I stared at my sister. She ignored me, calmly tapping the excess ink from her brush. She bowed her head again over the star chart, which was so long and wide it needed eight stones to pin it to the table. I glared at the side of Lusha’s head, contemplating grabbing one of the inksticks and grinding it into her careful drawings. Biter, one of Lusha’s ravens, gave me a warning crrrk from his perch on the windowsill.
“You’re going with him,” I repeated.
Lusha made no reply. The paper rustled as she shifted position.
“You didn’t say a word to me.” I kept my tone even through sheer force of will.
“There was no reason to.”
I shot Tem a look, but he only shook his head. He was hovering by the open door frame of the observatory, as if ready to dart away at a moment’s notice.
My sister glanced at me, her large eyes narrowing, as if she couldn’t comprehend what I was still doing here. Lusha wasn’t beautiful in the traditional sense, or even particularly pretty, with her thin face and ears that stuck out like the handles of a vase. But she was tall, with limbs like willow boughs, and eyes that flashed when she smiled. Her thick hair swirled to her shoulders like liquid night, appearing to be in motion even when there was no wind to stir it. Every week it seemed there was a new man falling tragically in love with her. Tragic for them—Lusha never seemed to take much notice of anything apart from astronomy. Plotting the courses of the moon and stars, tracking the constellations, and predicting future events based on their movements—it was a rare gift, more intuition than power. She had been even more obsessive about it recently, sometimes staying up all night and appearing late at the breakfast table with shadowed eyes and ink-stained hands. Whenever I remarked on her behavior, I was just met with a blank look, or, more commonly, a pointed comment about my own indulgent sleeping habits.
I wrapped my arms around my body, chilled even in my heavy chuba. The seer’s observatory, perched high above the village, beyond even the goatherds’ huts, was lined with windows with neither curtains nor shutters. There was a large square hole at the highest point in the roof, through which the wind whistled perpetually. The salt candleholders lining the table somehow only increased the feeling of cold as their small flames shivered in the breeze, permeating the air with a sharp, briny taste.
“Why would he need you?” The question just slipped out, harsher than I meant it.
Lusha gave me a stern look. She was only two years older than me, but it often felt like more.
“Because I can help him,” she said.
“With what?”
She seemed not to hear me. “I was honored that he would seek my assistance. We should all be honored. If the expedition goes well, Azmiri will win favor with the emperor.”
“Well, you will, anyway,” I muttered. It was typical of Lusha to assume that her own triumphs would somehow improve the world. Perhaps knowing from birth that you were destined to become an elder had something to do with it.
I edged closer, trying to get a glimpse of her worktable. But I saw no maps there, nothing that could give me a clue about this mysterious expedition. Only endless star charts—piles and piles of them. There were more scattered around the observatory, furled and leaning against walls, or hanging from nails hammered between the stonework.
“What are you doing?” I said. “Counting every star in the sky?”
Lusha’s brow furrowed as she traced a constellation with an inky finger. “I’m trying to work something out,” she muttered into the table.
I blew out my breath. I was used to my sister’s vagueness, but this was too much. “Lusha, why is River here? What does he want with you?”
She was quiet for so long I thought she was not going to answer. “I’m going to lead him to Mount Raksha.”
There was a loud clatter. Tem had knocked over one of Lusha’s wooden telescope stands. He stared at her, his eyes round as coins. I knew that my own expression was a mirror of his.
“Raksha?” I could barely get the word out. “He wants to climb Raksha?”
“Yes.”
“But why?”
“I don’t know. I only know that the emperor places a great deal of importance upon him doing so, and quickly. I’m to lead him there before the winter storms set in. Once we leave Azmiri, we’ll stop for nothing.”
“But why you?”
She gave me a hard look. “Because I’m one of only two people living who knows the way.”
The wind swirled through the observatory, smelling of night and snow. But this wasn’t the reason I shivered. The memories were, memories that stirred in my mind like a wind that heralded a storm.
“Are you mad?” I said.
“Not to my knowledge.” Lusha turned back to her star charts. “Now, Kamzin, if you could go someplace else? I’m really quite busy.”
I stood there, motionless, for a full minute. Lusha did not raise her head or give any sign that she was aware of me. I could have been a wayward comet in a constellation that did not interest her.
Finally, I stormed out, Tem trailing behind me.
Back in my room, I upended one of my clothes chests, spilling scarves and dresses across the already messy floor. I opened my cabinet and rifled through scrolls, tossing several onto the pile.
“Kamzin,” Tem said, “what are you doing?”
“I threw another scroll over my shoulder. Ragtooth, sleeping on my pillow, let out a growl. He opened one green eye to gaze at me.
“I can’t believe she agreed to this,” I raged. “I bet she doesn’t remember the way.”
“Do you remember the way?”
I didn’t answer immediately. The memories were old—I had been barely eleven—and I didn’t like thinking about them. It had been the first and last time Lusha and I had been allowed to join my mother on one of her expeditions. We’d set out in a large group, accompanied by several shamans and healers. Our goal was to search for new paths through the Arya Mountains—paths that could be taken by the emperor’s armies, or his enemies—and it had taken us within sighting distance of Raksha, the highest mountain in the world. Higher than the stars, the legends said. On the way back, half our party had been killed in an avalanche. A storm in Winding Pass had claimed more lives. My mother had barely managed to save Lusha and me.
“Yes,” I said quietly. “I remember.”
After my mother’s death, Lusha and I became the only living survivors of an expedition to that distant place. Yesterday, this hadn’t seemed significant.
It was now.
Tem rubbed his face. He looked tired—these last few days, he had been out late into the night, helping his father with the herds. “This isn’t like Lusha. She’s not usually reckless, and this goes beyond that.”
Shaking off the memories, I murmured in vague agreement, tossing another scroll onto the pile. Raksha was said to be unclimbable. Only a single explorer had ever attempted it—a man named Mingma, some fifty years ago. The only two survivors of his expedition—both of whom had died before I was born—wrote of black crevasses hidden beneath the snows, of ferocious storms and blizzards, and of sheer walls of ice hundreds of feet high. The mountain was said to be the abode of monsters, and cursed by spirits as ancient and unyielding as the glaciers. Even to lay eyes upon it was considered bad luck.
I found the scroll I was looking for. The light was fading, and I whistled for one of the house dragons. The beast that nested in the back corner of my room uncoiled himself sleepily and fluttered to my side. I dug the sour apples out of my pocket and placed them on a dish—dragons will eat almost anything—and he set upon them with enthusiastic gnashing and gnawing. Immediately, the faint glow radiating from his belly brightened enough to chase the shadows away. I bent over the scroll again, following the lines with my fingertip.
“Kamzin.”
I jumped. Tem was standing behind me, looking over my shoulder.
“What?”
“If you think climbing Raksha is madness, why are you lookin
g at a map of the Nightwood?”
I didn’t reply. The witches’ forest was a dark stain, with little in the way of labeled features—few explorers had visited it, fewer still had returned. It encroached upon the only viable route to Raksha, a grueling, northward hike through the Arya Mountains’ eastern foothills, which lay outside the domain of the Empire.
“Why are you really upset?” Tem’s voice held an undercurrent of anger. “Because Lusha is risking her life on a fool’s errand? Or because you want to be in her place?”
I let the scroll curl back up, turning to face him. “I thought you understood. You said you would help me.”
“That was before I knew what it would mean.” There was no hesitation in Tem’s voice now, as he met my eyes. “How can you even consider this? You saw what happened to your mother’s expedition. You were there.”
“I won’t make the same mistakes my mother did.”
Tem muttered something under his breath.
“What?”
“I said, you’re unbelievable.” His face was pale. “What do you expect to gain from this?”
“Everything!” I slashed the scroll through the air. “Tem, this is River Shara. If I can impress him, I could be leading my own expeditions for the emperor one day. Imagine—me in a tahrskin chuba.”
Tem didn’t need to ask what I meant. All the emperor’s explorers—only the emperor’s explorers—wore chubas made from skins of the mountain tahr, a rare and exceptionally difficult beast to hunt. A single skin could fetch enough gold to buy half a village. The tahr were born with coats of sooty brown, which gradually lightened to white as they aged. Hides of each color were stitched together to make a coat as warm as it was lightweight, and two-sided—the dark a perfect camouflage for forest travel, the light allowing the explorer to blend in against the snow. In a tahrskin chuba, you became part of the landscape itself.
“You would throw your life away for that?” Tem said.
“I’m not throwing my life away.” My own anger was rising. “Are you saying I can’t do this?”
“I think you can do anything,” he said quietly. “That’s what scares me.”
“So are you going to help me or not?” I turned away from him and began digging through the heap of clothes. I needed something that would make me look older, and imposing. More like Lusha.
“Tem?”
Silence.
I turned around. “Don’t be—”
I stopped. I was talking to a room of dragonlight and dusty scrolls. Tem was gone.
THREE
THE ECHOES OF the dinner bells had long since quieted by the time I entered the banquet hall. I had planned to arrive after Lusha, so as to be the one everybody would stare at when I swept dramatically into the room. But, to my annoyance, my sister wasn’t there yet. The few people who glanced up at my arrival soon looked away again, unimpressed.
I gazed around, momentarily overwhelmed. Father had spared no expense in welcoming the Royal Explorer to Azmiri. So many villagers had shown up that they spilled into the yard, where a roaring bonfire provided relief from the mountain cold. Guests lounged on bamboo benches that lined the stone-paved hall, or crowded around the central hearth, drinking raksi. The wooden pillars that held up the high, flat roof were adorned with brightly patterned tapestries, which, combined with the murals, gave the room a colorful, chaotic appearance. Dragons threaded their way sinuously through the crowd or perched on stone shelves that lined the walls, suffusing the hall with a shifting glow as they begged alternately for scraps and ear rubs from sympathetic guests. Because they were so costly to breed and maintain, Father liked to have as many dragons around as possible when trying to impress important guests. This, however, was more than I had ever seen in one place. Father must have borrowed some for the occasion from other villagers. Guests waded cautiously through the sea of scales and flickering light, nudging aside the beasts with their feet.
I had never seen anything like it.
A nervous shiver traveled down my spine. For a moment, I wondered what I was doing. River Shara was the most powerful man in the emperor’s court, and the hero of so many fireside stories it was sometimes difficult to believe that a living version of him existed. He was known for his ability to climb mountains like a snow leopard, find uncanny routes to safety through enemy lands, and hike for days over grueling terrain without wearying. What he was not known for was either patience or sympathy. It was said that when one of his assistants betrayed him, he had hunted the man down, stripped him of his clothes, and left him tied to a tree in a frozen mountain pass.
But I knew I would never have another chance like this. Taking a deep breath, I plunged into the sea of chattering guests.
“Kamzin!” It was Litas, one of the village boys. “Is it true? You met River Shara?”
“I saw him land, but—”
It was the wrong thing to say. Three of Litas’s friends pressed close, their eyes wide. “How big was the balloon?” said one.
“Did you speak to him?” another demanded. “Is it true that the barbarians cut off both his earlobes”—the girl pressed her hands against her head, mimicking earlessness—“and now he can hear leaves rustling ten miles away?”
I sighed, reeling off a brief description of what Tem and I had witnessed. The children listened with fascination, pelting me with more questions. How tall was River? Did the balloon bear the emperor’s insignia? How many shamans did River have, and had they announced his arrival with lightning and fireworks? It was some time before I was able to satisfy their curiosity enough to escape.
I scanned the room. Scattered among the crowd, mostly in small groups, were men and women who could only be members of River Shara’s entourage. They all had the same Three Cities look—as if a dye shop had thrown up on them, as I had once sneeringly remarked to Tem. I had never been to the Three Cities or the emperor’s magnificent court, with its glittering pagodas and fragrant gardens—nor had most villagers, given that it was a weeks-long journey along a winding trade road favored by bandits—and I had no desire to, judging by the people who lived there. Blue hair seemed to be the fashion now, and they wore theirs curled and woven with silver charms that looked as though they would be an awful trial to remove. Instead of chubas, they were draped in wispy cloaks of dark green.
I had no idea what River looked like, but it wasn’t a stretch to assume he would be the center of attention. Soon enough, I found him.
He was as handsome as the stories said, with a wide mouth, tousled hair, and broad shoulders. He stood several inches above the tallest man in the room, but even without this, there was something about him that drew the eye. An odd, uneven scar extended from the edge of his temple across the bridge of his nose, halving his face. He wore the same elaborate costume as the other Three Cities guests, but his hair was undyed. Consequently, it was easy to see that he was graying at the temples. Deep furrows extended from the corners of his eyes, though he was far from an old man—perhaps thirty or so.
That gave me pause. Given River Shara’s reputation and accomplishments, I had expected someone close to Father’s age. Still, there was no mistaking the curious crowd of villagers gathered around him, listening intently as he spoke. He had an expressive manner, moving his hands as if painting his story in the air.
I smoothed my dress, which was dark blue with fox-fur trim. It was the finest I owned—or rather, the finest Lusha owned. She never bothered with the luxurious clothes her suitors bought for her, and I doubted she would even notice it was missing. I had altered it, of course, from her narrow measurements to my stouter ones. Around my neck I wore my whitest silk scarf, edged with gold stitches, and beaded earrings hung past my shoulders, clinking softly when I moved my head. The outfit felt strange, almost like a costume—my lessons with Chirri were usually outdoors, and involved messiness in some form, so I spent most of my days in plain tunics and sheepskin trousers. But I knew I had to do something to make up for my otherwise unfortunate appearance. My bronze
skin was burned from the fierce sunlight that had beat down while I crouched over the dragon eggs, and my hands were scaly with a rash I had acquired helping Chirri prepare a healing salve. I hadn’t had time to exorcise all the tangles from my waist-length dark hair, and during my frenzied brushing I had broken several of the tines of my comb, which I was certain were now lodged somewhere behind my head.
Tem wasn’t there. He must have been angry enough to risk insulting my family by not attending the welcome banquet. Either that, or his father had ordered him to tend to the herds, not an uncommon occurrence. I tried to ignore the twinge of disappointment. Although I was still angry with him, his familiar presence would have been a comfort.
River had come to the end of his story, and seemed to be excusing himself from the hangers-on. He began making his way to the barrel of raksi.
I glanced over my shoulder. Where was Father? It was the height of rudeness to allow a guest, particularly one of River’s stature, to serve himself.
An idea slid into place.
I flew across the room, dodging elderly aunts and uncles and neighbors. More than one greeting was tossed at me, and I did my best to mumble and smile my way through them. I made it to the barrel a heartbeat before River did.
“More raksi?” I said breathlessly.
He paused, taking in my flustered appearance. Then, with a smoothness that reminded me of pulling on an old cloak, he flashed me a broad, wolfish smile.
“You read my mind,” he said, handing me his bowl.
I smiled back, quaking with nervousness while I maneuvered the bowl under the spout. I turned the spigot too hard, and wine splashed to the floor, spattering him.
“I’m so sorry—” I stammered, horrified.
“No matter,” he said, grasping my shoulder as I bent to brush at the stains. It was a rather firm squeeze, though he smiled still.
I refilled his bowl with shaking hands, cursing myself. “Forgive me, dyonpo Shara, I didn’t—”
He gave me a sharp look. “I’m afraid you’ve mistaken me. My name is Mara.”
Even the Darkest Stars Page 2