Arrival of the Rifted (The Rifted Series Book 1)

by C. C. York

  Reed cut her off, "Oh my god, Monti. Stop talking. No. I'm not doing this because I'm trying to sleep with you." He took the sticks from her hand before she could snap all of them into matches. "I feel guilty."

  "What?"

  He ran a hand over his shaved head. "I'm the reason we were all brought here."

  "How do you figure?"

  Reed walked ahead under the tree canopy and picked up more sticks for the fire. He glimpsed the first stars and the rising moons through the jagged edges of leaves and debated how to start.

  "I've had these nightmares my entire life where I hear a song my mother said was playing the night she met my father. If I described the dreams to you, they'd sound innocent enough, but they terrified me. But something changed in the last year, and people around me started to say phrases and doing things out of my dreams."

  "Like deja vu?" Monti asked, glancing around them at the darkening trees.

  He arranged the sticks in the clearing near the Aygir, his thoughts on the mailman.

  "More than that. The first day I realized it was happening again, I was standing in the yard watering flowers Staci and I planted at the new house. I had the nightmare a few hours before, and it sounds ridiculous, but it's just someone singing a lullaby in my ear. The thing is—I know in those dreams that if I turn towards the voice, something terrible will happen."

  Monti held out her hands over the smoke filtering through the sticks, and Reed blew the embers to a toasty fire. He could still feel the genderless voice tickling his ear, inching closer to him. He relished the heat of the flames against the chill spiraling down his spine.

  "Anyway, that morning, the mailman walked by. And this is going to sound absolutely crazy—"

  Monti cocked her eyebrow, "Crazier than being sucked into a vortex and dropped in a new realm?"

  He laughed, "Fair. The mailman came by singing the same song that was always in the nightmares."

  Reed would never be able to forget that song.

  Take me down to the river

  The river that's wide and blue

  Take me down to its water banks

  So I may swim with you

  He shuddered and continued, "Then the mailman just waved at me, chatting small like normal, like my heart hadn't just dropped out of my chest. And for the next several weeks, I kept running into strangers humming the same tune. I started to ask around, googled the song, the whole thing, but no one ever knew where they'd heard it. Most never even realized they were singing and looked at me like I was crazy. Staci thought I was paranoid and brushed it off as my imagination. She was with me a few times when the singing started, and she swore she never heard them sing. The only person who ever heard it when I did was my mother."

  He rifled through the bag on the Aygir's saddle and sat back down with the grain stalks, shoulders brushing Monti's, and continued.

  "Then bad things happened. I woke up to a few dead squirrels in our front yard, then a few days later, a hawk beat its bloody head through the glass in our kitchen window. All the grass, the trees, and the flowers died overnight in every yard except ours. The kindest man you'd ever know got arrested for beating his wife to death two doors down. He later killed himself, and his note said he didn't even remember picking up the hammer."

  Monti interjected, "What'd Staci say then?"

  The Aygir settled behind them like a cow made of steel, and Monti leaned back against her belly. Reed tensed, half expecting it to bite her, but he realized that Monti had a way of charming everyone around her. The Aygir was not immune.

  He tossed a broken stick into the fire, looking away from her. "We had just brought Madeline home from the hospital. I wanted to move, but she refused. We saved for months for the down payment, and she didn't want to move with an infant."

  "I didn't know you had a kid,” she said.

  Monti looked at him in a way he didn't want to examine. He tamped down the emotions threatening to overwhelm him as the fire spit higher into the air. Monti jumped up from the blaze and patted out the embers scattered on her pant legs.

  Reed brushed down a stray ember from her sleeve, "You alright?"

  The Aygir jerked up, gnashing her teeth at something in the dark beyond them. Reed dropped, shoveling dirt onto the fire, and then stood still in the swirls of smoke and moonlight, straining to hear whatever spooked the beast. He heard nothing but the wind rustling through leaves and water trickling past in the creek alongside their camp. He turned to mime a warning shush to Monti to ward off another loud-whisper when he saw it.

  The winged figure perched on a branch a few feet from Monti's head. Black wings tucked behind a sculpted chest and curved up into pointed daggers behind crossed arms. It had the head and upper torso of a man, but feathers that appeared soft enough to touch covered its crouched legs. Sharp talons gripped the tree branch when it shifted further into the moonlight.

  Monti turned at Reed's stare and fired the final bullets in her gun without hesitation. The shots echoed through the trees alongside the beast's roar as he dove to tackle Monti to the ground.

  The Aygir barreled in, kicking its hindquarters, and knocked the winged man off Monti while almost trampling her as well. Reed scrambled to Monti and tugged her deeper into the trees, running blindly away from the Aygir's screams, now mixing with low growls and grunts.

  The wind beat down on his neck before his brain registered their presence. Three more winged men landed on the ground just ahead of them, blocking their path. Monti split left through the trees but was swooped into a fourth's arms and held upside down while she kicked at its face.

  Reed's stomach dropped to the ground. He leapt up to catch Monti's arm, begging for the wind to lift him higher, but the sudden gust of wind just knocked the beast and Monti further away from his outstretched hand. They tumbled over each other in the air and hit a tree.

  The three creatures left on the ground looked at Reed with renewed interest. Before he could do anything other than panic, they tackled him and then raised him high in the air. He was suspended in the night sky by two of the beasts while the third led. Reed’s eyes watered in the wind as they sped faster under the two moons.

  Reed reached for anything to hold onto, thinking thoughts he knew would kill him faster than these creatures, and the pair gripping his shoulders bucked wildly at another guest of wind. The leader ahead of them turned back to Reed. The last thing he remembered was the sharp talon kicking him in the face before everything went black.

  Alik

  Alik silently thanked the Goddesses again that Agnian offered his room as a meeting place for her brothers. Servants are likely packing my things at this very moment, and if I walk out this hall, there will be a hundred eyes waiting to see my disgraced exit from the Palace steps. She winced at the ice at her lip, still fat from the altercation with her mother that morning. The sting bit through the fantastical theories ricocheting through her mind, each more unbelievable than the last, until one solidified among the rest.

  “I don’t understand,” Taavi said as he paced in front of Agnian’s window. “You believe that the Edicisi, the monster that we shared stories about as kids, is real? Even if he is real, even if he has Shauna and the others, there is no guarantee this Rifter will lead you to him. And even if you do find him, you have no way to fight him. He’s more powerful than any Duawielder. He can drain their powers, and I love you, but you do not have Dua to spare. Let Mother find him. Go with Agnian to Dvari until this is over and she has calmed down.”

  “That’s what you expect me to do? Flee so that someone else can find my best friend? Firtina has no interest in helping Shauna and the others.”

  Taavi tossed his hands in the air, “What are you talking about? She knows a Rifter is taking the girls, and now, so does everyone else in this kingdom. She has no other option but to find them.”

  “She has no obligation to find them alive,” Alik corrected, and at her nod, Agnian explained his theory about Fir
tina’s involvement and the man searching for Rifters from Perisien pirates.

  “This is absurd, Alik. Less than a week ago you thought Agnian was responsible, and now you want to believe that some delusional drunk is Mother’s former lover hellbent on blood sacrifices?” Taavi said.

  Damari waited motionless next to Alik, listening, but likely not hearing, Taavi speak. He asked, “Why are the initials important, Alik?”

  She thought about their trek to the library catacombs and the thick initials her fingers brushed in the darkness. She opened her mouth, closed it, and after a beat tried again.

  "How many lovers has our mother taken that you are aware of?" Alik asked, ignoring Taavi’s grimace.

  Damari replied with a halfhearted shrug, "Countless. She swaps out her companions like she does her jewels. Which is why if she is 'F.I,' I don't understand why the 'H.B' is important."

  Alik asked, "What did that room feel like to you, Damari?"

  He quieted for a moment before responding. "It wasn't a room. It was a shrine."

  "An obsession,” she nodded. “And hidden behind the secret shrine room was another secret door, and that's where she, and whomever H.B is, carved their initials together. She took someone back there she never wanted anyone else seeing. H.B must be the same man Agnian said required a blood sacrifice and a Rifter.”

  Taavi rubbed his hands over his face and sat. “Fine. Let’s assume everything you’ve said is correct. How does this tie back to the Edicisi and you not getting killed by him?”

  “I think Firtina and this man are trying to bring the Edicisi here.”

  The only noise for a few moments in the room came from the fire-orange birds roosting outside Agnian’s window.

  “No one,” Taavi said, “especially the Efendian Queen that will be usurped and likely eaten by the Edicisi, would willingly bring him here.”

  Alik took a deep breath, saying aloud something else she never imagined saying. “I don’t think she means to confront the Edicisi. I think Firtina intends to use him.”

  “For what?” Agnian asked.

  “I don’t know. Firtina is the most powerful Duawielder in history. Perhaps that’s not enough? Perhaps she can gain something from him? I have no idea. But understanding her motive is not as important as finding this Rifter and forcing her to bring us to Shauna and the others. Even if that means we face the Edicisi. And we have to find her before the Horde, the search parties, or Firtina does. Though I don’t know---”

  Damari interrupted, "I think I saw her."

  “Who?”

  “The Rifter Firtina is hunting,” he replied.

  Alik’s mouth dropped open, "And you're just now mentioning this? Let's go!"

  Damari scowled at Alik. "You don't understand. It can't be her."

  Taavi, unexpectedly assuming the role of the calm one, said, "Walk us through this, Damari. Where did you see her, what does she look like? Everything."

  "It's not her. She can't be behind the kidnappings, and she couldn’t be responsible for Rifting a group of people. She's a kid--"

  Alik snapped, "Exactly as Firtina said. She is the one we’re after. Don't you get it? If we don’t find her, we will not find Shauna and the other girls.”

  “If you are right and the Edicisi is behind this,” Damari said, “you are walking to your death. And I will not help you to your grave.”

  Taavi added, “Let Firtina fight him or control him. You don’t stand a chance.”

  Alik wanted to smash each window in the room and hurl every jagged shard at the wall above her brothers’ heads.

  Instead, fists clenched, she ground out, “I am sick of everyone telling me all the things I cannot do, of being told to look the other way, to flee. Or to let someone else handle my problems. My Dua is little more than a puff of air and a speck of sand. There are fountains here more powerful than my Waterwerk, and girls 12-years old have shown better control over flame than I do. But that doesn’t make me incapable. I am the daughter of Firtina Iktidar, heir to the Efendian throne and Pillar of the Iktidar line. I will find Shauna. I will find the other Daughters. And I will bring them all home.”

  She took a moment to breathe before she stepped closer to Damari. “Now you can help me get them back, or you can stay here and hide. But either way, you will tell me where you found the Rifter.”

  Damari dropped his hands to his sides. After a heavy pause, he said, "She is 10 or 11 at most. Small, maybe here," He raised his hand to his chest. "She is fair-skinned, long tangled blonde hair half out of a braid. Towner clothes. I saw her in the Solmus Tier this morning just before I came to you."

  Taavi asked, "What were you doing in the Solmus?"

  But Alik didn’t hear his question. She knew this girl. The final piece shifted in place.

  A knock at the door silenced the three of them. Agnian motioned for Taavi after answering it.

  Taavi said, "I have to go. My messenger still can't find Ty, and he doesn't know where Mother is keeping the foreigners. They're preparing for another patrol, and I am supposed to lead Tenida through Low Town soon. I'll see what I can find out from her." He turned to Damari, hand still on the doorknob. "Damari, can you put an Eye on Ty and the foreigners? Mother should have put them under guard, and it doesn't make sense that Ty or his men are still not here."

  Damari nodded and moved to follow him out.

  Alik, rooted in place, said, "Taavi, keep Tenida away from The Silos."

  Her brothers and Agnian looked at her, perplexed.

  "Every dream I've had is chasing a little girl through the Silos at night. I've seen this child's back a hundred times. Damari, Agnian, and I will find her there tonight.”

  Elaine

  Kara wasn’t home when Elaine woke up after a night of panicked dreams. She still felt Hvard's beady eyes on her even a day later, and she watched the Cluster for his ginger beard. Reiki interrupted her thoughts.

  "Anything you want to tell me, Elai?"

  She looked at him fully as he loaded the grain ladder. His olive-green eyes were a match to Kara's, but where hers were hard and mischievous most of the time, his were always kind. Elaine wanted to tell him. I know he’d never tell anyone this secret, but I don’t want to see his face when he knows I’m the reason his dad likely won’t walk again. So she slipped on the blank face adults often bought and shrugged, "No?"

  He gave her a long look but simply tugged a ratty tendril of her hair before hoisting the smaller ladder of grain over his head. Elaine went back inside the Hadishi home and took up a post next to Otum since Farisha took his place in the fields. She watched the strip of sunlight from the doorway travel over Yapi's face on the floor, praying to gods of two completely different worlds that he'd get better.

  The chanting in her head rumbled through in waves, sometimes so loud she couldn't drown them out, and other times quiet enough that she couldn't make out any words. None of this makes sense. Why do I hear only that chant now? Why haven’t I heard any others if I could hear them in Efendi before? Sweat had covered Elaine by the time the sunlight had passed entirely over Yapi, but she wouldn't dampen the fire in the hearth while Otum still shivered.

  Farisha and Reiki eventually came home to prepare dinner, but Kara was still gone. Elaine couldn't watch Farisha brush Otum's sparse hair back while singing to him anymore, so she told Reiki she was going for a walk. Elaine wandered, shaking, her mind lost in a sea of questions and sat by a broken fountain of Sulu behind the adjacent Cluster. Kara found her just as Elaine felt she might throw up if she didn’t Rift soon.

  "There you are! I've been looking all over for you. We have to leave. Now."

  "What? Why what happened?"

  Kara clipped a fast pace ahead of her, bypassing their Cluster.

  Elaine ran up and tugged her elbow, "Where are we going?"

  She shrugged her off and kept walking. "I found a way. I'm getting you to Bakilar."

  Elaine stopped, shocked. She felt lik
e her mind was tumbling down a steep hill of questions. "Now? I don't have anything with me. I didn't think it would be so soon. I'm not ready. I have to say goodbye!"

  Kara turned to her, face hard. "There is no time. The patrols start tonight. Reiki and my parents will understand."

  "But—"

  "No but's, Elai! It's now or never. I stole a cloak for you; they'll have everything else." She turned and continued their brutal pace.

  Elaine's heart raced. She fought back the tears at the thought of not seeing Otum smile, or hugging Farisha one last time, or thanking Reiki. "W-who will have everything? Are you not coming with me?"

  Kara stopped again; her jaw clenched tight before speaking. "Do you think this is easy? Do you know what situation you've put us in that I have to fix?"

  Elaine had seen Kara snappish before but never felt her anger directed at her. Tears welled up, and Elaine shook her head quickly back and forth. "I'm sorry. I—"

  The horns echoed through the Tiers, signaling the beginning of curfew. Kara glanced around them and pulled Elaine to a skinny path behind the lean-to homes. "There is no time. The patrols will likely come around our bend tonight. It's now or never."

  Elaine nodded, not noticing how Kara did not meet her eyes. Kara set a brisk pace. The path dumped out to a much wider space after they passed the final Towner home. Elaine dimly registered the entrance to the Silos as the voices in her head pounded louder and louder. Over the steady chant, she heard his voice, the voice she felt in her bones belonged to the Edicisi, ring out, Come.

  The sparse fire orbs hovered high above the Silos, dimmed to just a flicker with no attendants. Large, stone vats almost half as tall as the Perimeter Wall stood in pairs along either side of their path. The constant background noise of Low Town faded enough here that her footsteps in the path helped drown out the chanting in her head. Elaine took Kara’s hand. When they passed under a fire orb, she realized tears were running down Kara’s cheeks.