Given

by Nandi Taylor

  But there was a reason rune puppets made lethal assassins. They burned runes at less than half the speed of a person, and eyeing the speed runes on the thing, Yenni knew she could never outrun it. And though normally she would have the advantage with her spear against a sword, she couldn’t very well stab a creature made of wood. Nevertheless, if she wanted to save Weysh, she would have to find a way to destroy it.

  Or destroy its puppeteer.

  “Where are you?” she yelled in Gunzu, knowing he hid somewhere in the shadows of the trees.

  The puppet’s speed runes glowed, and it rushed her.

  It struck, its joints clacking as it thrust and Yenni just barely brought her spear up to catch it. The sword pinged against her spear, and made her arms tremble, but she slipped back into tortoise stance and flared her strength runes as she parried, swinging the sword down to the ground. Then she pulled on speed and darted back before the puppet could respond in kind.

  She dragged ach’e, feeling it buzz within her and tickle her fingers. “Source as twine to bind my foe!” she shouted. The puppet went rigid and fell to the ground. Yenni dashed to it, thrust the backs of her palms right at its face, and blasted it with fire.

  She could see its runes glowing through the flames, and seconds later it was back on its feet and thrusting at her, still ablaze. Yenni flowed into gazelle stance, dancing and darting out of the way of the puppet’s sword strikes, even as it smothered the flames with its fire wards. She gritted her teeth in frustration; she didn’t have time for this! Anything could be happening to Weysh. He must be in serious danger to have left her side.

  As she weaved and ducked, her runes warm on her skin, Yenni knew she could spend hours in this clearing and she would never defeat the puppet. Her runes would run out first, and it would kill her. She had to find the puppeteer.

  “Come out, coward!” she screamed in Gunzu. “Don’t send a puppet to fight for you. Face me!”

  Her taunt served only to set off the rune on her stomach, though now it was not more than a dull twinge—it was almost used up. But thanks to the warning, Yenni turned and slashed, deflecting a single metal dart coming at her from the back. She saw the trees rustle before she turned back to the puppet, just as it swung its long, wooden arm. It hit her in the middle like a log and sent her flying. She slammed down on the grass and wheezed, drawing heavily on pain ward until she could breathe again. When she finally jumped to her feet, the puppet stood a few paces away, clicking and clacking and jerking its strange head.

  He’s playing with me!

  Rage burned in the pit of her stomach. Yenni turned and attempted to dash into the woods, to try to find the cowardly puppeteer, but the puppet suddenly materialized right before her, slashing down with its sword. Yenni slipped into gazelle stance and darted back, the sword whizzing in front of her nose. Bright shock zipped through her; as far as she knew, the rune that allowed one to jump instantly from one place to another like that was known only to the Yirba—to her family and the Masters.

  What?

  The puppet disappeared, and she spun to find it behind her. Yenni stood panting and confused. That couldn’t be right. Why would her own tribe attack her?

  No. She was mistaken. She must be. More than ever she needed to force the puppeteer to show himself. Her runes would not hold out much longer.

  Think, think! Father Ri lend me your wisdom; Mother Ya lend me your fury—guide me!

  The rune on her stomach gave one last feeble pulse and the puppet rushed her again. It attacked her with a series of savage blows that she did her best to block and parry in tortoise stance, but she could feel her runes slowing down. She had to pull and pull to keep up with the puppet, and eventually it knocked her with its hard shoulder, once again sending her soaring and tumbling to the ground.

  Her head bounced off the grass, reminding her painfully of her fight with the bandits in the alley. The way the stars flashed in front of her eyes had her recalling the bright light of Queyor’s Magic Lantern when she’d used it to blind her foes. But she couldn’t blind a puppet.

  Though she could blind the puppeteer . . .

  Yes! He needed to see her to attack her. Magic lanterns would not work in the bright light of day, but if she could somehow block his line of sight she would force him to move and give himself away. Yenni struggled to her feet, leaning on her spear and making a great show of being injured, and it wasn’t all an act. Her bones ached but she pulled on pain ward, fell into aggressive lion stance, and charged the rune puppet.

  It met her charge, sword raised, but at the last moment she dove and rolled, bounding up, against all instincts, right behind the puppet, the drape of its cloak shielding her. It jerked and stopped as the puppeteer lost sight of her, and Yenni strained to listen to the sounds of the wood. Praises upon praises to lucky Ib-e-ji there was no breeze that day, so the faint rustling at the other side of the clearing must be her attacker.

  She dragged on her speed runes and darted between the stuttering puppet’s legs, under the cloak, and dashed for the edge of the clearing, chasing the sound. And when once more the puppet loomed in front of her, appearing from nowhere, she channeled swift gazelle and spun, flowing past it before finally bursting into the trees with a cry. A hooded figure jumped up from between two soaring trunks, startled, and took off into the woods.

  “You won’t get away this time!” Yenni snarled. She raised her spear, dragged on the last of her strength runes, took practiced aim, and hurled it.

  A deep yell echoed through the trees.

  Yenni ran after the cry and found the puppeteer limping through the trees, gripping his thigh. Her spear had cut but not pierced him, and lay on the ground nearby. She dashed to him and tackled him to the ground, ignoring his agonized scream, then yanked the hood from his head.

  And reeled.

  The shock of it stole her breath just as surely as if she’d been hit in the gut again. Professor Devon panted up at her, his eyes wild. Training, and only training, allowed Yenni to act through her horror. She shoved the back of her hand, with her fire rune, in his face.

  “Do not move, and do not speak, or I will set you ablaze,” she said coldly, switching back to Creshen. “Source as twine to bind my foe,” said Yenni. Devon cried out as his arms and legs went rigid, aggravating his wound. She pulled ach’e to the fire rune, just enough to make it glow.

  “Where is Weh-sheh?”

  Devon licked his lips. “I wasn’t trying to kill you!” he cried hoarsely. “Not really. I simply wanted to test the rune once more before you leave!”

  And Yenni thought she had been shocked before. She gawked at him. He’d attacked her to test the warning rune? And test it once more, he’d said. So it had been him at the training sands as well, though he’d fussed and fretted and pretended to fear for her safety.

  Was he truly capable of such selfish depravity? Was she such a bad judge of character? In all the time she’d known Devon, worked with him, she’d never seen so much as a hint that he could do something so vile.

  Yes—yes, she had. It hit her with the force of yet another blow.

  “You tried to kill Mainard as well,” she whispered, disbelieving. It was he who had set that sharp metal instrument toppling, straight for the crown of Mainard’s head.

  “I had to do something! And it worked, did it not? Besides, I knew you would save him, just like I knew you would save yourself. You’re so strong and resilient—”

  “SHUT UP!” Yenni screamed, spitting all the pain of his betrayal at him. She pulled more ach’e to the fire rune, igniting it, and held it just close enough to Devon that he could feel the uncomfortable heat of it. He breathed hard, sweat dripping down the side of his face.

  “Where is Weh-sheh, Devon. Where. Is. My. Given.”

  Devon’s eyes glimmered faintly with runelight. Yenni pulled hard on ach’e, ready to set him on fire, until she heard
a deep, pained dragon’s screech right above them. Instinctively her eyes darted to the sky. She squinted through the trees but she saw nothing.

  Because she was being deceived.

  She whipped her eyes back down to Devon and found the rune puppet looming over the both of them. Its sword hurtled down toward her, about to cleave her in two. She had half a moment to make her decision. She placed her life in the hands of the Sha. Yenni raised her face to the sword, watching it fall, then watching it pass right through her without stirring so much as a breeze. Just like before, when the puppet in the clearing had seemed to move from one place to the next within moments, this puppet was merely another illusion.

  “Oh hells!” cried Devon.

  Enough. Yenni pulled back her arm and punched him hard in the temple, putting all her disgust into the swing. His head snapped to the side, and his eyes fluttered closed. Yenni jumped to her feet.

  “Weh-sheh!” she called again.

  “What in the world is that thing?”

  “I heard someone shout. This way!”

  Two of her fellow students came crashing through the trees toward her.

  “Whoa!” one of them cried at the sight of her. The other one narrowed his blue eyes and drew his sword, pointing it at her. “Hands on your mouth.”

  Yenni cocked her head to the side, confused. “What?”

  “Is that—I think that’s a professor!” said his friend. He shot Yenni a look of alarm and drew his sword as well.

  “Hands on your mouth!” the first one yelled again.

  “But he is the one who attacked me!”

  “That’s for the peacekeepers to decide. We’re taking you in.”

  “Ah!” said Yenni. “This is lunacy! I am going to academy security.” While a panicked part of her wanted to run through the woods looking for Weysh, she knew she would have more luck with the help of the peacekeepers. They could more effectively interrogate Devon. She gestured to his unconscious body. “Pick him up and bring him. Mind my spear.”

  The two students glanced at each other in uncertainty.

  “Quickly!” snapped Yenni. They sheathed their swords and scurried over to Devon. Just then she heard a faint, familiar flapping. She gasped and looked up. A moment later a high dragon cry echoed through the wood. Yenni glared at Devon, but he was out cold.

  “Weh-sheh!” she yelled up at the trees. Yenni took off for the clearing as the two students shouted after her. She spotted Weysh gliding above the canopy of the trees.

  Oh thank all the Mothers and Fathers! “Weh-sheh!” she called again, waving her arms frantically. He dove into the clearing, changing a few feet in the air. He hit the ground running and swooped Yenni up into his arms.

  “Kindly Watcher, thank you,” he breathed, squeezing her.

  “I’pa! Weh-sheh . . . you’re . . . hugging me too . . . tightly.”

  He let her down. “Sorry.”

  Yenni slapped his arm. “Where did you go?!”

  “Where did you go?” Weysh retorted. “One moment we were walking together, the next you took off into the trees and I had to chase after you. Then you were just gone!”

  “Erm,” said one of the students from behind.

  Weysh’s face went dark. “Who are they?” he said, and took a step toward them. Yenni put a hand on his chest.

  “They are helping me bring my attacker to justice.”

  He looked to her in alarm. “You were attacked again? By who? Where are they?”

  “Weh-sheh, please calm down and I will explain. We were deceived.” She laid out how Devon must have used the deception rune to separate them.

  Weysh clenched his fists, breathed hard, and let out a menacing dragon’s growl. “This never would have happened if I could properly smell!” he shouted. “I’d have noticed if your scent was in one direction and your image in another. Where the hell is Devon?”

  “We’re taking him to academy security. Actually, now that you are here we can fly him there much faster. Change, and we will put him on your back.”

  “Not just yet, I want a word with him.”

  “No, Weh-sheh, he is dangerous and we need to get him to the authorities before he wakes up.”

  “Before he—you knocked him out?”

  “Yes.”

  “A professor? You incapacitated an accredited professor of magic? On your own?”

  “Professor or not, he could never best me at runelore. Now hurry, he—Weh-sheh!”

  Weysh had gathered her up in his arms again. “Watcher above, but I love you,” he murmured against the top of her head.

  “I love you, too, but now is not the time for this! Change, quickly.”

  He backed away, grinning strangely from ear to ear, and changed to dragon. Yenni could only shake her head. For all his virtues, her Weysh could be a real oddity.

  Next, one of the students staunched the blood flow with a basic healing incantation while Yenni collected her spear. Then came the task of hauling him up onto Weysh’s back. It didn’t help that Weysh kept nuzzling and sniffling her as they worked, until at last Yenni had to tap him on the nose and hiss at him to stay still. Yenni climbed up behind Devon to hold him in place.

  “You two bring the rune puppet there,” she said to the two Creshen students. They glanced fearfully at it.

  “Don’t worry, it cannot move without someone controlling it. Think of it as a giant doll.” How Devon had even come by it was another baffling mystery.

  She turned her attention back to keeping Devon in place. “Let’s go, Weh-sheh!” she called. He flapped his wings and they were off.

  The academy peacekeepers took them all into custody until a high peacekeeper could reach the academy. They split them into separate rooms, and Weysh was the one who had to keep Yenni calm when the academy officers tried to pull her away.

  “They only want to question us, lovely. You’re not in trouble.”

  Still, the room they put her in was horrible and stifling, and not simply because it had no windows and just one uncomfortable chair. The Creshens had done something to the room to dampen ach’e. The air felt heavy and soupy, and when she tried to pull ach’e it tingled painfully under her skin, like little knives. It would be difficult indeed to use runes or incantations.

  She waited for endless minutes until at last the door opened and a green-skinned woman—a dragon—stepped into the room. She held a book and ink pen.

  “Mam’selle Kayirba?” she said, tucking a lock of her chin-length green hair behind her ear. “I am High Peacekeeper Huisa. I’ll need to ask you a few questions. The quicker and more truthfully you answer them, the sooner you will go free. Now, are you, in fact, a royal of the Yirba tribe of the Moonrise Isles?”

  Yenni sighed. So much for keeping that secret.

  “I am,” Yenni confirmed. “I suppose Weh-sheh told you?”

  “Your Given? No, in fact it was Emmanuel Devon who made that claim.”

  “What? But how could he—”

  Because she had foolishly told him only the Masters knew how to draw the warning rune. Such a rare rune would normally only be bestowed on someone quite high ranking within a tribe, after all.

  Yenni sat, seething and embarrassed, as the high peacekeeper explained that Devon had not wanted to kill her but to test the accuracy of her rune and report back to his mentor, Gilles Desroches, who had also loaned Devon the rune puppet, having pilfered it from the Watatzi.

  Yenni in turn revealed everything about her trip to Cresh—from who she was to why she’d come. The clock bell tolled twice while she was stuck in that oppressive room, answering question after question, until finally the high peacekeeper called in her subordinates to escort Yenni out.

  They led her to the high-ceilinged foyer of the security building, where Weysh was waiting.

  “Right then, you two are free to go,” s
aid the first peacekeeper.

  Yenni went over to Weysh, and he put an arm around her in a gentle hug. She rested her head on his chest and sighed heavily against him.

  “What is it, lovely?” he asked, stroking her back. “You’re shaking.”

  “I feel so foolish,” she said, and explained to Weysh the plot hatched by Professor Devon and his mentor to test her rune.

  “Those bastards!” Weysh thundered. “Who in Movay’s name does something like that?” He looked past her down the hallway like he wanted to rush into the interrogation room and do some interrogating of his own.

  “Still, I suppose it was silly of me to trust Devon as much as I did. Perhaps I got what I deserved.”

  Weysh took her by the shoulders and frowned at her. “You may have been a bit naïve but that doesn’t mean you deserved to be attacked! Those two are insane! And furthermore, I should have been there to protect you.”

  “You couldn’t have known,” said Yenni.

  Weysh grunted. “I have to admit I’m rattled by how easily I was deceived. As a dragon I suppose I’m used to feeling somewhat invincible. Divine warrior and all that. Thank the Watcher you can handle yourself.” Suddenly he grinned at her.

  “Ah . . . what?” asked Yenni.

  “You told me you love me.”

  “I did?” Yes, in the clearing. She’d said I love you too. So easily she’d barely noticed. “I did.” She cupped his cheek. “I do.”

  Based on the stark terror that had struck her when he disappeared, she could no longer deny it. She loved him very much.

  “I think I must write another letter home,” she said.

  36

  Yenni did not get so much as a day of respite. The next morning in Foundations of Magical Theory students were once again staring brazenly, only this time it seemed to be in awe. For a while none were brave enough to come up to her. But as she was getting her books ready, her classmates began congregating around her seat. One of the braver ones—a familiar girl with a long brown horsetail trailing down the back of her green uniform dress—finally addressed her sheepishly.