Sisters of Glass

by Naomi Cyprus

  Looking at them, Nalah felt a dizzying mixture of longing, sadness, and awe.

  Princess Halan and Queen Rani.

  The queen was staring at Nalah with a stunned grief, as if seeing a perfect double of her daughter was too much for her to properly comprehend. Nalah guessed she was feeling a lot like she herself had when she first met the queen and saw her lost mother’s face looking back at her.

  She met Halan’s eyes. For a moment, Nalah felt the thread that connected her to Halam pulling her tight. It was as if there was nothing else in the world but the two tawams, connected by a bright passage of heat and light. Would Halan truly get her powers, once Nalah was dead? Nalah hoped so.

  Remember me when I’m gone, Nalah thought. Think of my death, and use my powers to avenge my father and me.

  An answer came back, more clearly than any voice she’d imagined from her mother’s picture. Be brave, the voice said. I’ve still got a couple of tricks up my sleeve. Don’t give up just yet.

  A jeering cry went up from the nobles in the crowd, and the rest of the world rushed back into Nalah’s mind. Her heart in her mouth, she stared at Halan.

  Had she imagined the princess’s reply, or was it truly her voice in Nalah’s head?

  Nalah then saw why the crowd had made such an ugly sound. Soren had been brought up to the platform as well, his swollen, bleeding face looking even more painful in the sunlight. Some of the nobles in the front of the crowd looked ready to tear him limb from limb, their faces twisted with rage as they shouted, “Traitor!”

  And then, there were footsteps on wood, and Nalah looked around to see another man ascending the stairs to join them on the platform.

  It was King Tam. He was dressed in robes the color of blood.

  He strode to the front of the stage, facing away from the prisoners, and raised his hands. The crowd immediately fell silent.

  “This day,” he announced, “marks the dawn of a new era in the Magi Kingdom. Behind me are two traitors who would bring chaos and ruin to our land. With their deaths, the violence of rebellion and dissent will end.”

  The nobles cheered—and some of the peasants did, too. Nalah stared, wondering if any of them truly believed the king’s words, if they thought that maybe this time he would be right, this time there would be peace.

  Or maybe they just knew that if they didn’t cheer, he would cut them down, too.

  They deserved better than this. They all did.

  She remembered that voice in her head. Don’t give up just yet.

  Her father would not have wanted her to go down without a fight. She thought about what he’d said, in the dark cell, his kind face illuminated by the silvery glow of the glass orb.

  Nothing was ever going to be able to hide the light within you. Perhaps you were meant to come here, to discover your true destiny.

  Tears sprang to Nalah’s eyes, but certainty filled her heart. It began to thump in her chest, her blood pumping hot and fast. Her hands tingled.

  “The Fifth Clan have long been thought to be a myth,” Tam went on, “But at last we have proof that they truly exist. My daughter’s tawam is one such Thauma. When she dies, the power of the Fifth Clan will be restored to the princess and the royal line, where it belongs.”

  He held out his hands, and a servant approached, carrying something long and thin wrapped in white silk. Nalah’s ears began to ring at its approach. What is that? she wondered.

  Tam reached into the folds and drew out a sword.

  Its handle was long and made of dark, polished wood inlaid with a crisscrossing pattern of silver ribbon. One side of the blade was forged steel, and inlaid in the other was a pane of glass that glittered like a diamond as Tam turned the sword in his hand. Nalah couldn’t seem to take her eyes off it. She felt that she knew it, but it was new at the same time—like seeing an old friend for the first time in years. Her whole body tingled and hummed, as if communing with the sword.

  “This is the Sword of the Fifth Clan, an artifact that has been kept safe in the palace since the Year of Storms. What more fitting weapon to dispatch the Fifth Clan traitor?”

  He raised the sword over his head in triumph, and the crowd roared. Nalah felt her hands unhooked from the stake. “Time to die,” she heard Tam whisper.

  No, Nalah thought. No!

  Her heart was thundering in her ears. A wild, primal rage overtook her, and she thrashed against her bonds and against the grip of the guards, not caring about the sparks of pain that the Thauma ropes shot into her arms when she did. “You can’t do this!” she screamed. “Liar! Murderer!”

  She was shoved down on her knees. Tam handed the sword to a man in a black hood. Of course he wouldn’t strike the blow himself.

  “Be quiet, girl,” the man in the hood said. “If you move, it will only be worse for you.”

  One of the guards pushed her head down onto a low wooden pedestal, brushing her hair aside to expose the back of her neck. Nalah felt light-headed as she knelt on the wooden planks, facing the gallery where Halan and Rani sat watching.

  I’m sorry, Papa. I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I couldn’t even save myself.

  She was about to close her eyes—for the last time—when a glimmer of gold sparkled in her vision.

  Princess Halan had risen from her seat. She had something in her hands, Nalah saw, a glass orb, swirling with purple smoke.

  What is she doing?

  Halan, her lips pressed into a hard line, looked directly at Nalah and threw the orb into the crowd. It shattered on the flagstones below, and an impossibly large cloud of purple smoke billowed out, filling the whole courtyard and blocking the sky.

  “Halan!” Tam screamed his daughter’s name across the smoke. Nalah saw his eyes dart back and forth as the clouds rose around him, his face pale with helpless rage. Halan and her mother had been swallowed up already, and Tam’s fists clenched. “Halan,” he screamed again. “What have you done?”

  The king’s words were drowned out by the cacophony coming from the crowd—screams of panic and confusion and the clattering of feet across the flagstones.

  Nalah tried to sit up, and the black-hooded executioner didn’t stop her. He was too busy peering into the purple fog. As the smoke cleared, she saw young people pouring through a portal that had opened in the center of the courtyard—one she hadn’t noticed before. Another secret passage? Nalah wondered. And as they charged into the courtyard at the surprised guards and nobles, glowing Wild Thauma blades and shields in hand, she noticed that they all had little metal lightning bolts glinting in their ears. The rebels! Halan must have shown them a way under the courtyard so they could bypass the Thauma barriers!

  “No!” King Tam screamed. He drew a long obsidian dagger, the twin of the one that he’d left behind in New Hadar, and leaped from the platform. “Guards, get the princess and the other prisoner inside! Crush the invaders!”

  Nalah rolled aside as the executioner suddenly remembered she was there and made a grab for the scruff of her neck. He missed her by an inch, and Nalah scrambled back across the platform, trying to get up despite her hands being bound. But she wasn’t fast enough. The executioner was upon her again in an instant, the Sword of the Fifth Clan raised above his head.

  Suddenly she saw an old man behind him hurl another glass orb at the wooden platform. It burst right by the executioner’s feet, sending out a plume of blue smoke that curled around his foot like the tentacle of a sea monster, dragging him off the stage and engulfing him in a pulsating cocoon of smoke.

  He’d dropped the sword. It clanged right by Nalah’s shoulder, and she twisted around to try to reach for it, thinking somehow that even with her hands tied, if she had a weapon she could get out of these ropes.

  A rumble from below their feet made her stop and crouch down, wishing she could hold on to something for balance. The rebels backed away from a patch of flagstones. One of the guards advanced, sword drawn, and then fell face-first into a hole that opened up under his feet. A flood
of people climbed out, weapons raised.

  “Long live the queen!” yelled the woman in front—the same bald woman with the Dust-scarred arm who Nalah had freed from the prison. “Get this to Ironside,” she commanded a younger boy, thrusting a thin, sparkling silver sword into his hand. The boy ran to where Ironside was standing and began releasing him from his bonds.

  Someone gripped Nalah’s shoulder, and she jumped, thinking it was another guard coming to cut her down.

  But it was Halan. The princess had discarded the golden robe, and underneath she was wearing a shirt of silver chain mail that glittered like stars in the drifting purple smoke.

  “Are you all right?” Halan asked, taking Nalah’s hands and quickly untying the ropes.

  Nalah shook out her hands and rubbed her wrists. “I am now,” she said.

  “I’m so sorry, Nalah, I was wrong,” Halan said. “I can’t undo what I did, or bring your father back, but—”

  “You saved my life,” Nalah said. She felt choked with emotion, standing there with her mirror self. Their eyes met, and Nalah reached out and pulled Halan into an embrace.

  Nalah felt it again: the warmth spreading through her body that she hadn’t felt since she was a young child. It nearly took her breath away.

  I’m home.

  Halan was staring at her, her eyes wet with emotion. “I haven’t known you very long,” Halan said, “but I think that we were destined to come together. To look out for each other. I don’t want your power. I have my own. I just want to bring peace to my kingdom. Real peace.”

  “Then I’m with you, Your Highness,” said Nalah solemnly.

  A black-clad shape loomed out of the smoke, sword raised. Halan and Nalah pulled apart and dodged out of the way of his swing. Halan vanished in the smoke, but Nalah could make out the hulking form of the guard, raising his sword for another blow.

  A glassy screech made him look up at the last minute. Cobalt flashed out of the purple cloud, talons outstretched, and raked them across the guard’s face. Blinded and filled with rage, the guard made another wild stab that might have caught Nalah in the shoulder if a flash of silver hadn’t come down across it, batting it out of the way as easily as a kitten batting at a piece of string.

  Soren Ferro rolled his shoulders and grinned at Nalah.

  “I told you the people would rise,” he said. “Find a weapon. This palace is ripe for the taking!”

  Nalah grinned back at him and cast her eyes around the platform.

  Where was the sword?

  The guard had dropped it, but perhaps someone else had already picked it up. As she searched the platform, another smoke bomb smashed against the palace wall behind them, releasing a dragon made of red-and-yellow smoke that crawled up and along the battlements, shooting fireballs at the guards before dissipating into the air.

  Down in the courtyard, Nalah saw rebels tangling with more guards and the few nobles who had stayed to fight.

  She shivered as she saw Lady Kayyali fighting alongside the others with a wooden staff that seemed to shrivel and sicken the flesh of the rebels where it struck. Another rebel went down, without any apparent blow at all—until Nalah realized that she could see a pair of feet and ankles, dressed in black stockings, hurrying away and vanishing. Lord Malek was here too, wearing his brand-new shadow cloak.

  But then, in the doorway to the palace, Nalah saw the captain who had captured her and Marcus standing with a huge number of guards. They jostled behind her, poised to rush into the courtyard and back up the king’s guards, ready to crush the rebels. Nalah sucked in a deep breath, to shout to Halan, or Soren, to be prepared for the fight of their lives—but the captain didn’t move.

  “Captain Alamar,” said one of the younger armsmen. “Shouldn’t we attack?”

  The captain turned on him. “When I give the order, armsman, and not before! Listen to me, all of you. Do you want to be on the right side of history or not?”

  Nalah’s heart leaped. Not all of the guards were loyal to Tam, and perhaps they would back Halan if it looked like she was going to win the day! The princess must know—

  But then she heard Halan scream. It was as if someone had reached into Nalah’s own chest and squeezed her heart.

  “My own daughter!” raged the voice of the king. He was dragging Halan up onto the platform by one arm, his dagger gripped in his other hand. “How could you do this?” Tam yelled. “Throw your life away by helping this rabble? I am your father! I only wanted to give you what you always wanted: power, respect!” He jabbed the air with the dagger.

  “Asa!” Two more figures stormed up onto the platform. Queen Rani, her black hair loose and flying, sprinted toward her husband. Beside her was a guard in black, the top of his face masked by an iron helmet. “It’s over. Let her go,” the queen demanded.

  “Over? Over?” Tam sneered. “My dear, it has only begun. After all these years, you would betray me too?” He turned to Halan. “I always knew you were your mother’s daughter. Traitors, both.” He pulled the princess close against his chest, holding the dagger dangerously close to her throat. “You never loved me, Rani, but I know that you love her. So step back, now.”

  Queen Rani hesitated, her eyes riveted on Halan. She reached out for the arm of the guard behind her, and he took off his helmet.

  Nalah’s heart gave a thunderous leap in her chest.

  It was her father.

  Except . . . it wasn’t. He was clean-shaven, burlier, darker from the relentless Magi Kingdom sun. And he was alive.

  “Bardak?” Tam gulped, as if he’d seen a ghost. “But you’re dead.” The hand holding the dagger sagged, and Halan wrenched herself out of his grip.

  “Captain Omar Bardak,” she said, standing tall before the king. “He’s been in the palace all this time. One of your very own guards—one of the hundreds of people you never really see because they’re not rich or noble enough. He’s my real father, not you.”

  Tam stumbled back as if he had been struck. He stared at Rani and Omar, standing before him, and then looked to Halan, defiant.

  “Halan,” Rani said. “That’s enough—come away from him.”

  Yes, please, Nalah urged in her mind. He’s dangerous. You know what he’s capable of now!

  But Halan wasn’t finished. “That’s the real reason Mother was always so afraid for me,” she went on. “It wasn’t because of the rebels, it was because of you.”

  The tension in the air made the hair on Nalah’s arms stand up, and she knew she had to act quickly. You already took one precious life, Tam, she thought. I’m not going to let you take another. She quieted her mind and listened for the hum she’d heard when Tam had unsheathed the sword. It was calling to her, like all the powerful Thauma objects did. Then she heard it, across the platform. She darted toward it and spotted the Sword of the Fifth Clan, forgotten on the ground.

  Her fingers brushed the silver-ribbon-crossed wooden handle, and she immediately felt an electric shiver coursing through her body. As she clasped the sword in her hand, she could almost feel the weapon melding with her, becoming one with her like an extension of her own arm.

  This, she thought. This is my destiny.

  The moment was broken by Tam’s strangled cry.

  “Your mother was right to be afraid,” he said softly. “You are no daughter of mine. That’s why you were born powerless, useless! I should have killed you at birth!” He raised the obsidian dagger and lurched toward Halan.

  “No!” Nalah screamed. She rolled to her feet in a single movement, the sword in her hands. This was like the feeling when she’d broken the glass at the market, but instead of passing through her and out her hands, it just seemed to keep cycling through her, like an electric current humming in her veins.

  Half a dozen armed guards leaped in between Nalah and where Tam held Halan, but Nalah didn’t stop. Something possessed her, a righteous fury that overtook fear and doubt like a cleansing fire. Three of them charged at her, raining down killing blows with
their swords, but Nalah batted them away like flies. The Sword of the Fifth Clan glowed with a fierce light, and every weapon that it met shattered on impact. Within seconds, the six guards had been disarmed, their weapons in ruin, their eyes watching Nalah with awe and fear.

  Finally, with the path to Tam cleared, Nalah stood before them, power surging through her like lightning in her veins. She pointed the sword at the king and said, “Let her go.”

  But the voice was not merely her own. And it contained more than just the simple chime of her earlier wonders. This voice, her voice, contained cracks of thunder, gusts of wind, and the crash of waves on the shore. It reverberated across the walls of the courtyard so that it felt as if she was everywhere at once.

  Tam was about to speak, but then he screamed and doubled over his hand. The obsidian blade was melting over his fingers, its volcanic glass heated to thousands of degrees.

  “Leave this place,” Nalah boomed. “Take your followers and go!”

  She pointed with the sword, and the smoke around her swirled and followed her gesture, all the colored smoke in the courtyard flowing together to form a tunnel between the platform and the gate. A wind began to rush down the tunnel, tugging at Tam’s robes as he stood cradling his burned hand.

  “Your rule over this place is ended.”

  The nobles Lang and Kayyali and Malek all rushed to the platform, wielding their Thauma weapons, the wind current tugging at their hair and clothes. Lady Lang threw a sharp glass dagger at Nalah, but Nalah parried it easily with the sword, and it fell and shattered on the platform at her feet.

  “Hear me, and be gone!” Nalah commanded. The wood under Tam’s feet cracked and tipped up, throwing him off the platform. The Thauma lords caught him and they began to back away. Tam tried to start back toward the platform one more time, and Nalah brought down the sword in a wide sweep. The smoke twisted around the arms of the nobles, pulling them away.

  “I will be back and I will destroy you. I’ll destroy you both!” Tam shouted, but his words were swallowed up by the roar of the wind. The four of them, and a small gang of guards, retreated out of the gate and were gone.