The Armor of Light

by Karen E. Hoover

  Ember didn’t like it, but she knew Lily was right. She nodded and finally opened the door and stepped through. After depositing her towel in the bin, she took a deep breath, stepped into the hall, and turned toward the eatery.

  Ember walked casually down the hallway in her multi-colored robe, everyone oblivious to who they passed. Ember’s first teacher, the one from the green room, strolled by, glancing her way, then moved by without pause. She sighed with relief and continued on, finding her way to the dining hall much more by smell than memory.

  She scrambled a bit as she reached the doorway and came face-to-face with Tiva and Ren. “Excuse me,” Ren said, smiling at her and stepping to the side.

  “No, excuse me.” Ember modulated her voice just a bit as she tried to squeeze past her twin half-brothers, and then Ezeker.

  “Has anybody seen Ember today?” she heard Ren ask as they walked away from her.

  “Nah,” answered Tiva. “She probably found the bathing pools and is soaking her skin off.” She hid her smile as she walked into the dining room. Yes, she had been to the baths, but she’d walked away with more than just clean skin.

  Picking up her tray and getting her food, she watched the doorway and saw Lily enter. They both tried hard to ignore each other, but Ember was aware of everything Lily did.

  After gathering her food, Ember decided to test her disguise on people she knew and headed toward her mother. It might not have been the best choice, but she’d fooled her once before, this woman who knew her better than anyone else. Marda was a good place to start. And Aldarin was sitting right beside her. Him, she had never been able to fool. This would be a major test as to whether she could fool Rahdnee or not.

  Ember approached their table, set down her tray across from her mother, stuck out a hand and said, “Hi, I’m Bettina. What’s your name?” She heightened the tone of her voice, just like she had for the twins, making herself sound slightly ditsy in the process.

  “Do I know you?” Marda asked, ignoring Ember’s outstretched hand.

  Ember wanted to laugh, but was partially worried that her mother had recognized her somehow. She shook her head and dropped her hand. “No, I’m new,” she said, sitting down and digging into her food.

  Ember could feel Aldarin’s gaze dissecting her, but she didn’t say anything as she ate. Finally Marda burst out with, “I’m rather new to the school myself, but I know you didn’t come in with the last group, and I’ve never seen you before. Where are you from?” She sounded very suspicious, and watched Ember’s face as if trying to see beneath her skin.

  Oh, boy. Ember thought, her brain scrambling for an answer. She took a guess and plastered on her most vapid smile. “Oh, I’m from one of the other schools. I just transferred in from a mage academy way east of here. They didn’t know what to do with me,” she said, leaning in toward her mother as if it were a big secret. “They said I didn’t know the difference between granite and marble, but that’s ridiculous. Of course I know the difference.”

  “Really?” Marda didn’t sound like she believed her. “What school? Maybe I know it.”

  Ember kept eating, snarfing down her food as if she were a bottomless pit. She felt like her stomach was going to eat its way right out of her belly with all the magic she’d done that morning. Shapeshifting was hard work.

  Ember filled her mouth, then held a finger up in the universal sign of, “One minute,” and wracked her brain for an answer while she chewed. She didn’t even know if there was more than one mage academy. “It’s a school for orange magic near the mountains of Kafutu.” Were there mountains called Kafutu? She didn’t know, but if there were, she hoped they were nowhere near here.

  Marda scrunched her brow, obviously thinking, then shook her head. “No, I don’t know that one. I have never heard of the Kafutu mountains. Where are they? Do you know?” she turned toward Aldarin, but he seemed to be trying to keep from laughing. He caught Ember’s eye and winked. Ember wanted to shake her head. He’d seen through her disguise again. How did he do that?

  “I told you, you wouldn’t know it,” Ember said, and laughed. “They’re far, far away. Way east of here on another continent. I think my parents were trying to get rid of me, sending me out here where I don’t know anyone.” She should have thought of a better story before. She hadn’t realized she’d be interrogated by her own mother, though she should have. Marda always questioned everything. She was beginning to regret her choice in testing her disguise on her own mother.

  She glanced across the room as Lily sat down with a group of kids Ember didn’t know. She caught her eye across the room and Lily nodded her head quickly, a new version of a thumbs-up.

  They ate in silence for several long moments, Ember feeling like a bug under a magnifying glass, when she felt a heavy hand on her shoulder. She glanced up, startled to see DeMunth staring down at her, a puzzled look on his face. He looked at Marda, then Aldarin, who was trying desperately not to laugh, then back at Ember. He opened his mouth to speak, then glanced at Marda again, who was openly staring at him, curiosity written all over her face, and closed his mouth with a snap.

  “What is going on here? It’s obviously something, as your mother doesn’t seem to know you, and yet you look exactly as you should,” he mindspoke, his eyes boring into hers like a worm into the earth.

  “I was testing my disguise,” she answered, glancing at her mother to gauge her reaction. “And you are about to give it away. Will you just sit down already and pretend you don’t know me? Please? And how did you see through it when no one else can?”

  DeMunth took his hand off her shoulder, his lips tight and eyes flaring. “I’m sorry,” he said with his new tongue. “I thought you were someone else. Is this seat taken?” He moved next to her and sat down without an answer or invitation.

  Ember shook her head and went back to her food. If she felt like a bug before, now she felt like she stood naked in a crowd. DeMunth continued to speak to her in his mind, though he didn’t glance her way. “I’ve always been able to see through your changes to the person beneath.”

  Ember didn’t know how DeMunth could see through her changes, no matter what they were, but knowing that he could explained a lot of things. It was no wonder he could be attracted to her even as a boy. He didn’t see the boy. He saw her. There was no escaping him. How could she manage this if she couldn’t hide in plain sight? She filed his revelation in the back of her mind

  He continued. “Why did you leave so quickly? We need to speak of things, Ember. How am I to guard you if you won’t help yourself by staying nearby?”

  Ember stiffened with that question. She was so tired of being watched all the time. Couldn’t people trust her to care for herself? She wasn’t one of the littles who needed constant supervision. She was nearly a grown woman and had a power none had seen in millennia. She wanted him to treat her like a woman, not a little girl. “I don’t need a guard,” she sent back to him. “I can take care of myself.”

  DeMunth choked at that, her response having made him inhale his food. He coughed and coughed, Aldarin coming around the table to slap him on the back.

  Just then, Rahdnee and Brendae stepped through the doorway and looked around the room. They nodded to Lily, then glanced at Ember and past her as if she didn’t exist at all. She sighed with relief, then looked back at DeMunth. They would be able to figure it out soon because DeMunth was with her. He was still too weak to protect her. She couldn’t let him get hurt, not because of her.

  She stood, and at her standing, all eyes went to her. She wasn’t sure why until she glanced down and realized her robes had gone from multicolored to their original white. She’d just given herself away. DeMunth stopped coughing and grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong?” Ember didn’t answer. Rahdnee and Brendae started toward her as a large group of kids came through the door. Ember took that moment of distraction to escape.

  She shook off DeMunth’s hand and jumped over the table, racing for the doorway. She knocked se
veral of the kids aside as she ran, pounding feet sounding behind her. She didn’t know if it was DeMunth, Lily, or the guards, but somebody was after her and she couldn’t afford to be caught, not by any of them. Either she would be hurt or they would, and she couldn’t let either happen.

  The anger filled her like a bellows and stole away all other thought. She just wanted to be invisible, to blend in. Why couldn’t things be easier?

  The anger built to a breaking point and Ember’s two legs couldn’t carry her fast enough. Without thought, she pulled at the power within her, and in an instant she changed from girl to wolf and raced down the paths on all fours. Students and instructors alike scattered before her, some squealing, others trying to hurt or catch her, but she eluded them all and raced for the portals. She leaped through the first one, the trip long and breathless, but the trek got shorter with each jump. She went through portal number three, then back in familiar territory, and knowing there were no more portals if she continued, she turned and raced through the abandoned tunnels, looking for the scent of magic to pull her to more portals.

  She had to find a place to be alone, a place that could be just hers, away from all the others so they wouldn’t get hurt. Somehow she would find a way to get word to Ezeker and DeMunth, but for now, she had to hide. No one was safe with her around. Not even the other students.

  Ember found another portal just past the waterfall cavern. She jumped through it, this one a longer leap that left her on the other side without breath, but she kept running and searching for more until she was thoroughly lost.

  She found one last portal and dove through. It was probably the eighth or ninth one she had entered, but this one was different. When she came out the other side, there was no open runway like the others had. This one came out mere feet from a quartz wall. She was racing so fast as she leaped through that she couldn’t stop, despite her desperate attempt to skid to a halt. She slammed into the wall, but didn’t stop there. She melted into the quartz like butter into toast and sat just inside the wall without moving, hoping against hope that the mountain hadn’t just eaten her like it had the poor skeletal man Ezeker had shown her group on their way in.

  When the stone didn’t harden around her, Ember took a chance and moved forward, one paw at a time, her tail standing straight out as she walked through solid stone. She knew she could do this with her hands, but it had never occurred to her that she could move her entire body through rock.

  Moving through the quartz felt much as she imagined walking through honey would feel. Definite resistance, but she was still able to progress. Far away, a light began to shine. It looked like a white magelight bobbing in the distance, though what a magelight would be doing in solid stone, she had no idea.

  But Ember was curious and definitely did not want to go back at the moment. She couldn’t take any chances on bringing attention to herself or the people she loved—not the kind of attention Rahdnee and Brendae had in mind for her. Here she was, the first white mage in three thousand years, and people wanted her dead.

  Ember followed the light, hoping only that the consequence of doing so wouldn’t kill her. She’d take just about any chance she could right now if it would free her from the failure of her magic, the treachery of the spies, and keep DeMunth safe.

  Now if only the white light would lead her to her father, she could finally have some peace. Not knowing where she was going, Ember put her focus on the light and slid through the stone.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  As soon as Kayla and Brant entered the forest, the temperature dropped. The shade was very welcome after the heat of the morning rays. The sound changed as well. Rather than the noise of busy people, everything was muffled, even the steps of their mounts, and they were instead surrounded by birdsong and insect trills. It was a comforting sound. Kayla felt the forest calling to her, but she ignored it for the moment, instead just reveling in the feel of these ancient woods surrounding her. She didn’t need to speak to them to know how old the trees were or how untouched these woods were by human hands.

  They rode in silence for a while, not really caring where they went. It was just the quiet comradery of friendship grown to love that required no speech. Brant moved his mount close to Kayla’s and reached out. She met his fingers, and they rode for several minutes that way, their fingers intertwined, healing the breach between them, until the uneven ground forced them apart, but it was all right. Just being together in this sacred place was healing for both of them. Kayla could feel it was indeed a sacred place, ancient as it was.

  Brant finally spoke, asking the question she had dreaded most. “Why did you let him kiss you?” The hurt was still there, lacing his voice like acid.

  She was quiet for a moment, trying to frame her thoughts into words. “I didn’t let him, exactly,” she said, then rushed on. “You have to understand something. In the sea world, no human can survive without gills or air bubbles surrounding their heads. Sarali created an air bubble for me and replenished it whenever I needed more. But they pop when you enter an oxygen-filled area, and beneath the bottom of the sea is a lattice of air tunnels connecting place to place.”

  “Really?” he asked, fascinated, and temporarily distracted from his question, though she knew that wouldn’t last long.

  “Truly,” she answered. She took a deep breath and continued, knowing this was the part he would hate. “When Niefusu and Jihong came to the passage where T’Kato, Sarali, and I were staying, they demanded that Sarali go with them to see the king and queen. T’Kato was not going to let them take her without him, of course, and if I had stayed in the tunnel, I would have been all alone with no idea which direction to go, so I demanded that Niefusu take me with them.” She looked down and fiddled with the reins, wrapping them loosely around the pommel of the saddle, then unwrapping them. “I thought Niefusu would do the same as Sarali and create a bubble for me and then place it over my head, but instead he pulled me to the edge, where water met air, and at that junction he kissed me, then pulled my head into the water, exhaling so that the bubble would cover me. I did not like it, Brant. Not at all,” she said, looking at him.

  Brant wouldn’t meet her eye, but he seemed to be listening, so she continued. “During the trip, my bubble almost disappeared, so he replenished my air the same way. I didn’t understand at the time that he was taking advantage of me. He tried it a third time that evening, and I was about to fight him when he bit me and gave me the gills. I didn’t know what it meant. I hadn’t thought to tell him about you—not because I was hiding you, but because I didn’t trust him. He didn’t need to know. Does that make sense?”

  She looked at Brant and he tried to flick away a tear as if it were nothing more than a bug, but she knew how deeply this hurt him. He remained silent, so she continued.

  “I never encouraged him, Brant. I give you my word that I never once told him I was interested in him or showed him in any way. Sarali said he was stubborn and would not give up easily, but I had no idea how difficult it would be. I don’t want anyone else. I don’t trust anyone but you. How could I even think of wedding another?” Kayla tried to touch out to him, but he rode just out of reach.

  Frustrated, she entered a clearing and stopped. Brant was nearly across the meadow and into the trees again before he realized she was not with him. He turned his horse, looking at her with questioning eyes. She stared at him, waiting for an answer. Finally he sighed, his shoulders slumped, and he returned to her. When his horse was nearly beside hers, he pulled it to a halt and looked at her, tears brimming in his eyes. He didn’t try to hide them this time, and Kayla’s immediately filled in response.

  “All I thought of was you,” she said, her voice hoarse. “All I wanted was to get back to you and find out if you had survived the fall from the grasp of C’Tan’s dragon. Your words as you fell those last few feet haunted me night after night. I wondered if I had killed you with my stupidity. I wondered if I had destroyed Dragonmeer. It nearly broke me to think of los
ing you. Why would I then turn to another?” She was sobbing by the time she ended, and now Brant brought his mount even closer so that at last he could reach out and take her fingers with his own.

  He stared at the ground as he spoke, the light coming through the trees dappling them both. “I had the healer mend the worst of my injuries, and despite my parents’ wishes, I left to find you. I took every hound we had, every tracker and hunter. We followed your path through the woods and saw the trees made into javelins. We found the place where one of you became the MerCat. Sarali, I’m assuming.” Kayla nodded. “We followed you to the burned spots that still smoldered with dragon fire and followed your path as you separated from them. The hounds . . .” he choked up and struggled to continue. “The hounds led me to the cliff where they found your blood. Your blood!” he cried, squeezing her fingers tight and at last lifted his head to meet her eyes. Both of them cried openly. “I couldn’t find you, Kayla. You saved me by playing the flute, and I couldn’t find you to save you in return.” His voice choked on a sob. “I just wanted to save you. I couldn’t live without you, Kayla. You’re my everything. You always have been. Don’t you know that?”

  She reached across and pulled him into her arms, awkward though it was. The horses shuffled a little to compensate for the adjustment of weight, but beyond that. they didn’t move. Now it was Kayla’s turn to soothe Brant as he sobbed into her shoulder. He wasn’t one to show his feelings, unless it was anger or happiness. She had seen him cry on so few occasions she could remember them all, but she had never seen him cry like this.

  “Hush, love. Hush, now. It’s all right. I haven’t gone anywhere, and I am not going anywhere. I am yours, remember? Yours. I will be Duchess Brant Domanta. I want no other. Not even the son of a king,” she said, smoothing his hair and rubbing his back.