Trials

by Kady Cross

  The palomino reared. “Wicket, no!” I gasped, grabbed onto his mane and held tight until he had all four hooves on the ground again. “What are you doing, you beast?” Then I saw what had startled him. Wanderluck, just a glimpse through the trees.

  “Whoa, boy,” I said quietly as I slid off Wicket’s back. My boots were silent on the frozen ground as I looped his reins around a tree branch. “Stay here,” I whispered and kissed his nose.

  I crept slowly through the younger pines to the small clearing where Wanderluck thrashed and bucked. Blood seeped from a gash on his shoulder and his eyes were wild. I pulled a small round charm out of the satchel at my hip. The wooden amulet was carved with a simple Calming conjure, and I ran my thumb across it, activating it. I held it out in front of me as I approached Wanderluck. He froze when he saw me and flattened his ears against his skull. Well, that’s not good, I thought to myself. I whispered calming things, noises and coos, and crept close enough to tuck the amulet under his saddle pad.

  He flicked his tail and shook his head as the magic took effect. I ran my hand down his neck and stepped closer to his face. He snorted out a sigh and looked at me. Fear showed in his eyes. “Where’s Betta?”

  He snorted and nudged me with his head. “Which way, Wanderluck? Show me.” I took hold of his reins and let him lead me to the edge of the clearing.

  “She wouldn’t have gone through here. It’s a mess of brambles and thorns! Where did she go, Wanderluck? Please show me.” He nipped at my elbow and nudged me. “Hey! Cut that out.” I straightened the stallion’s stirrups and talked him through my plan. I wasn’t sure if he could understand me, but it couldn’t hurt.

  When Wanderluck was ready, I climbed onto his back and settled myself into the saddle. Wicket neighed and stomped his hoof against the ground. “Give me a minute, Wicket!” The words were barely out of my mouth before Wanderluck bucked, throwing me off his back. I landed hard on the ground, breath knocked out of me, and rolled away from the spooked horse. “Seraph stones! What was that for?”

  I got to my feet and dusted myself off. Wanderluck made a few laps around the clearing before dashing off the way I’d come, scraping himself on the pines as he burst through them and past Wicket. “Ugh! Betta, you should have trained that horse a little better!” My eyes prickled with the threat of hot tears. I went to Wicket and buried my face in his mane. He turned his head, nuzzling my hair. I sniffed and took a deep breath before untying his reins. So much for that plan.

  “I’m walking from here. Can you find Wanderluck and make sure he gets back home?” I looked the horse in the eye and knew, somehow, that he understood. He nudged me with his head and turned so I could secure the reins. I smacked his rear and said, “Go on, boy. Be safe.”

  I returned to the clearing, the last place I knew Betta had been. I closed my eyes and opened my mind, scanning for her presence.

  The world had changed when I opened my eyes again, the clearing now colored with the turquoise and gold of sunlight on the sea. She wasn’t in the immediate area, so I fed creation energy from my prime amulet into the scan, broadening its reach. I let my mind roam the forest—through the trees, over the brambles and vines, deep into the wood. And there she was.

  Caged.

  She raged in the iron cage that held her, beating herself against the bars and clawing at her skin. I pushed deeper and gasped as my head split with pain, the image of a scarred face appearing, sniffing the air, recognizing the magic. It was as if lightning had struck my skull. I squeezed my eyes shut and fell to my knees, my forehead on the cold ground. Darkness. Betta had been captured by the Darkness.

  “No . . .” I moaned as my vision cleared, the pain ebbing. “Betta, what have you done?”

  I got to my feet, not knowing what to do, trying to get my bearings in this strange place. I took a deep breath, and my eyes widened as I caught the scent of salt on the air. Faint, but there. The sea was close. Somewhere. I reached out with my magics and tasted my first true taste of the sea. I could draw flavorless generic energy from the power sink under the Enclave whenever I wanted to, but the taste of true Sea energy was different . . . intoxicating.

  I filled myself with it, and my amulets. I pulled a crystal vial out of my bag, wrapped my hands around it, and pushed some creation energy into the seawater inside. The water sparkled with the turquoise and gold of the energy, and tiny waves lapped at the side of the vial. It’d stay there until I needed it. I hoped I wouldn’t need it. I tucked the vial into my leather vest instead of putting it back in my bag and turned to the forest.

  The bramble-choked path that Wanderluck had shown me seemed to be the shortest route to Betta, and I felt a moment of guilt. Poor Wanderluck; he’d been right.

  I hadn’t brought anything to cut through the vines. I pulled a small knife out of my bag and flipped open the blade. Better than nothing.

  I sawed at the vines that I couldn’t step over or duck under and made slow progress down the path. Where did these things come from? I’m no expert on trees and shrubs, but these didn’t seem like things that would grow around here, especially not in the winter in the middle of an ice age. The path was well worn and seemed like it was traveled recently, but how could anyone have gotten past these vines? There were surely better ways to traverse the forest.

  Rustling behind me grabbed my attention and I turned, blade outward.

  I watched in open-mouthed horror as the vines I’d just cut through knit themselves back together, sprouted new tendrils that intertwined and grew thick. “What the bloody hell?” I backed away from those vines and took my knife to the ones still blocking my way—the way forward, that is.

  Cut. Stomp. Saw. Toss.

  I made my way forward, the vines moving and growing behind me. The faster I worked, the thicker the ones blocking my return path grew.

  After a long, tiring time, the vines gave way to brambles, and the brambles gave way to evergreens. The warm light of a fire—small enough that I couldn’t see it from a few feet back—caught my attention. I closed the knife and slid it into my bag. Moving as silently as possible, I approached the clearing where the fire burned. The drum beat I’d heard earlier came again, steady now, louder. I held my breath as I crept closer but froze when I heard a scream.

  “Let me out! You monster! You can’t keep me here!” Betta beat against the iron cage, pulled at her hair. She was naked and threw herself up against the iron bars with a grunt and whine. Ice blue magic floated around her like a mist but never drifted past the bars of the cage.

  The warmth of the fire somehow reached me, warmed me from the inside out.

  I moved back into the tree cover, but the warmth persisted, growing hotter in my belly. I moved around the clearing slightly and peered from behind another tree. I gasped. A kylen. I realized in that moment that the heat I felt wasn’t from the fire. I was experiencing—for the first time—mage heat. My heart dropped, and I swallowed hard. Betta must’ve felt it, too. She wouldn’t leave her clothes piled on the floor of a cage to freeze out here for any other reason.

  I pressed my back to the tree and closed my eyes against the heat clouding my mind. I took a deep breath in and released it. I peered around the tree again, watching the kylen. His body was golden, tanned by the sun’s rays, a stark contrast to the paleness of the Northwestern mages I’d known all my life. He faced away from me and Betta, toward the deeper forest and beyond, and grasped the bars of his own cage, struggling against the mage heat as much as Betta and I struggled. Broad shoulders tapered into a narrow waist cinched by a leather belt looped through his trousers. Muscles bunched as he fought against the bars. My fingers tingled with the desire to slide my hands over his flesh and touch the wings that lay furled against his back.

  I was standing in the clearing before I’d even realized I’d stepped out from the tree line. A man hunkered down on the other side of the fire, a wizened figure clothed in tattered robes, a sprinkling of stringy silver hair sprouting from his scalp. I’ve never seen a
man this old before, I thought as I opened my mage sight. I froze in horror when his head rose and he sniffed the air. I took one step back toward the cover of the trees, but it was too late. He turned and hissed, drawing the attention of both Betta and the kylen. I realized that he wasn’t human.

  “No, Piper. Run!” Betta cried.

  He was old, but he was fast. In an instant he overtook me. His aura glowed dark to my mage sight, and I saw him for what he really was—a mule. His gnarled fingers encircled my throat and he held a wicked-looking blade to my side. “Another mage. What a treat.” He smiled, revealing rotted teeth ground to points, and licked his lips, spittle trailing behind. “Two wombs for us to fill.”

  “Let go of me!” I shouted as the mule hauled me toward an empty cage beside Betta’s—thankfully, the farthest away from the kylen. She reached out between the bars, the rough iron tearing her skin.

  The mule purred at the sight of the blood trickling down her arm. I jerked harder, hoping he was distracted enough to loosen his grip. He wasn’t. Instead, he pulled me closer to him and grasped my face in his pale hand. His long fingers dug into my skin as he turned my head, forcing me to look into his red eyes.

  “Master will be pleased,” he said, turning his head to the side. I choked at the putrid, hissing breath. He sniffed, pulling in air sharp through his teeth.

  I fought, but he only held tighter. Trinkets jingled at his waist and bumped against me. I looked down at his belt and my eyes went wide. He shook me, hard, jarring my head and causing me to bite my tongue. I tasted the tang of blood and swallowed it back.

  Pieces. Human? Mage? Bones. Tied to his waist.

  I gagged and felt the bile rise in my throat. He threw me to the ground, and I landed hard on my hip. I winced and tried to scoot away, but he was too fast. He pulled open the cage, grabbed me under the arms, and threw me in. My head bounced off the bars and I crumbled in the corner. I looked over at Betta in the cage next to mine. She’d stopped thrashing against the bars and stared at me, almost as if she didn’t believe I was here. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out.

  “Piper?”

  My name—carried on the wind from Betta’s cage to mine—was the last thing I heard before the black blanket of unconsciousness fell over me.

  “Piper, wake up. Please. Don’t be dead. Please wake up.”

  A voice drifted through my dreams and I slowly became aware of how cold I was. I huddled tighter and the voice came again.

  “Thank the seraphim. I thought you were dead for sure. Piper? Can you hear me?”

  I opened my eyes just a crack and rolled over onto my back. Black iron bars rose around me and met in a circle in the direction of the sky. “I hear you,” I said to the voice, still confused and distant. I pushed up on one elbow and looked around. Another cage sat near mine, a small blonde mage inside. Betta.

  I sat up fast and the world shifted. I grasped my head and cried out. My hands came away sticky with blood. Then I remembered the mule, his trinkets, being thrown into the cage, the kylen . . .

  “Betta? What happened? Where’s the kylen?” I raised my head, slowly this time, and looked over at my friend. She crouched in her cage, no longer nude, but her clothes were in ruins.

  “The mule took him. Others came, more Darkness. They hauled him onto a cart and took him. That was a few hours ago.”

  “How long was I out?”

  “Half the day, a little more maybe. I think he’ll be back for us at full dark.”

  “Fire and feathers!”

  “Piper! You’ll attract more of them. Who knows what’s out here?”

  I glared at her, my worry shifting to anger. “Why did you do it?” I asked, my voice low.

  “Why did I leave? You’ll think I’ve gone crazy.”

  “Try me,” I said, sitting back against the bars and stretching my legs out in front of me as best I could.

  She sighed. “The sea. It calls me.”

  “I’m the Sea mage, Betta. Moon mages are allergic to seawater.”

  “But tides on your seas are created by my moon.”

  “Technically, yes. Maybe that’s why our magics work so well together.”

  “Do you remember the trip I was allowed to take to the beach last summer? I spent the days lying there watching the tide come in and go out. I could feel the moon in the sky like always, but I could also feel it through the water. It was different, Piper. I’m used to the moon’s power waxing and waning over the month, but there at the sea, I could feel it changing with the hours.”

  “Fine. So we take trips to the beach every once in a while. Guarded and sanctioned trips.”

  “Last night was the spring tide.” I nodded and she continued. “The perigean spring tide. I could feel the moon calling me, pulling me to the sea. I knew I had to leave then . . . or I’d never get to leave at all,” Betta said, looking down at her torn clothes.

  “Betta, I don’t . . .”

  “I couldn’t stand the thought of living in a cage for all my life, no matter how exquisite. I wanted to be free. I know the Enclave is meant to keep us safe, but I am willing to give up that safety for a chance to see the world.”

  “That’s a death sentence, and you know it.”

  “But the sea calls to you, too, Piper. I know it does. I can’t imagine how strong the call is for you. A Sea mage. You might as well be a mermaid or pirate for all that you can resist it.” She laughed, a short sound out of place in the cold of the darkening day.

  “Yes. I understand the siren call, the desire. I never told you this, Betta, but when I came of age, I was hit with waves of intense desire. It wasn’t linked to a seraphic overflight, though. During the full moon when the high tides rolled in, my body burned and ached with need, like a noncontagious mage heat. So I went to Samara, the only mentor I felt comfortable telling my secrets to. She made me an amulet that I could wear, charged with the power of the sun—an opposite force to dampen the heat. I don’t have to wear it all the time, only during the full moon.”

  “Like last night.”

  “Yeah, it dulls the heat, but also makes me dead tired. I slept right through you leaving.”

  “We’re littermates, Piper. Why is this the first time I’m hearing about any of this?”

  “I should have told you, Betta. But it was embarrassing. And I could ask why you never mentioned your tide problem before.”

  “It was . . . oh, Piper, I’m sorry. I thought I could handle it on my own. I thought I was doing the right thing. It’s all my fault you’re here.”

  “You’re damn right it is.” I turned my head so that she couldn’t see the tears that had started down my cheeks. “But what’s done is done. Now we just have to figure out how to get out of here.”

  We tried to break open the cages, tried to tip them over, tried to cast every conjure we could think of. We tried everything. Nothing worked. All the spells we cast only worked within the confines of our cages.

  Betta and I sat in silence as the sun moved across the sky, hints of warmth breaking through the tree cover and falling in shafts of golden light. It would soon be dusk.

  “I wonder if the demon iron has extra spells cast on it,” Betta said, breaking the silence.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I wonder if there’s something that’s keeping us from using our magic outside the cage.”

  “Could our powers be blacked out somehow?” I said at last.

  “Is that even possible, Piper? I’ve never been the strongest mage—mediocre at best. If we get out of here and my magics are even more messed up, what will I do? I’m a freak.” Tears spilled over the edges of her eyes and trailed down her cheeks. She slumped into a ball at the bottom of her cage.

  I watched as Betta’s shoulders shook, her sobs soundless in the still of the darkening day. Betta had always been the weaker of the two of us. And making friends didn’t come easily for her. She and I had come from a litter of only three. Our brother was a Sun mage, so he hadn’t spent mu
ch time with his Moon and Sea mage sisters. Besides, Moon mages were always considered a bit mystical and odd, and not just because of the way they shunned daylight.

  I remembered the day she and I became friends and not just sisters. She’d sat on the ground of the play yard, much as she sat now, and cried. She was alone, different. She was strikingly beautiful, even as a child, but different, almost angelic in her softness. I’d sat down beside her and nudged her with my elbow. “Y’know, nobody’s playing on the swings around the corner because they’re in the shade now and it gets chilly.” She looked up at me, blue eyes rimmed with red. I stood, offered her my hand, and walked around the corner into the shade. We’d been inseparable ever since. Until this morning.

  Betta looked up at me and wiped the tears from her cheeks. “I think I know what to do.”

  She held out the small wooden disk, identical to the ones I’d tucked into my bag before leaving the Enclave. She activated the charm and then smiled at me. “Catch this,” she said as she reached through the bars and tossed the disk to me. I caught it—but only just—and pulled it inside. The Warming charm radiated heat inside my cage.

  “Betta! That’s it!”

  “Piper, this is going to be risky. But it’s the only thing I can think to do.” She pulled out her prime amulet and held it in her hands. She looked at me, and fat tears ran down her face.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, hoping she wasn’t going to smash her amulet.

  “We’ve always been stronger together, right? Well, we can’t use our magic together while we’re in here, so I’m going to send my magic over to you.”