by Hannah West
She looked tired. A prick of empathy pestered me. She had come to her power by accident, and it was no minor burden to bear. The politics were undoubtedly complicated. How do you convince the world you’re not a threat when you can hardly convince yourself?
“Ambrosine? Was it you who messaged me for help?” Her inflection revealed suspicion.
“Yes, and I know you probably think this is some sort of trick,” I said, my hands splayed in a peaceful gesture. “That’s why the message was anonymous. I needed you to meet me, face-to-face, without any preconceived notions. This is too urgent to allow our petty differences to stand in the way.”
“Petty differences?” she demanded. “You refuse to see the scope of the harm you’ve caused.”
I had to bite my lip hard to keep from retaliating.
“What is so urgent?” she asked.
“You may not believe me, but Nissera is under a new threat. The Water’s absence has created a power vacuum. That pool is and always has been sacred, and elicrin beings of long ago drank from it—centuries before our kin. That place has a connection to the beyond that even you could not possibly sever.”
“I don’t doubt that. But how would you know anything about the Water’s state? You can’t materialize, and it’s quite a journey to the Forest of the West Fringe.”
I stepped forward. Valory’s wary eyes narrowed, but she held her ground, relaxing her shoulders to show that she was not threatened by me.
“Listen,” I said. “A being who was once banished to eternal darkness possesses mirror magic not unlike mine, and he has been attempting to communicate with me, to use me. He and his kind are looking for a way back to this world, and the Water is their gateway.”
“What is your game here, Ambrosine?”
The connection I was about to voice had struck me suddenly in the night. I knew it would be my most salient argument and that Valory would not be able to dismiss it. “Think about the gate to the netherworld out in the Marav Sea, the same gate Tamarice’s supernatural army breached. What do legends say it’s made of?”
“Black rock,” she said, impatient.
“And after you dried up the Water…what was left?”
“Black rock,” she admitted.
“Even though the floor of the Water had been like the bottom of any other lake when it was full…”
A pause. She considered.
“What if it’s a ripped seam in the fabric of our world, like the gate to Galgeth?” I asked, hitting a panicked pitch that wasn’t entirely manufactured. “Through those gates have come war, destruction, death. Our grandfathers fortified the gate, but the Water is unguarded in the middle of the forest.”
Valory swallowed hard. A slight pallor washed over her face.
“Use your portal. We’ll go there now and make sure nothing has already passed through. And then, for the sake of the realm, lay every enchantment you can think of to sew those seams back up. If I’m wrong or you feel that I’m deceiving you, you can take what’s left of my power.”
The following seconds seemed like minutes. The wind tore at my hair. It would take an age to comb it smooth again.
Focus, Nexantius reminded me.
“I know I made a mistake, ignoring signs that Lord Valmarys meant ill,” I pressed. “I mean, the Moth King. But the truth is that I do know what that mistake cost. I don’t want to make another. I don’t want the being that’s been haunting me to find another way into this world. And that’s why I’m coming to you.”
Valory sighed. The angles of her face softened. Everyone loves a well-told tale of repentance and redemption.
Even so, I could hardly believe it when she stepped through the portal and turned her back to me, trusting me. The portal shrank to the size of a jewelry case before expanding again, revealing the Forest of the West Fringe on the opposite side.
The scene in the frame was oddly quiet. No breeze or birds whistled in the tops of the timeworn trees. The sun was no friend to this stretch of forest. It wasn’t raining, but dampness, dense and cool, draped over the air.
I followed Valory. My inward gloating ceased when the smell struck me—like wet stockings, mushrooms, and rotting wood all stewing in a cauldron.
“By Queen Bristal’s grave,” I swore. “That’s vile.”
Valory cut a look over her shoulder.
“What? I can say that. She was my great-great-grandmother too.”
She shielded her nose and mouth with her sleeve and took several steps into the forest. “That looks like the clearing up ahead,” she said. “Where the Water was.”
Leaving the portal open, she wended her way through the trees and ferns, reaching the clearing before I did. I heard her gasp.
When I drew up behind her and peered down into the pit, I found an incursion of sickly gray moss and lichen, a forest of cup-shaped fungal growths with mouth-sized pores that leaked a clear, tacky substance. There were many trapped insects and even a few birds and rodents.
At the center of the pit sprawled a complex web of grayish roots that resembled long, spindly fingers. The way they branched outward sent an unbidden shiver up my spine; it looked as though something had dug into our world from another. An invasion.
Yes, Nexantius hissed.
Valory hunkered down at the edge and made a disgusted sound. “I think you’re right. The Realm Alliance needs to know what is happening here.”
Are you sure about this? I asked Nexantius.
You underestimate us.
I took a fortifying breath and stepped up behind Valory. Like those creatures in the ooze, Valory was trapped in my deception. I almost hated to shatter the idea of me she now held: contrite, helpful, even transformed. For a moment, I fancied that I might be rewarded with my full power, might win forgiveness from my sisters and brother. Instead of treating me like a traitor, they would welcome me back. Warning them of a rising evil in Nissera would more than compensate for my mistakes.
I could simply release Myron from the grasp of illusion and delusion, and Navara would be too relieved to ever speak a word against me. I could reclaim my old life.
It’s a fantasy, my magnificent consort. You and I shall never be parted. We have made promises to each other, dreamed dreams we must fulfill. Claim your prize before it’s too late.
My nerves prickled with the thrill of crossing that line, shattering the deception. I flinched toward Valory, hesitated, steeled myself, and finally planted my sole between her shoulder blades.
She cried in shock as she tumbled into the putrescent pit. Her crown flung away and bounced with muffled clinks. She managed to land on her hands and knees, and when she looked up at me, I saw the fire of battle in her wild eyes.
Fear pummeled me like a punch to the gut. What if Nexantius had underestimated her?
A ring of fire flared up around her, the blistering flames licking high. This had to be one of the dozen powers she had stripped from elicromancers whom she had deemed worthy of punishment.
The fire hungrily climbed the walls of the pit and rushed at me like a wave. I lurched back and threw my hand over my face to shield myself from the heat, knowing my end had come.
But swirls of cool, bright silver painted over my flesh, beginning at my fingertips, coating my fingers and hands and arms like armor.
The fire should have claimed me. But I didn’t even feel it.
What is this? I asked Nexantius.
Your reward for doing what I asked.
When Valory realized the flames would not hurt me, she relented, and the flames snuffed out. I dropped my hand to stare deep into her eyes.
She looked unsure, maybe even afraid.
The image seared itself into my memory. Forevermore, it would bring me comfort and delight.
The wolf had become the helpless lamb.
She bared her teeth and struggled to stand, but the sticky substance slowed her down. The fire had not damaged the otherworldly infestation. If anything, her attack seemed to strengthen it. The collection
of varying growths seemed to breathe in and expand like diseased lungs.
I heard a whoosh behind me and spun to find a second, identical Valory. So she had confiscated the elicrin power from a Duplicator as well. “What an intriguing assortment of stolen gifts,” I mused. “Mercer must enjoy this one.”
This new Valory began to generate an armor of her own, made of sparkling, faceted crystal—the enviable gift that had once belonged to her first cousin Ander Ermetarius, before she killed him. Her diamond-hard fist struck me across the face and set my head ringing, but my armor from Nexantius made us equals, and the effect was no worse than if she’d struck me with her naked fist.
I’d never fought anyone with my hands before, but I reared upward, slamming a hard fist down on her shoulder. The supposedly impenetrable crystal of her armor cracked like glass, and both iterations of Valory cried out in pain. I reeled back to strike another blow, but the duplicate flickered and disappeared.
I turned to the pit and found Valory mired in the growth. The roots, which I’d imagined breathing only a moment ago, slithered their way around her calves. But she wasn’t done fighting. Spikes protruded from her limbs, sharp and pale. They were made of bone. Yet another gift she had curated, another elicromancer she had oppressed and robbed.
The growth in the pit recoiled a little, hissing and squealing as her spikes punctured its tendrils and spilled more ooze. But the sentient growth recovered, lashing around her wrists and pinning her against the earth.
Panic set in, and I relished it. Instead of relying on the sophisticated elicrin gifts in her collection, Valory resorted to her crude, unruly power of sheer destruction. Screaming, she curled her fingers and thrust her hands upward, ripping the roots from the earth without touching them.
Nexantius…what’s happening? She shouldn’t be able to escape.
He didn’t answer, but I felt his thoughts agitating.
Valory snapped her head up and looked at me. Her right hand rose, fingers tense with the potential to wreck and kill. She jerked her wrist, and magic erupted out of her.
No elicrin stone, all power.
The mighty trees around us cracked as though struck by lightning. I heard them sway and one fell right beside me, a hand’s breadth from crushing me. The impact shook the earth beneath my feet, but I remained still, solid and unmovable, like one of those iron effigies come to life.
Valory screamed as she tried and failed to break me, destroying everything around me instead.
When it stopped, I opened my eyes and found her panting, lines of despair etched across her somewhat-pretty face. The roots she had torn up squirmed back to life and seized her with new determination, dragging her to the center of the pit. One of them slithered into her mouth in spite of her fierce struggle, sliding down her throat like a snake, staking her in place. They trapped her so completely that I could not tell where she ended and they began. Her wide eyes stared in horror.
“The only power you can truly call your own is the power to cause discord,” I called to her. “Deep in your heart, you know this. The world will be a safer, fairer place with you restrained.”
I turned my back on her and hiked over felled trees to the portal, my silver armor retreating. After I stepped through to the deserted island, the portal shrank into a tiny wooden case again, small enough for me to pick up and carry back down to the shore, where Damiatta waited for me.
Silimos would crumble Valory’s will and possess her.
Nexantius and I had ideas for the other two Fallen. Soon all four would have vessels, and we would be unstoppable.
From now on I would obey no laws and bow to no authority.
THIRTY-FOUR
KADRI
AS soon as the bloodshed erupted outside the cabin, swift and brutal, I was ready. Viteus had struck Sev with the crossbow, but he wouldn’t hurt anyone else.
The spell came to me not from memory of the battles I had fought alongside my elicromancer friends. Instead, I’d found it while thumbing through the book Valory had given me. It was nonviolent but deadly. If I missed and caught the wrong person, I could simply release its hold.
As Glisette lunged to help Sev, I stepped toward the fire, taking her place. My elicrin stone had begun to learn from me, to sense my thoughts. I could feel it pulling from the magic Valory had infused in my blood, asking me what I wanted.
It lit up before I even uttered the spell.
I looked Viteus in the eyes, thinking of Lucrez and the sacrifices she had made for this family and for me, the sacrifices that had resulted in her murder. “Bereth caranwen,” I whispered.
The magic flowed out of me, and the strangling spell took hold. His eyes went wide and his lips parted as he gasped for breath. He doubled over and dropped the crossbow to claw at his throat.
The struggle lasted longer than I anticipated, my magic lapsing for a second as doubt overcame me. But finally, he choked and fell dead.
Good riddance.
When I turned to help Sev, I found Glisette lying prone on the ground beside him, colorless and convulsing. Sev’s mother ventured out of the cabin to press a cloth to his wound.
“What’s wrong with her?” Sev gasped, rapidly losing color himself.
I dropped to my knees and brushed hair away from her face. “Glisette?”
She jerked awake as if from a trance. She looked at Navara, back at me, and then at the children inside the cabin. She found Sev and let out a sob, rolling up onto her elbows to crawl toward him.
“I’m all right,” he said feebly.
“Let’s get you both inside,” his mother said.
One of the boys helped her lift Sev. At least the bolt had gone clean through his arm. If it had been barbed, it would have lodged in the muscle and made a downright mess of the wound.
Depositing Sev on a pallet, his mother calmly doled out orders to the children to bring her supplies. She had to slice Sev’s shirt to get at the wound. I did not envy her the delicate work ahead.
Jeno cut the string binding Navara’s wrists, and she smiled at him. “Thank you,” she said, and the boy’s cheeks darkened a few ruddy shades.
Navara and I sat Glisette at the table. Navara fetched her a ladle of water, and she drank obediently.
“No one but Sev is hurt?” Glisette asked.
“No one,” Navara answered. “Kadri saved our lives.”
“What happened to you?” I squeezed my friend’s hand. The puckered skin of her scar caught the light as she looked up at me. “I’ve never seen you like that.”
“Themera,” she said, and looked at Navara. “I think blood provokes hallucinations from her. Yesterday I pricked my finger on the blackberry bushes, and she came. This time she warned me that if I don’t let her use me as a vessel, I will lose everything and everyone. She sent me a vision. She made me think all of you had been slaughtered.”
Navara grimaced. “That’s horrible, Glisette. I’m so sorry.”
Glisette nodded, casting a glance toward Sev, who moaned in misery.
Navara traced her fingers over the surface of the knotty wood table. As though she’d been avoiding it, she lifted her eyes to look at the silver scroll case poised at the center. “At least we know what to do now…to banish Nexantius.”
“I thought you said it was blasphemous,” I said.
“I was just scared. To learn that everything I’ve always believed—everything my mother taught me—was based on lies. But feeling helpless just then made me even more scared. I don’t want anyone to die. And if the only way to save innocent people is to admit that my faith is rooted in magic”—she shrugged—“then so be it.”
I clasped her hand, and she squeezed it hard.
“The only thing I don’t understand is how my father could let my mother and me go on believing in Agrimas when he knew the truth. He knew that it was all a story. No wonder the leaders claimed a curse would befall whoever reads the scroll without divine appointment. Its contents would undermine their leadership.” She dropped
her face into her hands. “And no wonder my father was so keen to promote friendly ties with elicromancers. He knows your magic isn’t an unholy abomination. It’s just…a force.”
“A force made good or bad by the people who use it and the choices they make,” I offered.
Navara nodded and brushed her short hair behind her ears. “I think I always knew that.”
Glisette’s cheeks had recovered their natural blush. She placed a hand on Navara’s shoulder. “It shouldn’t change the way you see your mother, Navara. If she was virtuous, then she was virtuous, whatever the reason. Your people loved her, and they will love you.”
“They will love you, not because you lead them to the altar,” I added, “but because you lead them.”
“Leading well is hard,” Glisette added, sitting taller. She looked at me. “Kadri and I have not been queens for long. We’ve already made mistakes. We’ve had to set aside our pride. But I think either of us would endure embarrassment over our failures and frustration over being underestimated again and again just for the chance to do something good in this world. It won’t be easy, but you will be the best queen Perispos has ever known.”
Navara looked at her through her dewy eyelashes. A tear slipped down her cheek, but she nodded. “Then let’s defeat the worst.”
In the cool, quiet hours of the morning, we set out west to meet Commander Larsio. I hoped that what the scroll said was true, that there was a way to separate Ambrosine from the power inside her.
Otherwise, even the largest army in the known world might not be able to take her down.
The others seemed to have confidence in this commander, so I decided to set aside my worry until I heard his ideas.
The huntsman was hardly in a state to travel. The fresh dressing his mother applied would help, but she worried aloud about the risk of infection and begged him to wait another day. Only after Glisette promised to continue cleansing and rewrapping it every several hours did she finally concede.