If someone could love—were they capable of such evils? Of making two siblings fight to the death? Was Lore capable of that?
I look into her eyes now and I do not see that glint. That glint of humility. That glint of happiness and love. Instead, I see a barren landscape. A place devoid of anything.
She has changed.
We all have.
Lore's smile is wide as her lips spread to their breaking point. Her lids lower slightly as she makes no move to speak. As she only accepts the silence and my thoughts.
“You're the nightingale.”
A breath—a snort. She laughs and my tone is dejected—broken because she's had to force the words out of me. She's had to force me to realize that anyone—absolutely anyone was capable of evil. Even someone I loved so much. Even Lore.
“Correct.”
I want to hang my head, but I cannot. Lore hovers over me, her aura intimidating and dark. Though I feel broken, I cannot show it. Though I feel dejected and powerless, I cannot let her know that I am. I must hide the fact that what she has become has utterly broken me.
“How could this happen?” I blurt. The words coming out like vomit. “Lore—whatever happened to you—how could you become so…” I shake my head, not wanting to judge her. Not wanting to assume, but the word's there. Right on the tip of my tongue. Waiting to roll out.
This grin is tiny. Small. I see a flash of remorse in her pale eyes. “Hana has forgotten you. Tonight, all of Tsubame has. I've been to the west, Naia. I've seen what the world could become, and Hinata and I plan to stop it. We plan to end these ceaseless wars by a single means. A single weapon.” she breathes—I gasp.
I bring my hands to my sides. I clench them into fists. “What do you mean they've all forgotten me? How is that possible? I've lived here for almost a year now!”
“My birds are in every tree.” is her answer. A whisper that taunts me. That makes me see red.
“I've reconnected with Hana—made friends here. I've made friends—,”
Pale green eyes flash. “It is time that you became more than what you are, Naia. I know what you are capable of—what your voice is capable of.” her single hand strikes out—grabs my shoulder. Throws me off balance. Holds my arm as I teeter over the edge of the pathway. As I look down into a black abyss of nothing. “Do you see that drop, Naia? You could fall. Break every bone in your body, and his magic could keep you alive. You would heal in minutes. Seconds. Imagine—if your body is that powerful beneath his curse, how powerful could your voice become, girl? How powerful?” her voice is a crazed hiss in my ear as wind wafts up from below and throws my hair around me. Lore pulls me back and I hit the dark wall of the castle. I catch my breath. “You will be my tool now. Mine to bend and shape—just like you were back at the Orthella, remember? Do you remember, Naia?”
I round on her—my head light. My face hot. “I have made a life for myself here! As I am! I will not be your tool—,”
“Then Hana will die.”
My mouth opens. Closes.
“Then Corin will die. Sunan. Ken.” she grins. “I began with Hue. Rin warped his mind, made him believe I forced him to kill his brother, when he chose to do so of his own accord. He wanted power, like all of my little birds do. I'll kill them all, Naia. How would you like to live in a graveyard of your friends? Would you like that? I could bring Akane's body back. Make the headless body dance…”
My teeth clench. The tears come.
“…oh, I could bring Chima. Nyx. How would you like to see her crushed head? Or the other one's flayed body? How would you like to see all of your old friends?—”
“Stop!”
She smiles. Offers a hand.
That I take.
29. Silver Ringing
It is like a fog has crept into my mind as Lore takes me. Leads me around a sharp bend in the stony skyway and through a wide arch that's cut into the side of the castle. Moonlight doesn't come here. It doesn't spill into this darkness, and I'm surrounded by the black as she tugs me. As she picks up the pace and I notice flickering candlelight held high by steel candelabras is snuffed out when she rushes by. Blown out by a single gust of wind. It is a harrowing whistle that glides past me. That makes me shiver.
Her hand tightens around my forearm. It slides down to choke my wrist as she makes a sharp right and stops before a single wooden door. Taps upon it. Stills herself in the silence before throwing the sliding door open. She yanks me in, ripping me from the dark corridor and into a room that's dim with pulsating orange light. The room is small. It reminds me of my room back at the Orthella, though there's no bed. A single window at the back is covered with black paper and there's a candelabra before it. Flame grows on its high wick. Grows and shivers when Lore glares at it.
When a man stands before it, his shadow engulfs the room. Swallows the firelight whole before it burns brighter behind him. It litters his face with shadows. A young face.
A blank one.
“We need to be quick about this.” he hisses. Slender dark eyes move to the corner of the room before they focus back on Lore. “It's good you haven't spilt blood.”
“Yes.” Lore responds beside me. “Isn't it.” and she pushes me towards the man. When I look to the wooden floorboards of the room, I notice a large circle drawn in red. A deep crimson. My feet step before its boundaries and I freeze.
I remember Hue's story.
But it was false. A voice tells me. Concocted. Made up. He killed his brother of his own accord. For power.
Power.
A single hand comes to my shoulder. “The power you'll receive, Naia, will help us push forward.”
“How much have you told her?” comes the man's voice. It is soft. Calming. Slow, like the falling of snow.
“Enough.” Lore's fingers begin to bite into my shoulder and I try to shrug her off. “Don't get fearful now, Naia. Remember who you're doing this for. Remember what will happen if you fail.”
And I do. I think of Hana—what she has sacrificed to get Tsubame. To get her title.
I couldn't let her down. I couldn't be a coward now.
But I don't want to be her tool.
“Please—please tell me what's going to happen. What I have to do—Lore, please—,”
I see the man's eyes flash.
“Hinata?” Lore's voice. A sigh.
Hinata's shoulders rise. They fall. “She wouldn't understand. Not until she sees…”
I swallow.
Lore pushes me—shoves me towards the line and I take a lurching step towards it. I freeze. “Maybe I can—maybe I will understand!”
There's a deep chuckle. A pause and a breath. “Your voice—your breath is beautiful.” Lore shoves me again—until I'm fully in the circle and Hinata takes two quick steps towards me. I bring my hands up as I tremble—as he comes too close and I'm pressing on his chest. He brushes his nose through my hair. A set of sour fingers slide across my cheek and he lowers his face to mine. A long face. With dark eyes drawn by the gods. “I wonder…” He breathes. I freeze.
Cold steel kisses my neck.
“…how beautiful your voice will sound when you scream.”
30. Virtue's Fare
I refuse to give this man the satisfaction of my voice. Of my breath. Of my scream.
The dagger edges away. Glints in the firelight.
As Hinata's gaze flickers away from me.
And steel enters my ribcage through its center. Ripping through me as I hunch over. As I open my mouth—but no sound comes. As a hand takes my shoulder from behind and whirls me around. Blows white powder into my face—like snow. It blinds me. Makes me sweat—and now I scream. Now I feel the alien object lodged in between my bones that does not belong there. My heart thunders in my chest—blood rushing through my ears. Spilling onto me. Spilling from me as the knife is dislodged and I'm blinded.
Blinded by white.
…
Why have you come?
You do not belong here.
&nbs
p; Go back. Go back to your world.
No.
Bring this new child to me.
When I was nothing more than a child, I belonged to the streets. Like so many others. The drudge wars took my parents. Took them and threw them to the four circles of the underworld. To the void. To the barren wastes where the purposeless go. Where those who have died in unholy wars are banished to.
My eyes open.
My hands clutch charred ground. Blackened by flame. Red veins pump angrily through the rough dirt and I hoist myself up. I choke. I clutch my chest and my hand comes away bloody.
I'm dying.
My breath comes in unsteady coughs. Blood pools beneath me, but I push myself away from it. From the rough black dirt and its pulsating veins—I push myself away and breathe.
But the atmosphere is heavy. Beaten down with burning cinder and thick smoke. I cough. I choke. I feel myself slipping away as I fight to push myself onto my hands and knees. The ground is slick with my blood and my stomach flips. My body wants to heave.
Footsteps in the black. It churns up dust.
A hand reaches towards me. It is naked. Tanned.
I tremble. I reach for it—but the movement's too much and I fall—
—but the person reaches down to catch me. To pull me up. She places a hand to my chest and looks into my face as I struggle to look into hers.
“Yarne.” comes my voice—my breath. “Mother Yarne.”
An old face. Kind. Lined with heavy wrinkles of love. Tan. Large eyes wrinkle at their corners and she's smiling despite the blackened landscape that surrounds her. She's smiling despite the death. Despite the blood that pools around her hand as she holds it tight to my chest.
But she closes her eyes. Shakes her head. “I am mother to all, now.” she murmurs. Opens her eyes as fingers twist upon my wound and air leaves me. For a moment, I cannot breathe as her fingers curl. As they dance and slip themselves inside of the deep gash upon my chest. I watch her hand disappear and my vision becomes dark. But she calls me back. “Stay with me.” she says. “You cannot die here.”
It is a command and my eyes snap open. I wheeze—I suck at the air for breath but it does not come. There's a subtle ringing in my ears that resembles the pealing cry of a well played flute—but it becomes a scream. A screech and Yarne's got her hand around something inside of me now. She's clutching it and my blood freezes. Everything in me goes ice cold, and for a moment—I look into her eyes.
As they disappear. As her irises engulf the whole of her eyes, turning everything black. Everything.
Take what you are owed.
A voice booms—explodes around me and my heart's beating in her hand—she's pulling. She pulls.
This child will live to see warlords and emperors fall.
A wet gush springs from me. My chest cries and I'm crying—but I choke. I choke as liquid surges up through my throat and trickles upon my lips. Down my face. Upon Yarne's outstretched arm as she slowly throws back her head. Black hair reaches her hips—slithers down her legs.
Her dress is scarlet satin.
But, she must learn to take.
The sky is red. Clouds are moving—moving—and Yarne's hand is retreating. I fall to my knees, hands in the dirt. Hands covered by the black.
She must learn to take.
I breathe. I choke. The air comes. The bleeding stops. I bring my hand to my chest.
My heart—
I bring my gaze to Yarne—
—as her lips open. Her mouth engulfs it. She swallows a piece of me and my gaze falls back to the ground as I feel my heart in her mouth. As her teeth bite into the muscle—ripping it apart. Slicing it to nothing as she swallows. As it disappears, and it's a part of her now—my beating heart is a part of her.
Why am I still here? And gravel piles under my fingernails when I clutch it. When I grab at it.
What have I done to deserve this?
“Sing, child.” Yarne's voice. Yarne's command. “Show me what the dark god has blessed you with.”
I can't—I can't—
I hang my head. I bite my lip. I feel the tears come as she stands to hover over me. She plants a hand to my back. Pats me. Rakes her fingernails across me with a swift swipe of her hand.
What have I done to deserve this?
Sing.
I open my mouth.
31. A Flighty Heart
I sing.
I sing, and the black ground goes away. Yarne vanishes, and my hands are pressing on blackened floorboards now. I'm in the room from before, but the circle's gone. Sunlight struggles to slither through the black paper upon a small window, the white light dying when it attempts to touch the floor.
I bring myself up onto all fours. My knees dig into the rough surface of the ground as I breathe. As I heave, my back arching towards the ceiling. My breathing is fast—uncontrolled—and I bring a hand to my chest. I move it towards my heart and I cough. I choke—air catching in my throat as it constricts painfully. My hand finds the floor as my heart doesn't beat. It finds the floor and I hang my head—biting my lip. Ignoring the tears that crawl down my face as I wince. As I slam my palms to the ground and mourn what's been taken from me.
White hot pain explodes from my right side as a hard boot rams itself into me. Pushes me over, and I realize I'm naked save for my bindings and underclothes. There's a sudden rush of heat to my face—but I ignore it. I ignore the pain that screams from my side, and stand. I face my attacker with clenched fists and a splitting headache that makes me see red.
That makes me see the dead.
The will to fight drains from me. As does all color. My face blanches—I am barely able to breathe as she leers at me. Freckled face twisted. A ruinous scar slices through her neck. “Akane?”
Her green eyes are gone. Faraway. Curly red hair is matted. Matted with blood and dirt.
“You said you wouldn't do this!” I throw my head back—I scream because I know she's here. I know she's watching. “I've done as you asked, Lore—and you said—,”
But Akane rushes me. Tackles me and slams me to the ground with her fingers digging into my shoulders like sharp talons. They bite at me—rake skin from me and I cry out. I cry out as more tears come—as I stare into murky eyes that aren't there. That can't truly see me.
How could she be so cruel?
Akane is like lightning, her movements quick as she moves to rake my face with her nails. Luck allows me to catch her wrist—to choke it in an iron grip fed by fear.
“Lore!”
A snicker. Akane pauses—her face barren. Devoid of life—of humanity. Faraway eyes gaze upon me as I hear footsteps slowly walk from the back of the room. A figure comes to stand over me with pursed lips. Black covers her in a sweeping dress that creeps along the ground like a growing shadow, and I feel its rough fabric brush my naked leg. I watch her raise an arm and open her hand wide—fingers splayed. Like she's playing with a puppet—and Akane moves once more. Peering into my face before pressing her hands upon both of my cheeks.
Her hands slither towards my throat.
“This is a test.” the woman murmurs. Frowns. “Fail, and we will know you are not worthy.”
And the woman backs away, slowly. Silently. Disappearing into the shadows as I scream. As I buck wildly against Akane's icy grip—but it's too much. These were the hands that kept me safe at night. That played with my hair and brought electric to my skin when she touched me. When she grasped for me in her sleep and curled around me.
“You're gone…you're supposed to be dead…” I whisper to her, staring into those far away eyes as limp fingers curve around my throat. “…that scar on your neck—a soldier beheaded you!”
But it does not phase her as her grip slowly tightens. As she grunts and straddles me—her knees tight to my body. Hugging me. She smells like the earth. Like dirt and dead things.
Akane's body rises, her hands rising as she pulls me up by my throat.
Towards the back of the room, I hear a voic
e: “Why won't you sing?”
Lore's voice—the nightingale's voice—and I want to scream back—what good would that do?!
But I remember what Yarne did to me.
My heart is gone.
I'm cursed.
But I have been blessed with tremendous power.
Yarne gave me a voice.
I open my mouth as Akane begins to crush my windpipe—forcing the air from me. Constricting my throat and closing it up—but the words come out when I sing. A voice that is not my own—like thunder, like a powerful thunderclap screeching through silence—sings. Calms Akane. Makes her eyes roll back into her head as her fingers uncurl, freeing me and I slink to the ground. I'm on my knees when her body slams to the floorboards. When there's a sharp grunt from the back of the room and the woman in black presents herself with twitching fingers firmly planted in front of her. Her face is going red—her lips twisting into a snarl that's all sharp teeth. Her gaze snaps from Akane to me—to a shadow towards her right.
“You said that this would be easy—that it was her time.”
A low rumble of laughter. A snort, and Lore's out of the shadows. Stepping towards me—but stops at Akane's body. I watch the sides of her lips slide into a grin. “The dark god has chosen his gateway. Our gateway. Naia,” my hands slap to the floor as I close my mouth. As the world spins around me. “it is time you learned your purpose.”
…
I'm given a shift to hide my nakedness before the woman in black forces me out into the hallway. The brightness of the corridor is blinding when I'm out of that small room. Lore is leading me, with an undead Akane at my back followed by the woman in black.
She leads me up the corridor, away from the open archway at our backs. Sunlight shades the hallway in a dim white that peels away from us the further we go up the corridor. When the hallway forks two ways, Lore takes a right and I'm forced to follow as servants and wide-eyed residents flatten themselves to the walls with haste that reeks of fear. I hear people crossing themselves. Hushed voices murmur prayers or spit wards against our presence as we pass.
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