Ashes to Embers

by Michelle Schad

  “WAKE UP!!” he hollered, hoping the dreamer might hear him. All he heard in response was the snarl of the demons hunting him. A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed there was more than one. “Shit!”

  He darted behind trees or stunted shrubs, even tried to climb a tree only to have the blasted thing snap in half from how brittle and frail it was. His wings were entirely useless in the dream world, disappearing at random and reappearing when they were not wanted.

  The snarls were too close. He forced himself back up to his feet, finding a sturdier-looking tree before clamoring up its rickety, dry branches. Only shriveled handfuls of brown and gray leaves remained of the greenery that once was. The sky above was dark, roiling with wicked clouds and miasmas of fell magic. Just over the top of the tree line, Kaleo could make out the very faint outline of a spire.

  “Illurian City,” he breathed out. He knew where he was. His mind wanted to make a logical connection to the dreamer, but the tree jolted, nearly throwing him from the branches he clung to. The demons barked and growled below him, clawing their way up toward him. He looked up, hoping for more space to put between himself and the demons but there was nothing to see except a naked twig that would not hold his weight. Pulling on his Power inside of a dream was too risky. The results were not always what was intended and, often, had terrifying repercussions on the caster in the waking world. He’d learned that the hard way as well, and had a wicked scar on his arm to remind him of his ignorant choices.

  “Fionn!” he called, hoping the chimera might hear him. Sometimes it worked, most times it didn’t, much like his wings. When he made his first foray into the Sea of Stars, Fionn walked beside him, been there to witness the mistakes and pull him from the proverbial fire. There was no one to save him from his mistakes this time because no one knew where he was. “Argh, WAKE UP YOU BLASTED IDIOT!”

  He felt the rake of a claw against the bottom of his leg at the same moment that he felt a sharp tug at the scruff of his neck. He gasped, pain radiating up his leg as he landed on top of a solid form. It took a moment for him to realize he was no longer being clawed at, to stop fighting and just breathe. Jaysen lay on his back beneath him, glaring horribly at Kaleo’s stupidity.

  “What were you thinking?” the olven boy snarled. He shoved Kaleo off of himself as he spoke, making the young avian wince. They were in the Poppy Fields again. Another chimera, smaller than Fionn, stood beside Jaysen. She growled at Kaleo. Jaysen huffed. He raked clawed hands through overgrown hair that had no color. None of him did, really, as if someone forgot to color the olven boy in. Yira’s Realm was strange.

  “I didn’t mean -”

  “If you want to get yourself killed, then do us both a favor and launch yourself off the nearest cliff!” Jaysen cut in.

  “I have wings,” Kaleo answered in meek, dumb tones. Jaysen’s snarl deepened as he got back to his feet. The look of disgust Jaysen gave him was almost as painful as the claw mark on Kaleo’s leg.

  “You won’t find anyone if you’re dead,” Jaysen continued. He knew what Kaleo sought; or, rather, who. He also knew a great deal more about the dream world than Kaleo did. “Wake up.”

  The pure Power in Jaysen’s words rocked Kaleo from the dream world. It was so sudden that he found himself choking on a missed breath, sitting up sharply in the dark jungle of the Skiff. His leg burned terribly, throbbing with each beat of his heart. Fionn was no longer behind him nor anywhere else within eyesight either. Kaleo winced, pulling up the hem of his pants to inspect the damage. It was not as bad as he’d feared but the wound bled quite a bit and left a wide spread of blackened veins around the claw marks in his flesh. Demon wounds poisoned the blood in the waking world; were they the same if they were caused in a dream? Kaleo didn’t know.

  He sighed and let himself collapse back to the stick-littered ground. He had failed again and very likely ruined the only true friendship he had.

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly, curling back up into a ball until the sun peeked over the horizon.

  Chapter Five

  Reven sat up sharply, chest tight and painful, sweat running down his spine and saturating his tunic. The nightmares returned. It was a problem when he was first found, when his mind was still a mess of confusion and new experiences. When he still knew absolutely nothing and hid from the world. He was plagued with nightmares, with terrible creatures that hunted him, with the screams of innocents that begged for help, though he could not understand why or how he was supposed to help. This was the same. The demons hunted him, snarled and hissed as they chased him through blighted lands. There was a tall spire on the horizon that was but a husk of what it should be. Somehow, he knew that it was beautiful once, white and gleaming with brilliant green flags at its tip. He hated the nightmare, hated how familiar it felt to him, as if he’d lived the scenario once.

  He sighed, running hands through hair that needed a trim. It was almost long enough to tie back. He knew sleep would not happen after the terror he experienced and, honestly, he was glad he didn’t blow the dingy they’d been stuffed into out of the water. Liam needed to negotiate their mode of transportation better - - or let Reven do it. The man was so cheap it hurt; almost literally. Reven stretched, winced, felt things crack that shouldn’t and rubbed his left leg. It hurt when he was too long at sea. He tried not to dwell on it, rubbing the back of his neck until feeling as if he were being watched. When he looked up, he noticed Serai’s bright cerulean eyes staring right back at him. The bard sagged, dropping his arm to his lap. The girl was practically mute, only speaking in mere whispers and, as far as Reven knew, only to him or Ajana. She’d not said a single word to Liam since they found her.

  “Can’t sleep?” Reven asked. They were given a single room to share while Liam and Ajana took a second tiny room for themselves. There were no real furnishings, their beds made up of blankets and rolled canvas. They slept with barrels of whiskey bound for the floating city of Avir. Liam complained that Reven had gotten the better room as the thief-taker’s room was filled with tobacco crates that let out a rank stench according to Liam. The man complained too much; just another annoyance to add to Reven’s growing list with Liam.

  Serai did not answer Reven’s question, shifting in her corner. She sat atop her blankets, wearing only a simple tunic. At Reven’s last recollection, she also had trews that were pilfered from somewhere, but they were gone in that moment. The bard sighed and moved over beside the awkwardly silent woman.

  They knew very little about her or why she was living in a cave with a drake. He was not aboard the Persephone’s Dawn. While the creature could not fly, he seemed able to follow wherever Serai went. Reven neither questioned how nor really cared. The girl, on the other hand, piqued his interest a great deal. She had Power, of that he was certain. He felt it pulse through her as clearly as he felt it through himself.

  She did not appear to be much older than late adolescence or early adulthood as humans went, although, he was not well-versed in human maturity. The olve mentally matured rapidly but physically took much longer than humans. He, for example, looked to be an adult of approximately twenty-five summers according to Ajana, though he was, in fact, at least seventy summers gone, if not more. As he could not remember his birthday, it was a rough estimation based on what Liam knew of the tirsai. Of all the olve, the duende aged a little faster than the tirsai, and the tywyll hardly seemed to age at all. So, guessing Serai’s age was, just that, a guess.

  “You had trews earlier,” Reven said, trying to make idle conversation. “Where did they go?”

  She pointed to the rolled canvas that served as a pillow. The trews were there. “I don’t like them.”

  Reven snorted a laugh. “Uhm… ok, well, when we get to Avir, we’ll find you new ones that you do like.”

  “I do not like any of them,” she insisted. He glanced at her, watched her scratch at the tunic as if wanting to strip that off as well, and finally understood. When she’d been found, she was naked. If that
was all she knew, he could see how clothing would be restrictive and uncomfortable.

  “Fair enough,” he said, happy for the few words so far. “Were you born in Kalaegh?”

  She looked at him but shook her head. He nodded. He had nothing left to ask without feeling like a busy body, so he sat beside her in silence. He squinted when she brought her hand up to eye level, creating a fog that projected an image, almost like a map. Reven felt his mouth drop. It was a spell he had never seen before. He could clearly see the land masses and seas, oceans, mountains, rivers - except none of them were right. She pointed at a land mass in the east, somewhere that looked vaguely similar to where Vinlaine might be now.

  “There?” he asked. “That’s where you were born?”

  She nodded. He squinted at the map, the land masses and seas oddly familiar to him even if they were wrong. His eyes nearly bulged when he realized why.

  Liam, for all his insanities and quirks, loved maps. He had a map for every nation. He claimed it was good business sense, knowing where one was going, but he also had maps that were ancient, that showed lands that no longer existed or borders that changed over time. This map, in particular, Reven had seen on a few occasions, when Liam felt like proving his intelligence. It was a map of the world prior to the Destruction, a great cataclysmic event that nearly tore the whole of Doranelle apart. It was an event that happened more than three thousand years gone.

  “That’s… impossible…” Reven snorted, looking at Serai. She remained silent, placid, and entirely unwavering in her mute answer. “But that means…you’d…”

  Reven did not finish the sentence. He couldn’t. The olve were long-lived but they weren’t that long- lived. No one was. And she certainly did not appear olven. The map eventually faded away, her palm closing so she could tuck it back into herself. The bard scratched his head, frowning in thought, but decided that she must be mistaken. Perhaps she didn’t remember much either. The gods knew he could barely remember the last five years, let alone anything else.

  “Well…” the bard continued, needing to find something rational to hold on to. “What about your family then?”

  “Malek,” she answered simply. The drake was her family; of course he was. “Liam is yours.”

  “My family? After a fashion, I suppose. I don’t remember my family, and I don’t have a Malek,” Reven answered. He glanced at her, this girl that did not like clothing and was born in a land that was three thousand years gone. She was not beautiful like some women, but had a radiance about her that was alluring. And her eyes… a man could lose himself in those eyes.

  He cleared his throat and crawled back to his pile of blankets. She watched him then followed. Reven opened his mouth to stop her, to tell her she did not have to follow, but thought better of it and shut his mouth. It would not be the first time they had slept in each other’s company. She curled up beside him, her back pressed against his side.

  “Are you really three thousand years old?” Reven asked after a few moments of silence. His voice was pitched low, almost inaudible as if he’d been afraid to ask. She did not immediately answer but finally nodded and said very quietly ‘yes’.

  ***

  By morning the conversation with Serai had completely left the bard’s mind. He woke with a groan. His bones ached, his leg especially, and his arm tingled uncomfortably. The banging on the door did not help matters, Liam’s voice following with demands to come up to the deck and stop loafing about. There was nothing to be done on the speck of a ship they traveled on except stare at the fish.

  Serai was no longer beside him, so the creaky bard forced himself to his feet and shuffled up to where Liam waited. He was still too bleary-eyed for the sudden caustic brightness of the sun, and squinted and raised a hand to blot out the light trying to blind him.

  “She’s causin’ a scene,” Liam said as soon as Reven finished his shuffle over to the thief-taker.

  “Who is?”

  “Yer cave woman,” Liam said, pointing to where Serai was. She was bent over the railing, naked as the day they found her, arms reaching for something in the water below. Reven could only blink. The crew watched admiringly, all of them smirking and making lude gestures. Reven only palmed his face, grabbing the first thing he could find that might act as a cover.

  “Is Ajana up yet?” Reven asked, walking toward Serai.

  “No, she needs the rest,” Liam answered, arms folded across his chest. He could have done something, but put the responsibility of Serai solely on Reven’s shoulders. He’d wanted to leave her behind. Ajana and Reven had both argued to bring her along lest she be sold or worse. Reven only shook his head, walking up behind Serai with a wool blanket in his hands. He draped it around her, surprising her some. She stood up, turning right into him, looking at the wool with disgust.

  “You can’t be up here without clothes,” he explained, wrapping her up. “We can fish after we find you something to wear, all right?”

  “I do not like clothes,” she argued, pouting as he pushed her back down below deck. He glared at anyone that dared to comment, the crew going back to their duties with grumbles of disappointment.

  “I know, but you can’t … look, if we’re in the room, just you and I, you don’t have to wear clothes, but if you come up here you have to wear them. Deal?”

  “Why?” she asked, turning around as soon as they were in the room. Reven hastily shut the door and tried not to sigh in exasperation.

  “Because… because it isn’t proper to go without them. It’s… distracting.”

  She made a face, clearly not understanding him. He shook his head and gathered the clothing she’d been given, shoving it into her arms. She looked at it with a frown, then shared that frown with him.

  “Please, just put them on. We’ve still got at least six more days until we reach Avir. I’m wearing clothing. Everyone wears clothing.”

  “You are not,” she countered. He frowned at her, looking down at the scarred tattoo on his chest, realizing he wore no shirt.

  “You’re… ok, so I have pants on. I’ve got the important parts covered,” he argued. “You need to do the same.”

  To his great dismay, she put the trews on but not the tunic. It took over an hour to explain things to her and another to cajole her into the silk material. It was too big on her but it was, at the very least, soft, and it properly covered what needed covering. They remained below deck for a bit longer, finally resurfacing shortly after noon. The sun beat down on them, the wind gone from the sails. It was unsettling. Reven shivered despite the heat and looked to the sky. There were no clouds, the sky an eerie gray-green. Not a single bird flew in the sky, not a single fish swam beneath them.

  “You’ve got that look, mate,” Liam said, coming to stand at Reven’s shoulder. Reven peered at the sky but remained silent. The hairs on his arms stood on end.

  “Something’s coming,” Reven finally said.

  “Wha’?” Liam asked, looking to the sky. Reven had no answer.

  ***

  The voyage across the Kiradon Ocean to the floating city of Avir drained all the life from those aboard the Persephone’s Dawn, especially in the crux of the maelstrom that roiled above them. The ship was small, in ill repair, and pitched at any inkling of a breeze, which meant that it rolled and crashed through the waves created by the miasmic storm around them. Reven despised every single bit of it. His stomach roiled any time he looked away from his toes. What was not nailed to the ground rolled back and forth or slid across the rotting planks, knocking into them any time they smashed into a wave or banked against a swell. The safest place on the ship was in a corner, which was exactly where the tirsai bard opted to stay. Besides, the two walls offered a modicum of support, so he could at least imagine he was on solid ground.

  “Roe,” he groaned from the corner. Liam ignored him, holding tightly to a rope that was strung across the deck for stability. “Roe!”

  Nothing. Reven peered at the duende man’s back and snatched
up a loose cog rolling about. He bounced it in his palm once before lobbing it at Liam’s back. It struck its target, making the other olven man shoot straight up in his spot only to totter over the rope with the next pitch of the ship. He landed rather unceremoniously onto the floorboards beneath him with curses and snarls aimed at the bard. Reven smirked.

  “The bloody hells ya do tha’ for!” Liam barked, rubbing the spot on his back where the cog hit him. Reven only smirked more. “Prat.”

  “If you’d found anything smaller, we’d be rowing ourselves to Avir,” Reven complained. The women remained silent but they both turned a glare on Liamas well. Ajana was not helped by the poor stability of the ship and Serai had never been on a ship. The journey was difficult for them. The storm made things worse. The sky was blacker than pitch, clouds roiling like churning waves in the sky. Rain flooded the deck above and sloshed its way down to the lower level where Reven and his companions hid.

  Staying below deck in the tiny hole he’d been given to sleep in was no better than staying on deck especially with two more bodies crammed in it. He could feel the rumble of thunder in his chest and heard the whip-crack of lightning until it felt as if his eardrums would explode. It was more than just a maelstrom across the sea, however. Reven felt it at his core, deep in his bones, down to his soul. He saw the same discomfort in Serai’s face, though she hid it well; hid it better than Reven.

  “Next time ya can pay fer transport then, yeah?” Liam threw back. Reven scoffed at him, shifting uncomfortably in his corner.

  “I do pay for the transportation. The money we have comes from my shows and… whoring, I believe, is the word you used for what you contract me out for,” Reven practically spat. He was not wrong, either. A good deal of their wealth came from performances - public or private - that the bard took on. Liam and Ajana were good at their work, but thieving only worked if you did not get caught and found a decent cache of goods to steal. Contract work had its faults, too. They’d made a decent living before he came along; with him in tow, they made a killing.