Embers of Empire

by Michaela Strauther

  That night, Nya and Sutra did all they could to stop Iryse, but he always found a way to sneak under their wing. And people did find out—the servants telling rumors went home and repeated the rumors until everyone in all the regions knew, and of course, somewhere along the way, “Iryse is torturing prisoners” became “The kings are torturing prisoners.” And the people hated him for it.

  One night, Iryse was once again left alone. The other four, including Sutra, were out apologizing and explaining the rumors to people, fabricating stories to make it look like Iryse had lost his mind, or was drunk, or he somehow couldn’t control himself—“He is better now, we promise”—and it wasn’t the other brothers’ faults. When they came back from their trip, it was nighttime. They entered the castle, calling Iryse’s name and telling him the people were calmer, but there was no response. They entered his room and found him lying limp across his bed, his brown skin lighter, his lips paler, and his breathing too shallow.

  They took Iryse to the medic, and in the three days it took for him to recover, they all thought he would die. He didn’t—when he was alive and well and conscious again, he told them what had happened. While they were gone, he was drinking water—not wine, he promised them—and felt dizzy afterward. He went up to his room to lie down, and from then on, he couldn’t remember much.

  “It was treason!” Iryse told them. He was no longer sick—weighed a little less, perhaps, but he wasn’t discolored or dizzy. “Someone poisoned me!”

  He was right. Someone had poisoned the water supply. Their medic observed the water, and sure enough, there were traces of Duch Snake venom in the well.

  When they spoke to their servants about it, the servants didn’t seem to know what they were talking about, but when questioning continued for weeks on end, one finally broke down. It was a young maid, new to the service. She wasn’t the one who did it, but she knew who the culprit was. It was an old man—he was tried for treason, found guilty, and stayed in prison for the rest of his life. They fired all the servants after that to make sure, and when they hired again, the candidates went through several tests before being accepted.

  The whole experience drove Iryse mad. He became so controlling that the four brothers worked with each other without him to figure out ways to calm him down. Taking him off the throne was the popular answer, but figuring out how to make him do that would be the problem.

  By then, it was too late. One afternoon, Iryse returned home after being out all night, a cloth wrapped around his neck. He seemed dazed and disoriented. The brothers tried to question him, but he was too confused to be of any help. Once Iryse fell asleep, they peeled away the little cloth around his neck and found a small gash, no more than an inch, stitched up on his neck near his jaw.

  It took a day for Iryse to be lucid again. When his words made sense, the brothers sat him down and questioned him.

  “Someone has tried to kill me,” he said. “I just want to make sure that doesn’t happen again. They’ll never get rid of me now. Isn’t that wonderful?”

  “What did you do?” Rowyn asked.

  “I went to a special person.”

  Sutra glared at him but said nothing. Rowyn spoke up again. “What person?”

  “A man.” Iryse paused. “A dragon breeder.”

  “For what?”

  Iryse laughed and brushed his hand against the stitched area of his neck. It didn’t seem to cause him any pain, even though the stitches were raw and new. “For a dose of something.”

  “Medicine? We have medicine here. And what for? You’re already healed from the Duch Snake venom—there’s no need for medicine.”

  And that was when Iryse told them all his secret. He had taken a dose of a drug into his blood. An occultist had made it—an old, crazy man in Richarta with special elixirs for things no one thought possible. He’d made one for Iryse from the natural venom of the teeth of a Lucifer’s Phoenix and dozens of other ingredients, herbs especially to lessen its potency—and Iryse had taken it through the cut on his neck.

  It made him immortal.

  Sathryn

  leep, Sathryn had decided, was not an option.

  With all the walking they had done—trekking for days on end, hardly stopping for rest—it made sense for them to be exhausted. But with all the noise from outside echoing through the cracks and holes in the wall, with all the thoughts racing around in her mind—Julian, her father—it was also impossible for her to fall asleep.

  Careful not to disturb Etzimek beside her, Sathryn slid out of bed, pulling her coat over her shoulders and her shoes on her feet. She was going to go find Julian.

  But as soon as she walked out the door, she wasn’t so sure. Everyone around her had the face of the Spade who had attacked her, but now, there was no one to save her. And how could she track down Julian in this forest of people, anyway? Based on the way that Spade had seemed so scared of him, what made her think anyone from the crowd would just tell her where he lived?

  She turned from the crowd, ready to get back in the little mud-brick home, when a woman pulled her back by the collar and spun her around.

  “Little girl.” Her voice was smooth and seamless, like a cloak of silk. “Perhaps I can interest you in buying some of my merchandise?” Her smile was too wide to be genuine, her voice too cheerful for a refugee camp.

  “No.” Sathryn tried to pull herself away from the woman—a Faerie with chalky-blue, pastel hair that raked the ground. The grip on her coat was too strong. “I was just going back in my . . . home.”

  “So soon? I watched you walk out. You stood there for only a few seconds before turning around. Look upon my items—you will be satisfied.”

  Sathryn rolled her eyes, mumbling under her breath before returning the Faerie’s plastered grin. “Sure. What do you sell?”

  The Faerie’s eyes lit up. She scurried behind the counter. “I have Blue Fire eggs on sale since they are increasing in number, and let me just say that Blue Fires are wonderful pets, wonderful! They don’t require a lot of food, and they are easily trained. Anyway, I have a new shipment on Duch Snakes and Velda’s eggs that are cheap if you buy them together. I have some Lucifer’s Crystals—nasty little beasts, good for defense—that are half their price in an hour, and I’ve got Gynko hatchlings, the rarest in the regions.”

  The Faerie looked at her. “Well?”

  But Sathryn was no longer paying attention to her, because on the Faerie’s table, there was a little notecard—an invitation. Written in script, it read:

  The Faerie snatched the card from the table and stared at Sathryn, her sweet smile morphing into a sneer. “What do you think you’re doing, little girl? Didn’t anyone ever teach you not to be nosy? Are you trying to play me? If you don’t wish to buy anything, then move! I have other costumers.”

  Sathryn stumbled back, looking up at the Faerie woman, who before had seemed so unbearably sweet. But that card had said Ajasek. “You know an Ajasek? I’m looking for an Ajasek.” The Faerie woman brushed her aside with an arrogant flip of her hand and called out to the crowd behind her.

  “Julian Ajasek? Would you know him too?”

  The Faerie eyed Sathryn. “Maybe.”

  Sathryn couldn’t help smiling. “How do you know him?”

  “The question should be how do you know an Ajasek? You must be confused.” With that, she shrugged her thin, olive-colored shoulders and waved her eggs at the crowd.

  “I spoke with one the other day.” Curious, she added, “What have they done to make it so hard to believe that I’ve met one?”

  The Faerie scoffed, pulling a blue braid over her shoulder. “They are only the most famous rebels against the Dragon Kings. They have kept that title for well over three hundred years—royalty at this point. Which is why I find it hard to believe you just happened to stumble upon Julian Ajasek, or any other Ajasek for that matter.”

  “What makes their rebellion so famous?”

  The Faerie shook her head. “You’re wasting my t
ime. Leave my stand. You’re scaring away all the customers.”

  Sathryn looked around the stand. If the Faerie did in fact have customers, they were invisible, so Sathryn didn’t leave. Instead, she looked up at the Faerie woman and waited.

  “Adamant little girl, aren’t you? Fine, but,” the woman began, “I don’t give up anything valuable for free.”

  In the pocket of her coat, Sathryn had fifteen silver pieces and three gold pieces. It was a mere fraction of what they owned back in Pomek, but her mother had insisted not to bring anymore—it would be too heavy, and people would rob them. “We have to fit in,” her mother had said.

  In Pomek, fifteen silver pieces could only buy a few apples, and three gold pieces would buy no more than a bottle of middle-class wine. But here, her mother had said, fifteen silvers were of enough value to get a horse, and three gold pieces could pay for a small home.

  “How much?” Sathryn asked, wondering how badly she wanted to see Julian, wondering if it was enough of an incentive to waste money on a conniving Faerie woman.

  She smirked. “Five silvers. No more, no less.” When Sathryn stayed quiet for a long time, weighing her options, the Faerie spoke up, her haughty voice mocking her. “That’s what I figured. Now get out of my sight, pest.”

  Sathryn rolled her eyes and reached into her pocket, counting out five silvers. She handed them to the Faerie woman, who snatched them from her grasp and placed them in an empty wooden box.

  “So,” the Faerie said, that fake, obnoxious smile pasted to her face again, “what did you wish to know?”

  “I wanted to know more about the Ajaseks.”

  The Faerie’s smile widened. “You look like you come from somewhere else. Somewhere rich?”

  “Pomek.” Sathryn made sure no one else could hear her.

  “Pomek. I’ve heard those cats in Pomek live under the kings’ thumbs. Rich, but only if you do their bidding. I suppose you had no clue the kings were so bad.”

  Sathryn shook her head. The Faerie shook the little wooden box with the silver so that it rattled.

  “That’s the key to their rule. If you worship them and love them and never doubt them, you live in the richest regions, where there are fresh fruits and horses, acres of land and paved roadways, large houses, schools . . . but if you retaliate against them, you live in a wasteland.” She gestured around herself, staring up at the drooping, gray sky and dull sun.

  “They have been around for so long—forever, it seems. Anyone who was alive when they didn’t lead has been dead a long time now. But ever since they ruled us, they have ruled us unfairly. Maybe you fortunate swans in Pomek don’t see it, but down here, we are no more than dogs to them. They torture us for entertainment, waste all their wealth for themselves. They don’t die, they don’t get sick, they don’t age . . . it’s a mystery to us mortals.

  “For a long time, we did nothing about it. Lived under them like dirt.”

  The Faerie, Sathryn realized, had unbraided one of her braids and was in the middle of plaiting it again. Her eyes had long since glossed over, as if she were looking at something Sathryn couldn’t see.

  “The Ajaseks came along after that, had been forming a secret rebellion for months, gathering men and making plans. They were different—stronger than the other rebels, smarter, quicker—and they began sneaking into the kings’ castle—as servants or cleaners or merchants—revealing a little more information and stealing small gold and silver bars for us each time they came back. They did it so often that I think they got careless—stealing too much, serving the kings too little. That’s when they got caught. As punishment, they created these creatures—big, hairy beings they bred from humans and some other creature to make Beastmen.”

  Sathryn had heard of them, but only in stories.

  “They sent them out like dogs to kill the rebels and burn their villages—some lands are still so badly scorched that the land is barren, uninhabitable. But the smart ones, the ones that hid underground or in disguise, kept fighting and continued to fight for years after. Some even say the Ajaseks and their followers drew the castle—inside and out—and recorded everything about the kings: their weaknesses, strengths, abilities. No one has been able to find it, but nonetheless, the Ajaseks are heroes to us. Royalty.” A chorus of loud cries rang out through the camp, causing the Faerie to frown and pulling her from her thoughts.

  “Which,” her voice was cold and arrogant once more, “is why I don’t believe you met Julian Ajasek.”

  “Fine. Could you at least tell me where he lives?”

  The Faerie smiled. “I could.” She shook the wooden box with silver in it.

  Sathryn sighed and grabbed one more silver piece from her pocket, tossing it toward the wooden bowl. It missed.

  The Faerie took the coin from the table and bit down on it. “B160,” she said. “You can’t miss it.”

  The crowd never thinned. Hordes of stinking, narrow bodies stood in clumps in the street, shivering from the cold. Others ambled alongside Sathryn, but with no purpose, no direction, making it nearly impossible for her to shove past them. She had to fight her way to the edge of the river of people to avoid being sucked away by the current, watching the whole time for the face of a Spade anywhere in the crowd.

  B140 . . . B141 . . . B142 . . .

  The addresses were painted onto little wooden posts. B146 . . .

  The voices around her dulled to white noise as she focused on finding the right address. She told herself she would only look for this address—wouldn’t stray away, wouldn’t doubt. But the farther she walked, the farther she got from the entrance to the camp, and the farther she got from the entrance to the camp, the deeper into the camp she went. The deeper she got, the more she saw.

  There was an alarming number of children—far younger than her—lying near wastebins or alleys, all of them thin, all of them sickly, and all of them underdressed for the cold weather.

  B149 . . . B150 . . . B151 . . .

  The fruits the merchants offered were soft and ready to rot, as were the people buying the fruit. During winter, at least in Pomek, fruit had to be brought in from someplace warmer—usually from across the Onawa Sea. They came a bit underripe, but that was better—far better—than what these merchants shoved in customers’ faces. And each bag of apples was only two silver pieces.

  B155 . . . B156 . . . B157 . . .

  An old man collapsed in the street.

  B158 . . .

  A group of young girls ran to the old man and robbed him.

  B159 . . .

  They took his clothes.

  B160.

  And then they ran off.

  The house was in fact very hard to miss. It towered over everything else in the camp, and its bricks were painted a shiny black. It also happened to be the only place without clumps of people surrounding it, so walking to the front door was far too simple for supposed royals. Sathryn reached for the dragon-shaped knocker and tapped on the door’s sleek, wooden surface.

  It was opened by a tall man with bright, pale skin and shiny, black hair tied into a tight bun at the back of his head. The first thing she noticed was his clothing—silk (expensive silk) and a thin fur coat. It took her only a second after that to realize that the man’s eyes were blank white, save for a pinpoint black dot in the very center, and when he smiled down at her, his small, sharp teeth were stained red. He took a sip from his glass cup, filled to the brim with dark-red liquid.

  “May I help you, young lady?” he asked. His voice was so soft, she could hardly hear him over the loud music from inside.

  She must have had the wrong house. It would teach her not to take directions from a deceitful Faerie woman, whose only real interest was in unfair bribery. “No, I must have the wrong address.”

  “Where might you be trying to go?” He offered her another smile, but it only made her more uncomfortable.

  She wanted to leave. “I was talking to a Faerie and she told me this address.” He gave her a blank
stare. “An address for someone named Julian Ajasek, but I see you don’t know him, so—”

  Entirely different from the Faerie’s and the Spade’s reactions, the man seemed hardly amused at the mention of the boy’s name. “Ah, yes. The boy.”

  She couldn’t help smiling. “Is he here? Inside?” She tried to look over his shoulder, but he blocked her view.

  He frowned. “You seem a bit eager. Too eager. Are you an Arrow?” His gaze wandered the length of her arms.

  Sathryn shook her head. “He knows me, I promise. He’ll tell you if you let me talk to him.”

  “Name?” he asked.

  She hesitated. “Sathryn.”

  The man gave her yet another smile, taking a slow sip from his red drink. “Have you arranged an appointment?”

  “What?” Why hadn’t the Faerie told her this? “I didn’t know I needed—”

  He laughed. “Relax, darling, I was only teasing.” He turned and made his way into the house, leaving the door wide open. “Come in, dear, don’t just stand there like a fool.”

  Sathryn hurried inside after him and shut the door behind her. “Stay close,” the man said. “You do not want anyone here to catch you unattended.” His comment was met with a smile that suggested more than a light tease.

  The room she had entered was endless. Its round walls were illuminated by nothing more than large candles and torches, casting an eerie glow over the throngs of people. Dressed in elegant silks and furs, they glided along with the hum of music—lutes and flutes and drums and harps—many of them holding the same chalices as the man leading her through. Every so often, one of them, men and women alike, would cast her a dirty glance, but once they saw the man in front of her, they all overlooked her presence. All except the waiters, who approached her and persistently asked her if she would like a drink.