Sunburner (Moonburner Cycle Book 2)

by Claire Luana

  Adrenaline exploded through Hiro’s body and he crossed the choppy water with all the speed he could muster, quickly closing the distance between himself and Quitsu. Ryu could swim, but he didn’t know about Quitsu.

  About halfway to Quitsu, he crossed paths with a panicked woman flailing and moaning in the dark water. Without encouragement, she clung to him, pushing him under the surface with her desperate efforts. Hiro kicked with his legs, freeing himself from the pull of her grasping hands and heavy skirts.

  As he surfaced, he threw an arm around her waist, pulling her hard against himself. “Stop struggling,” he managed to gasp, taking in a mouthful of foul water. He kicked towards a large piece of wood and heaved her on top of it. “Hold on,” he gasped.

  The spot where he had seen Quitsu struggling was now empty. He swam towards it with powerful strokes, praying that he wasn’t too late. He reached it and peered through the water for Quitsu. Nothing.

  He took a deep breath and dove, searching the blackness with his hands. There. He felt fur brushing softly against his skin under the water. He grabbed Quitsu’s tail and heaved the seishen towards him, struggling against the river’s greedy pull. Quitsu would never let him hear the end of this.

  Hiro grabbed under Quitsu’s chest as he surfaced and swam towards the shore, pushing beams and debris out of his way. The river was a mess of people and wood, a layer of grain floating over the surface of it all. Kyuden’s faint hope for surviving the winter was quickly becoming a drowned memory.

  His feet struck the muddy bottom of the river and he scrambled onto the riverbank. Quitsu’s body was limp and heavy in his arms and blood poured from a gash over the seishen’s eye. Hiro resolutely ignored the worry that was seeping through his mind like a poison. It wasn’t too late for Quitsu. He wouldn’t allow it.

  Once on dry land, Hiro fell to his knees on shaky legs and gently laid Quitsu down. Quitsu wasn’t breathing. Hiro, remembering his medical training, began rhythmically pounding on Quitsu’s chest, willing the seishen to breathe.

  It wasn’t working. He knew the other piece of the medical treatment, but had been hoping it wouldn’t be necessary. He lifted Quitsu’s snout, cupping it so none of the air could escape. He blew into Quitsu’s mouth and then returned to his pounding. He did this again, and again. The third time, Quitsu shuddered and with a lurching cough, water exploded out of Quitsu’s mouth right into Hiro’s own.

  Hiro spluttered and spit, wiping the regurgitated water off his lips.

  Quitsu opened his eyes. “Sorry, Prince,” he rasped, “but you’re not my type.”

  Hiro blinked with surprise and then started laughing. He swept Quitsu up into his arms, giving him a backbreaking hug. “Thank Taiyo you are all right.”

  “Where’s Kai?”

  Hiro looked over the dark river full of people who still struggled and cried for help. “I don’t know,” he admitted, his worry like a dark storm in the pit of his stomach. “I haven’t seen Ryu either, though I know he’s a strong swimmer. He’ll be all right. I guess we should help these people and see if we can find her.”

  It was the right thing to do, and he couldn’t go back to the citadel without Kai.

  Hiro heaved himself up and waded back into the river.

  The collapsing dock flung Kai high into the air. She enjoyed a feeling of strange lightness before she hit the water with a teeth-rattling crash. The river spun her around until she didn’t know which way was up or down. She tried to draw in moonlight to burn, but she didn’t know what to do, how to help herself. It felt raw and strange to her. She was in a foreign world that she couldn’t translate.

  As she contemplated her predicament in a strangely detached way, a strong hand gripped her wrist and pulled. Hiro, she thought with relief.

  She breached the surface with a gasping cough, forcing the water from her lungs. She treaded water, taking several shuddering breaths that burned her raw throat.

  She looked around for her rescuer. It was not Hiro. Even in the darkness and sliver of a moon, she knew every outline of Hiro’s profile. Her rescuer had curly hair, illuminated like an eerie halo by the moon.

  “Colum?” she rasped.

  “Aye, Queenie,” he said. “Let’s get to the shore and get dry before we exchange pleasantries.” He set off towards the far shore with a determined stroke.

  She looked back towards the port with its roiling mass of flotsam and debris. From the far side, they could follow along the river and cross over one of the bridges back to the other side.

  She swam after him.

  By the time they reached the riverbank, Kai’s muscles were burning with fatigue. She collapsed onto the sticky mud, catching her breath. The high stone of the riverwall loomed behind her.

  “Looks like you need a bit more adventuring and a bit less cushy palace life, ‘eh, Queenie?” Colum said, sitting next to her with his elbows resting on his knees. He didn’t even seem winded from the swim.

  “Don’t call me ‘Queenie,’” Kai said, glaring at the man.

  “As you wish,” he said. “Queenie,” he added under his breath.

  She growled softly but dropped it, climbing shakily to her feet. She had bigger problems.

  “The citadel is this way,” she said, setting off along the riverbank.

  He paused for a moment and then followed, his staff making sucking noises in the mud. Somehow he had managed to hold on to it through the whole ideal.

  “Your name sounds familiar,” she remarked. It was on the tip of her brain. Where had she heard it before?

  “I used to work at the citadel. Maybe you’ve heard stories of my impressive…deeds from some of the moonburners.” He raised an eyebrow in a lascivious manner.

  She snorted. “Don’t flatter yourself. No legends of that type around the citadel. But maybe it is from someone you worked with…Would anyone you knew still be there?”

  “Mariko was the headmistress of the citadel…”

  Kai shook her head.

  “Gypsil was chief servant…”

  Another head shake.

  “Master Vita was the head of the libraries.”

  “Yes!” Kai cried. “Master Vita! That’s where I remember your name. You built the dirty song into the floor of the treasury!”

  He laughed. “You bet your balls I did. I forgot about that. Though how could I? The late queen ran me out on my heel when she found out.”

  Kai smiled despite herself. His wide grin and square white teeth reminded her of her father. She found herself relaxing slightly in his presence, despite his sudden appearance on the docks. “So why were you looking for me? Why are you in Kyuden?”

  “I want to help you.”

  Kai glanced sideways at him. “Help me?”

  “Do so few people offer help that you aren’t familiar with the term?”

  She chuckled ruefully. “I’ll admit, I haven’t had a lot of turns of luck lately.”

  “Then you’re due for some good news.”

  “And you’re here to help me, what, out of the kindness of your heart? Your sense of patriotism?”

  “No, Queenie. For money. I’ll help you for money.” He whipped a great golden coin out of his pocket and twirled it expertly through his fingers before it disappeared again.

  “What makes you think that I have need of you? Or that there’s money in it for you?”

  “I’m a bettin’ man, you see. No one wants to bet on the lame horse. But if you do…and win…” He rubbed his hands together. “That’s quite a jackpot indeed.”

  Kai furrowed her brow. “Am I the lame horse in this analogy?”

  “You are,” he said cheerfully.

  Kai knew she should feel offended, but somehow she felt more heartened by the fact that he thought she had a chance of winning the race.

  He went on. “I pulled you out of a river after your entire granary collapsed in an earthquake. And I have a feeling that’s not the worst disaster that’ll happen this month. You can’t afford not to hire
me.”

  Kai gritted her teeth. She wished he wasn’t right. That it wasn’t so obvious. But she couldn’t let her pride get in her way. She did need help. But could she trust this man? Who knew what ulterior motives he might have. She would have to talk to Master Vita, get his read on the man, before making any decisions.

  Kai’s heart twisted as they summited a set of stairs that deposited them back in the city streets. Her city looked as if a spoiled boy had upturned his toybox onto the floor, scattering building blocks and miniature figures. Fires raged in the distance, and the sounds of wailing and crying mingled with the dust and smoke.

  Tears pricked her eyes as she turned from the chaos and began walking towards the citadel. She could do more good with the moonburners and citadel resources at her disposal than by pulling people out of buildings singlehandedly. And she had learned days ago, there was risk that came from blindly rushing into an unknown situation.

  Colum paced her silently, his unassailable good mood temporarily dampened.

  When they reached the main courtyard of the citadel, Kai’s heart sank further. Several of the buildings had crumbled. Tsuki’s temple, which had been burned in last year’s sunburner attack, had totally collapsed. One half of the koumori rookery had given way, and rubble littered the ground. Koumori swooped through the sky, clicking with upset.

  “Nanase!” Kai called as she saw the woman across the courtyard directing moonburners and servants.

  Nanase turned and her face sagged with relief when she saw Kai. “Thank the goddess. We feared for what happened in town.”

  “We were on the docks; they collapsed. The granaries are destroyed.”

  Nanase’s mouth thinned to a tight-lipped line at this news.

  “I might not have made it if not for Colum.”

  “Who?” Nanase blinked.

  Colum stepped from behind Kai and waved, his curly hair bobbing.

  “I’ll explain later,” Kai said. “If we can spare one, send a koumori to the docks in town to retrieve Hiro, Ryu and Quitsu. We were separated.” Kai had been shoving down her trepidation over what had happened to Hiro and their seishen when the dock collapsed. At least she knew Quitsu was all right. She would have felt it if something had happened to him.

  “Consider it done.” Nanase said.

  “What’s the damage?” Kai asked.

  “Tsuki’s temple, which is ironic. Part of the rookery, the kitchens and cellars are totally collapsed.”

  Kai couldn’t keep the dismay off her face.

  “Our god and goddess are trying to starve us out. But we’ll make do. We’ll dig out and salvage what we can.”

  Kai nodded, trying to fight her growing sense of despair. “Casualties?”

  “A few. We’re still digging.”

  “Thank you. Keep me posted.”

  “Oh,” Nanase said, a flash of guilt crossing her face. “I heard your mother was taken to the hospital ward.”

  “What?” Kai exclaimed.

  Nanase’s next words were lost on the hot breeze, as Kai was already running across the courtyard.

  Kai burst into the hospital ward. “My mother,” she asked a nurse, who was busy wrapping gauze around a young woman’s arm. The nurse nodded towards the back of the hospital ward, not looking up from her work.

  Kai scanned the room, past the injured and those busily tending them. There she was! At the end standing over a cot.

  Kai ran up to her breathlessly. “I could kill Nanase,” Kai said. “She told me you were here. I thought you’d been injured.”

  Hanae clucked her tongue. “Don’t be too hard on her. She might not have known. Will you help me turn her? I want to get a look at her back, see if there is any bruising.”

  Kai looked down at the patient her mother was tending and sighed. “Oh, Chiya,” Kai said, rounding the cot to help her mother. “Is she all right?”

  “She should be fine. She was in the armory when it happened; she’s lucky she wasn’t impaled by a dozen different weapons. A shelf collapsed on her.”

  “Why is she unconscious?”

  “I sedated her,” Hanae said, pursing her lips. “I wanted to make sure she didn’t have internal bleeding, but she refused to sit still to be looked at. I did what I had to.”

  Together, Kai and her mother lifted Chiya’s shoulder and back, rolling her onto her side. Kai knelt by the cot, holding Chiya’s body while her mother lifted the woman’s shirt, probing her back with deft fingers.

  Watching her mother work, Kai noticed that Chiya had a tan birthmark in the shape of a perfect heart on her spine. “I bet she hates that,” Kai said, pointing, a half-smile crossing her face. “Doesn’t fit her tough girl reputation.”

  Hanae’s hands stopped moving.

  “Mother?” Kai asked. Hanae’s face had turned pale. Kai nudged her with her shoulder. “Mother.”

  Hanae started, as if realizing where she was. She pulled Chiya’s shirt down. “You can set her down.”

  Kai carefully returned the full weight of Chiya’s unconscious body to the bed and stood, stretching her knees.

  Hanae had stepped back and stood staring at Chiya, one hand to her chest.

  “What is it? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Kai said.

  “Do you know anything about Chiya’s background?” Hanae asked faintly.

  “Her background? Like her family?” Kai frowned, trying to remember what she had heard. “She was raised in the citadel. She was one of the babies who were rescued from the Tottori Desert after King Ozora started the Gleaming. I don’t think they know who her parents were.”

  “How old is she?”

  “A few years older than me, I think? I’m not sure. Why?”

  Hanae had not moved. A tear trickled down her face. “I think Chiya is your sister.”

  Her mother’s words froze Kai in place. Sister. She had known her parents had had a child before she’d been born, and that the little baby’s power had been exposed in the Gleaming, the terrible sunburner tradition of testing and then leaving babies with moonburning ability in the Tottori Desert to die.

  But…alive? And…Chiya?

  “How…do you know?”

  Hanae’s face was radiant through her tears. “Your sister, Saeko… She had a birthmark just like Chiya’s. A heart on her back.”

  “And Saeko was left in the desert?”

  “Yes,” Hanae said. “We didn’t live in Ushai shoen then; we lived closer to the Chiritsu plain.”

  “They told me that the Oracle would see visions about where the babies were dropped. The moonburners would retrieve them.”

  “Maybe she will remember the details of Chiya’s rescue,” Hanae said.

  Kai shook her head to clear it. “Perhaps. I know this is important, but it can’t be a priority right now until we evaluate the damage to the citadel. Can we deal with this tomorrow?” She stood to leave.

  Hanae grimaced but nodded. “Kai…”

  “What?”

  “Chiya is older than you. If this is true…by rights…”

  The realization hit her like a gale force wind. Chiya was older. If Chiya was really her sister, she was the rightful heir to the throne.

  Hanae’s gray eyes were sympathetic, pleading. “We’ll figure it out. It won’t change anything.”

  Kai nodded numbly. They both knew that wasn’t true. This would change everything.

  Kai had never wanted to be queen and had always thought she would hand over the reins gladly if another qualified candidate came along. But when faced with the actual prospect of giving it up…the thought twisted at her like a knife.

  A sparkle on her hand caught the light and Kai choked back a laugh.

  “What, my daughter?”

  “Hiro and I got engaged today,” Kai said, holding her hand up with a rueful smile. “I wonder if he’ll still want me when he finds out the truth.”

  “Hiro loves you for who you are.”

  “I hope you’re right. Can we…” Kai closed her eyes,
partially disbelieving that she was asking this. “Can we keep this between us until we know more?”

  “Of course,” Hanae whispered.

  Kai exited the hospital ward as if in a dream. She felt strangely removed from the chaos around her. In the year since she had been crowned queen, she had come to see this citadel as hers. Her responsibility, her calling. She had made a difference, changed things for the better. But perhaps it had been a lie. Maybe it should have been Chiya, continuing the war with the sunburners, appeasing the gods’ desire for blood. Maybe this earthquake wouldn’t have happened.

  But no. There was more to the burners than war. In the last year, she had seen marvels. Advancements in medicine, learning, improvements in the condition of her people. If it weren’t for these damn natural disasters, her reign would already be sung about by the bards.

  Kai watched the citadel’s inhabitants work together to clear debris from the kitchens, tossing wood and stones into a pile. A neat line of bodies, covered with sheets, lay against the building. Nine so far, and many were still missing. Kai tightened her fists. She was still queen, and she wouldn’t stop fighting.

  Kai started towards her council chamber. She needed a report on the damage. And they needed a plan. Maybe Jurou and Master Vita had come up with something. She would go over what they had learned from Geisa…

  Kai froze. Geisa.

  Kai broke into a run towards the dungeons, bursting through the front door and down the stairs. The guards had abandoned their posts—not that she blamed them. She wouldn’t have wanted to stay in the dungeons during an earthquake, either. Bricks had fallen from the ceiling, leaving piles of dust and mortar on the ground. But the structure appeared sound.

  Kai skidded to a stop at the bottom of the stairs. A figure stood ahead of her, a shadow just out of reach of the light of the moon orbs.

  The figure turned.

  Daarco’s face was menacing in the darkness. Had he come here to free Geisa, an enemy of the moonburners? How had he known she was here?

  “Daarco?” Kai asked. “What are you doing here?”

  “Chiya told me to check on her,” Daarco said defensively. “I took Chiya to the hospital ward after the earthquake. She told me to make sure the prisoner hadn’t broken out.”