Skyfire

by Skye Melki-Wegner

  And then Clementine falls.

  I reach for her with a cry, and my lungs fill with a choke of smoke and ash. I squeeze my eyes shut as the bubble of protective air dissolves and a sulphuric stink fills my throat. I swipe out blindly, vaguely aware of the screams and shouts and scrabbling limbs around me.

  Nothing. Just empty air. She’s gone.

  Suddenly I think of Radnor. I think of his body tumbling from the waterfall; my desperate hands trying to keep a grip on his limbs as they slip away. And now another body, another friend, lost to the churn of air and flame and –

  No!

  And without thinking, I dissolve.

  Night slips around me, cool and inviting. I slip into its embrace and melt between the steam and shadows. I have no body. No hands, no arms, no eyes, no breath. She’s here somewhere. I know she is. Her proclivity is Air; she can’t have fallen, she must have –

  And then I sense her. Just the slightest twitch. She’s dissolved into Air, but she’s losing herself: melting like candlewax into the dark until –

  Nothing.

  Perhaps I imagined it. The chance of sensing Clementine, in her proclivity form, is painfully slim. If we’d both dissolved into Night, it would be simple. Silver used the same trick to save me upon the Night-song. But our powers don’t match. A connection is technically possible, but difficult. It would require our melted forms to physically cross through each other, to be mutually searching, to overlap in the exact same patch of night-stained air …

  Clementine! I shout the name inside my mind, as rough and raw and coarse as if my voice were made of gravel.

  Nothing. Silence.

  Then I hear it. My own name, lost and confused. More of a whisper than a cry: the echo of a voice almost gone. Danika.

  And there she is. We cling to each other. A moment of shared breath, of shared power. Toxic steam billows around us, and Curiefer boils below. Somewhere above, our friends are choking. They can’t survive without Clementine’s proclivity – not for long.

  But part of me is slipping. I can feel the lure of Night. What’s the point of going back? It just means more pain, more death, more struggling. Easier to end it this way. To end it all here, drifting into peace and shadow …

  Maisy!

  The word explodes inside my breath. Inside my bones. It’s Clementine calling, searching for her sister. The desperation in that cry shakes me from my confusion. I can’t fade. We can’t fade. Our friends still need us.

  As one, we bluster back towards the rocks. Suddenly I’m solid, my raw fingertips fumbling on stone and my lungs heaving as Clementine reels a gush of wild breeze into our faces.

  ‘Clementine!’ someone cries.

  ‘Danika!’

  Shouting, fumbling. The raucous cough of half-choked lungs. Ash stings my eyes as our crew takes a moment to check that we’re all here, we’re all safe. But we can’t afford to rest. Not yet. We have to keep climbing, our bodies strained, our minds wrecked.

  And the twins use their proclivities to keep us alive. These spoilt richie girls, who once painted their nails to enter Rourton’s sewers, and who brought a pack of designer clothing on a refugee trek. I hated them at first. I hated them for their lives of luxury, while I starved and scrimped on the city’s winter streets. I’ve been wrong many times in my life, but underestimating those girls was perhaps my greatest mistake of all.

  Like a slow-spinning waltz, we keep on moving. One hand, then the other. One foot, then the other. A patch of night sky above. Far above. It’s barely visible through the haze and steam and gas, but I can see it. I know I can.

  The faintest shine of stars.

  I clamber over the lip of the geyser. My body trembles with this final effort and I collapse with a grunt. The stone is blessedly cold on my face and burnt fingertips. I hear the others around me: panting, gasping, rolling their own faces across the cold rocks.

  I don’t know how long we lie there. It could be five minutes, or it could be an hour. All I can sense is the crisp night air. The chill of it is sweeter than roseberries.

  Finally, I force myself onto my elbows. My fingertips are still stinging, but I can handle it. What I can’t handle is a bullet through the skull – and if we don’t start moving, that’s exactly what we’ll get. ‘Come on,’ I say. ‘We’ve got to move.’

  No one responds.

  I suck down a slow breath. ‘When Farran finds out we’re missing …’

  Lukas pulls himself up into a sitting position. His face is strained, but determined. ‘I can sense the sólfoxes,’ he says. ‘They’re still sleeping where we left them.’

  ‘Better than me,’ Teddy says. ‘My head’s all groggy – can’t feel a thing yet. Reckon you can call ’em here?’

  Lukas shakes his head. ‘Too far away – I can only just sense them. It’s like a shadow. Just at the edge of what I can feel. But once we’re closer …’

  Those words are just what we need to get moving. The thought of descending the mountain on foot, trekking through the wild … it’s too much to cope with. Too bleak a plan to face. But to stumble just a little further, and then ride our sólfoxes towards the stars?

  Well, that sounds almost feasible.

  We struggle to our feet, brushing soot from our clothes. The twins’ blonde curls are dark with grime, and my own auburn hair feels thin and oily against my scalp. But there’s nowhere to wash ourselves, even if we wanted to. All we can do is clamber down the slope, tiny pebbles skittering beneath each step.

  The sólfoxes doze where we left them – curled up together in the branches, an enormous ball of feathers and claws. Teddy gives a quiet whistle as we approach, and their heads snap up. They stare at us, their eyes huge pale beads, and for a terrible moment I think they’re about to pounce. But Lukas holds out his hands and the creatures lower their heads a little, mollified. I release a deep breath.

  We bundle onto the sólfoxes’ backs, in the same formation as before. I wrap my hands around Lukas’s torso, ignoring the sting of his cloak on my swollen fingertips. I’m too exhausted to care. Lukas smells faintly of sulphur, but under the grime I can almost sense the rhythm of his heartbeat. So close. So near.

  And with a rush of wind, our sólfox leaps into the night.

  As we fly, I look to the side. The second sólfox soars alongside us, with the twins and Teddy bundled on its back. Beyond them lies an endless field of stars.

  Back in Rourton, I never had a chance to see stars like these. There was too much light from the factories and forges, from the richies’ houses and the squalid apartments. Even the alchemy streetlamps helped to cast a constant glow. They fuzzed out the edges of the stars, as though I were staring into the sky through a constant fog. Always dimness, never darkness.

  Here, there’s nothing to dilute the night. In the space between mountains – between the geyser’s glow and the city spires – the sky is as black as treacle. I want to reach out and touch the stars, to brush them, to taste them. My magic burns beneath my skin. It would be so easy to let go, to fling myself into the dark and dissolve like –

  Stop it, Danika.

  What am I thinking? I need to get a grip on my proclivity. It’s becoming too persistent, too tempting. And my moment of Night in the geyser hasn’t helped. If I can’t control my powers, I’ll end up floating off in my sleep – dozing into dreams and losing myself to the dark.

  ‘All right, Danika?’ Lukas says.

  It takes me a moment to register his voice, barely audible over the rushing wind. I swallow my thoughts and nod into the back of his cloak. ‘Yeah. You?’

  ‘Yeah. I’m fine.’

  The sólfox dips a little lower, and a rumple of wind blasts our bodies. Lukas leans down, bracing himself, and I fall against his back with a gasp.

  ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘Should’ve warned you.’

  There’s something distant in his voice now. Almost uncertain, as though his mind is elsewhere.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I say. ‘Lukas? Are you –�
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  I lose my words in a bluster of air. The sólfox begins to rise again, soaring up on a thermal with a flickering adjustment of its wings.

  Lukas takes a moment to respond. ‘What are we going to do?’

  ‘About what?’ I say.

  ‘About the war.’

  I stiffen a little, but don’t speak.

  ‘The Víndurnics are being conscripted at dawn,’ Lukas says. ‘They probably left for the plains as soon as midnight was over. Tomorrow, they’ll travel to the Valley, and then …’

  ‘And then they’ll fight,’ I say. ‘All the solid souls of Víndurn, against King Morrigan’s armies.’

  An image of the Magnetic Valley flashes into my mind. A watery channel framed by slopes of wild grass. They’ll have to fight on those slopes, up above the waterline. No proclivities, and no alchemy – except for Farran’s firestones. Chasing those distant deserts of green …

  ‘If the firestones work,’ Lukas says, ‘Lord Farran could transmit any kind of magic into the battle, just like broadcasting a song through the radio.’ His voice is hoarse with tension. ‘We have to warn them, Danika. We have to warn the Taladians what they’re up against.’

  I close my eyes. I know what he’s asking. He’s asking us to throw away our lives. To fly straight into that battlefield and spread the word. To risk being shot from the sky, or hacked down with swords and knives and axes.

  But I know he’s right. The Taladian soldiers are just kids themselves: eighteen-year-olds conscripted from cities like Rourton. Kids like Mitcham or Riley. If we hadn’t fled, we’d have been forced to join the army ourselves one day. Armed with clunky old weapons like swords and bows, while Lord Farran uses his Curiefer-infused firestones to blast us with magic.

  ‘You’re right.’ I take a coarse breath, and force my eyes open. ‘We’ve got to warn them. But how? There’ll be thousands of soldiers, spread all through their army camp, and –’

  Lukas cranes his neck around. His face is tight and determined, his eyes like glass in the moonlight. ‘We can’t tell an entire army at once. But we can tell the man who leads the field, and let him think better of the risk he’s taking.’

  ‘The man who …’ My voice trails off. ‘Oh.’

  My fingers clench on his shoulders. I think of crashing bombs, of burning cities. Of hunters and pistols and flames in the dark. No. Not after all we’ve been through. Not after all we’ve endured to escape …

  But if we don’t do it, how could we live with ourselves? How could we live with the blood on our hands?

  ‘Okay. We’ll have to talk to the others, but … you’re right. We have to warn him. We have to try.’ The final words stick in my throat.

  As our sólfox soars upwards, plans unravel in my head. What are the first steps? It’s easier to look at it piece by piece than to focus on the overall picture.

  A picture of my friends’ bodies, broken on a battlefield.

  But first, Lukas Morrigan will fly us to the Valley.

  Tomorrow, we confront a king.

  By the time dawn brushes the sky, we’re high above the plains of Víndurn. The air is frigid, sharp with the promise of frost despite the slice of rising sun. Our sólfoxes soar westwards, towards the Valley.

  I glance down behind the wings and almost swallow my tongue. It was one thing to fly at night, when the world was a blur of dark around me. But now, in the light of dawn? I can see everything. My stomach jolts as the world rushes by below me. It brings back the memory of Tindra’s body, tumbling down, soon to be crushed beneath the weight of her sólfox.

  I close my eyes and force myself to calm down. I’m being ridiculous. If I can cope with catacombs and geysers, I can sure as hell cope with a bird’s eye view of Víndurn.

  We soar higher, then higher still: our sólfox blasts into the clouds, until the world itself is a whirl of grey. Cold liquid sprays around my face, shocking my skin. My cloak streams behind me.

  And suddenly, I’m not afraid. I’m flying.

  I feel the smile spread across my face: one of those uncontrollable smiles that unfurls like a banner. My eyes are wide open and my hands are secure on Lukas’s shoulders. I lean upwards, gazing into this whirl of white.

  I’m alive. I’m truly alive. I let out a little whoop, unable to hold it back, and Lukas laughs. I feel it bubble up through his torso before it spills from his lips. We fly together, bodies pressed tight, the rush of wind and feathers and claws beneath us.

  And for the first time, I understand Lukas’s words. ‘It feels like ages since I’ve flown! Isn’t it amazing?’ This was what he missed: the sheer, giddy joy of life against the sky.

  An orange glow spills across Víndurn: syrup on a slice of bread. I feel as if I can see half the country. Vast fields of rock. The scraggly forests. Lakes of shining blue, frozen in the winter light. Bubbling geysers shoot steam and sulphur into the sky.

  And in the distance … the Boundary Range. The border between Víndurn and Taladia. Too high and impenetrable to cross, even in a biplane. The Magnetic Valley is the only chink in its armour.

  ‘Are you scared?’ I ask Lukas. ‘About seeing your father, I mean?’

  ‘No. It has to be done.’

  But a little spasm runs through his voice, and I know that he’s not being entirely truthful. I don’t blame him. If I were about to confront a father who wanted me dead – a father who bombed innocent cities and sent thousands of conscripts to their slaughter – I’d be pretty damn nervous too.

  Of course, I am nervous. The king wants me dead as well. In Víndurn, it was easy to forget who I really am: Danika Glynn, the most wanted fugitive in Taladia. Yet here I am, about to throw myself into the clutches of the man who signed my death warrant.

  We land at the edge of the Valley. Despite the sunlight, the air is bitterly cold. Unfortunately, we can’t fly the sólfoxes any further. As soon as we pass over a magnetic seam, the alchemy in their bones will cease to keep them airborne and we’ll fall like broken biplanes from the sky.

  ‘Reckon Farran knows we’ve gone yet?’ Teddy says.

  ‘Probably,’ I say. ‘He doesn’t strike me as the sort to sleep in.’

  ‘Oh, I dunno. I bet he’s sitting back in his big lordly bed in the spires, waiting for servants to bring him cups of tea and caviar cakes and that.’

  ‘On a day like today?’ I shake my head. ‘No. He’ll be up and busy by now. I’m sure he’s checked on our prison cell.’

  ‘Good,’ Clementine huffs. ‘It serves him right. I only wish I could have seen his face when he realised we were gone.’

  ‘I don’t,’ Teddy says fervently. ‘That’d mean I was in his firing range.’

  Down at the waterline, we take a few minutes to scrub our arms and faces. To present our argument to King Morrigan, we must first present ourselves. The grime of the geyser slides away – filth and sweat and the stink of sulphur. We dry ourselves quickly and stuff our limbs back into the warmth of our Víndurnic cloaks, before clambering back atop the sólfoxes.

  Luckily, the creatures don’t need magic to gallop on the ground. They tuck their wings against their sides – which shields our legs from the cold beautifully – and charge towards the western end of the Valley.

  The water ripples softly in the morning light. It’s strange to think we were here so recently in a rowboat. Those hours of floating through the Valley feel like a story. Something that was never real, and could never have been.

  The sólfoxes charge on, their claws churning through grass and mud. I wrap my legs tighter around the furry torso. The beasts are fast – as fast as foxaries – and they show no sign of tiring. At this rate, we’ll traverse the Valley in less than a day.

  Teddy gives a wild whoop. ‘Faster than rowing, I reckon!’

  Minutes turn to hours. The water ripples. The sun arcs across the sky, melting morning into noon. My body jolts. My legs ache. But I cling to the galloping sólfox with every skerrick of strength I can muster.

  Finally, we bring t
he beasts to a halt.

  ‘Better walk from here,’ Teddy says. ‘Don’t fancy rocking up on these things.’

  We can just make out the Taladian army camp: a distant smear by the Valley’s western mouth. It scars the slope, a shadow above the waterline. All it would take is for a single soldier to look up – to see us charging forth on these monstrous beasts – and we’d die in a spray of panicked arrows.

  I slide off the sólfox with a grunt. My legs are wobbly, addled by hours upon the creature’s back. ‘What’ll we do with them?’

  No one answers. Lukas strokes the closest fox across the neck. It leans into his touch, its eyes closed. The moment is quiet and tender, and I wait a moment before I speak again.

  ‘Maybe you could call them if we need help?’ I say.

  Lukas shakes his head. ‘Not in the Valley. They’re still obeying me now because they recognise me – they remember the touch of my magic. But it won’t take long for them to forget.’

  ‘Yeah, same here,’ Teddy says. ‘Damn shame too, I reckon. I never say no to a getaway vehicle.’ He sighs. ‘Better get rid of them, I reckon. Don’t want ’em running down into the camp and giving us away.’

  Lukas strokes the sólfoxes again, whispering something I can’t quite make out. The creatures stiffen a little. Then he and Teddy each place a hand on their withers, preparing to lead them away. To my surprise, Clementine offers to help control the beasts.

  ‘I had a pet canary once,’ she says primly. ‘I know how birds react to things.’

  Teddy snorts, but doesn’t argue.

  And so I’m left to sit with Maisy atop a sheltered crop of boulders. For a long while, neither of us speaks. We just gaze across the rippling water, and at the army camp. I open my mouth then close it again.

  Maisy stares down at the ripples. ‘That was our mother’s proclivity.’