Asunder (Incarnate)

by Jodi Meadows

  Dread rushed through me, chased by fear. How had they gotten here? What did they want?

  “Do we have sylph eggs?” Stef whispered, reaching for the nearest bag.

  “No.” I didn’t have to look. Why would we have sylph eggs when we were so close to Heart? Midrange Lake should have been safe. There had to be a hundred sylph traps all through the forest between here and Menehem’s laboratory.

  No sylph eggs. What did we have?

  “Protect Anid,” I said, standing. “When you can get him out of here, do it.” The sylph on the edges of Range hadn’t done anything more threatening than sing at us, but here, with more people? With Anid?

  I couldn’t take the chance of them hurting him.

  “What are you doing?” Armande asked, even as everyone stood and made a protective circle around Lidea and Anid. As if that would stop sylph.

  No sylph eggs. My jacket pocket held my knife, the temple key, and my SED.

  Unearthly cries shivered across the beach as I drew the SED from my pocket and sent a quick message to Councilor Sine, asking for guards and sylph eggs at the lake. Then I shifted to the music player.

  “Get behind me.” My voice quivered, and my heart beat too fast, but toward the forest the sylph had stopped, and they were looking at me. “When they’re distracted, head toward the path. Don’t run or they’ll chase. They’re predators. They can’t help but chase.” No one knew whether sylph somehow ate what they burned, but they would chase.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Stef said. “No one’s leaving you.”

  “Please.” I shot her a desperate look. “Please just trust me.” Maybe these were the same sylph. Maybe they weren’t. I had to try.

  “I’m staying with you.” Sam touched my shoulder, looking uncertain about my plan but determined to remain at my side.

  Grateful for his presence, I set my SED volume on high, and strains of a nocturne floated on the air.

  The sylph, which had all been curious before, snapped to alertness. All ten focused on me as I stepped to the right, away from the path. Away from my friends.

  The breeze picked at the melody, sweeping it across the beach and toward the sylph. They followed the sound bit by bit, edging closer to me like they were afraid I’d take the music away.

  The SED had good speakers for its size—Stef had designed everything, consulting Sam for sound quality—so the music was loud and clear as I lured the sylph away from the group. The line of shadows followed me, entranced by the long chords and arpeggios.

  “Go.” I tried to keep my voice level, hoping Stef, Lidea, and the others would hear me. “While they’re distracted.”

  Orrin and Armande motioned for Lidea and the baby to go first, toward the path off the beach. Pine boughs rustled, but the sylph didn’t turn. They watched me, slipping closer as I bent and placed the SED on the ground. I backed away, and they writhed toward the device, seeming to stare down at it.

  Their cries were like wind over canyons: hollow, melancholy, eerie. Heat rolled off them in waves, reeking of ash and death. Any sane creature made of flesh and bone knew to stay away from sylph.

  That was my plan as well. Soon my friends would be on the path to the city, and then Sam and I would follow. I’d have to leave the SED to keep the sylph distracted, but surely the Council would replace it. But how would I explain this? Call it an accident? Stef and everyone else had seen me pull out my SED with a purpose.

  While my friends escaped, sylph swirled around the device as though dancing. Their moans carried across the graying beach, and then one of their cries hit a high note at the same time as the nocturne. The cacophony snapped, a sensation like walking into a crowded room—and suddenly understanding individual voices and words. One mournful wail became the melody, while another sang countermelody. They all chose parts, like they were members of one of Sam’s orchestras.

  Near the path, Stef—the last to escape—turned around, her mouth hanging open. I motioned for her to hurry, and she turned back to the path.

  The nocturne swirled around the beach, above the swish of waves and alongside the rustling of pine boughs. It was beautiful, all of them singing. Part of me wanted to lose myself in the haunting sound, but I knew better.

  The nocturne ended.

  Sylph fluttered around the SED, waiting. A tendril of shadow hovered over the small device, but nothing happened.

  I glanced over my shoulder. Stef and the others were still visible between trees, and if anyone from the guard station was coming, I couldn’t hear them.

  Sam and I weren’t nearly close enough to the path off the beach. Not that reaching the path would magically make us safe. Sylph could fly between trees and catch us in no time.

  I shot Sam a pleading look, silently urging him to stay put while I started toward the sylph and my SED again. He nodded once, watching me with an intense protectiveness. But he’d let me do what I needed to do. He always did. And all I had to do was program the SED to play enough music to give us time to get back to Heart.

  Sylph whistled and moaned, watching my approach like I might attack them. My heartbeat thundered in my ears as the sun dipped behind mountain peaks. Golden shafts of light spilled across the beach and the dusk-gray water, and the sylph grew darker. Taller. They hummed at the crunch of my boots on sand.

  “Back away,” I whispered, and put my hands palm-out as though I could push them. “Back away.”

  A line of inky shadows shuddered away from the SED, keeping an even distance from me. Sam gasped.

  Shivering in spite of the heat billowing off the creatures, I bent and retrieved the SED. “Stay back,” I murmured, tapping the SED’s face and selecting all of Sam’s music. Typically, selling recorded music was part of how he earned enough credit to feed himself, but as his student—and other things—I was able to access all his music. I’d been grateful before. Now his music would save lives.

  The opening chords of Sam’s Phoenix Symphony flowed from the speakers. I put the device back on the sand. The sylph stuttered forward in unison, and stopped when I held up my hands.

  A weak, panicked laugh escaped me. I was holding up my hands? The same hands a sylph had burned less than a year ago? Sometimes my idiocy astounded even me.

  As before, the sylph began to dance, writhing like dark flames. They flowed in and out of one another, moving closer to the SED as I took measured steps away.

  Soon, one picked up the melody, sang the notes just behind the piano, violins, and flutes. Close. So close.

  Sam reached for me when I glanced backward. I moved as quickly as I dared. My heart raced and my hands shook, but I didn’t want to give the sylph any more indication of my fear.

  I was halfway back to Sam when one of the sylph trilled and turned its eyeless gaze on me. The weight of its attention made me stagger as dusk deepened across the beach.

  “What?” My words came as a whisper.

  The sylph trilled again, twisting closer to me as it took up its part in the music once more.

  It wanted me to sing? I stayed where I was, boots planted in the sand, conscious of Sam behind me. But when the sylph trilled again, I hummed the next few measures of the melody.

  As though electricity surged through the sylph, they all shivered straighter, taller, and closer to me. They seemed eager and—welcoming?

  That sounded ridiculous, even in my head, but the last thing I wanted to do was anger them. I held up my hands as though pushing, stepped forward, and kept humming.

  They breezed backward, eerily intent while they sang.

  I could feel Sam’s attention on my back, and hear the edges of hushed orders in the forest. A rescue, I hoped, because it was obvious the sylph wouldn’t let me go. At least one had recognized my plan to escape. If I tried again, they might attack.

  The sylph eased back as I moved forward. Music played between us, warm and joyful, with a flute duet and bass thudding like a heartbeat. We all—the sylph and me—stepped on the beats.

  “What in the nam
e of Janan?” A boy’s voice carried across the twilight beach, stunning the sylph, stunning me.

  Someone swore. “What is she doing?”

  “She controls the sylph.”

  I spun around, too shocked to respond, and suddenly the sylph fanned around me like an escort or army or dark wings, all heat and ashy reek. They keened, voices so high my ears ached, and two of them shot forward to attack the intruders.

  “Stop!”

  At my cry, the sylph halted and their wailing silenced. Breath rasped across the gloom, the only sound in a pause between movements of the Phoenix Symphony.

  “How did she do that?” The growling voice was familiar. Merton? That guy was everywhere.

  “Janan has indeed forsaken us,” someone else muttered. “Nosouls will be our ruin.”

  “Shut up,” I hissed. “I don’t control sylph any more than you control the weather or your own reincarnation. They like music. That’s all.” Was it?

  Councilor Deborl stepped forward, holding a brass egg the size of two fists. “We’ll take care of them now, Ana.” Physically, he was younger than me, but he held himself with all the importance of his rank. Even his tone was a reminder of his true age.

  Darkness shuddered on either side of me: sylph. Heat bloomed against my bare face and hands; I could even feel it through my coat. But the sylph never moved too close—close enough to boil me alive, anyway. Any sylph was always too close.

  And yet, they’d responded to music. Now, with the second movement beginning on the SED behind us, one sylph hummed quietly along with the bass line.

  I glanced at Sam; the way he stared at the sylph told me he heard it, too.

  “Do the eggs hurt the sylph?” I bit my lip, regretting the question immediately. Now Deborl and the guards would think I sympathized with sylph.

  “Does it matter?” Deborl moved forward, and a dozen others followed. They all carried eggs. “Sylph will burn you alive. They almost did before, remember? And they were just about to attack Lidea and the other newsoul. I thought you cared about them.”

  “I do!” Too shrill, too desperate, but the sylph waited beside me as Deborl, Merton, and the others approached. “I do care, but look, they’re not hurting anyone. What if they just left on their own?”

  Sam shook his head, a warning.

  “Ana,” Deborl said as he neared the first pair of quivering shadows. The sylph didn’t move. Why didn’t they flee? They would be trapped. “Ana, clearly the sylph listen to you. You’re a special soul.”

  Hah.

  But I couldn’t forget that night at Purple Rose Cottage, or the way they’d stood guard outside Menehem’s lab. Why were they following me everywhere?

  He continued. “Word of this will spread. If you use your gift to help us, perhaps the popular view of newsouls will change.”

  Oh. He wanted me to tell the sylph to get inside the eggs, though why would they do that just because I said? Anyway, they weren’t supposed to be able to understand words.

  They weren’t supposed to be able to come inside Range, either. These had been very clever, and very determined to get here. Why? To sing at me again? To attack Anid?

  They hadn’t attacked him, though. They’d moved toward him, yes, but a group of adults posed no barrier if the sylph had wanted to kill him. They could have killed all of us.

  But they hadn’t.

  They’d chosen not to kill Menehem during his experiments.

  “Ana?” Sam moved closer, though sylph stood between us and he looked torn. Risk the sylph to stand by me, or stay put.

  Near the first two sylph, Deborl and Merton twisted the eggs to activate them, and within seconds both shadows would be sucked in—

  “Run!” I shouted. “Fly away. Go!”

  Obsidian-black shadows shrieked and surged into the woods, moving around people and the eggs meant to trap them.

  People yelled, Sam rushed to my side, and soon Deborl and his guards surrounded me. Blue targeting lights flashed against my coat: the guards aimed lasers at my chest.

  “What are you doing?” Sam stepped in front of me, reaching behind himself to touch me, make sure I wasn’t dead. “You can’t shoot her.”

  Deborl motioned, and everyone lowered their weapons. Targeting lights flickered off. “No one is shooting anyone.”

  Yet.

  “Ana,” the Councilor said, “why did you tell the sylph to flee?” There was no fear in his voice, only calculating curiosity.

  I stepped out from behind Sam. I didn’t need a human shield. What would I have done if he’d gotten shot? “It was the right thing to do.” My voice shook. I swallowed and tried again. “They hadn’t hurt anyone, and they were listening to me. I don’t know why.”

  “So you took their side?” Deborl cocked his head.

  “I didn’t take their side. I accomplished the same thing you were trying to do, but without trapping them inside eggs, and without anyone accidentally getting burned. They’ll go away now.” I hoped.

  “Hmm. Perhaps.” Deborl reminded me of Meuric, the Council’s former Speaker, and the boy I’d killed inside the temple. They were both short and skinny, physically younger than me, and devoted to Janan—though Deborl’s devotion seemed to depend on the season, the phase of the moon, and whoever happened to be standing within earshot.

  I hadn’t trusted Meuric; I didn’t trust Deborl, either.

  I stood as tall as I could make myself, trying not to shiver in the evening breeze, and with the adrenaline fading from my system. “We’re going to leave now.” My voice trembled.

  “Very well.” Deborl twisted his sylph egg to deactivate it, then pressed the cold object into my hands. “Try not to get into trouble between here and the Southern Arch. And”—his gaze flickered to Sam—“I expect to see both of you in the Council chamber in the morning. Tenth hour.”

  “But we have—” Music practice, but Sam touched my hand and shook his head. “Fine.” I turned away to reclaim my SED, still determinedly playing the second movement of the Phoenix Symphony. Sand swished as Deborl, Merton, and the guards headed up the path.

  “Are you all right?” Sam touched my shoulder, my cheek. “I can’t believe they threatened to shoot you.”

  He wanted to know if I was all right because of Deborl and the guards. Not because of the sylph. The sylph, as crazy as it seemed, had been ready to protect me. From people.

  Oh, how our lives had changed. “I’m all right.” I hugged Sam close, my cheek pressed against his chest so I could hear his racing heartbeat. “We’re both all right.” Because they’d pointed lasers at him, too.

  Then, in silence, we packed what was left of our afternoon with friends and trudged toward Heart.

  The huge outer wall blocked the sky as we drew near. Solar panels and antennae glimmered like needles in the moonlight. From the center of the city, the temple rose into the clouds, a shining beacon.

  I kept my eyes on the Southern Arch, nearly big enough for a dragon to fly through, but the temple seemed to watch my approach no matter how I avoided looking at it.

  Janan’s presence hung over the city as thick as ash. I imagined I could feel the heat of molten rock and boiling mud churning just beneath my feet. If Janan cared about his people at all, why had he built Heart over the most powerful volcano on the planet? Surely not even the temple would survive if Range erupted.

  “What will we tell the Council?” Sam pressed his palm to the soul-scanner, and the gate swung open.

  “I’m not sure.” I bit my lip, confused and frustrated and ready to collapse into bed. “They’ll think I like sylph now. Or that I’m like Menehem.”

  One thing was for sure: I’d just made life for newsouls a lot worse.

  10

  QUESTIONS

  IN THE MORNING, Sam and I headed to the Councilhouse, a firm plan in mind: deny. They would get nothing about the research Menehem had left to me, and even less about the lab east of Range.

  I fidgeted with my notebook as we headed up So
uth Avenue, wondering if I’d done a good enough job hiding the folders and diaries Menehem had left, and the books I’d stolen from the temple. I still hadn’t figured out how to read the temple books, though not for lack of trying.

  “Let’s walk around the right side,” Sam said as we approached the market field.

  I craned my neck to see why we were heading for a different doorway into the Councilhouse, but all I could see ahead were people walking, talking, sipping from cups of Armande’s coffee. “What’s going on?” I was too short to see over the crowd.

  “Nothing,” Sam said too quickly, and winced when I eyed him askance. “One of Merton’s public rants. He’s on the steps getting people worked up.”

  “Ugh.” Fortunately, there were more doors into the Councilhouse. After what happened yesterday, I really didn’t want to go anywhere near Merton.

  “Just last night, the newsoul set sylph free by Midrange Lake,” Merton cried. “She controlled them. They did as she said. I was there. Janan forbid, but what if all newsouls have this power?”

  Shouts rose up, sounding afraid, defiant, angry.

  Merton roared louder. “Newsouls will rip Heart asunder! We’ve spent five thousand years perfecting our lifestyle and honing our talents, and now this.”

  I sighed and stared at the cobblestones. “I’m sorry, Sam.”

  “Why?” He walked between Merton and me, guiding me through a thin spot in the crowd.

  A few people sneered at me. One shouted, “Sylph-lover!” but most just frowned and turned away. Maybe they didn’t completely believe what Merton was saying. It did seem too fantastic.

  “For dragging you even deeper into this mess.” I ducked through the door when Sam hauled it open for me. “After our trip”—I didn’t specify where, in case anyone overheard us—“and what we learned there, you must be pretty nervous.”

  Darkness flashed in his eyes, something he wasn’t telling me, but it vanished quickly. “I want you to feel safe. I’d never regret your feeling safe.” He followed me inside. “If I can’t give you that, I at least want you to have answers. I’ll help you find them however I can.”