The Broken World

by Lindsey Klingele

  “Thanks. I’m not really used to dirt roads. Concrete’s more my thing.”

  Rafe’s face broke in a confused smile. “I am not sure what you mean, but it is certainly my pleasure to keep you from falling.”

  Liv pulled her hand from his and stood up straight.

  “Are you looking for Cedric?” Rafe asked. “I believe he and Katerina have retired for the evening.”

  “Oh,” she replied, a small voice inside wondering if they had retired together for the evening. She pushed it aside. “No, I’m not looking for him.”

  Rafe tilted his head. “Well, I am still glad you came this way. I’ve never conversed with someone from another world before.”

  “Oh, uh . . . it is kind of strange, the first time.”

  “Would you care to sit? Unless you have someplace to be . . . ?”

  Rafe pointed to the pile of stones on the side of the dirt road, which Liv could now clearly see actually did make up a small wall—or once had. She shrugged and sat down on top of it, several inches from Rafe. Now that her eyes had adjusted to the dim light from the stars, she could make out more of his features. He looked a bit like Merek, but there was something else to him—a sureness.

  “I actually do have somewhere else to be; I just don’t know how to get there. That’s the problem.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My brother, Peter. He’s with Malquin. Or I think he is. Cedric thinks he’s in the castle by now, but I can’t stop worrying about what might be happening to him.”

  “I understand what you mean,” Rafe said. The smile slipped from his face. “For so long, I thought my parents were dead. But now that I know they are alive . . . all I can think about is how to get them free.”

  “And you think you can do that better than Cedric?” Liv bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to be so blunt; but, then again, Rafe wasn’t exactly hiding his intentions.

  “I know I can.”

  Liv shook her head. “I may not have known Cedric as long as you, and he and I might not be on the best of terms right now, but if there’s one thing I know he’s good at, it’s fighting wraths.”

  “True, Prince Cedric has always been an able enough warrior. Growing up, he would constantly tell tales of how he smashed this wrath or that. Not the worst trait, but . . . we need a cooler, more experienced head at the moment. Especially now that we know the royals are alive and at the wraths’ mercy. We need a plan that is built on stealth if we want to save our families,” Rafe said, his eyes glittering as he leaned closer. “Including your brother,” he added quickly.

  Liv considered his words. Wasn’t this what she wanted to hear? A plan? But she couldn’t dismiss Cedric so easily, no matter how intent he seemed on dismissing her.

  Rafe sensed her hesitation. “I do not mean to speak against the prince. Like I said, he is a fine fighter, and I even believe he could make a good king someday. But right now, we need someone else to take charge. Someone more experienced, someone—”

  “Like you?”

  A surprised laugh escaped from Rafe’s lips. “Direct, aren’t you? I can see why Cedric has taken to you.”

  Liv smiled, but shook her head. “I don’t think you’re right on that one. Not anymore, anyway.”

  “His loss,” Rafe said, smiling. “But yes, I believe I am the man to take on this charge. I have been here, every day, fighting against these wraths. I know the ways they have organized, and I know what they are capable of. The men and women of Duoin will follow me without question, and I believe we should spare as many of their lives as possible.”

  Liv sighed, thinking his words over. They did make sense, and Rafe spoke with a confidence that was easy to get swept up in. But to say that out loud felt too much like betraying Cedric. Instead, she changed the subject.

  “You know, it’s hard to imagine that you and Merek are related.”

  “You are not the first to make that assessment,” Rafe said with a laugh. “Merek makes enemies faster than friends. Whereas I find that friends are more useful.” He turned to Liv. “Are you very much like your brother?”

  “I . . . I don’t know. We’re not exactly close. We didn’t grow up together. We sort of just reconnected, before he came here.”

  Rafe raised an eyebrow. “You traveled across worlds for a brother you do not even know?”

  “He’s family. I don’t really have a lot of that to spare.” Liv pictured Peter in her mind, with his skinny frame and glasses, his Dungeons & Dragons T-shirt. But the image of his eighteen-year-old self faded quickly into the image of him as a child, the one Liv had held on to in her mind all those years she was on her own. How much had Peter changed since then? Would the brother she remembered ever really be returned to her?

  “I understand,” Rafe said, quiet. “I know more than most that family can be . . . complicated. But they are worth fighting for. I think what you are doing is brave.”

  Liv gave a rueful laugh. “Maybe in theory. But it turns out, going through the portal was the easy part. Now that I’m here, I don’t have any idea how to actually save Peter.”

  “Maybe not yet, but know this, Liv. When the time comes for you to rescue your brother, I would gladly be at your side.”

  And even though the words were coming from the wrong person, and Liv was looking into unfamiliar brown eyes instead of blue, she felt comforted.

  For a moment, she even forgot about the smell.

  Cedric paced across the wooden floorboards in the small healing room, balling his hands into fists. Kat lay propped up against the wall, watching him. Under her clean linens, fresh bandages covered her wound.

  “I am growing dizzy just watching you,” she said, trying to swing her legs over the side of the bed. She winced.

  That got Cedric to stop pacing. “You should not move so suddenly until you are healed.”

  Kat waved her hand and sat up straight. “I have been injured worse.”

  Cedric resumed his steps. “When?”

  “Well . . . I cannot think of when at the moment. It is impossible to think while you attempt to walk a hole through the floor.”

  “I’m sorry,” Cedric said, going to sit by Kat on the bed. Up close, he could see that color was returning to her cheeks. He’d rather not cause her more worry, but if anyone could help him sort out his jumbled thoughts, it was Kat.

  “I just cannot understand why Rafe would do this. All of Caelum hangs in the balance, and now he wants to pit himself against me, dividing the loyalties of the village in two?”

  “To be fair, I do not think Rafe believes the village will be all that divided.”

  Kat’s words sank in, and it felt like they were pressing Cedric even further down in his seat. “Ouch.”

  Kat shifted on the soft bed, so she was facing Cedric completely. “We should have anticipated this—that your return after so long could be met with challenge, particularly after the biggest upheaval our land has faced in centuries.”

  “But there’s no time! The important thing is getting Malquin and the wraths out of our lands for good.”

  “You’re right,” Kat said. “And what is more, you are the prince. You do not have to go along with Rafe’s ridiculous scheme to have the villagers choose between you. You could demand the people follow you—that is your right.”

  Kat’s words hung in the air, and Cedric considered them. He knew this is what his father would do if his own command were ever challenged. But he thought about the beaten-down, weary people of Duoin, and couldn’t stomach the thought of taking another choice from them. Not when they’d lost so much.

  “It cannot be like that,” Cedric said, shaking his head. “But I also don’t think Rafe realizes what kind of threat he is truly facing. He has dealt with the wraths, yes, but not with Malquin. He’ll see us coming; I believe that. I just need for the fighters of Duoin to believe it, too.”

  Kat nodded. “Now you are talking like a true leader.” She leaned forward slightly, and her dark hair fell down over her
shoulders, its tips tickling the skin of Cedric’s arm. He cleared his throat then and shifted a bit away from her. Sometimes, Cedric relied so much on Kat for guidance and advice, he forgot that he was also talking to his future wife. He forgot, in some moments, that she was a girl at all.

  This was not one of those moments.

  In the dim candlelight of the room, with Kat so near to him, it was all too easy to remember what lay in store for them. Thankfully, Kat didn’t seem to be following Cedric’s line of thought. She pursed her lips together, mind busy on the actual problem at hand.

  Which was so very like Kat to do.

  “You think I can do this? Win the people over without forcing them as their prince?”

  “I do,” Kat said, her eyes brimming with belief. And not just belief—belief in him. “I think Rafe miscalculated. He has challenged the Cedric he once knew, the one who led us away from wraths in the palace dungeon without a thought as to what would come next. But you have changed, Cedric. Rafe was not counting on that. Tomorrow morning, you will show him—and everyone else, too.”

  “You are aware that, in order to succeed, I actually will need to think up a brilliant plan to counter Rafe’s?”

  Kat grinned. “We have all night.”

  STAND BY ME

  The alehouse was full to bursting the next morning, and Cedric’s stomach twisted as he looked over the faces of every man, woman, and child in the village. He suddenly wished he’d taken Kat’s suggestion to have some eggs for breakfast.

  How could it be he was more nervous to face a roomful of his own people than to face a handful of wraths bent on killing him? If only being a ruler were always as easy as charging into battle. There was no sure outcome for this morning, especially after Rafe had spent an hour whipping the alehouse into a fury of support for himself. His plan (delivered while wearing a wrath horn on a cord around his neck) involved leaving Duoin immediately with a small band of fighters and finding and torturing wrath after wrath until they came across one who would sneak them into the palace. Not a terrible plan, Cedric realized, but one that had too many risks attached. The wraths had more loyalty to Malquin than Rafe anticipated, and they were much more organized. It was far more likely Rafe’s team would give themselves away and lose fighter after fighter until there would be none left to take back the city.

  Cedric knew all the drawbacks of Rafe’s plan, but the words were frozen in his throat. Kat stood steady at his side as he faced the room, many of whom were still talking loudly with each other. Across the room, Liv stood alone near a window. The morning light settled on her features, highlighting the green flecks of her eyes. When Liv caught Cedric looking at her, she smiled. He quickly looked away.

  He needed to focus.

  “Thank you all for gathering this morning,” Cedric said, gripping the handle of a sword. At Kat’s suggestion, he’d dressed in scrounged-up battle gear for the announcement of his plan. Which suited him just fine.

  “I know you have been fighting long and hard these many months, and you are eager to expel the wraths from our lands once and for all.”

  Across the room, Rafe joked with some men who sat in a circle of stools around him, eager to refill his mead glass whenever it ran low. When Cedric met Rafe’s gaze, the joking stopped, and Rafe made a show of paying attention.

  Cedric turned back to the crowd and raised his voice. “As Rafe mentioned yesterday, I have not been here to share the burden of the past few months with you. I have been in another world.”

  The crowd shifted. The muttering died down a bit, and more and more eyes focused on Cedric alone. He took a big breath. This was the hard part, when he would have to say the exact right thing or else everything would fall to shreds. And then Rafe would be right—he wouldn’t be the best person to lead these people.

  “But I was not resting in this other world. I was fighting wraths. And I faced Malquin there as well. Which is why I know how foolhardy it is to try to outmaneuver him, to rush a plan against a foe who is always two steps ahead—”

  “So you will not fight?” a voice called out. Cedric turned to see it belonged to a tall, bulky man who leaned up against the wall. He recognized him as one of the men who had been in the forest with Rafe. As soon as the man spoke, more muttering broke out among the crowd.

  Cedric tried to focus. “Not today, no. I have a plan, but it does not involve leaving immediately, or torturing wraths—”

  Cries from the crowd. Someone threw a glass to the ground, and it shattered. From the corner of his eye, Cedric saw Liv flinch.

  A second man rose, his face a mask of anger. “You have sympathy for those beasts? My brother was a guard at Westing, and they cut his throat without a second thought. A true prince would stop at nothing to avenge his people.”

  Cedric’s heart stuttered at the words a true prince. He was losing them.

  “I have no sympathy for the wraths,” Cedric said, struggling to get his words out before the crowd grew too much against him. “But neither will I provoke a longer war with these creatures.”

  Cedric straightened and looked out over the crowd. “We cannot defeat the wraths in Westing with our numbers, and to pick the creatures off one by one is too risky. Which is why I propose we increase our numbers. A great number of our men are in the north, beyond the main city—”

  “The wraths have cut off the north,” Rafe objected. “I told you, we have sent three parties to try and reach the northern lands. None have returned.”

  “None have had the secret weapon that we have.” Cedric gestured to Kat, who at this point came forward, just as they’d planned. Though Cedric could tell that walking was causing her some pain, she hid it well. Anyone who did not know her would not have guessed that she had recently been stabbed.

  “The northern lands are my home,” Kat said. “And I have traveled from there to the southern holdings countless times with my own father and his men. I know of a passageway under the Westing Mountains that will take only a few days to traverse.”

  “How do you know the wraths will not be waiting in this passageway?” the bulky man asked.

  “I have not been in them since I was small,” Kat continued, “but I remember how tightly we fit into them. I do not believe the wraths could get far inside, even if they were to find the tunnels.”

  More murmuring broke out among the tables, but this time it held notes of excitement. Rafe sat in one corner, watching his men as they watched Cedric. His eyes narrowed.

  “We will send a third of our forces through the tunnel,” Cedric said. “Once they reach the other side, they can join with our men in the north. Together, we may have the numbers necessary to overwhelm the wraths in the city. If the men in the north and the south attack the city walls from both sides at the same time, we can overwhelm them and cut off any possible escape routes.”

  “A solid suggestion, my prince,” Rafe said, rising. Cedric was impressed that he was managing to keep his expression neutral. “But assuming the men in the north have survived, and assuming we can find and unite with them, and assuming they can make their way to the city, how will we be able to coordinate our attack? Any messengers caught by wraths would be killed on sight.”

  “That’s true,” Cedric said, maintaining eye contact with Rafe. “Which is why we will not be using messengers. We will be using these.”

  Cedric reached into the bag by his feet—the one he’d taken from Liv’s room that morning—and pulled out two dark, boxy devices. Their casings looked impossibly shiny in the dim lighting of the pub. The townspeople fell silent, so still that Cedric could hear only his own breathing.

  “Wh-what are those?” Rafe asked, his voice finally faltering.

  In answer, Cedric handed one of the devices to Kat, who took it and walked to the other side of the pub. Cedric pushed down on the button on his device, what Liv called “the walkie,” and spoke. “Message to Katerina—”

  He wasn’t able to complete his sentence before the pub broke out in gasps and
exclamations. His voice had carried from the device Kat held, ringing out as clearly as if he’d been standing next to her.

  “How is this possible?” a woman asked, clutching a hand to her chest.

  At this, Cedric looked sheepishly at Liv. She cleared her throat.

  “It’s, um, radio waves,” Liv said. She seemed to notice then that every eye in the pub was on her, and she sat up straighter. “Sound travels on these invisible waves, and . . .” She looked up and to the right, as if she were trying to remember something and thought the answer might be written on the ceiling. “The walkies use those waves to send sound across distances. I’m pretty sure. It’s been a while since eighth-grade science. . . .”

  The villagers of Duoin looked at Liv as if she were speaking another language. Some looked amazed, others afraid.

  “They’re not dangerous,” Liv said quickly. She turned to Cedric. “But you shouldn’t overuse them—I’m not sure how much battery is left, and it’s not like we can just run out to a Rite Aid.”

  Cedric nodded. “We will use them sparingly.”

  Liv smiled, and caught off guard, Cedric smiled back. For a moment—just a moment—it felt as though they were alone in the room. If Liv was speaking a foreign language, he was the only one in Caelum who could understand it. He gripped the device in his hand, liking that he carried around a part of her world.

  Cedric looked back to the crowd, who no longer seemed so critical of their prince. Even the group of men around Rafe looked rapt.

  “We will take the next few weeks to work out the details of the plan, sending out small scouting parties to ensure that the land around the tunnel entrance is free of wraths, and to watch their patterns for guarding the city.”

  Cedric took a breath then, and looked to Liv again. He noticed her eyebrows draw together, her expression stony. Cedric’s stomach pinched with guilt; he knew Liv would be upset at the delay in rescuing her brother. But there was nothing to be done about it. He turned away, facing the crowd again.