by Evelyn Skye
This was what all that time and effort was for. To bring Kichona and its people a glorious, immortal paradise.
Gin turned his attention back to the assembling crowd in the square. Taking away their free will is a necessary sacrifice. The Ceremony of Two Hundred Hearts is part of the process. It’s for the ultimate good of the kingdom.
“I’ve spent a decade dreaming of coming home,” Gin said. “You’re my kin. I missed you deeply.” He smiled.
A little girl in the front row shrieked. “His face is so ugly!” She buried herself in the folds of her mother’s skirt.
The woman flushed and took several steps backward, all while wrapping the fabric of her skirt around her daughter, as if doing so could make her disappear. “I-I’m sorry, Your Highness. She’s only three. She doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
Gin clenched his fists. But he didn’t respond. The girl—and everyone else—would love him soon enough.
Now, in fact.
Emerald-green particles whooshed through the air, falling like snow on the people’s heads. A moment later, they smiled drowsily.
Gin glared at them. “As I was saying, I’ve been looking forward to coming home. You missed me too, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” the crowd answered in chorus. Their eyes twinkled with the kind of blissful peace only Gin’s enchantment could give them.
Perhaps free will was overrated.
“I’m here to bring eternal paradise to Kichona,” Gin said. “But I need your help. Are you willing?”
“Whatever you require, Your Highness,” the villagers said.
“Good. My sister has been empress for a while, but I intend to take the crown from her, so that I may lead you to glory and everything our kingdom deserves. There will be a coronation, and I would like to invite citizens from throughout Kichona. Is anyone interested?”
“Me!”
“Over here!”
“Your Highness, pick me, pick me!”
The crowd erupted in clamoring chaos.
Gin motioned for Virtuoso, one of the most reliable of his original warriors, to come over. “You know what to do, right?”
She nodded. “Two hundred slots that need to be filled. Ages one to one hundred, a male and female each.”
“We don’t need to find all of them here. We’ll make plenty more stops before the Imperial City as we amass our army. But go ahead and choose some here.”
Virtuoso nodded and began shouting at the people for order. The other taigas jumped in to herd them into lines to submit their names.
Gin turned his back on the square. He strode away, pushing through the curtains of flowering vines to the outskirts of town, where his warriors’ horses waited. Even from here, he could still hear the people shouting over each other as they argued for the honor of going to his coronation. For the privilege of sacrificing their lives for Zomuri.
Another little shudder of nausea rippled through Gin.
But this time, the guilt was smaller, and it passed quickly. Because after a lifetime of dreaming and ten years of planning in exile, everything was starting to come together. Gin had the makings of a magical army that no one would be able to defeat. He’d begun collecting Hearts.
And the fantasy of the Evermore was within reach.
Chapter Sixteen
Fairy and Broomstick pushed their way through the streets of Shima. Obnoxious, sweaty hawkers stood on the narrow sidewalks, each shouting louder than the previous one that their gambling hall had the most honest dealers, the greatest odds of winning, and the cheapest tobacco and beer. In every alley, crowds of people huddled in circles, exchanging bets and watching roosters screech and fight in a mess of blood and feathers. And pretty girls with too much makeup hung on the arms of men strolling through the tawdry city.
Usually, taigas liked to dress in street clothes when they were on leave. Kichonans respected taigas immensely, because the gods interacted with humans in only two situations—when they blessed babies as taigas, and when they were summoned by an emperor and empress. Thus, people bowed at the taigas’ feet and called them “Your Honor” wherever they went, and it wasn’t unusual for small children to run up and ask taigas—even apprentices—for their autograph. It was hard to blend in and enjoy a brief leave from school or duties when wearing a black uniform.
But there were other occasions when a Society uniform was needed. Going into Shima was one of those times. Fairy had worn a red dress here on her first leave as a Level 9 and had received enough leers to last a lifetime. She swore never to do that again.
Fairy and Broomstick finally arrived at their destination, a tiny herbal medicine shop that was sandwiched between a gentleman’s club and a pawnshop. The owner, Mrs. Mura, was from a long lineage of respected herbal masters, and she sold dried plants that had been used in ancient remedies for centuries. Unfortunately, the demand for traditional medicine was dying, so she found she had to cater to a less savory clientele to keep her shop open; she sold relaxing grasses and hallucinogenic mushrooms in the main part of her store. But Fairy was here for the rare seeds and crushed leaves that she needed for her botanicals. Like Sora had said, she needed something to distract her while her friends were off hunting a Dragon Prince.
Mrs. Mura’s seemingly permanent frown melted away as soon as she saw who had walked in her door. She pushed up the heavy spectacles on her nose and straightened her blouse, which was decorated with a pattern of brightly colored flowers and herbs, spiraling out as if seen through a kaleidoscope.
“Your Honors, welcome back. I cannot tell you how happy I am to see your faces. What can I do for you today?” Not only did she respect Fairy and Broomstick as taigas, but it was also a relief to be able to serve someone who actually appreciated her plants. It wore Mrs. Mura down to sell areca nuts to the patrons of the gentleman’s club next door.
“It’s great to see you again,” Broomstick said before wandering off to look at the amusing collection of pipes in the display window. There was one shaped like a laughing banana, another like a pig’s snout, and more. Broomstick didn’t smoke—taigas weren’t allowed to, and besides, he didn’t see the allure of tarring up his lungs and coughing all the time—but the pipes were something to look at while his gemina did her shopping.
Fairy handed a piece of paper to Mrs. Mura. “I made a list of what I need for my experiments. Do you have any of these?”
Mrs. Mura put on her glasses. “Two ounces of swallow’s saliva, one ounce each of dried wood-ear mushroom, cherry blossom petals, and mangrove bark, half an ounce of bitter almond extract . . .” She read the rest of the list in silence. When she finished, she took her glasses off and said, “I think I have most of these. I’ll be right back.”
“That’s a lot of ingredients,” Broomstick said. “You’re going to spend your entire apprentice allowance on them.”
Fairy shrugged. “I gave my satchel to Spirit, so I want to make new batches of some of my standbys. Plus, I need some of them for Wolf’s birthday project. . . .”
“Oh yeah!” He grinned. Then he picked up a pipe shaped like a hairy, bare foot. The mouthpiece was the big toe. “Who in their right mind would want to put this in their mouth?”
She laughed. It caught her by surprise, because she’d been so anxious since Spirit and Wolf had left. But it was a welcome surprise, even if it was only temporary.
Mrs. Mura came back with a tray of tiny glass jars and vials.
Fairy flitted back to the counter.
“Your Honor, I have everything on your list except the wood-ear mushroom.”
“It’s okay. I can forage in the woods for that. Everything else is harder to come by.”
Mrs. Mura rang her up, and as Broomstick predicted, it cost Fairy her whole allowance. It was a good thing Mrs. Mura was out of the wood ear.
“Someday when you have more time,” Mrs. Mura said, “I would love to hear what you’re cooking up with all these ingredients.”
Fairy smiled and clasped Mrs. Mura’s
wrinkled hands. “I will definitely tell you all about it once I get better at brewing these potions.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” Mrs. Mura said. “Thank you again for coming by, Your Honors. I hope to see you soon.”
Fairy waved, and then she and Broomstick were out the door, hurrying back to the Citadel. There was lots of work to be done on Wolf’s surprise, and they had only a couple weeks left.
Not to mention that their best friends were on a potentially dangerous mission, and Fairy and Broomstick had to do something to keep their minds off worrying.
So they would go back to her lab and play with chemicals. And explosives. Because that’s what fairies and broomsticks did best.
Chapter Seventeen
Takish Gorge was as pristine as Sora and Daemon had left it.
Or, perhaps, a bit more pristine.
As they rode to the top of the canyon walls and peered down, they saw exactly what they’d expected to see the first time—a roaring waterfall, towering cypress trees, and a rocky floor through which various sharp-toothed creatures and their prey darted. What Sora and Daemon did not see was the camp, other than the log walls.
“Stars,” Sora swore, even though they knew the Paro Village taigas had reported nothing here but the remnants of a celebration.
“It’s been less than a week since we were here,” Daemon said. “Maybe we can still pick up their trail.”
Sora sighed. “Maybe. I suppose we should go down to the campsite to look for clues.”
They descended into the gorge. There weren’t paths here, so they had to make their own, pushing through spaces between boulders and steering their horses around trees downed by lightning.
Hours later, they reached the canyon floor. They were dusty and sweaty, and their legs ached from holding tight against their saddles during the climb down. Sora dismounted first, just outside the strange log walls. Most remained in place, but a twenty-foot length of it had been eased open like massive doors.
Sora ran her fingers between two of the logs until she reached the corner, where it hinged out from the rest of the fortifications. “There’s nothing holding them together. No mud or other daubing between the wood, and no notches to lock the logs into place. It’s as if they’re just . . . balanced on top of one another.”
“Magic?” Daemon asked.
She shook her head. “I don’t know.”
Daemon kneeled into the dirt. “Add something else to our list of this camp’s strangeness—there aren’t hoofprints or wheel ruts here. It looks like they opened the log wall in order to leave and then rolled out in something giant.”
Sora bent to examine the dried mud. The ground had, indeed, been flattened by something wider than a cart or carriage. “Or maybe they marched and rode out of here like normal but had something follow them to erase their footprints?”
“Why would that matter? We could still follow the path crushed by . . .” Daemon’s voice trailed off as he looked in the direction of the path. It disappeared just a stone’s throw away from the logs, as if no one had been here at all. “So much for that theory.” He chewed on his lip, puzzled.
“Let’s go through the camp to see if there are any other clues,” Sora said.
They walked slowly through the site. Where there had been crimson tents last time, now there was emptiness, not even a stray stake left unpacked. Despite the Paro Village taigas’ report, there was no trash left behind, besides some horse dung in the area that had been their stables. And other than a handful of tree trunks that had been sliced a bit too cleanly, as if a sword had glided through them rather than a saw, there was no indication that magic of any sort—green fire or otherwise—had been here.
Sora and Daemon stood in the middle of the campsite, completely flummoxed.
A howl sounded at the edge of the forest, too close to the campsite. Sora froze.
Another howl responded. Then another and another.
The wolves were surrounding the camp.
“I don’t like the sound of that,” Sora whispered, drawing her sword and placing her back at his so they could fight attacks from both sides.
But Daemon hadn’t drawn his bo or any of his other weapons. Instead, he tilted his head up to the sky and belted out his own howl.
Sora whirled around, eyes wide. Her terror shivered through their gemina bond.
Daemon put a hand on her arm to calm her. “The wolves were issuing a warning to us.”
“I figured that out,” she said, “which is why I have my sword out. Why aren’t you armed? Why are you howling and letting the wolves know precisely where we are?” She shook her arm free from his grip and began to pace in an arc again, ready for an attack.
“Because they aren’t after us,” Daemon said. “They’re trying to warn us against the ones who were here before.”
She lowered her sword. Daemon often downplayed his ability to communicate with wolves—he called his language skills “rudimentary eating and fighting words,” since that’s pretty much all he remembered from his wolf cub days—but Sora thought he sold himself short. Other taiga apprentices might have been better at magic, but how many of them could be left in the wild for years—or even weeks—and survive alongside predators like the wolves, bears, and cougars of Takish Gorge? Not many.
Sora watched as he tilted his head up and let out another cry, his eyes closed and lashes fluttering as he poured himself into his past self, lost for a minute from this world. He usually kept his wildness stashed away, but in moments like these, Sora saw his true essence, and she swelled with pride. She also, irrationally, felt safer, knowing that her gemina had this ferociousness in him. She silently thanked Luna for bonding her with Daemon.
The wolves streamed in now from the surrounding parts of the canyon, into the center of camp. They were all colors—gray and black and snowy white—and their leader was a mottled brown, grizzled and scarred from winning his place at the top of the pack. The muscles beneath his fur heaved, fierce and taut, and he bared his fangs as he growled, teeth shiny and sharp in the sunlight.
Daemon crouched on all fours and bowed his head in submission. Sora mimicked him.
The alpha wolf barked.
Daemon lifted his head, growled, and barked in return. Despite living as a civilized human for thirteen years, he still seemed surprisingly at home in the company of wolves.
“What are you saying?” Sora asked.
“Shh,” Daemon said, as the wolf answered. They exchanged a few more rounds of barking and guttural growling. The effect echoed through Sora’s gemina bond, and she felt the rumble deep in her core.
Daemon finally turned to her. “I don’t understand everything he’s telling me, but from what I can gather, the people in the camp could do a lot more than turn a bonfire green. The wolf said the log fortifications were built in less than a day. Trees were ripped from the forest throughout the canyon and then flew through the air here.”
“Flew through the air?” Sora said.
“Yeah. He also said something about giant balls rolling out of the camp . . . they were made of ice and fire and . . . something about insects?”
Sora frowned. She didn’t want to doubt Daemon, but by his own admission, his wolfish was a little shaky, and what he was translating made no logical sense.
But he had enough doubt about his abilities as a taiga. Sora wasn’t going to undermine him now.
“Do the wolves know when the group left the camp, and did they see where they went?” she asked.
Daemon faced the brown wolf again and barked his questions.
The wolf consulted two others near him, then replied.
“I see.” Daemon was so fully in wolf mode, he pointed his nose—rather than his finger—northeast to indicate to Sora where they had gone.
“Huh. I wonder where they’re going?” Sora envisioned a map of Kichona in her head. They were in the tiger’s tail, and there wasn’t much else there. “Paro Village, maybe?” It was a short distance inland.
He said something else to the wolves.
The alpha barked.
Daemon went quiet, but their gemina bond blanched white.
“What is it?” Sora asked. “What did he say?”
Daemon stayed still for a minute, then looked up, swiping at his eyes. “He expressed condolences for my pack. The last of my wolf family passed on in the winter.”
“Gods, I’m so sorry.”
He waved it away. “Wolves in the wild don’t live that long usually. They had full lives.”
The alpha wolf growled again.
Daemon composed himself and nodded.
“The pack will accompany us to the top of the canyon,” he said. “They want us to exact revenge against those who came in and cut down their trees and disrespected the gorge.”
Sora bowed her head to the wolf to convey her thanks and accept his charge. Daemon reinforced it with a string of barks.
“I guess we’ll head in the direction of Paro Village and see where it takes us,” Sora said. Her heartbeat was already sprinting ahead.
“And if we don’t find them?” Daemon asked.
“We report what the wolves told you.”
“That’ll go over even better than trying to convince Glass Lady of what we saw.” He twisted his mouth downward. “It always sounds ridiculous when I say I can talk to wolves.”
Sora crossed her arms. “Well, they’ll have to deal with it, because you know what else sounds ridiculous? A magical cult cutting down flying trees and rolling around in balls made of ice and fire. But if that’s what Kichona is about to face, then the taigas had better listen.”
“And if they don’t?”
“Then I suppose we’ll have to take matters into our own hands.”