The Moonburner Cycle

by Claire Luana

  Daarco knelt by Taiyo and shook his head gravely. The light coming through the windows was dull and watery.

  “Orders?” one of the men asked, eying the door nervously.

  “They want to kill Taiyo,” Hiro said. “We can’t let them.”

  “We have reinforcements coming,” General Ipan said. “We hold here and protect Taiyo. If we can’t, we do as much damage as possible on our way out of this world.”

  The men straightened, their courage bolstered by his words.

  Until the unthinkable happened. Taiyo took a shuddering breath and fell still. The remaining sunlight winked out, plunging the room into darkness.

  Hiro’s heart sank. His breath came in shallow bursts in the darkness. They had lost.

  The dark room devolved into chaos as the men shouted and moaned in fear, and the demons outside rejoiced with otherworldly howls and screams.

  A white orb shot into the air, illuminating the room with moonlight. Emi stood by the body of their god, her face grim.

  “Quiet,” General Ipan shouted, and the men fell into an uneasy silence. “New plan. We attack and try to rescue Tsuki before they can kill her,” he said. “Protect her as long as possible.”

  “But, General,” one burner said, “Taiyo is dead. The sun is dark!”

  “You have a sword, don’t you?” General Ipan barked.

  “Yes, General,” the man said, his cheeks coloring under his golden hair.

  “Have you forgotten how to use it?”

  “No, General.”

  “Then we fight.”

  CHAPTER 39

  The flight felt like an absolute eternity. They had been flying over the Tottori Desert for several hours but hadn’t yet caught up to Tsuki. The sun still glowed mutely in the sky. The fact that it still shined told Kai that all hope wasn’t lost. She held on to that hope like a lifeline.

  “Is that a city?” Chiya shouted from her koumori.

  Kai shrugged, peering through the twilight.

  “Yoshai,” Quitsu said. “It’s supposed to be a legend.”

  “So were gods and demons,” Kai muttered.

  As they neared the city, a white shape swooped past Kai in the twilight. She peered into the dim, trying to make it out.

  “It’s Iska!” Quitsu said.

  Nanase’s seishen? What was it doing all the way out here?

  The bird banked hard to the right, apparently realizing Kai had spotted it.

  “It says to follow!” Quitsu said.

  “Chiya, Colum, follow me!” Kai shouted.

  They landed with a terrifying thud, Kai and Quitsu sliding halfway over the koumori’s neck. They stumbled to the ground amongst two dozen other koumori.

  “Nanase?” Kai said, squinting in the gloom.

  Nanase strode to Kai. “We received word from General Ipan that they’re under attack. We thought they could use reinforcements come nightfall.”

  Kai grabbed Nanase in a hug, the impulse overcoming her.

  Nanase stood stiffly for a moment but finally patted Kai on the back.

  “Thank you for coming for them,” Kai said.

  “This is our world too,” Nanase said. “And they are our allies now. We fight together. Where’s Tsuki?”

  Kai bit her lip. “Jurou took her. He’s in the Order.”

  “Damn it,” Nanase cursed.

  “How are things in Kyuden?” Kai asked.

  “Barely holding together,” Nanase said grimly. “No doubt this strange darkness will lead to full spread rioting. Even if we are successful here, who knows what we will return to.”

  Kai drew in a shaky breath. “One problem at a time. We need to get in there—now.”

  As Kai said the words, the dim light of the sun winked out completely, plunging them into darkness. But it wasn’t the darkness of night, full of cheerful stars and the moon’s comforting presence. It was emptiness. A black void where something should be.

  “Taiyo,” Kai whispered.

  “We’re already too late,” Nanase said.

  “Maybe not for Tsuki,” Kai said. “We go now.”

  Nanase nodded. Kai darted back to her koumori and hopped on, scooping Quitsu up.

  Their koumori climbed up over the wall of the desert city and to the palace that perched at its top. As they neared, a strange feeling overcame Kai. A memory. She had seen this city before. Been here.

  They descended towards a courtyard filled with dark figures. Kai squinted, trying to count their numbers. Many. Too many.

  Her koumori screeched and lurched sideways, almost sending Kai tumbling from her back. Quitsu was jerked from her fingertips. She managed to grab his tail before he tumbled into the night sky. He yowled with pain as she hauled him up in front of her.

  “What was that?” she said shakily, her heart hammering in her chest.

  Kai’s question was answered as a huge shape banked beside her, approaching Nanase’s koumori from behind. It was a massive black beast with wings like a koumori’s. A tengu far larger than she had ever seen.

  “Look out!” Kai screamed at Nanase.

  Nanase reined her koumori in, dropping sharply. The tengu shot past, inches from Nanase.

  The ground was rapidly approaching and Kai yanked up on the reins. Her koumori pulled out of her dive just in time, but Kai and Quitsu were torn from her back by the force. They hit the stones of the palace courtyard hard, tumbling in a ball of limbs and fur.

  With her head spinning, Kai pulled herself to her knees and then her feet. A line of snarling tengu greeted her. Behind them were Hiei and Yukina flanked by three impossibly-tall and fearsome-looking tengu. Jurou stood between Hiei and Yukina, Tsuki on the ground at his feet. Kai swallowed and drew her sword.

  The other moonburners were landing now, jumping off their koumori and drawing weapons, facing off in a line against the tengu. The doors behind them burst open and the sunburners poured out, joining the moonburners’ ranks. Hiro and Emi stood on either side of Kai, Ryu at Hiro’s side. General Ipan carried Taiyo’s body in his arms and laid it gently on the stones behind them before pulling his great golden axe from the strap on his back.

  Kai’s heart felt as if it would burst in her chest at the gravity of the moment, as her despair over Taiyo’s broken body mingled with her profound gratitude for her friends. They could still save Tsuki. They had to.

  “Give Tsuki to us,” Kai called to the tengu.

  “No,” Yukina said petulantly, and nodded to Jurou.

  Jurou drew a thin dagger from his belt and raised it for the killing blow. But before his blade found its mark, true night fell, and a thin sliver of moon appeared on the horizon.

  Tsuki’s eyes flew open, filled with shining quicksilver energy. The moonlight pooled and pulsed around her, filling her, pouring from her in blinding rays.

  Jurou stumbled back, shielding his eyes from the brilliance.

  When the light dimmed, Tsuki stood tall before the tengu in a billowing white gown and bare feet. Her hair was not the silver of most moonburners, but an icy blue, the blue of pale dawn on a clear winter morning. Tsuki surveyed the scene with slate gray eyes topped with thick white lashes, a look of fury on her flawless face.

  “You!” Tsuki pointed at Yukina. “What have you done to this world? To my husband?” A bolt of white lightning snaked down from the clear sky, striking the stones as Yukina leaped clear.

  And then the battle began in earnest.

  The demon horde met the burners in a clash of animal fury against steel and moonlight. Hiei and Yukina launched themselves at Tsuki, who flitted away in darting movements, sending fire and lightning at them with punishing ferocity.

  Kai found herself fighting for her life with as fearsome tengu and lightning-quick Order members flew at her in wave after wave.

  She lost sight of Hiro and Quitsu and anyone else as her universe narrowed to the fight before her, the next blow, the next foe.

  “We have to get the big ones down.” Chiya appeared through the crowd as
she sliced the head off a bird-like tengu in one swift movement.

  “Ideas?” Kai asked, her arm swinging, her chest heaving.

  “I…think so,” Chiya said. “Follow my lead?”

  Kai nodded, skewering a tengu that came at her with gnashing black fangs.

  “Come on,” Chiya said. She darted into the fight, heading towards the huge black tengu with the head like a wolf. It was tossing moonburners aside like leaves in the wind with smacks of its massive tail and fearsome claws.

  Chiya ran under its legs, jerking back at the last minute, narrowly missing being crushed by its huge foot. Kai harried the tengu from the front, slicing at its belly as Chiya circled around behind it.

  Chiya slashed out with a vicious blade of light, severing the tendons in both of the demon’s hind legs. It reared back and roared with pain, toppling forward first onto its knees, and then to the ground.

  Its flailing tail caught Chiya in the chest and threw her across the courtyard, where she rolled to a stop with a crunch against the hard stone wall.

  “Chiya!” Kai screamed, launching herself towards her fallen sister. The injured demon scrambled around, roaring its fury at Kai, blocking her path.

  Kai felt for the creator’s power, the raging river that waited for her. As if the light itself was eager to take part in the fray, it poured itself into her qi as soon as she opened her mind to it. Burning the light in a swift movement, she slit the creature’s throat with a blow powerful enough to sink through to its spine.

  “Chiya,” she screamed again, half-running, half-crawling around the tengu as it thrashed in the throes of death.

  Chiya hadn’t gotten to her feet. When Kai reached her side, having to fight her way through two tengu on the way, Chiya’s face was pale and there was blood on her lips. Broken ribs, Kai thought. Perhaps a punctured lung.

  Chiya’s seishen, Tanu, had found his mistress’s side and was burying his furry silver face in the crook of Chiya’s neck.

  Kai knew she shouldn’t move her, but Chiya couldn’t stay here, exposed. “I’m going to get you somewhere safe,” Kai said, sheathing her sword and heaving Chiya up by her armpits. Tanu backed up to give her room. The woman was heavy.

  “Let me,” a voice said, and Kai turned as Hiro knelt beside her, his face streaked with blood, both black and red. Gratitude blossomed in Kai’s chest as she quickly moved to Chiya’s feet, lifting her together with Hiro. They carried Chiya though the doors of the great hall before lowering her gently to the floor.

  Chiya’s eyes fluttered and opened as they settled her down. She reached out one hand to Tanu, who pressed against her hip, whimpering softly.

  As Kai knelt down beside Chiya, her eye caught sight of a broken body across the great hall, still in a pool of dark blood. Silver hair stained red.

  “Who is that?” Kai whispered.

  “Leilu,” Hiro said, the word an apology.

  Kai squeezed her eyes closed, images of the first night she had met her friend swimming into view. Sitting at a table in the Fox and Fiddle with Maaya and Emi and Stela and Leilu. Leilu’s mischievous smile as she ordered another plate of noodles and a second bottle of sake. Flirting with Stela’s friends and feeling carefree and alive and welcomed amongst these women, who’d taken her in as one of their own.

  “Oh, Leilu.” Kai keened, her heart splintering at the loss of another friend.

  Chiya coughed and Kai opened her eyes, struggling to shift from one sorrow to another.

  “Don’t move,” Kai said. “I think your ribs are broken. We’ll send a burner to guard you.”

  Chiya gripped her hand as Kai turned to stand. “On the island,” Chiya said. She coughed, and blood flecked on her lips.

  “Don’t try to talk,” Kai said.

  Chiya’s grip tightened as she ignored Kai’s instructions. “On the island…I was hurt. I said things I didn’t mean.”

  “You’ll have plenty of time to tell me this after the battle,” Kai said. “When you’ve healed.”

  “There may be no…after the battle.” Chiya coughed again.

  Kai looked at Hiro and saw her reluctant assessment mirrored on his face. Chiya’s condition was grave.

  “…Proud to be your sister.”

  “I’m proud to be your sister, too,” Kai said. Chiya’s words were a balm to her wounded spirit, her grief, her anger and disappointment at herself. “There’s no one I’d rather have as part of my family. After this is all over, I’ll tell you everything about our father, all his annoying traits. He would whistle this horrible song…” Kai trailed off as Chiya smiled, her teeth coated in crimson blood.

  “He would have loved you so much,” Kai said, tears pricking in her eyes. “You would have driven each other crazy, of course. Stubborn as mules, the both of you.”

  “You’re…one to talk,” Chiya managed as a triumphant demon cry sounded from the courtyard outside.

  “Kai.” Hiro laid a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “We have to go. I think something’s happening. I’ve found a burner to guard Chiya.”

  A burner Kai recognized from the citadel stood behind him, two short swords bloody in her hands.

  “We’ll talk about all of this after the battle,” Kai said to Chiya, trying to stand. “Catch up on everything.”

  Chiya pulled at Kai’s hand, not letting her go. “You’re…a good queen. I’ve always…thought so.”

  “Thank you,” Kai whispered.

  She stood as Chiya’s hand fell from her grip.

  Hiro ushered her out through the doors, and as Kai looked back at her sister, she couldn’t help the feeling that she was seeing her for the last time.

  CHAPTER 40

  Though the battle was still raging fiercely, it had taken a turn. Somehow, Yukina had wounded Tsuki, and blood now poured from a wound in the goddess’s shoulder.

  Yukina howled in triumph and redoubled its efforts, slashing at Tsuki with a long, thin dagger in one hand and gouts of flame from the other.

  The goddess stumbled backwards and looked as if she would fall.

  “Tsuki!” Kai screamed, pulling white light into her qi to burn Yukina out of this world.

  But it was too late. Yukina’s blade buried itself in the goddess’s chest to the hilt. When the tengu pulled the sword out, the goddess fell to the stones in a shower of silver blood.

  The moon, hanging low in the sky, winked out.

  Kai stood still as a statue, the life drained out of her. Leilu was dead. Chiya was dying. And the moon was gone. Gone.

  It was Nanase who broke first from the daze and disbelief that had struck the moonburners. “Keep fighting,” she screamed, felling an Order member who ventured too close to the arc of her swinging sword.

  The others followed suit, throwing themselves back into the fray, weapons slashing, hacking at tengu and masked Order members. Hiro dashed across the courtyard to take on one of the huge tengu that was being harried by multiple burners and was ripe for attack.

  But Kai couldn’t move. They had lost. Tsuki and Taiyo were dead. All light and life in this world was gone. What was the point of going on?

  “Kai!” Quitsu screamed at her from below, appearing through the mass of booted feet and scratching claws.

  Yukina, freed from its fight with the goddess, was now prowling the battlefield. The massive demon stalked towards Kai, the dagger in its hand, still dripping with Tsuki’s blood.

  Kai looked on, soaking in the violence and bloodshed that she had caused like salt rubbed in a wound. Chiya may have said Kai was a good queen, but it was a lie. Kai had set them on this path. It had been her idea to free Tsuki and Taiyo. She had caused this. Let the Order fool her into handing over the gods. Handing over her world. Her people. It was time she paid for what she did.

  Yukina stopped before Kai, a deep chuckle emanating from the demon’s throat.

  Kai didn’t care that the demon was mocking her. None of it mattered anymore. She had been a child playing at being queen. And she had destroyed
everything.

  As Yukina drew back to strike, a flash of white crashed into her, toppling the tengu onto her back. The tengu fell with a thunderous boom and an immense white form clawed at it, ripping its face and body with sharp talons.

  It was the seishen elder, pure white against the blackness.

  It leaped from Yukina’s prone form and landed in front of Kai, a fearsome sight with red eyes and glorious outstretched wings. “I told you to let them be,” it shouted at Kai.

  Tears sprang to her eyes as shame welled up inside of her. She hadn’t listened. She deserved whatever punishment it had come to bestow upon her. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “For everything.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” it said. “Make it right.”

  It reached out an eagle-like arm and pinned her against the wall. It was going to kill her. And she probably deserved it. She had destroyed its world.

  But when its talons made contact with the handprint on Kai’s chest, they didn’t dig into her flesh. Instead, a white light burst out from her chest and enveloped her and the elder.

  Kai gasped in surprise, and with a swift motion, the elder reached out with its other arm and poured a vial of liquid down her throat. Pure sweet water. From the lake that had healed Emi. It had to be.

  For as soon as the water passed her lips, Kai’s vision exploded into bright white. Images and memories flashed before her. The creator. Sitting with him on this very rooftop, looking at the sea. And then she was him, seeing through his eyes. The beginning of the world. How he’d formed the universe into three realms, banishing the tengu to the demon realm, sealing it off. Then the spirit realm. Creating the sun and the moon, setting them in the sky, bright and cheerful to give life and light to the world he had created. And then the mortal world, shaping mountains, dotting the land with green, washing the earth with blue seas. The first seishen, guardians of the mortal realm, colossal majestic beings that walked the earth and soared through the sky and swam the seas with their burners at their sides. She saw all of it. Knew all of it.