch. Buck had handled it all right.

  “It was set to detect magic,” he said.

  She almost dropped it.

  “I don’t have magic.”

  “You sure?”

  She handed the remote back.

  “Yep.”

  Buck leaned back. Bright orange flashed under his thumb.

  The beeps returned.

  “It seems to disagree.”

  She stared. The light looked similar to what burned on the walls around them.

  What was magic, anyway? She knew it powered the shield. If the mage’s titles were anything to go on, it had an elemental base. Not the chemical elements, but the old, mythological ones. There were three mages in Lyarne: Fire, Water, and Earth. The mage in Terremain was Electric. Beyond that, her education was sorely lacking. Robin said they’d learned about mages last semester. Too bad Mieshka hadn’t arrived earlier.

  She winced at the thought. A lot of things would be different if she had.

  Buck was watching her. She pushed away the memories.

  “I definitely don’t have magic.” She shook. “Heck, I didn’t think Terrans could get magic.”

  “It’s rare,” he agreed. “but it’s been popping up more and more lately. Usually, those who have it don’t discover it until it manifests, which can be unfortunate depending on the circumstance, so the Council in Mersetzdeitz developed some detection devices.”

  She stared. He hadn’t outright said it, but she could imagine what those ‘manifestations’ had been like. Anything that had necessitated the creation of a detection device had probably not been quiet or peaceful.

  “I’ve literally never heard of this.”

  “They’ve been keeping it on the down-low. For security reasons.”

  It took her a few seconds before she understood the full implication of his words—if it were a hushed-up security thing, and he had no problem telling her all about it, then he was either a terrible soldier or he had a ninety-nine percent certainty that his machine hadn’t glitched out and that it was telling the truth.

  Magic. I have magic.

  She took a slow, shaky breath. He pretended not to notice.

  “Jo’s calling Aiden now,” he went on. “He can say for sure.”

  “Aiden?”

  “Aiden Tergunan. The fire mage. He’s kind of Mersetzdeitz’s go-to guy for this sort of thing. He’ll probably be the one who takes you on as an apprentice if you do have magic.”

  Wasn’t that the old name for ‘student’? Mieshka’s mind spun away from that thought, fiercely looking for an excuse for the beeping-thing’s mistake. That woman—Jo—she’d said something before, hadn’t she? That something had been… fucking with the device? She glanced at the orange screen hovering above the fountain. It looked magical.

  That was probably it. The tracker probably meant the screen, but pointed to her instead. Like a bloodhound scenting something and getting distracted by a person with treats in her pocket
.

  Treats. Hah. All she had were textbooks and tissues.

  “So, what’s a girl like you doing in a place like this?” He had a wry look in his eye.

  “Skipping.” She kept her tone dry. Despite that, there was a flash of teeth in his smile.

  “Had enough?”

  She folded her knees closer to her chest, hunching over to hug them.

  “You could say that.”

  They were interrupted by footsteps approaching in the corridor. The shadows at the entrance danced briefly across the floor before a man appeared. The woman—Jo—was close behind.

  “—probably just the ship,” she was saying. She stopped short at the opposite side of the pit, leaned against a pillar, and crossed her arms over her chest.

  Ship? Robin had said the fire mage’s ship was underneath here.

  “Probably not,” said the other man—the fire mage, she assumed. As he crossed the pit of the amphitheater, she tried to make herself smaller. He stretched a hand out to Buck.

  “Gimme that.”

  Buck handed over the silent tracker. The beeps returned as the man flipped it over, holding it lengthwise between his hands. Orange light reflected off his face as he operated it. Mieshka stared.

  It was hard to see in the dim room, but both his hair and his eyes were light-colored. His worn t-shirt had several dark smudges across it, as if he’d been doing some work on the underside of a car. Several holes, not designer, gaped at the knees of his worn jeans.

  Not quite what she’d expected.

  An orange screen rolled out of the front edge of the device and hovered in the air, roughly four inches tall. It looked like a miniature version of the one above the fountain.

  “So? Did Buck break it?” Jo stepped down onto the sunken dais, ignoring the shimmering display of names that surrounded her. She carried two guns, Mieshka noticed.

  “No.” Aiden was still fiddling with it. He hmmed, suddenly catching her eyes. “Ever set something on fire with your brain?”

  Mieshka froze, feeling as though she were caught in a spotlight. “No?”

  “Damn. That would have made it easy.” The beeping stopped a second later. He put the device away and crouched down to her level. She stiffened as his eyes studied hers, moving back and forth.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Mieshka.”

  He paused. For the first time, she saw him smile.

  “Nice name. Bonus points. Well, Mieshka, I need a bigger computer to scan you properly.”

  “What?”

  Her heart froze. Scan?

  “This device here says you have magic, but it’s not smart enough to tell me what kind or how it’s developed.”

  “I have magic?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  She sat there, stunned.

  Aiden apparently didn’t have time to deal with a confused teen.

  “Come on, I’ll show you my spaceship. It’ll figure things out.”

  Huh. So this was what happened when you skipped school. She’d been missing out.

  Chapter Six

  Aiden led them behind the fountain, where a black wall stretched up to meet the memorial’s screen. Backlit by the fiery names, their reflections became dim silhouettes on its glassy obsidian surface. Behind them, the mythological tapestry wavered in the gloom.

  He splayed his hand against the wall’s surface, and the main screen flickered above. Burning orange lines appeared, cutting across the black surface under his hand and looking a bit like a magical variant of one of those graphite-and-sand drawing screens she’d used as a kid. They formed a door-like square in the wall, which slid aside with a subtle hiss. Behind it, the aluminum doors of a freight elevator were slower to open.

  The four of them walked in. Mieshka found herself crowded against the control panel, wincing at the sudden, bright light. As the doors rumbled to a close, Aiden reached around to push the lowest button. With a lurch, the elevator began its descent.

  Buck held her backpack, and Mieshka tried not to fidget as its absence caught at her awareness. She stared straight ahead, aware of three sets of eyes discreetly studying her. Her head throbbed from the crying she’d done earlier, but only a little pain came with the sensation. Except for the less-than-comforting grinding screeches from outside the elevator, it was quiet.

  Aiden was the first to break the silence: “You’re a redhead.”

  “Well spotted, sir.” Jo leaned against the opposite wall, arms folded over her chest.

  “Shut it. I’m tired.”

  The elevator rumbled on. Mieshka caught her blurred reflection in the brushed aluminum siding—the light blue of her jeans, the darker blue of her hoodie, the blob of orange that was her hair. She glanced to the other reflections, noticing a similar orange blob on Aiden’s head.

  “So are you.”

  He had blue eyes, though, unlike her plain brown.

  The elevator kept rumbling down. She examined the control panel. It only had three buttons: up, down, and panic. She resisted an urge to press that last one.

  Just how far were they going, anyway? They’d already been—

  Ding!

  The door stumbled back, spilling light across a square of smooth concrete. Beyond the square, it was pitch black.

  They filed out, Mieshka last. Aiden slipped off to the left, while Jo walked straight into the dark. The elevator lifted slightly as Buck stepped off.

  Mieshka toed the edge of the light square. A dry cold pressed in on her, and she hunched over, jamming her hands into her hoodie’s pouch.

  The doors closed behind her, shutting out the light like blackout curtains. She heard a hydraulic hiss just after it closed. Then, nothing.

  She couldn’t see anything. She held her breath, heard the scuff of a boot against concrete. By the way the darkness swallowed it, she felt she was in a large place.

  She was right.

  With a thunk, a row of lights switched on high above her head. As she squinted in the sudden light, another row switched on, and a third row after that. The pattern continued until the whole room was lit.

  Room was an understatement. The place was a hangar, its high ceiling secured by a complex pattern of metal framing. The walls were a darker mix of concrete than the floor, with bare pipes and naked wires snaking across them. The lights, suspended from the ceiling’s framework, were bright and industrial. They burned with a baseline hum.

  In the middle was the ship. It had a triangular shape, with its head tapered to a sharp point and straight, fixed wings swooping out from its middle to the back end. It was black, and seemed to drink the light in. It reflected the room through a dim, oily sheen.

  It was smaller than she’d expected, maybe the size of a school bus from nose to tail.

  Aiden returned from the light switch, rubbing his hands.

  “Don’t worry, he doesn’t bite.”

  ‘He’? Weren’t ships and other things like them traditionally referred to in the feminine? Maybe the mages had other traditions. Mieshka took the hint, following him to the ship’s side. Only once did she glance back at the now closed elevator.

  Closer to the ship, she noticed there were no joints or seams in the metal. It appeared to have been made of one continuous piece. Her reflection distorted in its side like a funhouse mirror.

  Aiden patted it gently before he splayed his fingers against its side, as he’d done on the wall in the memorial. This time, Mieshka felt something pulse in the air before the orange lines sliced open a door. The door hissed back just as the door to the elevator upstairs had. She was starting to see some correlations.

  “Ladies first.”

  She peered inside. Lights glowed to life from beneath the floor’s grating, under-lighting a cramped space with smooth black surfaces and a chrome-like trim. As she watched, the controls began to glow with a familiar orange light.

  She found a couple of handles on the inside of the door and hauled herself up the three-foot step. Her sneakers clunked o
nto the grating, and her head automatically ducked. Up front, a console was arranged in a semicircle, alight with many orange symbols. The tops of two chairs blocked out part of the console’s light. Pilot and copilot, she assumed. A bright white light flicked on over the pilot’s seat.

  She shuffled forward as Aiden climbed in after her.

  “Have a seat,” he said, gesturing to the center chair. He squeezed by to tap a few keys on the front console. Three screens flicked on: the center displayed a video feed of Buck and Jo loitering around the hangar, with their weapons highlighted and magnified on the leftmost screen. The rightmost screen was completely filled with text.

  A soft hiss distracted her. She looked back in time to see the door close, the edges briefly glowing orange as it cut off the outside light.

  Now I’m stuck here, alone with a strange man in his spaceship.

  She decided not to count just how much was wrong with that. Sliding around the chair, she leaned heavily on the armrests as she sank into it. The light shone down on her head and arms, warm against her skin.

  “It’s not going to hurt, is it?”

  Aiden gave her an alarmed look. “What?”

  “The scan.”

  “Oh. No. Of course not.” He hunched close to the console, eyes returning to the screen. She looked away, feeling heat rush to her face—well, what did she know about planes? Or spaceships? But his tone had been absent rather than judgmental, distracted. She doubted he’d thought much at all about her. And, from the grease and oil stains on his shirt, and the utterly bagged look on his face, she suspected he’d been interrupted from something else to investigate her potential magical claim.

  He slumped back into the chair, watching the screen.

  “It’ll just feel warm. Won’t take long. Try to relax.”

  She tried to follow his example, settling against the chair’s rigid cushion. Her eyes went to the center screen. The outside feed of Buck and Jo had been replaced by a single string of words, looking like a command in a computer. A soft whir sounded overhead. The light grew warmer, touching her skin like a tropical sun. A warning about tanning beds slipped briefly through her mind.

  After a few seconds, the light seemed to thicken—as if something internal had just switched on. A dust mote drifted in front of her face, glowing. Data began to roll down the screen.