by Sara Wolf
I stare out at the moonlit horizon and imagine it. A half-rebuilt Vetris, full of sawdust and rubble and almost-finished buildings. The brown-patched lawn of the palace, unkempt but spread with a blanket of delicious snacks and cakes and drinks. Fione making flower crowns with Varia, giggling and laughing. Yorl and Malachite bickering about something with a wine-flush on their cheeks. And Lucien, offering me his hand to dance a slow dance in the new buds.
It’s a beautiful idea, and I hold on to it like a dream. I hold on to it as Fione leaves and Lucien joins me at the railing, his kiss like honeyed fire. I hold on to it as he pulls me into the captain’s quarters, the feather bed consuming us and him consuming me. I hold on to it even as—with every incremental sink of the moons and rise of the sun outside the little window—it slips like seawater through my fingers.
A wolf kisses a rose.
“What are you thinking about?” Lucien murmurs, his dark hair mussed and his eyes heavy. Just looking at him, every worry melts away from me. I smile at him.
“Nothing, anymore.”
He strokes my hair from my face, his return smile more glorious than moonlight. “Good.”
I don’t like to think of them as the last days. I can’t think of them as the last days, or Lucien will catch on.
So I think of them as the first days.
The first days of the rest of my life with my friends and with my love. The first days of my life in the new world we’re going to make.
Together.
together.
Sometimes, when I’m staring at the ocean depths, at the dolphins cutting paths beside the boat joyfully, I get sad. Not terribly sad. But a little sad that I won’t see the new world, that I won’t get to see what happens to it, how it moves, what it looks like in the years to come. And when I get too sad, I go to Lucien and he holds me, and I hold him, until both of us feel better. He asks if it’s about Varia, the Trees, and I nod. Because it is. That’s not a lie at all. I was done lying to him a long time ago.
Sometimes, Lucien’s presence doesn’t work. Going to him bandages the wound but doesn’t heal it. I think that’s the nature of love, really—no one can heal you but yourself. Your love for yourself is what is most important, above all others.
“I’ve gotten so wise in my old age,” I drawl to myself, bent over a parchment with a quill in my hand. Sequestered behind a crate spate in the cargo bay with only the brass-gleaming matronic as company, I write. Drafts and drafts of a letter, just one, for all of them. The words don’t come out right, or at all sometimes. But I try. I pull blood up from my veins, tears up from my eyes, and I write. It takes days, and many close calls of being discovered by Lucien and his thief-instincts and me-instincts, but I manage to finish alone. I rip up each draft when I’m done for the day, opening the waste shaft to drop them into the sea and be rid of them for good.
It’s not an easy thing, to keep a secret from a worrier like Lucien. But I try—he tries to stay up with me, but he’s still a mortal. Sleep claims him as it always does. He touches me, trying to skinread out of sheer concern, but all he hears are the faint whispers of the hunger, the wolf who will end the world, a poem orbiting my thoughts like a shield.
In the end, the hunger shields me.
we will protect ourselves and no one else.
The empty wine bottle makes a good hiding place for the letter, and a word to the helmsman polymath to deliver the wine bottle to Lucien when it’s over is all it takes.
It’s easier for me than most people not to sleep, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. And on the sixth day of travel, I like it even less.
“Hi,” I announce as I walk into the mess hall and toward the table where my friends eat hot oats and syrup. “I’m grumpy.”
“What’d he do this time?” Malachite drawls, shooting a look at Lucien.
Lucien smugly takes a sip of his tea. “Nothing wrong, I can assure you.”
“Land ho!”
The cry is exactly the one we’ve all been waiting for. Our eyes flash up at one another in a suspended second of disbelief, and then everyone bursts from the table and we make one mad dash together up the stairs, crowding the railing for a better look.
“Ow! Stop stepping on my tail!” Yorl yelps.
“Quit putting your tail under my boot, then!” Malachite snaps.
Fione stamps her foot. “Both of you, behave, or I’ll put my heel in the two of you!”
“Heel time, heel time, heel time!” I chant. Lucien’s the only one not taking part in the cabin-fevered fight, his onyx eyes focused on the strip of green in the distance, his whole face washed by relief.
“Cavanos,” he breathes.
I watch it grow closer with him, my hand intertwining his on the railing as if to silently say, I know how much you missed it, how every day away from it has been eating you up. Because it has. How could it not? He’s its prince, and he’s always longed to protect it. To protect everyone. Varia destroyed Vetris, but his people are still in Cavanos, and his heart belongs with them.
And to me, too, I think with a wry smile. We can share it.
“The Sea Gate is the main entrance to Pala Amna—” Malachite clears his throat and points. There, not far from the beach is a dirt road utterly packed with people, so many they overflow onto the beach, into the thin gray forest bordering it.
“New God’s throat,” I mutter. “Look at them all.”
“Refugees from Cavanos,” Lucien says, black iron in his voice. “Perhaps even Helkyris. They think the beneathers can save them from the valkerax.”
“And we can,” Malachite insists. “Just slowly. With periods to repopulate.”
“We don’t have that time,” the prince insists.
Mal sighs. “I know, Luc. It’s called a joke.”
“How will we get through that crowd?” Fione frowns. “They must be backing up the entire road into Pala Amna!”
“The Fog Road is the ancestral council’s special entrance and a more direct line to them,” Yorl offers. “It’s highly guarded, but when we announce who we are, I’m sure we’ll have no trouble.”
“No trouble?” Malachite’s white brows knit hard. “Yeah, no trouble getting past the guards at the entrance. But there are no guards inside. There’s nobody inside but the bones of thieves and assassins, because it’s booby-trapped to the afterlife and back!”
“Why?” I wrinkle my nose.
“Well, I’m glad you asked, and the answer is because it’s less of a gate and more of a maze designed to destroy anyone who doesn’t know the specific route.”
“Even without the crowd, it saves us hours of travel time in the Dark Below.” Yorl ignores him and insists to the prince, “Speed is of the essence.”
“Is death of the fuckin’ essence?” Malachite asks him lightly.
“We’ll be fine! We have me.” I jerk my thumb to my empty chest and wink. “I can die a few times.”
“You upworlders don’t seem to spiritsdamn understand,” Mal says faux patiently. “The Fog Gate is where we send our defectors and criminals to die.”
“So then we take the safe route,” Fione says softly. “And risk Varia attacking in that time.”
“No!” Malachite blurts and then heaves a sigh so massive, it squeaks his chainmail. “Fine. Fine! This is total death-wish garbage, but I’ll go along with it because why not?!”
“I have my grandfather’s map.” Yorl taps his head.
“What map?” Malachite growls.
“He bought a rudimentary map of the Fog Road from a beneather on his travels in Pala Amna.”
“You know who else bought a rudimentary map?” Malachite motions to the land. “All the dead skeletons in there who were naive enough to give up a gold piece for some hungry kid’s attempt at gouging tourists! There is no map! The ancestral council are the only ones who know the way,
and they make sure of that!”
Yorl looks thoroughly shocked, his ears pulling back. “Are you saying my grandfather—the smartest mortal in all of Arathess—was duped?”
“I’m saying I was seven when Muro Farspear-Ashwalker came to Vetris,” Malachite fires back. “And he was a laugh-happy old croak of a man who tripped over his own robe a lot!”
Yorl goes a shade darker under his whiskers. “How dare you—”
“He’s not all wrong, Yorl,” Lucien murmurs from the railing. “Your grandfather did laugh a lot.”
I think back on Muro’s night visit. He certainly did laugh a lot, the jolly old cat. As in life, so in afterlife.
“A real hoot. Complete opposite of you, frankly,” Malachite bites at Yorl.
“All right, break it up.” I step between them. Malachite throws his hands up just as the polymaths bring the sails down, and Yorl’s huge green eyes quietly watch the sea below us. The ship slowly glides into a rickety wood dock covered in moss that looks as if it hasn’t seen traffic since the Sunless War.
“You okay?” I touch Yorl’s paw as we walk down the gangplank.
The celeon looks over at me, heavy-lidded. “Yes. It’s just strange. To hear of someone you hold in such high regard as being…”
“Not like you envisioned?” I ask.
He nods. “Not anything like I envisioned.”
“He tried to help Vetris, and Varia. I didn’t know him, but I’d say he was a good guy.”
“He helped design white mercury swords to kill witches.”
“We all have our faults,” I chirp. “Your grandpa’s was laughing.”
Yorl breathes out and then turns to say something to the helmsman polymath—about moving the matronic down to Pala Amna via one of the larger surface-to-city air ducts.
“They’ll make camp here and wait for me to return,” the celeon says when he rejoins us. “So let’s ensure we all make it back.”
“Affirmative.” I salute facetiously even as I feel Fione’s eyes dragging on my back the whole way up the beach. She hasn’t told anyone, Lucien least of all. She wouldn’t. She wants Varia back no matter what, and I know she’s struggling with the idea of losing one of us. Me, or the princess. A hard choice to make, certainly.
But Fione won’t really lose me. None of them will. I’ll be here, always. The valkerax know it, the Tree of Souls knows it, and I know it too, now. Nobody’s ever really gone.
Evlorasin said it best.
This is never-goodbye.
Life is a garden that must flourish, and we will water its soil. The valkerax bodies, cut apart and piled on the beach of Rel’donas. The blood watering the sea, the sand, the mangrove trees growing greener as their roots soaked up crimson.
Evlorasin said it best, and most truly.
Something pretty on the not-red sand catches my eye. I bend down and scoop it, skipping up the beach to draw even with Lucien. I hold the tiny, brightly blue iridescent shell up to his face.
“Isn’t it pretty?” I ask. He doesn’t spare a glance my way, eyes determined and forward, but one corner of his lips perks up.
“This is the part where I’m supposed to say ‘not as pretty as you,’ right?”
“If you want to sound like a rehearsed theater performance,” I sniff. “Then yes. By all means, follow the script.”
“Can I deviate?” he ribs playfully.
“Are you capable of deviating? Or is it all just princely business in that head of yours right now?”
There’s a popping sound, and the shell disappears from my hand and reappears in his.
“Hey!” I pout. “No fair!”
His smirk grows, and the fingers of his working hand grow midnight void up to the first knuckle.
“I’ll give it back later,” he assures me.
I point accusatorially at him. “You’re a thief!”
“You’re a worse one,” he lilts. “Considering you stole my heart.”
“Ugh!” I tamp down the pleased rush in my chest. “You really are sticking to a theater script!”
His laugh fades as we walk over the sandy roots of the forest and toward the crowd. People with bandages over their eyes, their hands, some of them missing legs. Burned skin peeking out, children huddled together without family. The crowd is brimming with the injured, the old, the sick, and the hungry. A little boy tugs at Lucien’s overcoat, and the prince puts a hand on the boy’s head and offers a bit of jerky from his pouch. He takes it eagerly, chomping, and Lucien looks back to me. His smile is sadder this time.
“Right now, it’s princely business time.”
My unheart steels and I nod, carefully maneuvering through the crowd with him. People cry out when they see our swords, our clothes that aren’t rags. Some cling and beg for food, for shelter, thinking we’re with some authority, and I watch Lucien’s heart break one shard at a time. He reaches out to all of them with his food and coin pouch, but the crowd starts to frenzy around him, and I know instantly he’s in danger. Like a synchronized performance, I feel Malachite at my side as we step in between the prince and the crowd, making a ring with our backs and arms.
“Keep distance,” Malachite bellows. “And maintain patience! There’s room enough for all in Pala Amna!”
“Is there?” Fione whispers at my side. “It seems half of Cavanos is here.”
“Pala Amna is a fortress city,” Yorl assures her. “There are wings built into the Dark Below for just such an occasion.”
“And the food?” Fione presses.
“The beneathers are expert preservers and fermenters. They can stretch their stores to last for several weeks, even with this amount of mouths.”
“Enough time, then,” Lucien says, fists gripped tight at his side as he strides through the crowd and we follow. I can tell he’s trying desperately not to look at the people, lest he break again. “For us to do what must be done.”
“Won’t be able to endure a siege, though,” Malachite muses.
“If we do things right, there won’t be a siege,” Fione says. I clear my throat.
“Varia doesn’t want a siege anyway. That’s slow death. She wants immediate and total destruction.”
“Comforting.” Malachite throws a smirk at me, and I throw one back.
“I try.”
“Advocate,” he suddenly barks at a passing guard beneather. “Where’s your adjudicator?”
The beneather narrows his ruby eyes through his helmet. “Who’s asking?”
A dimness creeps into Malachite’s gaze, stifling the usual bite and wit in them. “The Malachite of House Olt’reya.”
The change is instant. The guard goes from suspicious and low-stanced to tall, clutching his spear rigidly and his visor almost too comically falling with his shock.
“Mala—” The guard chokes. “Second Son Olt’reya! Faldinis arn!”
“Tor-arn faldinis cet,” Malachite sighs back. “Now, pretty please tell your adjudicator to get these people processed and inside the road as soon as you can. And if he asks who’s being bossy, it was me.”
The guard nods and whirls on his heel, ushering the people of the crowd forward and into the massive mouth of a distant cavern with more fervor. I’ve never seen beneather armor before—I thought it was all chainmail like Mal—but their native design seems a lot more organic. Ivory, but of what? Every piece of their armor is made of smoothed bone, ribbed at the joints with a rubbery substance for what must be great mobility.
“Valkerax, in case you were wondering,” Malachite answers my lingering gaze. “That Bone Tree’s a pain in the arse, but it’s got the right idea—nothing stronger than valkerax bone. And it pulls double duty in disguising our scent from them.”
“It isn’t easy to shape,” Yorl chimes in beside me. “It requires years of precise acid-soaking to make it bend even the slightes
t bit. And to remove the glow it incurs in the dark.”
“So it’s sturdy, but hard to replace or repair,” I muse.
“Exactly.” Yorl’s green shining eyes look almost…proud of me?
“Are we going to ignore the part where you hold considerable sway around here, Malachite?” Fione asks innocently. “Did he forget to mention something, Lucien?”
Lucien looks over at his bodyguard. “Should I tell them?”
“What does ‘second son’ mean, anyway?” I frown.
Yorl is practically vibrating, gaze a little less hostile toward Mal all of a sudden. “Each house has a hereditary hierarchy. Tourmalines are the first sons of a house. Malachites are the second sons of a house. You’re…Malachite Olt’reya. I thought the name was ironic—no second son would leave Pala Amna.”
“Kept it out of sentimentality, I guess.” Malachite massages between his feathery white eyebrows. “It’s not even a big deal. I’m technically disowned in all the chronicles.”
“Thankfully, beneather politics are quite petty, and branches hoard information from other branches for years hoping to gain political edge in the ancestral council,” Yorl murmurs.
Malachite’s ruby gaze softens at the celeon for once. “Yeah. Can’t get past the bloodpriests or the orators, but the advocates and adjudicators apparently still don’t know shit.”
I nod like it all makes sense when it absolutely doesn’t. “We move quick like bunnies, then, before anybody catches on.”
Malachite steers us through the sickly gray forest, great boulders becoming more and more frequent, small rocks making it difficult to walk without pain. An ancient riverbed, maybe. Lucien maneuvers with ease, but Fione and I lag behind, helping each other pick out sturdy surfaces. Up an incline and around a dusty corner of the forest, the dried riverbed carves a path straight to the mouth of a cave, the stone overhang worn blade-sharp smooth by old water. The darkness inside looms as deep and indecipherable as a throat.
And Yorl was right. It’s slightly well-defended. Sixteen beneather guards in their bone armor stand at the ready, spears and swords aloft, and five more pace atop the cavern with intimidating longbows at the ready.