The Bone Maker

by Sarah Beth Durst

  She couldn’t give any of the names she’d used for the prior gates. There was only one name that would grant her access here:

  Her own.

  But once she gave it, word would spread. It would be known that Kreya Odi Altriana, the legendary bone maker who had disappeared over a decade ago, was alive and back. Whispers would spread. Rumors would start. And she’d have to find a way to vanish from the public imagination all over again, if she wanted any peace.

  “It will be worth it,” she told herself.

  Hopefully.

  “Ma’am?” one of the guards said. He eyed her threadbare coat, hiker’s boots, and leather-reinforced pants. “You are aware this area is restricted?”

  “No area is restricted to me,” Kreya said.

  And she gave him her name.

  The expression on the guard’s face almost made it worth it.

  They consulted their books, and each other, but it wasn’t long before she passed through the gate into the fifth tier.

  If the fourth tier was known to be decadent as sugar cake, then the fifth tier was like sugar cake drizzled with honey and soaked in chocolate sauce. Kreya stepped onto a disc of white stone carved to resemble a cloud, and it lifted her up the slope of the street. “No one told them this was absurd?”

  Men and women, traveling on their own ridiculous “cloud” lifts, stared at her. She met their gazes until they blushed and looked away. She knew how she appeared to them: ragged, travel-worn. I probably smell. Subtly, she raised her arm and sniffed. Definitely smell.

  In contrast, they were swathed in layers of Liyan silk, undoubtedly imported from the lake islands beyond Vos and woven by elite weavers who created their magnificent fabric in absolute silence. From the shimmer, the thread looked to be spun gold. Kreya had worn such a garment exactly once. It had ended up spattered in blood, the day Eklor had announced his intention to wage his war against the Bone Workers Guild and anyone who supported them. She had lost interest in wearing silk wraps after her favorite mentor had bled to death at her feet and she’d been unable to save him.

  She did not enjoy the memories that the fifth tier brought back.

  Switching onto a new cloud lift, Kreya traveled in a spiral up to the palatial home of her friend. She remembered the location perfectly, but as she was carried to the arched entrance, she didn’t recognize anything else about it. Years ago, Zera’s palace had been an elegant apartment, expensive but tasteful, with a spectacular view.

  “The view is still nice,” Kreya said.

  The word “tasteful,” though, did not apply.

  Murals of either gems or colored glass covered the exterior, which would have been fine if the gems weren’t in the shape of animal, bird, and fish skeletons. Worse were the statues that clogged the gardens. Dozens of them. Each was a white stone carving of an animal, with its skeleton outlined in gold inlay.

  Subtlety had never been Zera’s strength, but this was impressive in its hit-you-over-the-head way of announcing a bone wizard lived here. Couldn’t she have just invested in a sign? she thought.

  Sidestepping between the statues, Kreya approached the entrance. Before she could knock, the door, which was flanked with more skeleton-themed statues, flew open. A woman with shockingly bright multicolored hair in a gold silk robe beamed at her.

  “Kreya!” Zera cried.

  “Hello, Zera.”

  Zera looked her up and down. “You look terrible.”

  “And you look ridiculous.”

  Maybe this is going to be all right, she thought. She didn’t let go of the ball of worry in the pit of her stomach, though.

  “Just so we’re clear, I’m not embracing you until you’ve had a bath.” Zera wrinkled her nose, which caused her makeup to crinkle. She’d painted her cheeks in streaks of gold, and her eyelids were ruby red. “But I think it’s fantastic you’re not dead.”

  “I’m not dead,” Kreya agreed. “Glad you’re not either.”

  Zera flashed a smile that reminded Kreya of all the jewels in the city winking in the sun. And suddenly Kreya knew everything was not going to be all right. It was a false smile, the kind Zera used to use on potential buyers or on bandits to distract them before Jentt and Stran, the warriors of their team, attacked. She’d never, ever used that smile on Kreya.

  Shit, Kreya thought.

  “A hundred curious eyes are watching us,” Zera said gaily. “Come inside where only half that many will stare at us, and you can tell me what you’ve been doing the past twenty-five years, why you’ve never contacted me in all that time, and what brings you here now.”

  Kreya heard the edge in her voice, beneath the bubbles.

  Definitely not happy.

  She let Zera guide her inside anyway.

  Half-naked men and women of varying ages lounged around the salon, reclining on couches between pillars shaped like animal skeletons—when Zera liked a theme, she apparently went for it. A shirtless man played a harp by a pond with one of the fake waterfalls that cascaded from a vaulted ceiling into a koi pond. Two women played a child’s game with grape-size balls and circles drawn on a marble table. It smelled like cloying flowers and reminded Kreya of the unforgettable taste of poisoned wine. With all the tiny waterfalls (pouring out of vases, out of sculptures, and out of mosaic walls), it sounded as if two dozen people were simultaneously peeing on the floor.

  “You live like this?” Kreya asked before she stopped herself.

  “You are judging me,” Zera said in a singsong voice. Her diamond smile hadn’t faded, which was not a good sign. “How delightfully droll from someone who looks as if she climbed the aqueduct pipes to get here. You do realize you’re wearing the same coat you wore twenty-five years ago? Your hair hasn’t been cut or combed in that long either. And you left without a word, without a goodbye, and never once reached out to see if I was all right.

  “It all—well, I’ll be blunt—stinks.”

  She’s not wrong. Except about the hair. Kreya recalled instructing a construct to hack half of it off a few years ago, after she noticed silver strands sticking to her shirts. “You look like you’ve done all right.” She waved at her golden silk scarflike clothes, the multiple waterfalls, and the random assortment of lounging partially dressed people. “But I am sorry for leaving without a goodbye. It was just too painful—”

  “And you’re the only one whose pain matters, of course. Tell me, Kreya: did you come after all this time because you missed me, or did you come because you need me?”

  She waited for an answer. Kreya opened her mouth, then shut it.

  “What a pity.”

  “Zera—”

  “No,” Zera said, her face hard, her smile chipped out of granite. “Whatever it is you’ve come to ask me for, whyever you decided that now was the time to crawl out of whatever hole you’ve been living in, however much you think I care about our past friendship . . . The answer is no.”

  “I haven’t asked anything yet,” Kreya protested. She’d known there was a high probability that Zera would be dramatic about their reunion, but this was extreme. “You can’t say no before I even ask. That’s absurd.”

  “I prefer ‘eccentric,’ not ‘absurd,’ thank you.” Zera spread her arms wide and beckoned to her . . . friends? Followers? Sycophants? Lovers? Kreya didn’t know who they were and didn’t much care, except they were all watching Zera. Even the ones who acted absorbed in their own selves, such as the shirtless man with the harp, had their bodies twisted toward Zera, as if they were flowers and she was their sun. It made Kreya’s skin crawl. “Aren’t I delightfully eccentric, my darlings?”

  The harp stopped. “You’re the pinnacle,” the musician said, and then beamed at her.

  “The pinnacle of what, my love?”

  That flummoxed him.

  “Come now, I can’t be the pinnacle of nothing. A pinnacle is the highest point, by definition, so who am I crushing beneath the glory of me?”

  His face brightened. “Everyone!”

/>   Zera laughed, as if delighted. “And do you know how I became so glorious?”

  She hasn’t changed, Kreya realized. Underneath the ridiculous face paint and the gold silk, Zera was still the girl who chose to fight her battles with dramatic flair. She’d provided the distraction, as well as the firepower, when they’d gone after Eklor. Quietly, Kreya said, “You don’t need to perform for me. I’m not your enemy.”

  “Of course you’re not! You’re my dearest friend!”

  It was worse than Kreya had thought. Zera not only wanted an argument, she wanted a spectacle. Exactly what Kreya didn’t need. She checked the distance to the exit. She wasn’t convinced she could make it there faster than Zera’s sycophants could, especially if they had any of their leader’s talismans tucked into their virtually nonexistent outfits. Plus it was likely that Zera had locked it behind her anyway. She wondered precisely how angry Zera was beneath the drama and what sort of control she had over her temper.

  Zera settled onto a couch that was plump with cushions. Sinking in, she positioned herself as if posing for a portrait, artfully arranging her many silk scarves. Her followers flocked closer, sitting at her feet. She patted a cushion next to her, inviting Kreya to sit with her, but Kreya crossed her arms and leaned against a column that was carved to resemble a croco-raptor skeleton. Undeterred, Zera beamed at her audience. “You’ve all heard the legends. There were five of us, tasked by the guild master to eliminate the threat posed by the rogue bone maker Eklor.” She held up one finger. “Kreya, our bone maker, a rising star in the guild, chosen for possessing a power that could rival Eklor’s—if she lived long enough to hone it.” A second finger. “Zera . . . that’s me, my loves.” Her audience cooed appreciatively, and Kreya rolled her eyes. “Bone wizard. Unknown until then, but soon to be unrivaled.” Third. “Marso, a bone reader, with a unique gift of seeing the truth of the past, present, and future that far exceeded the skills of other bone readers.” Four. “Stran, a warrior with experience in using bone talismans to enhance his already prodigious strength.” And five. “Jentt, a reformed thief, who specialized in using talismans of speed and stealth to win his battles.”

  Kreya felt a pang at his name. She didn’t know what Zera was playing at, acting like a storyteller. “Everyone knows this.”

  “Ahh, but what not everyone knows is this: the legend says that the guild master tasked five, but he did not. He tasked only one. Kreya. She chose the rest of us. All that befell us is her fault. All the glory, and all the pain.”

  Ouch.

  Of course it wasn’t anything that Kreya hadn’t thought a million times before. She’d insisted Jentt was perfect for the job. She’d pushed Marso to read the bones again and again, until his eyes were sunken and he murmured in his sleep. I pushed all of them. Zera, too.

  “Plucked from obscurity, we were chosen to become the best of the best,” Zera continued. “Kreya insisted upon it. She pushed us to train and train and train until I thought my fingers would erode to only bone themselves.” She twisted her hands in the air, and jeweled rings flashed. Each ring was linked by gold chains that braided themselves into bracelets that wound up her arms to her elbows.

  Kreya remembered how they’d trained: holed up in an abandoned farmhouse. Jentt and Stran had hunted together, practicing with speed and strength talismans, bringing home ferrets, rabbits, even a bear once. They’d skin them, process the carcasses, and harvest the bones. The wood floors in the kitchen had been soaked with blood by the time they were done, and the house stank of death, but she remembered how much they’d laughed, how long they’d talked, and most of all, how alive they’d felt.

  It had been among the happiest times in Kreya’s life. Even though they were preparing for war. She’d never been much good at making friends, and these people . . . they’d been more than friends. We were family, she thought.

  Zera was studying her, her eyes glittering like a cat’s. “I hated her sometimes, for her unswerving faith in my abilities. And loved her for it. I didn’t know she was right, that I was destined for greatness. She believed in me more than I believed in myself. Until she didn’t. Until she betrayed me.”

  “I didn’t mean to steal your moment. I only wanted to avenge Jentt.” She’d told Zera this twenty-five years ago, and she’d thought she understood. But apparently she’d just had twenty-five years to brood.

  “She’d laid all the plans,” Zera told her sycophants. “We’d all agreed to them.”

  Kreya cut in. “But reality had other ideas. It was never in the plan for Jentt to die. And that changed everything.”

  “She went in alone, to face Eklor,” Zera continued for her audience. “Despite our plans. Left us behind to face an army, while she went after Eklor without us. Oh, it was very dramatic. Death all around. Hopelessness. Despair. He’d even condemned children to serve in his army of horrors, both before and after death, and our heroine Kreya marched through it all, buoyed by self-righteous grief and rage.”

  Kreya peeled herself off the pillar. “Enough. There’s no need to relive it. I stopped him. You stopped his army. World saved. Everyone went their separate ways. The end.”

  “You went your separate way first,” Zera said. “Or did you miss the part when I said you went in alone, leaving us to face an army of nightmares?”

  One of the girls at Zera’s feet, starry-eyed, sighed and said, “You were so brave, Master Zera. A few against an army. Saving us all.”

  Smiling, Zera patted her on the head as if she were a well-behaved puppy. “That’s right. We were victorious, even though our friend and leader, our sister, abandoned us. And then she walked off into the sunset, still without us, to grieve a loss we should have shared.”

  Kreya snorted. “Seriously? You’re angry at me for grieving my husband. That’s it?”

  “Yes. And for all the years since then.”

  “Sorry for saving the world at great personal cost and needing time to recover.”

  “Twenty-five years, Kreya. A quarter century! Maybe, just maybe, I needed you too! Ever think of that?” Zera shot to her feet, and her sycophants, who had been leaning in closer and closer, fell backward.

  “I was in pain.”

  “So was I! My heart hurt!” Zera grabbed the fabric of her shirt over her heart and yanked. Pearls and beads and jewels popped off. They sprinkled onto the marble floor, and Kreya watched them roll, scattering in every direction.

  Zera’s chest was heaving, as if she’d run a race, and her curves were visible through the torn fabric, which Kreya had no doubt was intentional. She wore an expression of pure martyrdom, holding the pose, while her sycophants looked from her to Kreya and back again, waiting with bated breath.

  Slowly, sarcastically, Kreya applauded.

  Zera quit panting and closed the front of her shirt. “Go,” she said to her followers.

  They scrambled up and out of the salon. A few of them slid on the pearls that littered the marble floor, then caught themselves on the pillars carved like skeletons. In seconds, all of them had tumbled out of the room. All that remained was the sound of waterfalls, trickling.

  “You left me,” Zera repeated, but this time there were no theatrics.

  “I’m sorry,” Kreya said quietly. She meant it. She’d never intended for any of it to happen—or yes, she had. They had defeated Eklor and become heroes, exactly as they’d wanted to. She had just never anticipated that doing so would destroy her. “Have you been all right?”

  “Do you even care?”

  Kreya considered that. It was an honest question; it deserved an honest answer. “Yes.”

  Zera sank again onto her couch. “I told myself you’d come back. For a long time, I made excuses. ‘She just has to grieve.’ ‘She needs to be alone now.’ ‘She cares, but she doesn’t know how to express it.’ I waited for you. Kept my heart open for you. And then, when you didn’t come, all that hope switched to anger. I succeeded here, built all of this, in part to spite you, to show that I could be fine wi
thout you.”

  Kreya didn’t know what to say, but she didn’t need to, because Zera wasn’t finished.

  “And you know what I discovered? I am fine. Without you. Now that you’ve come back, I look at you, and I know I should feel all that old anger and hate. I know that’s what they”—she gestured to where her sycophants had disappeared—“expect. But you know what I feel?”

  Kreya shook her head.

  “Nothing.” Zera scooped up a few of the fallen pearls, spread her fingers, and then let them fall again in her lap. “I feel nothing for you, Kreya, because you are nothing to me now. You are the past, and I’ve let go of the past.”

  Kreya felt as if her ribs had tightened around her heart. She deserved that. And more. She hadn’t expected forgiveness. Still, a piece of her had hoped for it all the same. After all this time, she did still care what Zera thought and felt. “Very well. I understand. But the talismans—”

  “What will you use them for?”

  “I . . . I can’t tell you that.” She had intended to tell Zera the truth. She’d thought she owed her that much. But now . . . There was too great a risk that she’d be overheard, or that Zera would disapprove and try to stop her.

  Zera laughed, an empty sound. “You came here, after all this time, to ask a favor and won’t tell me why? You have not lost your nerve.”

  “It is for a good cause.”

  “Is it? That’s nice. I charge for good causes. And for bad. My power bones are among the most coveted, and therefore most expensive, in Vos. How much gold did you bring with you, Kreya dear?”

  “None. I had hoped our past friendship would be enough—”

  “Friendship means connection. And for that, you need to actually stay connected. You are nothing to me now, Kreya. I don’t think you understand that. Nothing. And so I will give you nothing.” She rose and crossed the room. Holding open the front door, she waited. Her expression looked, more than anything else, tired. And a little sad.