We Are Bound by Stars

by Kesia Lupo

  I stumble across the room and kneel by Hal, rolling him on to his back by levering him with my leg. I press my head to his mouth, shakily, listening for breath …

  He’s alive.

  I feel relief wash over me. For a moment, I feared he might be the second man I’d killed with my magic.

  My resolve hardens as I gaze down at his slack face. I have to escape. I have to find the Contessa. I have to discover the truth. Or none of this was worth it.

  No more puppets.

  Somehow in the confusion my mask has found itself lying by Hal’s side, unravelled from its wrapping of cloth, touching his hand. I draw closer to retrieve it and notice something strange: the mask is lying face up, but where it’s touching Hal’s hand, it appears to have absorbed a little of his darker skin colour, spreading across the surface like ink staining paper. I pick it up and, next to my skin, the colour leeches away.

  I frown. Was it … changing?

  The forbidden mask she’s wearing has powers they don’t want out in the world.

  And that’s when I start to suspect what the mask is capable of. Not allowing myself to hesitate, I lower the mask on to Hal’s face. At first, nothing – my old face, my sisters’ faces, superimposed on his. Then … I watch as the features of the mask shift – the nose broadening, the brows deepening, the skin darkening. My breath catches in my throat. The mask is Hal’s face now.

  I lift off the mask with trembling fingers, breathe deep, and press it to my own face. Power surges and I nearly scream as pain rips through my body. I fall to my knees. Faintly, I hear the tunic I’m wearing pop and tear at the seams. I black out …

  And wake, I think, a few seconds later, my lips cold and tingling. Hal lies unmoving at my side. Slowly, I rise up and draw on my power to summon a mage-light. The tiny flame that lifts from my palm is a deep, purplish red.

  TWENTY-FIVE:

  Homecoming

  Livio

  We walk through Dark Scarossa, its passages strung with cobweb banners – a sad celebration for me, the new puppet king. Shadow leads the way, and I follow – Silas swirling at my side. Twelve plain-clothed Rogues strapped from head to heel with weapons walk in our wake.

  For now, I’m obeying Shadow’s wishes – but the thought of casting aside everything my grandmother so carefully preserved, everything she’s been fighting for, sickens me. She stole a child to replace her mask-maker, yes. But good people do bad things, sometimes. I know she wants what’s right for Scarossa, even if occasionally she is willing to compromise her morals to achieve it.

  If I do as Shadow wants, I let Grandmother down – and that isn’t an option. But if I disobey her orders, Shadow has promised a painful death to the last remaining member of my family. Except … Shadow is my family. The thought fills me with horror. All this time I’ve longed for my mother, fantasised about her return … and now … I shiver.

  My head is reeling. I feel weightless, powerless. What if Shadow’s right? What if this plan really is my fate? Events are aligning perfectly for her vision, circumstances slipping into place like clockwork. Are the stars on her side?

  If so, I will not go down without a fight. I’ll keep my eyes and ears open – searching for a way out. No chance of that here – this dark, narrow passage is winding on forever. But perhaps, perhaps when we surface in the palazzo …

  Silas growls at my side, as if he can sense the direction of my thoughts. I feel his power, a pure raging swirl of Chaos, as firmly as if someone is tugging at my hand; feel the two red orbs of his eyes examining me sidelong as I walk. I wonder … On impulse, I reach out with my astromancy, carefully, softly, towards the wolf …

  Silas lets out a shrill, rasping yap, flinching away from my astromantic touch. Shadow spins around.

  ‘You may have the power to control sandwolves, Livio, but you can’t command this one.’ A flash of silver: a blade is held to my throat so fast I’ve no time to block it. ‘Try that again, and I’ll make you pay for it. Understand?’

  I nod slightly, my heart hammering.

  Her eyes land on Silas, next, burning. ‘Quiet, beast!’

  Silas whimpers and falls silent.

  At last we reach an ending to the passage – a narrow stone staircase twisting up to the underside of what looks like a trapdoor.

  Shadow stops, turns to her warriors, her mage-light hovering overhead casting long shadows along the stone floor. ‘Once we climb this staircase, we’ll be in the kitchens. Our people are watching and waiting in the gardens for our signal. All we need to do is secure the palazzo and grounds by sunrise, when the crowning and execution will be staged in the square. We have’ – she glances at a watch she pulls from a pocket of her jerkin – ‘around two hours.’

  ‘What kind of resistance can we expect?’ a scarred woman asks.

  ‘My reports suggest the palazzo has been abandoned, though largely stripped of furnishings and possessions. But stay on your guard. The Contessa is no fool, and the temples remain a force to be reckoned with in the city – though they’ve little business here.’

  I think of the Cardinal’s visit, how Grandmother had alluded to the temple’s thirst for secular power. I’m not sure Shadow is right that the temple will have no business in the palazzo tonight … But she is continuing.

  ‘If you encounter anyone, kill with knives if you can – magic is loud and bright. We don’t want to raise an alarm if we can help it.’

  She hands out orders, separating the small team into groups to spread out and search the building, sending signals to her Rogues outside once various areas are secured. Her knowledge of the palazzo’s layout is immaculate – of course, she lived here once – but she never mentions the secret temple through Grandmother’s rooms.

  ‘Livio,’ she says at last, ‘you’re with me and Silas. Try anything and the beast kills you – got it? We’ll be waiting downstairs for the last signal.’ She glances at her watch. ‘Let’s go.’

  TWENTY-SIX:

  A New Face

  Beatrice

  I lean against the wall of the tunnel, my vision swimming.

  I am Hal. His tightly muscled, tall body is my own. I’m wearing his clothes. I’ve stolen the colour of his magic.

  I try not to think about his unconscious form, half naked and locked in the room of old puppets. The door won’t hold him for long – if he survives.

  Adrenalin runs through the blood of this body and sets its heart pattering – even as it fights the sensation. In fact, it feels as if it’s fighting my every command. Down the dark passage I walk, my way lit by the mage-light, feeling uncomfortable and unwieldy, tall and uncoordinated. It feels as if I’m walking on stilts, and the floor is rising and falling like the surface of the ocean. Every other step I stumble, and I’m glad the passage is dark – if anyone could see me here, they’d think I was drunk.

  I can understand why this magic is forbidden. I feel pulled in every direction, my identity twisted, my powers sullied. My vision blurs. My ears ring. But of course, they’re not my eyes or my ears. I want nothing more than to tear this treacherous mask off my face.

  No – I have to keep going.

  Why didn’t the mask have this effect on me before? I lurch down another passage, praying the gods will guide me to safety. I think of how the baby whose face the mask originally stole barely had a will of its own – except, in a mirror of my own infant instincts, to feed and to cry. Besides, it had already died. Whereas now, I have stolen the identity of a fully grown, living man – and an enemy. It appears his will has transferred to the mask as much as his magic.

  I find a staircase, at last, my heart pounding as I stagger up the steps and shoulder open the door at the top. A foul, damp stench fills my nostrils as I enter what appears to be a sewer. I gag, but I force myself onwards. Somewhere, there’ll be a way up into the city.

  TWENTY-SEVEN:

  Fortune

  Livio

  Shadow pushes the door of the kitchens open, slow and careful. On the other side,
the entrance hall is silent. One by one, the Rogues step silently into the moonlight, and I’m carried along in the middle, swept up in the current of a fate I never sought.

  The hall feels cavernous. The marble floor, normally polished to a shine, is scuffed and grubby. White spaces linger on the walls where pictures and mirrors have been packed away, and the whole place smells of emptiness. The huge windows throw squares of moonlight on to the stairs, casting a cold white glow over the building I once called home.

  Because this place isn’t my home – not any more. I wonder if it ever will be again.

  Shadow clicks the door shut behind us. She opens her mouth to speak … but doesn’t. Instead, she sniffs the air, shuts her eyes as if honing her other senses. Silas is twisting at her side – something about his movement feels off-kilter, unsettled.

  ‘Something is wrong,’ Shadow whispers.

  A blinding purple flash lights the room – bright enough for me to cower and flinch in shock, raising my hands to my eyes. I hear the swish and snap of cloth, Shadow cursing; the air hums with magic. And when I lower my hands and open my eyes, the room, though once again half hidden in the silver light, is transformed. Countless figures surround us – hooded and cloaked and terribly still, like the statues of the masked god himself.

  I was right. Grandmother was right. Mythris’s temple is here to claim the palazzo for itself.

  One of the figures in front of the grand main entrance steps forward, his robes edge in gold. The Cardinal.

  ‘Shadow, at last,’ he says in a low, cultured voice. His eyes fix on mine – hold for a moment – and then return to the pirate queen’s face. ‘Or should I say, Seraphina?’

  Shadow scowls. ‘It’s been a long time since I was Seraphina, Cardinal.’

  ‘I remember you, even so. A good novice, once. The masked god values ambition and cunning, Sera – but yours has stretched outside the bounds of reason. You think you are more powerful than Mythris himself.’

  ‘Fortune is the one with the power,’ Shadow counters. ‘I am her vessel – a messenger of her will.’

  ‘Fortune … very well.’ The Cardinal smiles indulgently. ‘Regardless, you have led us a merry chase … but for all your cleverness, you fell right into my trap. Did you really think the palazzo would be yours for the taking? That the masked god would let you claim what is his?’

  As the Cardinal and Shadow exchange words, I catch sight of a face beneath the hood of the figure at the Cardinal’s side. Except, it’s not a face at all. Tears run down blue, cloudy cheeks, water glittering across its brow. Ice trickles down my spine. The True Masked guards are pledged to my grandmother – why is this one in the Cardinal’s service, wearing the robes of Mythris’s temple?

  Shadow steps forward, unbowed by the unexpected arrivals or the Cardinal’s speech. ‘I don’t care about your treacherous god,’ she spits. ‘And I don’t care if I have to fight you. The future is ours – Fortune has declared it. All roads lead to the King of the Wishes, whether they’re paved with peace or blood.’ She raises an arm, Silas spinning to her side, ready for battle. ‘Surrender now, crawl back to the north, to your City of False Kings and traitor gods. Or die at the hands of my beast.’

  ‘Scarossa is ours,’ the Cardinal counters. He summons a fizzing orb of dark purple magic, held in his upright palm. Every one of his mages follows suit until the hall is alive with dancing light and magic hums in the air. ‘This is your last chance,’ he adds softly. ‘You can’t win against the nine.’

  ‘Even gods can’t triumph over fate,’ hisses Shadow, her arm remaining raised, poised, holding Silas at her side. Her followers summon their own attacks – every mage’s magic a different colour. I feel the louder, wilder tune of their unbound power – Rogue power. And then she shouts, ‘Attack!’

  Silas disappears and reappears, consuming the Cardinal in his sandy whirlwind – and the rest of the hall explodes into action, a bright purple attack instantly barrelling towards me from a mage I hadn’t spotted.

  I throw myself to the ground, feeling the heat of the spell skim the top of my head. The air smells singed and electric. Feet pound around me. Men and women cry out in pain, frustration, triumph. Blades sing. I catch a glimpse of the True Mask, its ghastly crying face bringing one of Shadow’s men to his knees, tears streaming down his cheeks in a mirror of the mask’s as his emotions are twisted by Mythris’s magic. Light flashes as spells are thrown, blocked, shatter into sparks against the walls, skitter over the marble floor and smash through the great arched window over the door.

  Confusion reigns. And, I realise, that’s an opportunity. No one’s watching me – not even Shadow. The Cardinal and Shadow are fighting so fast and wild that I see nothing but flashes of purple light, glimpses of the Cardinal’s gold-edged robes and Shadow’s glittering rings.

  I cast my gaze around the room. The fighting is blocking the exits – the front door, the servant’s corridors like the one we emerged from. But the staircase … If I can get upstairs, I can climb down the bone-rose trellis and escape into the city.

  I start to crawl across the marble floor towards the staircase. One of Shadow’s men collapses on the floor right in front of me, eyes wide open, blood trailing from his nose. My heart pounds, stomach twisting in horror – but I force myself to crawl over him. I reach the bottom step and rise carefully to my feet, ready to run up to the first floor.

  A rasping growl sounds as Silas materialises in front of me, red eyes narrowed. I stagger backwards in shock.

  He’s blocking my path, watching me as I stumble to the floor, helpless. A bright red attack zooms from behind me and explodes on the banister a few inches to my left – I jump near out of my skin. Despite the noise, lights and confusion at my back, the world narrows to just me and the creature, our eyes locked. The sandwolf is huge – twice the size of the yellow-eyed sandwolves I’ve encountered – his head reaching past my waist as I lift myself up once more.

  In the underground passage, I’d managed to affect him with my astromancy. I remember how angry Shadow was – she was desperate to frighten me off. So she must’ve been scared I could steal Silas away from her. Which means …

  I reach for my power again, feeling the otherness of the magic – the two strands of astromancy held in my heart. Somehow, this time, I can sense which is which – the textures are different: one rough and dry like a sandwolf’s body; one cool and smooth like the feeling of slipping into the stars. I hold out my hand, push a thread of magic towards the sandwolf, who growls soft and low, cowering. I push harder, against the resistance I’m feeling, like a chain protecting Silas’s core, determined to break it down.

  Then, Silas jumps – attacks – and suddenly my world is lightning, swirling sand and pain. Choking, hot dust fills my lungs, a raw celestial magic burning my skin. I suppress my urge to panic as time is muddied, slowed. For a moment I feel like surrendering – but then a thought crosses my mind in the space of a heartbeat, clear and bright.

  I’m past the chains, now. I’m inside the creature.

  Drawing on my astromancy again, in spite of the confusion surrounding me, I reach out for Silas’s spark of life, the raw intelligence I sensed in him and others of his kind. I find it … but it’s shackled, bound to Shadow. The star in his heart is wrapped in another’s will. But Silas has a will of his own – a will which he has been denied. I don’t need to command him myself. All I have to do is set him free. I reach out, pull …

  The sandwolf lifts from my chest. I glance up, panting. My face feels scratched and burned with sand, and my hands are scarred with magical streaks. But I’m alive.

  ‘Go,’ I whisper to Silas.

  The creature’s red eyes blink. And suddenly, there’s nothing guarding the stairs but moonlight.

  Not allowing myself to think, or hesitate further, I run upstairs while the battle rages on behind me.

  I sprint down the empty corridor, feet thudding on the thick carpet. I consider my room but pass it – instead, I dart int
o Grandmother’s. Her balcony and trellis are hidden from the front of the palazzo – I’m less likely to be spotted by any of Shadow’s people from there. I’m through the door, running across the strangely bare room, the ghosts of furniture imprinted on the rugs – but hesitate as I reach the double windows. I glance over my shoulder. The curtain hiding the entrance to Fortune’s temple swings slightly.

  Where will I run? What would I achieve by fleeing? I could survive, perhaps. But Scarossa would be lost. I cannot let that happen.

  Inside the temple, though, I could find answers. Direction.

  The decision is instinctive. I stride over to the door, lifting the tiny key from under my clothes. I open it, step inside and lock it behind me.

  Trailing my hand against the wall, I climb the stairs. Alone, I sense the age of the building like I never have before. I imagine the ghosts of my Ancestors lingering in front of me, out of sight around the tight spiral, leading my way.

  Up in the temple, under the spiralling tower of blue glass, the moon is sinking and tinged with purple. Dawn approaches. The world turns, as it always does, in bad times as well as good. I lie under the stars, on the marble altar, feeling the silence like a companion at my side. Magic thrums in the air. Astromancy. I draw on my power, stronger than ever before, and open my eyes wide. The stars warp and twist in the enchanted glass, a high note chiming in my head.

  Chains stretch out between the stars in a myriad of webs, layers of near and far and possible futures stretching on into forever. I push into the chains, feel my stomach lurch as I demand answers, demand a way through. To my surprise, I’m drawn not up, further into the stars, but down …

  The chains are connected to us, down here in the city of Scarossa, connecting the souls who live here to one another, to the stars, binding us to our fates … but down I go, and down again. I feel hot, shivery. Earth envelopes me – a jumbled layer of the forgotten, the lost, the discarded. I sink into the rocky no man’s land beneath, old bones resting in their midst – and down, down further to the steaming streams gurgling in dripping lightless caves. Lower, lower I follow the chains until …