The Moonburner Cycle

by Claire Luana

  But still, Kai was blocked. Pura consulted other burners and teachers, but none could recommend a solution to her problem. Pura and Kai linked together, exploring the edges and contours of her blockage, examining it from every angle. Sometimes, she felt like she could almost see seams in the wall, as if it was built by adding one stone to another.

  When Kai said as much, Pura paled, growing quiet.

  “What?” Kai asked.

  “It is nothing,” Pura said.

  “You know something,” Kai insisted. “Tell me. Maybe it could help.”

  A flurry of emotions passed over Pura’s face, before her shoulders sagged. “It’s not much,” she said. “I have heard . . . in the early days, before the Burning War . . . that moonburning was used in darker ways. Burners would use it not just physically, but against each other’s minds. They knew ways to drive each other mad with visions or terrors. They knew how to cut each other off from the moon, sometimes permanently.”

  “So you think,” Kai said, “that someone might have done this to me? You said as much to Nanase.”

  I do not think so,” Pura assured her. “That was very old magic, a dark way that was lost to us. I do not believe that anyone alive today would know how to do this thing.”

  “But, it is possible,” Kai said.

  “Yes, “ Pura admitted. “It is possible.”

  Kai and Quitsu spent time with Master Vita too, drinking menthe tea, reading in the big armchairs by the fire and playing Goa with black and white pieces on his ancient carved wood game board. He gave her mountains of books to read, pulling volume after volume until her backlog seemed impossibly long. She almost asked him about the Oracle and her strange prophecy a hundred times, but never did. Somehow, it felt like it had been for her and Quitsu’s ears only. Instead, she gently nudged him towards titles that could help her understand her moonburning blockage.

  When they took breaks, she would pepper him with questions about moonburners, the queen, the citadel or the city. She was grateful to receive unedited answers from him, unlike some of her professors.

  “So not everyone is happy with the queen’s leadership?” Kai asked.

  “You’ve been into the city, you must know there is dissatisfaction,” Master Vita chided gently. “But yes, there is unhappiness among the nobles and merchant classes, as well. That’s what happens when you demonize half your population. There is also discussion about who will succeed the throne, since she has shown no signs of producing an heir.”

  “An heir?” Kai asked. She hadn’t even thought about it. “Do Miinan queens marry?”

  “They used to,” he said. “But I doubt this queen ever will. I do not think there will be an heir. Let us hope that a strong candidate emerges when the time comes.”

  Kai turned the new information over in her head, dismayed at how little she still understood of this new world.

  Kai didn’t know if it was the adjustment from day to night that upset her circadian rhythm, or if it was the Oracle’s strange words that floated up, unbidden, when she closed her eyes, but she didn’t sleep much. She spent some mornings wandering the citadel’s many green spaces, like the garden where she had first met the Oracle.

  Her favorite was the herb garden that grew behind the hospital ward. The garden was arranged in neat rows, bordered on one side by a tall wooden wall covered with climbing herbs, and on the other by a serene pond which held aquatic plants.

  The nurses and staff had originally tried to shoo her away from the garden, but eventually relented when they realized that she was useful. Kai trimmed branches, pulled weeds, and checked the soil and the plants. When she worked in the garden, it felt like her mother was there. It was as if Kai could hear her careful instruction, teaching Kai the difference between the goatwort, goatweed and sheeproot. She had doused her father’s tea with goatwort as a prank, leaving his tongue totally numb for a day. Her mother scolded her half-heartedly, but couldn’t stop laughing at her father’s slurred speech.

  It was one such sleepless night, working in the garden under the light of a weak winter sun, that Kai found herself face to face with Queen Airi. She couldn’t hide her surprise. Kai hardly ever ran into anyone else in the garden, besides the few nurses who worked the day shift.

  “Your Majesty,” Kai said, giving a low bow. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  The queen, resplendent in a thick cloak of honey-colored wool with a white fur lining, waved Kai’s comment aside. “Every now and then I like to run my own errands. Helps me feel grounded.”

  “Of course,” Kai said. “Can I help you find something?”

  “I already found it,” the queen nonchalantly waved a bundle of herbs that she had been holding at her side. “But thank you.”

  Kai stilled her breathing, trying not to appear alarmed. She would recognize that herb anywhere. Nightmark. It was a very powerful sedative. If given in too great a dose, it was lethal. The bundle the queen held in her hand was enough to kill a herd of cattle. Why in Tsuki’s name did she need that much?

  “Well . . .” Kai continued awkwardly. “I am glad you found what you needed.”

  “Why are you here?” The queen asked. “Shouldn’t you be in bed, resting before your lessons?”

  Kai’s face colored. “I have a hard time sleeping sometimes. This garden . . . it is soothing. It reminds me of home, of my mother.”

  “Your mother must be very proud of what you have accomplished,” the queen said.

  “My mother . . .” Kai said. “She was enslaved to a Kitan official. It’s my fault. It happened after I was exposed . . . as a burner.”

  “Kita is a cruel place,” the queen said. “I am sorry to hear about her plight.”

  A crazy thought struck Kai. “I can’t just leave her there, subject to his whims. Once my training is complete, would you allow me to go rescue her?”

  The queen was quiet for a moment. “I see this weighs on your soul. I fear this unfinished business will keep you from true devotion to our cause.”

  Kai opened her mouth to protest, but the queen held up a hand to silence her. “I do not fault you for this. Devotion to one’s family is a trait we value here. However, I cannot allow a moonburner to risk herself on a personal mission. You are too valuable.”

  Kai’s heart sank. What did she expect?

  “However,” the queen said. “We have operatives in Ushai. I will make inquiries into the condition of your mother. Perhaps we can help her situation.”

  “Thank you!” Kai said. “That would be a great kindness.”

  “We are hard sometimes, Kai, because we have to be,” the queen said. “But we are not animals, like the sunburners. I will see what we can do.”

  CHAPTER 17

  It was a cold winter morning. Quitsu stretched out in front of the hearth like a dog, his dignity tossed aside. Master Vita stoked the fire in one of the big stone fireplaces. He was moving more slowly than usual, his cough angry and deep.

  “Are you feeling all right?” Kai asked, examining his coloring as he collapsed into the chair opposite hers. He looked pale.

  “Don’t you worry.”

  Kai looked at him skeptically, but decided to let him be. She thumbed through the stack of books on the table next to her. At the very bottom, she saw one she had pulled months ago, Moonburner Lineage. She pulled it out and began to flip through the pages. She was disappointed to see only page after page of highly illustrated family trees.

  “Are these the Miinan royal family?”

  He looked at it through his half-moon spectacles. “Some of them. And the nobility. All the burners should be in here.”

  The end of the book contained blank pages, no doubt to include the future Miinan royals. The last page with writing showed Queen Airi, as well as her parents and grandparents. There was another name next to Airi’s, a name that had been scratched out.

  “Did Queen Airi have a sibling?” Kai asked, holding the page out to Master Vita and pointing at the obscured name. Des
pite the mystery of the Oracle’s words and the woman in the crypt dancing through her head on a daily basis, she had not worked up the courage to ask.

  He grew still. “Yes. She had an older sister.

  “What happened to her?” Kai asked.

  Master Vita looked at her for a long moment. “This is not a topic often spoken about around the citadel.”

  “Please tell me,” Kai said. “How can this be my home if there are pieces of it that are hidden from me?”

  Master Vita snorted. “That sounds like every home I’ve ever been in.” But he relented. “She died. The queen was heartbroken. Her name and image were wiped from the books and paintings. It was too painful for the queen to hear mention of her.”

  “When did she die?” Kai asked.

  “Well . . . almost twenty years ago now. The whole kingdom was devastated when it happened.”

  “The whole kingdom?” Kai asked.

  Master Vita removed his half-moon spectacles and wiped them with a handkerchief he produced from his vest pocket.

  “Azura was like a ray of moonlight. She was the most delightful child, joyful and full of laughter. Everyone in the palace loved her, most of all her mother, the queen. She had every right to be spoiled rotten, but she wasn’t. She was kind, generous to a fault. She would spend her free time in the hospital ward or the herb garden, where most children would be climbing trees or getting into trouble. She would have been an excellent queen.” He paused, his voice quivering.

  “I see why her sister must have loved her,” Kai said, trying to give him time to compose himself. The Oracle’s prophecy must be wrong. Master Vita confirmed it again. Azura had died almost twenty years ago. There is no way she could have a seventeen-year old daughter.

  “Yes,” Master Vita said. “Airi. Never were two sisters less alike. Although they had different fathers, so they were only half-sisters. Airi was darkness where Azura was light. She was spoiled, selfish, downright cruel at times. She would play pranks on the servants; she broke the cook’s leg by strewing marbles about the kitchen one winter. Although, I doubt she meant to do that,” he admitted.

  “She played so many mean-spirited pranks on her tutor that he quit and I took Airi on as well. That girl worshipped her sister along with everyone, but you could see jealousy there as well. Always she was in trouble, seeking any attention she could get. When Azura died, Airi lost herself.”

  “I could see that,” Kai remarked, thinking of the queen’s ice-cold eyes.

  “It wasn’t until Geisa showed up and Airi found religion that she seemed to come back to her senses,” Master Vita said. “I can’t help but wonder if she really has changed, or if she’s just a better actress.”

  “You said Geisa just showed up? Where did she come from?” Kai asked.

  “It was rumored that she was a sunburner prisoner, who escaped and pre-

  sented herself to the queen for refuge. Within days of Geisa’s arrival, she and the queen became thick as thieves. There were those who tried to warn the queen that Geisa might have too great of an influence over her, especially with so little known about her past. Their warnings were not . . . well received.”

  Kai thought about the sunburner’s mention of a facility, the ivy-covered door, and the bundle of nightmark in the queen’s hand.

  “Do you think the queen could be holding sunburners prisoner? Hurting them?” she asked.

  “Queen Airi is capable of anything, so long as it furthers her interests.” Master Vita leaned forward and locked his eyes with hers. “Curiosity is a gift, and I can see you have much of it. But at the citadel, curiosity is dangerous, especially where Airi is concerned. You must promise me you will abandon any theories of yours and think of it no more.”

  Kai squirmed, looking away. How could she just ignore the fact that something was going on?

  “Promise me,” he commanded, with an iron will behind his voice that she had never heard before.

  “I promise,” she said, sighing.

  Kai and Quitsu sat on the front steps of the library in the shadow of the huge overhang. She had stayed long into the day after she and Master Vita had their conversation, staring into the fire and thinking. She couldn’t be the daughter of Azura, Azura had died. And besides, her mother’s name was Hanae.

  “Do you think Master Vita is right about Airi?” Kai asked.

  “Yes,” Quitsu said. “He has been here a lot longer than we have.”

  “I hate this,” Kai said. “There is something going on, I can feel it. The prophecy, the sunburner attacks. The queen is up to something. But I don’t even know what kind of puzzle I’m trying to piece together.” Kai sighed and stood up, brushing the dust from her uniform. Her eye caught a silver shape winding through the courtyard across from them. It was the queen’s seishen.

  She stepped back into the shadows, watching him pass. Geisa strode beside him, a look of permanent unpleasantness on her face.

  “Where are they going?” Kai whispered.

  “I don’t know,” replied Quitsu. “But they both make me nervous.”

  “You know,” Kai said. “There is no time like the present.”

  “For what?” Quitsu asked.

  “To start putting together the pieces.”

  “This is a bad idea,” Quitsu whispered as he caught up to her, his paws silent on the stones. “You promised Master Vita you would drop it.”

  “We’re not looking into the queen, just Geisa.”

  “Somehow I think that violates the spirit of the promise.”

  “Admit it,” Kai whispered. “You’re as curious as I am.”

  “You know what they say about curiosity,” Quitsu said. “It killed the seishen.”

  “No one says that.”

  Kai and Quitsu stalked Geisa and the seishen, keeping to the shadows of bushes and buildings. They entered the front door of a compact two-story building, an intricately carved square archway above its doors.

  “What is this place?” Kai asked.

  “Tsuki’s temple,” Quitsu said.

  Kai had never been here.

  “You should probably at least pretend to be religious, you know, keep up appearances.”

  “I’ll take that under advisement,” Kai said, crouching low. Seeing that the coast was clear, Kai darted across the courtyard and around the side of the temple.

  “Let’s see if there’s another way in,” she whispered.

  Around the side of the building, Quitsu leaped up into a tree, easily bounding from branch to branch.

  “There is a balcony above the chapel,” he said. “I see the queen on the ground floor. She’s probably just praying. She’s known to be very devout.”

  Kai hesitated. Sneaking into the temple to spy on the queen while she was praying? Suddenly this didn’t seem like a very good plan. Kai’s excitement began to fade.

  “We should go,” she said, “before we get into trouble.”

  “There is another woman present,” Quitsu whispered down from the tree. “The Oracle.”

  The Oracle’s words came rushing back to Kai, echoing ominously in her head. She heard them every night in her troubled dreams.

  “Daughter of Azura. Daughter of Miina. Hear these truths.

  The moon cannot enslave the sun, nor make the day its mistress.

  Or victory shall spell defeat, a crimson sky its auspice.

  The sun and moon must shine as one, or all will be undone.”

  The few times Kai had managed to talk to Roweni since that day, she had refused to give any more information about her prophecy. Was the Oracle more direct when she talked with the queen? Maybe Kai could learn something.

  Pushing aside her better judgment, Kai scuttled up to the side of the temple, trying to stay out of sight. The building was made of rough-hewn stone and she made her way up easily. She had climbed the few trees around the ranch as a child to avoid the chores her father had assigned her. This wasn’t much different.

  She reached the stone balcony and
grabbed the ornamental railing. It groaned as she hauled herself over the edge, but held. She opened the window, cringing when it squeaked. Quitsu had joined her on the balcony and he slipped inside, checking for signs of other moonburners or servants.

  “It’s clear,” he whispered. She crept inside, dropping off the windowsill onto the floor.

  Kai had never been inside Tsuki’s temple before. It smelled sickly sweet of incense and candle smoke. She crept from the side room they had entered through a dark wood-paneled hallway to what she hoped was the sanctuary. The temple floor was wide and empty, leaving Kai and Quitsu few places to hide.

  The balcony was open as well, but for an ornamental railing of twisting dragons keeping the balcony-goers from plunging to the main floor. Two carved white stone statues of Tsuki flanked either side of the balcony. Kai and Quitsu crept behind one. It was as close as they could get without being clearly visible.

  On the main floor of the temple, near the altar, stood the queen, Geisa, and the Oracle. The queen’s seishen writhed through the air lazily around the group, nonchalantly defying gravity. The Oracle’s tiny seishen sat on her shoulder, its feathers so puffed up that Kai could hardly see the bird beneath.

  The queen and the Oracle were two of the smallest but fiercest women she had ever seen, and even from her vantage point, she could see that no love was lost between them. The Oracle’s arms were tightly folded before her. The queen’s hands were clasped behind her back, a look of disdain on her beautiful face. Geisa stood a strange counterpoint to the taut hostility of the other two women, relaxed and leaning against the tall altar, picking her fingernails with a dagger. Kai had no doubt that she would be ready to strike at a moment’s notice.

  “I think you are interpreting it wrong. You’ve been wrong before,” Queen Airi said, coldly.

  “Yes,” the Oracle hesitated. “But, in those instances, there were many paths set before me. In this, I see a night of no moon and a day of no sun.”

  “A new moon, and an eclipse. My scholars have already interpreted this. It is the perfect chance to strike at the sunburners unaware.”