“Promised who?” Djola demanded.
Green aurora smudged the dark. Awa sped toward these shimmering undulations. “I don’t know her name. The conjure woman who lives beyond the light bridge.”
Djola quivered. For two years, whenever Samina’s favorite lights wavered in the sky he’d refused to look. He’d brew an almost lethal sleeping potion, don a blindfold, and hide in a hole. Tonight he was transfixed. The moon was red on its outer edge and more blade than wound, a weapon hacking at Djola’s heart. The aurora pulsed, and his left hand throbbed against the mesh glove; his right eye oozed pus. Spirit debt for Xhalan Xhala.
“Your thoughts are heavy.” Awa drizzled honey into his mouth. Haloed by the aurora, she looked like a demon of old. “I have you. And Fannie guards our breath bodies. Don’t worry.” The sweet taste and her graceful wind dance soothed him. A thousand thousand bees, gossamer wings roaring, hot stingers sparking, surrounded them. Faceted eyes reflected green iridescence and red moonlight. “She calls us.”
“Who? Tell me,” Djola pleaded.
“I think you know who.” Awa had carried them through luminous clouds to—
“Smokeland.” Djola had avoided crossing the border-void since he turned Pezarrat’s fleet to pearls. Samina might see his actions as revenge. He had never dared to smoke-walk without drinking a seed and silk potion. “Stop!” A gelatinous creature exploded, showering them with muck. He pawed slime from his face. “My spirit debt, Hezram will—” The void seeped through his skin, engulfing betrayal, anguish, regret, cloaking even hidden caches of joy. “Hezram, he will find … He…”
“What?” Awa said.
Djola forgot that he had anything to say.
“We can’t linger.” She pulled them into a whirlwind of smoke and poison dust.
Djola resisted, bashing her with silver-mesh fists and booted feet. Void-smoke made it hard to breathe, hard to fight or think. As he got tangled in himself, only one thing remained clear: he should never leave the border realm.
“Hold to your feelings.” Awa gripped him to the bone. Her good arm was muscled and strong, too strong for his dull resistance. “We make the void and we can unmake it.” Bee hearts glittered around her face as they escaped the whirlwind. “See?”
They drifted over land shrouded in shadows. Anguish returned, a mountain, a deluge. “Sugar on dung.” Djola felt flimsy, yet as heavy as a broken promise. “We’re carrying too much weight for Smokeland.” A tendril of border-void chased after them. “Cowards couldn’t bear a return to the everyday—too many possibilities frightened them. Trying to eliminate harsh futures, they conjured the border-void and got trapped in their own spells.”
“The void is lost possibilities?”
“Or stolen ones.”
Awa soared on toward a distant blue horizon, Djola trailing behind her like a banner. “Yari never said people conjured the void.”
“The griot of griots always tried to see past the gloom,” Djola grunted, “and what good was that? Scoundrels poisoned Yari while vie roamed Smokeland.”
Awa trembled. “If there is no hope, only fools willingly return to torment or death.”
“Exactly. Who told you that?”
“I figured it out for myself.” She scanned the skies, steering clear of void tendrils.
“So, living in the huts has granted you great wisdom—”
“Living anywhere. We could all be lost souls. We must never give up looking for each other.”
Djola scoffed. “Should I write that down for the Elder book? Every day a new page.”
“I’d be honored if you included me in any book or song.” Awa jammed a honeycomb in his mouth. “Clear your thoughts. The void lingers in you.”
Djola chewed reluctantly. The honey was full of swamp blossom and fireweed that dulled torment. Smoke cleared from his mind. “Smart girl, friend of bees and horses…”
“Don’t sneer. That slows our progress. And there’s nowhere to land.” They flew over fields of rotting strangle vines and cathedral tree carcasses, not the steamy swamplands or tall grass prairies he recalled. Despite their breakneck speed, blue sky was no closer. Awa groaned. “Reaching the winter region is a trick.”
Something hissed in the wind.
Djola jerked every direction. Beyond the rotting fields was poison sand. No trees or grass, no wild dogs, warhorses, or smoke-walkers in sight. “Zst! What region is this?”
“Poison desert of the mind.”
The honeycomb fell from his mouth. He cursed. “The void encroaches on every region with the blessings of witchdoctors and high priests.”
“Every region except the seventh.” Awa chomped her lip. “An impossible rhythm to find in my heart.”
“I know the way. Through the aurora to the starway, a light bridge.”
“Do you see one here?”
He looked up. Tendrils of smoke chased after them from every direction and covered the sky. On the ground, scurrying through tree ruins and poison sand, emaciated spirit slaves jabbered. Dark holes gaped where eyes and mouths should have been. Beneath translucent skin, collapsed lungs shivered and heart embers had almost gone dark. A few fiends sprang high, tangling worker bees in sticky hair. Sentinels came to their rescue, poking hefty stingers into bony chests. The fiends, and sentinels too, dissolved into a pool of indigo. Djola was transfixed by bee sacrifice.
Awa shook him. “Don’t think down. Think up. We must fly higher.”
“Who are those people?” Djola muttered.
“Spirit slaves.”
“I know that, but I’ve never seen so many…”
“Smokeland is no longer just a waste of space.” A deep voice jabbed Djola’s ears.
“Do you hear that?” Djola scanned a ravaged valley. A dead river cut a black ribbon through gray rubble. The last trickle of water boiled away. “Where’s it coming from?”
“Nowhere. Don’t listen.” Awa gritted her teeth. “You’ll be too heavy to fly.”
Below them, the upturned faces of over a hundred spirit slaves wore the same smirk: Hezram. Worker bees flew into vacant eye sockets and exploded. The fiend’s ember hearts flickered brighter. Djola snorted wing filaments and bitter venom as he and Awa plummeted down through smoke toward the dead riverbed.
“Master of Poisons”—Hezram’s horde spoke with one melodious voice—“why carry so many heavy ghosts?”
Displaying great Smokeland skill, Awa slowed their descent. The blast of light from her heart made Djola squint. “We all carry ghosts,” she proclaimed, “and still fly.”
Hezram’s horde shouted over her. “Djola, you think you’re better than I am, better than us all, yet you’d sacrifice anybody or anything for your cause.”
“I’m not like you,” Djola insisted. He gagged on a mouthful of void-smoke. “You would destroy our world.”
“Denial is worse than poison sand.” More worker bees exploded in dark fiend mouths. “Your words. Look in your bag of death.”
“Don’t.” Awa pulled him close as they stalled in midair. “It’s a trick.”
“Your only shield is a swarm of bees.” The horde snickered. “Lugging a library of lost languages and a dead mountain, you’re too heavy to fly.”
“Ice Mountain too?” Djola squinted in Vandana’s bag. The turquoise rocks turned into crumbling cliffs jammed between dry waterfalls and silent songbirds. Citizens’ bones rattled in glass jars. Icy mountain tears turned to muck.
“Witchdoctor illusions.” Awa shook Djola. “Look away.”
“To where?” Djola asked. “Smokeland is never very far from the everyday.” Ice Mountain’s ghost glaciers got heavier with each breath. Tessa and Quint were shadow and ash among burning cathedral trees. Where was Bal?
“Hezram is the rogue Babalawo who lost his way on the Empire Road, not you.” Awa cinched the bag shut. “He tries to snare us in your despair.”
“I do that myself.” The bag banged Djola’s hip, a hammer smashing his bones.
Awa slug
ged him too. “Tell a different story.”
“You’re a true child of Yari, of the griot of griots—”
“You’re not?”
“Sometimes, there’s only one story to tell.”
“Never.” Awa clicked and warbled like a cheeky crow. Her breath tasted of honey and bananas. “I am feathers,” she sang. “My bones are air. I am the wind.”
Djola scowled. “Green Elder jumba jabba.”
Awa tugged his murderous weight straight up. “The Empire tongue twists meaning. To northern ancestors, jumba jabba means speaking miracles is grace, for we are what we say.” She sucked in a deep breath. Her heart was like a volcano pumping lava. “Say who you mean to be.”
Djola’s tongue felt too thick for words.
In the riverbed, Hezram’s fiends joined other spirit slaves building a tower with cathedral tree carcasses and slaves whose hearts were almost dark. Djola observed them, fascinated, dazed. Haphazard and clumsy, the tower collapsed twice, and the sweet-sour scent of decay and death rose in a cloud of smoke. Vandana’s bag got heavier and heavier, dragging him and Awa down. He tasted blood on Awa’s breath. By the fourth attempt, the fiends were careful, even cooperating with each other.
“Empty out your bag before it’s too late for you both,” Hezram’s voices whispered.
Rising quickly, the tower was less than ten feet away. Sentinel bees exploded with a flash of indigo, but made little difference—too many spirit slaves. Djola tried to pull free of Awa.
“Stop.” She held on. “We are miracles together.”
Djola shook his head. “Not here.” His left hand glowed inside the silver-mesh glove.
“Remove your glove,” Hezram’s horde said sweetly. “Touch the transgressor’s cheek. You will bring her down like Ice Mountain.”
Awa’s face fractured in his right eye. The left eye saw only smoke. As she spoke, her words also broke apart. Meaning escaped him.
“This monster murdered innocents.” Hezram’s voices were as clear as glass shattering. “You’re a witness, girl.”
“He speaks truth. I’ll exhaust you, destroy you,” Djola said.
“Save yourself. Abandon the Master of Poisons and his bag of demons and haints before he abandons you. Everyone always abandons you.”
Awa babbled and her grip tightened.
Panicked, Djola thrust his lethal left hand back and forth between her face and his own. “With me, no escape,” he said over and over.
2
Family
Smokeland was jumbled up. Demon voices and void-smoke confused Awa, made her wonder if she should honor a wild promise to a stranger, made her doubt that she could carry Djola to the seventh region and back to the everyday. But the conjure woman saved her life, saved the bees too. “Basawili!” Awa put a hand to Djola’s lips, silencing jibber jabber. He was heavier than Bal. Hovering with him over the dead riverbed was a challenge. Flying on seemed impossible. She couldn’t find the rhythm of the seventh region in her heart, still, “I can hold you and not lose myself.” She said what she wanted to believe, speaking Djola’s ancestor tongue, Anawanama.
“Be reasonable,” Djola spoke Anawanama also, intelligible again. “I’m begging you.”
They wobbled, thrown off balance by the conjure bag dangling from his shoulder. Awa glanced at the fiend tower, so many wasted bodies and dead trees. Djola’s fault, her fault also, still, “If I abandon you, I’m lost.”
“I should have smelled a smoke-walker so close.” Hezram’s fiends jabbed Awa with Empire talk. “Friend to bees, to horses and crows too. Jod said beware.”
“I need your long life not your sacrifice, Awa.” Djola’s Anawanama was a caress.
“You can’t hide in yesterday’s words,” Hezram’s fiends shouted. A lie. Hezram feared what he couldn’t understand.
Awa shouted, “Anawanama is today and tomorrow too.”
Djola clenched his lethal hand. “The Empire conquered the old ones. What good are their words?”
“That’s void talk,” Awa countered.
“I speak from the crack in my heart, not the void,” Djola replied.
She squinted a hundred hundred leagues through haze and dust, looking for clear sky. “Every language changes your mind.” Green Elder talk.
Hezram laughed. “I’ll find you two anywhere.” Priests and witchdoctors hunted smoke-walkers to use for gate- and weapon-spells. Hezram knew Djola’s and Awa’s blood rhythms. Tracking them in Smokeland and the everyday would be simple.
“Hezram can’t chase you to the winter region, no spirit slaves to serve him there. Kyrie’s Gates protect our breath bodies in the everyday.” Djola talked to Awa’s thoughts, one of his most irritating gifts. “So, drop me and fly on.”
Awa rubbed burning eyes. “The conjure woman said bring you—”
“Save one of us.”
“Does he tell you to drop him?” Hezram asked. “Listen to wise counsel.”
“We save each other.” Using a polyrhythm of dissonant voices, Awa sang over the single voice coming from a hundred mouths. She wasn’t as skilled as Bal, yet the fiends clutched their ears and Hezram’s chorus of one disintegrated into cacophony.
“Smart conjure.” Djola almost smiled.
Awa touched her forehead to Djola’s like a good daughter to a wise father. “Every soul a miracle, every maggot, every rotten leaf.” Green Elder jumba jabba, saying who you mean to be.
A fierce wind twisted along the riverbed, painting the horizon black and red. Djola jerked and spit at the storm charging toward them. “Hezram is not our only threat. The Amethyst River and Holy City chase us too. No mercy.” Poison sand from the storm spiraled up the fiend tower and blasted them. Djola’s eyes rolled in their sockets.
“Stay with me.” The crown of bees in Awa’s hair grew silent. The sentinels were dead—nobody left to protect them. A wound on her belly opened, and blood oozed through cloud-silk bandages. Many old wounds split open. Her leg was on fire, as if a Zamanzi woman had smashed her bones again. Survive! What choice but to abandon Djola? Awa curled in a ball around him and pulled his cloak over them and the bees. In the darkness, Yari’s favorite song dropped from her lips:
No one owns your heart
We can give love away
Stolen love tears you apart
For no one owns the trees
If Hezram conjured his way through Kyrie’s thicket of haints and stormed the elder tree, Fannie would stomp their breath bodies before she let the witchdoctor near. No living death in Smokeland. Awa filled herself with warhorse ferocity:
No one owns the sky
No one owns the question why
I say, stolen love tears you apart, but—
We can give love away
Make a bridge of the heart
In the storm’s fury, ember hearts burned out and spirit slaves turned to poison dust. The fiend tower sank a few feet. Awa stroked Djola’s feverish face and sang in his ear.
No one owns the clouds or the dew
The mountain rocks, the color blue
No one owns the leaves or the breeze
The rushing river, the frothy seas
We belong to ourselves
Or maybe to the bees
Djola roused from his stupor. “A new version?”
“Yari could never leave a song be.”
The strap on Djola’s conjure bag sliced his shoulder. Blood dribbled into the mouths of fiends below. Their heart embers sparked brighter. They leapt up, sucking the air for more blood. Djola shook her. “Take a good look at what chases us.”
Hezram’s sneer on a hundred faces chilled Awa more than empty eyes. Drunk on stolen dreams, Hezram had lost himself, lost the world. “I promised and—” Djola might be Bal’s father, a master forced to slave on a pirate ship and give his daughter to an enclave to save her. Awa needed to fly Djola to the seventh region for Bal. “And…”
“What?” Djola asked. “Can you see beyond the void?”
Awa closed her
eyes and willed them away from the fiend tower. Hezram couldn’t be everywhere; that was a bluff, an illusion to steal the speed of thought from her. Awa opened her eyes to a grove of flowering trees untouched by creeping void. She dropped them into the bushy crown of a young raintree. The supple branches dipped low and flung them into a black velvet sky. Fragrant petals cleared her mind. “The conjure woman smelled of raintree blossoms…”
“Zst!” Djola’s bag slid down his bloody left arm.
Awa grabbed the strap. “I can carry this for you.” The bag weighed nothing. She slung it over her shoulder. Beyond a splash of green aurora, she spied the bridge of stars. Endless arches of light cut into the deep dark. “I see a way.”
“Good.” Djola twisted free and flung her toward the aurora. His cape fluttered about him, giant black wings. Without the conjure bag he glided easily.
“What are you doing?” Awa chased him.
“Hezram tracks us still. Take my bag. Escape.” Djola feinted away from her. He was fast again. “Get to Emperor Azizi. Warn him against disaster before it’s too late. Build no Dream Gates in Arkhys City.”
“What do I care if the Arkhysian Empire crumbles away?” Awa shouted. “Warn him yourself.”
The fiend tower burst beyond smoke into black sky.
“Here I am,” Djola shouted, and the tower tilted toward him. “Take me if you can.”
Clambering to the top, a spirit slave with a bright heart smashed others out of the way using a double-headed talking drum. Awa stared at bells and seeds on the rims and faltered. The fiend leapt at her, light as ashes and faster than thought.
“Get out of here.” Djola collided with the fiend, shoving it off course. He fumbled with the mesh glove on his left hand. The fiend gripped Djola’s cape, tugging him toward granite teeth. They twisted and whirled and got tangled in rippling fabric. “Fly!” Djola yelled.
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