Defiant

by Karina Sumner-Smith

  “I know that,” Emara said quietly. “Imagine if you were. Imagine if you spent only one day generating power on Edren’s behalf. Believe me when I say that the magic—the currency—you could provide is absolutely beyond anything we’ve ever had in the Lower City. It almost is already, and you’re not even trying.”

  “I won’t do it.” Shai spoke firmly—or tried to. Only Xhea could hear that attempt fail as Shai’s voice trembled.

  Unhearing, Emara continued. “We’ve tried to suppress word of your presence here, Xhea, and rumors of even Shai’s existence—but there is only so much we can do. Neither of you is a secret anymore, not in Edren—and people talk.”

  Xhea knew the truth in that. It was all too easy to imagine the rumors that spread from Edren like ripples across water: speculation between friends, drunken musings in the stands at the arena, conversations overheard in the market.

  “The other skyscrapers have noticed,” Xhea said, her voice bleak. “They’ve noticed, and they want Shai for their own.”

  “No,” Shai protested. “Not again. I am not a thing to be possessed.” She looked from Emara to Xhea and back again, her eyes wild as her voice rose in pitch. “Xhea, tell her—I’m not letting anyone do that to me again. They can’t—”

  Xhea reached for Shai’s hand; caught it, the pressure of their conflicting magics feeling almost like real touch. “She knows. I know. We’re going to make sure nothing like that ever happens to you again.” She turned, directing those last words at Emara.

  Oh, really? asked a vicious voice in the silence of her mind. How are you going to stop them? Barely able to walk, near incapacitated by pain and painkillers in turn, her strange magic but a whisper of dark. If another skyscraper wanted to steal Shai—if Edren wanted to use her—what could you possibly do to stop them?

  She had but to glance at Emara’s face to see that the woman knew the course of her thoughts—and that Xhea’s mind had made her point more eloquently than she ever could.

  “I’m not asking to enslave you, Shai,” Emara said. “I’m not even asking for your service. Just think, both of you. Think what that power—what even the potential for that power—could do here, in the Lower City. In the hands of a single skyscraper.”

  “But—” Xhea started. Stopped.

  Emara looked at her, steady, unblinking.

  “War,” Xhea said at last. Breath and word alike seemed to catch in her throat; she swallowed. “It would mean war.”

  No, she thought, even as she spoke the words. Clinging to denial, even if it was only in the darkened confines of her mind. But the continuance of the Lower City’s delicate political balance in the face of so much power was the lie, war the seemingly inevitable reality.

  What had Lorn told her when he rescued her from the ruins? The words came back to her as if from a dream. “You don’t understand what you’ve done, do you? You’ve brought a Radiant—a true Radiant—to the Lower City. Everything is about to change.”

  She had expected change; had wondered over it as she lay, mind muddled with pain meds, and stared at the ceiling of her room. But change for her own life, change for Shai, change even for Edren. She had never let herself think beyond that. Had never tried.

  Now she closed her eyes, suddenly unable to look at Emara’s expression, or Shai’s confusion and concern. Her mind whirled, thoughts turning over themselves so quickly that it was all she could do to keep from reaching out to grab the edge of Emara’s desk, cling to it for dear life, and wait for the foundations to stop spinning.

  Except that was the heart of it, wasn’t it? Two months Shai had stayed with her in Edren—two months with the skyscraper growing stronger and richer. Two months for the other skyscrapers to notice, to plan, and to begin to act against them. For what could the careful destruction of Edren’s barricade presage but an attack? An assassin, sabotage, a bomb—something. Stories from the last Lower City war whirled through her mind, their distant horrors suddenly all too real.

  We could just go, Xhea thought suddenly. Both of us—just vanish into the underground again. Shai’s power didn’t have to go into anyone’s coffers, especially not if these were the consequences. And yes, Xhea’s injuries would pose a problem, but it was a problem she was already facing, even without that freedom. With Shai’s help, she didn’t have to scrounge and starve; together, they could build a life for themselves.

  Yet that too was a lie, though a seductive one. It took her a long moment to consider, turn the tempting thought over in her mind, and push it away.

  Though they might not give Shai’s magic to any skyscraper willingly, each had collecting spells to gather any free power, most notably run-off from the City above. Even being careful, Shai’s magic would be collected and their every move—the shops they frequented, the buildings they passed—would become a political action. At least with Edren’s protection they might have more choice in what magic was given and how it was used—or was that, too, a seductive lie?

  Besides, for all that Xhea had lived for years underground, it was beyond foolish to imagine that she could recreate that reality now with Shai at her side. Few had ventured below because there was little of sufficient value to justify the trip. Yet the skyscrapers had used the underground in their war, forcing themselves through the fear and discomfort and pain to use those tunnels as a method of attack and assassination. What would stop them from pursuing Shai and the almost incomprehensible magic she represented? And not just the skyscrapers: if anyone knew that the greatest treasure in the Lower City existed in the underground, a near limitless source of power and wealth, what would keep them from hunting Shai?

  Shai, and the only person in the Lower City who could see her, speak to her, and convince her to do another’s bidding. Or, Xhea thought darkly, to be used as leverage.

  No, the underground wouldn’t be a refuge, but a trap. Besieged, she couldn’t imagine how they could last longer than mere months—and only that if they were clever, beyond lucky, and Xhea had full use of her leg.

  Had they thought it was difficult to flee two Towers? Powerful as Allenai and Eridian were, there had only been the two of them, attempting to operate in something resembling secrecy. She could not imagine what she and Shai would do with all of the Lower City arrayed against them.

  Xhea took a deep breath and opened her eyes. Across from her, Emara waited, hands folded atop the mountainous surface of her desk. She nodded as she met Xhea’s gaze; nodded, Xhea thought, at the changes she could only imagine were written across her expression.

  Still, intuition prodded her. “There’s more, isn’t there?”

  “There’s always more,” Emara said softly. “Edren’s council has been in session since early this morning. I’ve come to prepare you to face the Council, if you’re willing to help.”

  “Why?” Xhea asked. But she knew why they needed her; of course she knew. “I’m the only way you can speak to Shai.”

  Emara inclined her head. “There is that. But also you can go underground without difficulty or preparation. Do you see why I need you to be able to walk? It took you nearly 45 minutes to respond to my summons. But if you were healthy again, or closer to it, I cannot stress enough the value that would have.”

  Xhea stared. She wanted—suddenly, desperately—to believe Emara’s words and the reality they created; she was surprised at the intensity of that desire. To be wanted not for her knack with ghosts, but for the very thing that had made her outcast. Weakest of the weak, poorest of the poor, no way to contribute to the skyscraper’s coffers, always costing more than she could generate. That was what Edren suddenly valued?

  “Without you,” Emara added softly, “we wouldn’t have known that the barricade was being taken down—not until we were under attack. We grew careless, negligent, hard as that is to admit.”

  Xhea shook her head, forcing her thoughts back to reality. “Without me,” she said, “without Shai, there would be no reason for the attack.”

  “Perhaps,” Emara said. “
Or perhaps it was inevitable. We don’t know when the dismantling began, don’t know the condition of the other skyscrapers’ barricades. But you could tell us faster than anyone.”

  “Xhea,” Shai said, and her hand brushed Xhea’s upper arm. “This could be your chance for something good to—”

  Unable to hear Shai, Emara continued. “There is also the question of your other abilities, whatever they might prove to be. Lorn has told no one of your own power—”

  “No one but you, you mean.”

  A brief smile. “Indeed. But even so, if your magic returns—”

  There was a knock at the door. At the sound, a mask seemed to slam down over Emara’s features; Xhea hadn’t realized the change in the woman until suddenly that stern visage looked back at her once more. Emara called for the person to enter.

  Her young assistant came inside. “They’re asking for you in Council, ma’am,” he said, ignoring Xhea.

  “I’ll be right there.” Emara gave a curt nod. “Xhea, will you accompany me?”

  So much weight in that question; so many things left unasked, unanswered; so many consequences she had barely begun to consider. She glanced at Shai and saw the same emotions in her expression, fear and hope and something that was almost like resignation.

  Xhea nodded, not trusting herself to speak, and reached for her walking stick. Again she heard the ghost’s voice, so clear in her memory it felt that she had but to turn to see him.

  Run away. Run away. Run away.

  If only she could. She rose and slowly followed Emara from the room.

  In the Council meeting room, an argument was already in full swing. A dull roar was audible in the hallway; even so, Xhea stumbled back as the door opened, wincing at the assault.

  Sounds just like the summertime market. Goods at their most plentiful, haggling at its fiercest, and tempers heating as quickly as the sunbaked asphalt. Smells better, though. Xhea tightened her grip on her stick, squared her shoulders, and limped forward.

  “Councilors, my apologies for the delay.” Emara entered the room with Xhea at her heels and Shai unseen behind them. Something in her calm, quiet voice cut through the shouting with the ease of a well-honed knife; in the wake of her words, her footsteps echoed through the suddenly quiet room.

  Xhea glanced around the table. Lorn, she knew: a large, dark-skinned man with tattooed arms and handsome features that even now made women across the Lower City sigh after him and shout coarse jokes. Lorn glanced from his wife to Xhea and away just as swiftly. His voice had been among the loudest raised, she realized; the true Lorn had often shouted, even though Addis had not. Appearances have to be maintained, she thought wryly; but something about the joke seemed unfunny, even in the privacy of her own mind.

  To Lorn’s left, at the head of the table, sat a man who could only be his father, Verrus Edren, ruler of the skyscraper that bore the family name. She could see in that hard and weathered face something of Lorn and Addis both. The resemblance was little obscured by the man’s close-shorn gray hair, or the deep wrinkles carved into the flesh around his eyes and mouth and forehead—lines that seemed worn there by every expression but a smile. It was his eyes that caught Xhea’s attention: darker than his skin, they seemed almost black to her vision, black and hard like smoke-stained iron.

  On Verrus Edren’s other side was an absurdly tall man that Xhea knew by reputation alone: Pol. He was head of the arena, its business and its battles, and had been Edren’s wartime general, known as a genius of the embattled streets. He was also Emara’s father. Pol was often cited as the reason that Edren had not fallen ten years earlier, when the once-strong alliance between Edren and neighboring skyscraper Orren was broken. Yet no matter his former glory, since the war he was seldom seen outside the arena that he now managed on Edren’s behalf.

  Even sitting, Pol towered above Verrus, casting a shadow on the more powerful man and the son at his side. He was, Xhea thought, oddly suited to the monosyllabic name by which he was known; and if there was more to him or that name than was spoken of in Lower City gossip, she had heard neither.

  Behind him was a small video monitor on a rolling stand, seemingly forgotten in the corner. Its flickering light cast harsh-edged shadows across the council table. Xhea knew a few others around that table, mostly from the seemingly endless interviews in the morning’s early hours. The horse-faced councilor and his wire-thin assistant, the councilor with the cloud-pale hair, and, beside her, the one with the unfortunately nasal voice. None more than glanced at Xhea; bigger things at play here than the girl who could see ghosts. Even so, Xhea had to fight the urge to hunch her shoulders, as if making herself even smaller could dispel her discomfort or banish her sudden uncertainty.

  Sweetness, what am I doing here?

  Shai came to stand at her side, the ghost a glow in her peripheral vision. Xhea took a breath and let it out slowly, willing her heart to slow.

  “Your seat, councilor.” Verrus gestured to a vacant chair midway down the table. “The child may stand by the wall,” he added, already turning away.

  “Xhea has an injured knee,” Emara said, cutting short the nasal-voiced councilor who had begun speaking into the silence. Xhea wished she could sink through the floor and away. “We requested her presence at this meeting. The least we can do is provide her a chair.”

  Verrus looked up slowly. “If you wish to stand in her stead, by all means.” Concrete was more forgiving than that voice.

  Xhea grabbed the edge of Emara’s sleeve.

  “Don’t,” she said. “It’s fine.”

  Emara shook her head and made to drag her chair toward the back of the room. Her face was a perfect mask, but something in the way Emara’s hands curled made Xhea think she wished she could reach for knives.

  “Please,” Xhea whispered; the word felt strange in her mouth. “I’ll be fine, really.”

  Emara acquiesced with obvious reluctance, and Xhea leaned against the far wall. The conversation resumed quickly, centering on Edren’s response to the threat implied by the barricade’s removal. The room seemed split between calls for a quick offensive stance and continued denials while they sought more information.

  Others speculated on the possible source of the attack, pointing fingers, it seemed, at each of the other four skyscrapers in turn. Someone referenced the dark history between Edren and Orren—history enough, it seemed, that an attack from that quarter was not wholly unexpected. Xhea perked up at this bit of information. It wasn’t hard to believe in Orren’s treachery.

  Debate raged about the possible motives of Rown and Farrow. Rown was the poorest of the skyscrapers, desperate for more magic, while their reputation as an unstable political entity had been well earned in recent years. Listening to what the councilors did not say, it seemed to Xhea that they expected attack—or retaliation—from that quarter; it was only that the planning and foresight evident in weakening Edren’s barricade hardly seemed Rown’s style.

  Retaliation, Xhea wondered, for what?

  In contrast, Farrow—the richest and most independent of the skyscrapers—might have an entirely different motive for wanting a Radiant’s power. Farrow was the Lower City’s magic-merchant, home to many of the most powerful spellcasters on the ground, and the ones who had trained many more—for a price. It was one thing to have magic and the power, real and political, that accompanied it. Farrow knew how to use that magic in ways that none of the other skyscrapers could hope to achieve.

  Of the four, only Senn was more ally than potential enemy. With a recent trade agreement for food and lesser entertainments in the arena, Senn stood more to gain from cooperation with Edren than from attack. Besides, Senn’s hold on the Lower City market—and the majority of the materials-trading contracts with the few Towers who deigned to do business with those on the ground—would be most destabilized with the return of conflict to the streets. While the last war had allowed Senn to consolidate its hold on the central territories, including the ancient mall that housed
the market, renewed warfare could only damage its profits and risk the loss of much of the power that the skyscraper had attained in recent years.

  Pol, Xhea noted, remained silent throughout the debates, as animated as a stone carving. If anything, his look was one of anger and disdain; and he leaned away from the table and Verrus Edren both.

  As the conversation continued, Xhea shifted against the wall and attempted to hide her discomfort. Her whispered assurances to Emara had been but lies: her knee was a hot pain, her leg muscles ached, and she yearned for her next dose of painkillers the way she used to want the sweet hit of bright magic. Oh, for that numbness, limbs and mind alike turned hazy and indistinct—a barrier through which pain could not pierce. Pity the pills brought her no color; she struggled to remember what red looked like, or green, or blue.

  A trickle of sweat ran down her cheek, and her fingers shook as she brushed it away. No, she was not fine. It was pride that made her stand. Pride that kept her upright despite her growing tremors; pride, and nearly pride alone, that kept her from fleeing this too small council room and its stuffy air as ever-louder words washed over her like waves.

  Standing was salve, too, for her pride—knowing that Verrus had taken her worth and dismissed it in the same glance. He had made her stand—wanting to make her look weak; wanting her to be at his mercy, or Emara’s. Wanting her to beg for the small comfort of a chair.

  She refused.

  Instead, Xhea looked toward the video forgotten in the corner. The quality was poor, grainy and flickering, taken by a night-vision camera. It took a moment to make out the picture: a wide corridor with something dark at the end. A familiar corridor, Xhea realized, with fake trees and benches down the center. The darkness at the end was the barricade.

  “Look,” she whispered to Shai, and watched herself step into the frame.

  It had to be her, for all that the blurry image showed few details. The figure’s limp was clear enough, as was her mass of braid-tangled hair. Yet that person seemed so small, so inconsequential, one tiny person alone in the dark.