Even the Darkest Stars

by Heather Fawcett

  “Greatness is overrated,” River said. “Norbu is one of my oldest friends. He’s a trustworthy man.”

  “As in we can trust him to protect us, or we can trust him to lead us over a cliff?”

  River let out a short laugh. “Shall we leave cliff navigation to your shaman, Kamzin?”

  “I’m going to get Tem to look at these tracks,” I said, turning. “He’ll know a spell that can identify them.”

  “What tracks?” River said, and then, before I could stop him, scuffed them rapidly with his boot.

  “River!” I cried, grabbing his arm. But it was too late—all traces of the mysterious markings had been obliterated.

  “You worry too much,” he said. “You’ll never make a good explorer if you’re always troubling yourself over things that don’t matter. Though I have to admit, I’m flattered by your concern. What would you have done if I had been eaten by a wild animal?”

  I glared at him. I was still holding his arm, and released it hurriedly. “After I finished celebrating, you mean?”

  He began to laugh. I left him to it and went to collect my breakfast. I hunched over my bowl, muttering to myself. Tem appeared moments later, and gave me a strange look.

  “What’s wrong now?”

  “Oh, just River,” I said, taking a vicious chomp out of a piece of dried yak meat. “I think he’s trying to drive me as mad as he is.”

  Tem, for some reason, looked irritated at this. “Right. I’m sure that’s what he’s doing.”

  I finished my breakfast and stared mournfully into the empty bowl. “I can’t believe I thought these rations would be enough.”

  Tem, who had barely taken a bite of his sampa cake, handed it to me. “Here.”

  I pushed it away. “You need to keep up your strength.” Tem still looked tired from yesterday’s hike. I hoped and prayed that his body would adjust to the demands of the journey.

  He shook his head, coughing. “I don’t like how Dargye makes it. Too salty.”

  “I think at this point I would eat dirt if it wouldn’t make me sick.”

  We were packed and ready to depart within the hour. I gave the yak one final inspection, checking that her straps were secure but not too tight, and that her hooves were in good condition. If the beast were to sustain an injury, it would be disastrous. I rubbed the base of her horns, and she grunted with pleasure.

  “Did you see anything strange last night?” I murmured, stroking her hair, which had a silky texture and smelled like summer grass. She gazed at me with her large, mournful brown eyes, as if she knew the answer to my question, and it was very dark indeed. The shadows were deep around us, and would remain so until midday, in this land of sharp valleys and snowy peaks that scraped the sky. Shaking off my apprehension, I gave the yak’s lead a tug and we set out, the others falling into step behind us.

  “Dare you to jump in,” Tem said after dinner the next night, our third since leaving Azmiri. We sat side by side, dipping our feet in the pool of glacial meltwater beside the rocky meadow that would be our campsite. We had made good time again, reaching our destination several hours before sunset. We could have pushed on toward tomorrow’s campsite, but I knew the opportunity for rest was more important. Not that I needed it—apart from a blister or two, I could have kept going all night—but the others did, particularly Tem.

  I watched as he leaned forward to splash water across his bare chest. The droplets glinted against his skin, slipping between the planes of muscle and bone. I remembered who I was looking at, and glanced away, feeling vaguely guilty. It wasn’t that Tem lacked strength—he could lift a year-old calf without breaking a sweat, and I suspected that his already-muscular build would one day rival Dargye’s—but he wasn’t built for endurance. When we were ten, I convinced him to hike to Nila Lake, a glittering blue pool fed by the Karranak glacier. It was a six-hour, uphill journey, and halfway there Tem had one of his breathing attacks, so bad his lips turned gray. There had always been something wrong with his lungs, even when he was a baby. He took medicine now that Chirri prepared for him, and submitted himself weekly to her healing chants. It seemed to keep the attacks at bay, but he still tired more easily than other boys his age.

  “Come on,” Tem said. “I bet you can’t touch the bottom.”

  I shrugged, watching the water swirl and ripple around my feet, the chill soothing the blister forming on my left heel.

  Tem bumped his shoulder against mine. “You’ve been distracted all day. What’s wrong? Is it Lusha?”

  I gazed over the mountains, the here-and-there patches of melting snow, the meadow grass speckled with clover and blue poppies. “I thought we’d catch them by now.”

  “They’re moving fast,” Tem said. “It makes sense. Mara wants to stay ahead of River and reach Raksha first.”

  I glowered at those words. Lusha would not reach Raksha first. Every hour that passed made me more determined to catch up to them. I still didn’t know what I would do when we did—either hug her or shout at her, or grab her by the shoulders and shake her until her teeth rattled and she agreed to turn around.

  I supposed I could do all three.

  I dragged a stick across the damp soil. “I feel like I’m missing something.”

  Tem nodded slowly. “I feel the same. It’s hard to believe Lusha would do something like this for gold, no matter how much Mara offered.”

  I thought about the charts I had found in the observatory, Lusha’s mysterious notes. I’m trying to work something out.

  “Mara wants River’s position,” I said. “Maybe he offered her something more than gold.”

  “Like what?”

  I shook my head, frustrated. “I don’t know.”

  “So what do you want to do?”

  Laughter floated toward us from the campfire, where the others were gathered. I gazed at them, and an idea occurred to me.

  “I want to learn more about this mysterious talisman,” I said.

  I rose, and Tem followed. But before he could take a step, he suddenly doubled over, coughing.

  I touched his arm. “Are you all right?”

  He nodded, clearing his throat. “Fine.”

  “You don’t sound fine. Have you been taking Chirri’s medicine?”

  “Yes.” He brushed me away. “Don’t worry, Kamzin, it’s nothing I haven’t dealt with before. What’s your plan?”

  I frowned, unconvinced, but the look on Tem’s face told me that further argument would get us nowhere. I squinted at the sheer wall of rock that towered over the meadow. It was glacial stone, layered and crumbly. Rhododendrons poked up here and there from narrow shelves. A smile spread across my face.

  “Kamzin?” Tem said warily.

  I pulled my boots back on, ignoring the bits of grass stuck to my wet feet. Then I marched back to the fire.

  He was sitting with his back to the flames, drinking butter tea and talking—of course talking—to Norbu in a low voice. His hair was damp from washing, and fell loosely against his forehead. He glanced up and smiled as he saw me approaching—a sudden, unguarded smile that struck me unexpectedly like a physical thing, making my steps falter.

  “Kamzin,” River said, “would you like to join us?”

  “No thanks,” I said. “Actually, I’m feeling restless. I thought that, since we’re nearing the Nightwood, I’d survey the area before dark. You can’t be too careful.”

  “If you like,” he said. “But you shouldn’t go alone. I’ll come with you.”

  That was too easy. I suppressed a smile.

  “Thank you, River,” I said. Norbu winced. He didn’t like it when I used River’s name, but he couldn’t very well protest, if River didn’t. Norbu wasn’t a snob, I had decided, but he did like things to be done a certain way. He had a wife back in the Three Cities, a noblewoman, and usually that “certain way” of doing things was her way. He had already spent considerable breath instructing Aimo on the precise ratio of flour to water for making sampa cakes, and had twice
dropped heavy hints in my presence regarding the correct way of addressing nobles, a subject on which his wife was apparently an expert. I doubted that Norbu saw his wife as often as he would like, given how much time he spent tramping around in the wilderness with River, and his comments would almost be endearing if they weren’t so frequent—or so frequently aimed at me.

  “We’ll need to find higher ground,” I said. “You can’t see much from here.”

  River raised an eyebrow. “What do you suggest?”

  I glanced over my shoulder at the sheer mountain face.

  “Kamzin,” Tem muttered.

  I shot him a look. I needed to get River away from the others, where I could interrogate him without being interrupted. Also, he was less intimidating when we were alone—the others, particularly Norbu and Dargye, acted as if he were the emperor himself, scrambling to fetch him things and hanging on his every word. Even though I found their behavior ridiculous, it was catching.

  “What do you say?” There was a dare in my voice. River’s smile took on a wicked quality.

  “I say let’s go.”

  “Dyonpo,” Norbu began, “are you certain that—”

  “We won’t be gone long, my friend,” River said.

  Norbu bowed his head, frowning slightly in my direction. River shrugged on his tahrskin chuba and followed me to the base of the rock face. The others had fallen silent. I could feel their eyes on us. I could also feel Tem’s glare boring into my back.

  “Would you like to go first?” River said. He gazed up at the mountainside with a calculating look on his face. It was a look I understood well. I felt a shiver of anticipation.

  “Why don’t I shadow you?” I said.

  His gaze met mine. “Is that a challenge?”

  “Maybe.”

  He laughed, and I couldn’t suppress a grin.

  “All right,” he said. “Challenge accepted. You copy me on the way up, and I follow you on the way down.”

  “Deal,” I said. I was almost hopping up and down with excitement, my worries all but forgotten. I knew I was going to win the game.

  River cocked his head to one side, considering. Then, smoothly, he grabbed hold of a crack in the rock face, dug his toe into a root, and pulled himself onto a ledge.

  I watched him closely, memorizing every move he made. It was clear almost immediately that River was like no one else I had climbed with. He climbed as easily as most people walked, moving with an almost bored grace. I found myself almost forgetting to note the route he took—merely watching him, my mouth half-open.

  He paused perhaps twenty feet above the ground. Hooking his arm around a rock, he leaned back and called, “Coming?”

  I started. Taking a deep breath, I stepped up to the rock face, and began to climb.

  We moved swiftly up the mountainside. River paused several times to ensure I was keeping pace. In fact, I could have climbed much faster. I wondered if he was taking it easy to test me. The route he had chosen was straightforward enough, at least for me, though some of the moves he made were tricky, surprising. Creeping sideways along a narrow ledge, holding on with only your fingertips. Navigating an overhang upside down, your feet above your head.

  As we climbed, I gradually became aware of the sound of rushing water. There were falls nearby, I was certain of it—somewhere beyond the curve of the mountainside, where I could make out a narrow chasm filled with boulders and trees. River climbed sideways along the mountain until he reached it. He paused, and I caught up quickly.

  The chasm wasn’t overly deep—we were only halfway level with the pines rising from the mountain rubble below—but it was wide, several times the span of my reach. The other side was a slippery mess, coated with moss wet from the spray of the hidden waterfall. It floated toward us in icy clouds, dampening my face. Through the spray, I could just make out a narrow ledge on the wall opposite, slightly higher up the rock face.

  River glanced over his shoulder. I couldn’t read his expression, but thought I saw the flash of a smile. I smiled back, because I knew that he was stuck, and I had won. I shifted position slightly, preparing to make way when he began to lower himself down the ridge.

  Instead, he turned away from me and leaped.

  Leaped across the impossible gap, or perhaps flew—I could see little difference. He grabbed hold of a knuckle of stone, wedged his foot against the rock, and pulled himself onto the narrow ledge in a single movement as fluid as a cat’s.

  I stared at him. He called something, but the crashing of the water winnowed it to “Care—hold—ice—zin.” He sidestepped along the rock face and disappeared into the fine mist beyond. There was no doubt in his mind, apparently, that I would follow.

  “River!” I shouted.

  I climbed to where he had been standing and squinted across the chasm. Now that I was closer, I could see there were, in fact, several decent handholds—narrow, but nothing I couldn’t handle.

  Did he say “ice”? I saw no sign of it, but that didn’t mean anything in this deep shade. I gritted my teeth. Normally, I wouldn’t have bothered to attempt what River had just done; I would have climbed down into the chasm, and then up the other side. Or, more likely, turned back. But if I did either of those things, River would win.

  I would not let River win.

  I took a long, slow breath and took my hands off the rock face, lowering my body into a crouch. A stillness settled over me, a feeling that was like hovering at the edge of sleep, but also its opposite, for everything was heightened. Then I sprang into the air.

  I caught the handhold. But my gasp of relief was cut short—my hands began to slide slowly, painfully, down the rock.

  He said “ice.”

  Somehow, I managed to jam my fingertips into a crack. Shaken by the near miss, I pushed myself up to the ledge somewhat less gracefully than River, and then stood there for a long moment, my breath hissing against the rock.

  Once I had caught my breath, I brushed my hair back from my face and composed my features into a nonchalant expression. The ledge broadened up ahead as the sound of the waterfall intensified. I could feel it reverberate through the mountain and up my legs as I walked. Where was River? The chill mist was sharp against my skin. Then the rock ahead folded back, and I stopped.

  The waterfall thundered down, down, down, into a pool clutched between rock walls. The water was blue, glacial, half-frozen. Impossibly long icicles hung down from the mountainside, glinting in the sunlight, and rainbows draped themselves across the water like cobwebs. I stared in awe.

  River, crouched at the edge of the cliff, turned his head slightly and tapped a finger against his lips. It was too late—at the sound of my approaching footsteps, the dragons he had been watching spread their wings and took flight. They were feral, I knew immediately. Feral dragons are smaller than domestic ones, barely the size of my two fists stuck together, and their lights were usually colorless. It was a family—two adults and four offspring. The baby dragons bobbed clumsily a few times, chirping, as they followed their parents up the waterfall to settle on some distant ledge.

  A cloud of mist rose between me and River. I stepped through it, blinking, and he grabbed my hand.

  “Careful,” he said. “There’s a lot of—”

  “Ice,” I snapped.

  He laughed. I laughed too, surprising myself. It felt like a reflex. I was still amazed. It wasn’t that I had never done anything as difficult, or dangerous. But I had never climbed with someone like River, who seemed to understand the mountain on an intuitive level that went beyond ordinary senses. The way I understood it.

  We made our way along the ledge to the nearest fall of water, where we washed the dirt from our hands and took turns tilting our heads back to drink. We kept hold of each other, for safety, though River never seemed to put a foot wrong, and his eyesight in that world of mist and shadow seemed sharper than mine. I nudged him slightly as he drank, and he stumbled, the water trickling over his head and plastering his hair down on
one side. He gave me another wicked smile. He tugged my arm as we clambered over a boulder, so that I had to stab my foot into a tiny crevice to arrest my fall. I half scowled, half grinned at him. A challenge hung between us like electricity.

  My left hand was cold from the waterfall, but my right, pressed against River’s, was warm, almost hot. His palm was as rough and callused as mine. He did not attempt to hold me with his left hand, the one with the missing fingertips, as if he thought it would bother me. To show him that it didn’t, I made a point of reaching for it myself.

  We settled on a ledge overlooking the meadow and the valley, with the waterfall at our backs. I could see the others—small, blobby dots far below—but I didn’t think they could see us.

  I gazed over the landscape, exultant. I had traveled farther in the last two days than many villagers had in their lifetimes. The days had been grueling, certainly—but they had also brought moments of exquisite wonder unlike anything I had ever experienced, a wonder so complete I felt like an ember stoked to life by a gust of wind.

  This is what being a real explorer would feel like. Every day would be like this.

  “I’m not easily surprised,” River said, “but you keep surprising me.”

  I swung my legs back and forth, equal parts tired and content. “I surprise you?”

  “I never thought someone like you could exist.” He watched me with a half smile on his face. “A girl from a tiny village many explorers have never even heard of, with greater skill than most of them will ever possess.”