King of the Rising

by Kacen Callender

  The salt air stings the corners of my eyes as the ship’s sails whip through the air. Water sprays and mists, and Olina shivers under a torn blanket. When I hand her the one I’d had wrapped over my legs, she hesitates.

  “We wouldn’t want our leader to get a storm-season sickness.”

  “The storm season is over,” I tell her with a brief smile. “I’ll be fine.”

  Olina is older than me, her lungs weaker. I’ll need her to help negotiate in the northern empires and free nations. She takes the blanket gratefully. I can feel the curiosity in her glance. Olina has heard many things about me over the past months, before the start of the war when I became the guard of Sigourney Rose. She hadn’t trusted me—not because she thought I would betray the revolution, but because she thought I was too young. I am young. I’m about twenty-two, though I can’t be sure, since my father hadn’t told me the exact year I was born. Olina was worried my youth would cause me to misstep, and that I’d cost the entire plan they’d taken decades to build. Marieke had truly been a force in the network of whispers; a woman who insisted on patience and who finally brought them Sigourney Rose. Sigourney had been the piece they’d needed. But while we think of Marieke as the mother of the revolution and our savior, Olina had always been in the background, working diligently and silently without requiring thanks or praise or attention. There was always work to be done: messages to pass from Hans Lollik Helle, where she had been stationed and where she’d also looked closely after the girl Agatha, after Agatha was brought to the royal island. She hadn’t cared for Agatha like the girl was her daughter, but she still grieved when we found her body on the rocks. She didn’t grieve Agatha so much as she grieved the end of a power that could have helped us win this war. Olina had worked so hard to raise the child, to cultivate the girl’s ability, only for her to be thrown from a cliff.

  Youth, she’d decided—it was because of Agatha’s youth that she’d chased Sigourney Rose and found herself dead.

  “Yet Malthe is not so young, and he acts just as rashly,” I tell her. She’s surprised, then remembers the power of my kraft. She immediately becomes uncomfortable and defensive. She doesn’t like the idea of me seeing her thoughts.

  “That’s true,” she admits, adjusting the blanket around her legs. “Perhaps I’m looking for an excuse to explain why things haven’t turned out the way we’d hoped.” She hesitates, but I can feel the question in her before she asks it out loud. “Can you truly see everything that I think and feel, just like Sigourney Rose?”

  “Not everything,” I tell her. “Sigourney could become her target. She can know them as well as she knows herself. I can only see snippets of their past and know some thoughts.”

  “What do you see?” Olina asks. “Tell me.”

  I can see that though she’s uncomfortable with this power of mine, she can’t help but be intrigued. I can see that she’s always been intrigued by kraft and has often wondered why there are some who’re born with their abilities but not others. She’d wished she had been born with power. Even understanding that there was a chance the Fjern would’ve realized her kraft and had her killed, she wanted to see what such a power must feel like. Olina was raised to believe in the gods of the Fjern rather than the spirits of our ancestors. There are some like Marieke who have always praised the spirits, despite the risk of having her tongue cut from her mouth if any of the Fjern were to hear. It’s what our people did long before the Fjern ever arrived. When the Fjern came, they brought their gods with them: the seven gods, each of whom control their aspects of this world, each of whom must be worshipped. The Fjern believe the gods granted them their kraft, and that the powers are meant for the divine rule of the kongelig. Any islander who has taken this kraft has stolen their power and is sentenced to die.

  Olina can’t help but continue to worship the gods of the Fjern. She fears their wrath. There’s a part of her, a part that she won’t admit to herself, that can’t help but believe that I, too, have stolen the power I have. That this kraft was not meant for me or any of the islanders—that it should only be in the hands of the Fjern who rule us. She wishes she could have kraft, but she doesn’t think that she would deserve it.

  The days are long and hot under the sun with no shade except for the blankets we try to use as tarps. Olina sits cross-legged while Georg and I man the sails.

  “I can’t imagine a full week of this,” Olina says. She wipes the sweat from her face. “We’ll need to prepare ourselves once we reach land. The northerners won’t be impressed with our appearances. Especially our contact. Dame Nage Aris of the Rescela Empire. She’d be offended if we arrived sweaty and salted.”

  “Surely she’ll understand,” I tell her. “We’re in a war. Traveling for a week at sea.”

  “She won’t care about the circumstances,” she says. “They care about their looks quite a lot, in the north.”

  The days pass and begin to meld together. We let a net loose in an attempt to catch our food. The fish that gets tangled in the net are cut from the bone, scales cleaned from their meat, strips laid out on the wood under the heat of the sun. The sunlight isn’t enough to cook the fish thoroughly, however, and most of the meat is eaten raw. Malthe had always taken care to teach his guards how to survive in the wild without any resources, but Olina doesn’t take to the raw fish kindly. She becomes ill on the third day, vomiting and unmoving under the shade of the blankets, the rocking motion of the ship having her whisper her prayers.

  Georg is concerned. “We’d focused so much on what we would do if we found Fjern ships at sea,” he said. “I didn’t consider the chance of one of us falling ill.”

  I’m not sure if Olina’s illness is so serious that it could be fatal, but his nervousness affects me. We try to take care of Olina, passing her most of our water and praying for a rainstorm that can refill our supply. I attempt to use the kraft I’d learned from little Anke, but her ability had always been for wounds—not for a sickness of the lungs and stomach. We pass the islands of the north without stopping, holding our breath as we pass each island, never sure when a Fjern ship will appear in the distance: We sail until each island is a green hill in the haze on the horizon, and until they are gone and there’s nothing but the unending blue of sea. I realize suddenly that the pull I feel, connecting me to Sigourney Rose, is gone. The distance has finally become too much for the kraft that binds us. I’m surprised by the hollowness I feel. There’s a similar melancholy when I realize I can’t see the islands of Hans Lollik anymore, even if these lands had been the site of so much pain. I have never lived a day when I could not see one of the green hills of my home. The farther I am from the islands, the less I feel a connection to my past and the spirits who have always watched over me.

  Time becomes a mix of sunlight and cold night breeze, and it’s difficult to keep the days apart. There’s nothing but blue sea and blue sky and salt air. I start to fear that we’ve gotten turned around or become lost. There’s nothing to guide us, no landmarks on the ocean’s plains, except for the stars at night. Olina becomes sicker with every passing day. As Georg says, “Some just weren’t made for the sea.”

  Olina stops speaking. She keeps her eyes closed. There’s something she needs to tell me, but speaking has begun to hurt her throat. But what she has to say is necessary for me to know. It’s a matter of survival.

  “The people of the north have different customs,” she says, her voice hoarse and her eyes shut. “Each nation takes a different view on kraft.”

  She tells me that there are some nations that honor kraft regardless of who holds the power in their blood. Some empires honor this kraft to the point that anyone who holds the power is taken to a temple worshipping one of the seven gods. They’re forced to praise the gods in thanks for their abilities, kept away from those without kraft. To Olina, it’s a different sort of slavery under a different name.

  “It would be best if you kept your ability hidden,” Olina tells me. “Dame Nage Aris is a devout worshippe
r of the gods.”

  I think I’m about to go mad when a bird flies overhead. Georg is so overjoyed that he nearly cries. Our darker skin was made for the sunlight on these islands, and it’s rare for us to burn, but our skin has begun to peel and crack with nothing but the salt air and sun. Though only five or six days have passed, we’ve all lost weight. Olina looks like a skeleton already. Georg doesn’t say it aloud, but he doesn’t believe she will survive much longer, once we’ve made it to shore. I hope that he’s wrong. Not only for Olina’s sake, but for the sake of this entire war. We need her if we’re to be successful in these negotiations with the northern empires. Without the north’s help, we’ve already lost.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Land appears as the sun begins to set. As if the wind can feel our desperation, it becomes stronger, pushing us through the water and toward land. Awe overcomes me. The horizon is like the ocean, a sweep of land that seems never ending. The largeness of it feels unnatural. This is where the northern empires lie—where Koninkrijk, the land of the Fjern, rests. I can’t see the Koninkrijk Empire with my own eyes. From what I’ve heard, the empire is the farthest north of the seven main nations. If the Fjern had stayed here in their land instead of leaving to conquer ours, so much would be different.

  The docks of Rescela are crowded with fishermen and traders. They almost remind me of the docks of Jannik Helle, except that here, there’s too much to see and too much sound. My eyes can’t take in everything—the sheer number of people pushing against one another in the crowds, and the different sorts of people, too. I’m used to the beige and brown shirts and slacks of the islanders, the white dresses and shirts and pants of the kongelig. Here, the colors swirl and blend—reds, greens, blues, and all with different patterns. Some people wear jewelry, so much that it covers their otherwise bare chests. Others have markings and scars designed in their skin. The color of skin varies as much as their clothes. There are still the pale-skinned people who had originally come from the north, yes—but there are also tones as dark as an islander’s, with golden brown shades in between. There’s no separation between the people of different colors. They speak to one another as friends might, some laughing together, others bartering at stalls in the marketplace. I stare at everyone I pass, searching for any sign that those with pale skin might turn on their apparent friends at any second, take out a whip and beat them into submission. But nothing like this happens. I have a hard time believing that the islands of Hans Lollik are so close, and yet we have remained enslaved and oppressed and trapped in our own land. So few had been lucky enough to escape and survive both the waters and the Fjern. There’s another emotion as well: anger, for the people who live here in their freedom. They have to have seen how we’ve suffered, but they did nothing but continue to live in their comforts. It’s unforgivable.

  Georg clasps a hand on my shoulder, reminding me of the urgency in finding help for Olina. She had mentioned the name of a woman who had already promised aid if we ever needed to come to the docks of the Rescela Empire. She is an islander who had escaped Niklasson Helle years before and worked an inn called the Krage. We leave our ship tied to the docks and push through the tangle of stone and wooden buildings in winding streets that are crowded with merchants and beggars and dirty-faced children and horses and chickens and starving dogs, the smell of piss and rum overwhelming my senses. Sigourney’s kraft is too much. The thoughts and memories and emotions all mingle into a low hum that grows until it’s a roar that fills my head. I have to put up a block to stop the wave after wave of thought and emotion. I can sometimes feel the spike of kraft in the crowd we push through, but I can’t see who the kraft belonged to with every person shoving past and disappearing into the masses again.

  We try to ask for help. Olina, her arm over Georg’s shoulders, is half awake and so weak she can barely drag her feet. We ask again and again if anyone has heard of the Krage, but the response is annoyance and in some cases disgust. For the first time in all my years, I don’t think the disgust has anything to do with the color of our skin. Others with skin as dark as ours and darker only sneer, eyeing our tattered and sun-bleached clothes and the way our skin clings to our bones. Others look at Olina with fear, as if they worry her illness is contagious. Finally it’s a pale, gruff, and impatient man I hadn’t bothered turning to that helps us. I assumed he would ignore us the way so many others had, and I’d unconsciously been avoiding anyone with skin as pale as the Fjern. But the man overheard me asking another person with brown skin, and he points the way, instructing us to follow the path of an empty alley until we come to an inn nested between two larger buildings, where the image of a crow will be painted on a sign. He warns us that it’ll be easy to miss, and he’s right. We pass by the sign that swings in the breeze and have to turn back.

  Though the inn is hidden away, many of its patrons have easily found it as well. The inside is loud with music, someone playing a stringed instrument I’ve never seen and a man singing a song that would’ve insulted the kongelig’s delicate ears. Others laugh as they sit at their tables, joining in with the song or shouting over the music to hold their own conversations. I expect to open the door and for faces to turn, for pale-skinned Fjern to stare us down and demand where our masters were and why we weren’t where we belonged. But we only receive two curious glances at most. Georg and I help Olina through the aisles of tables and chairs, to the barkeep who wipes glasses busily. He reminds me of my father. He’s pale—pale skin, pale hair and eyes, and broad shoulders. My breath automatically hitches in my throat at the sight of him. But when he sees us approaching, he only nods in greeting before he notices Olina.

  “Not sure she could handle another one.”

  Georg is too nervous to speak to the man directly. It’s easy enough to see from the tension in Georg’s shoulders and the pinch between his brows that he’s also struggling with the number of people who ought to be our enemies.

  “We’re looking for a woman,” I tell the man. “She’s a friend of ours. Her name is Roos.”

  “Roos?” he says. I get the sense that he knows who she is, but that he’s surprised to hear us call her our friend. I can see the click of understanding. He takes in the color of our skin, our thinness, and our worn clothes. He realizes that we’re islanders of the south, and that we’ve escaped Hans Lollik. He hides his feelings on this information. I fear that he considers capturing and selling us to the Fjern. I wonder how aware the north is about the rebellion. If they realize we’re in the grips of fighting for our freedom and our lives. If the barkeep does understand, he doesn’t comment on any of this.

  “Roos is on an errand,” he says. “She’s expected to return tonight.”

  Georg and I exchange looks. We don’t think Olina will live much longer without the care she needs. The barkeep seems to see Olina in a different light. “We have herbs that could help her,” he says, nodding his head at Olina. “Roos is always conjuring her herbal teas. People come from across the nation just for her medicine.”

  The man offers a room for us, and we tell him that we’re grateful. Even as he helps us, I can’t trust him. I still expect him to turn on us, to pull out a machete and attempt to cut open our stomachs. He opens a door to a small room draped in patterned colors that seem to vibrate. The barkeep leaves for a moment to get the herbs he’s promised us, and Georg helps Olina lie down in the bed.

  “Do you think he would bring the Fjern here?” Georg asks, not looking away from Olina’s gray face.

  “He could be Fjern himself.”

  He glances at me. “There are kongelig who escaped to the north. Alida Nørup. Cousins of the Solberg and Niklasson. He could be sending messages to them. He could say that slaves who’ve escaped are waiting like fools inside of his inn.”

  “We’ll have to trust that he isn’t.”

  “Trusting him could be fatal.”

  Georg could be right, but I don’t see the point in arguing. The simple fact is that we need to trust in this man to
help save Olina. It’s the only option we have.

  When he returns later, it’s with a woman with dark skin, close to Olina’s age. She’s beautiful. She holds her head with all the regality of the kongelig, a shawl wrapped from her shoulders and across her chest. The only sign that this woman was ever enslaved by the Fjern is a scar that runs from her cheek and curves down her neck.

  Roos doesn’t waste time with greetings. She’s immediately at Olina’s side, kneeling beside the bed. She puts a hand against Olina’s temple and uses a finger to force open her eyelids. Olina’s breathing has harshened. Roos stands.

  “Olina won’t live,” Roos tells us. “Say your goodbyes while you can.”

  Georg gives a bewildered expression. “Aren’t you going to try to help her?” he asks.

  “There isn’t any point in wasting my herbs on her if the result will still be the same.”

  Georg opens his mouth to argue and to insist that Roos try to save Olina, but his tone won’t help our situation. I put a hand up to quiet him.

  “Please,” I tell her. “We need her alive. For all of our sakes. For the sake of the islands.”

  Roos eyes me. “Are you hoping you’ll persuade me by mentioning the islands?” Her eyes are dull, but behind her cold gaze I sense she holds memories she tries not to unleash. “Those islands are no longer my home.”

  “So you don’t care about what happens to our lands? About your people still trapped there?”

  “Why should I? You’re the fools who still haven’t managed to escape in all this time.”

  Anger swells in me, and I can tell that Georg is ready to hit Roos across the face, no matter that she’s the only person in this room that can save Olina. I swallow the anger and close my eyes to take a breath.