The Story Raider

by Lindsay A. Franklin

  “Master Insegno,” Warmil cut in. “Is this sorcery you’re speaking of? I’ve never heard of anything like it in my studies.”

  “No, not sorcery, Captain Warmil Bo-Awirth. It is power from the Source, as I told you. Of a different realm—spiritual, though not evil. But make no mistake. This is a dangerous, dynamic artifact you hope to recreate. You are meddling with something much deeper, much more real, than sorcery.”

  “So it is a physical object,” I said. Insegno seemed to be done with his solo lecture and open to answering our questions now, so I took my chance.

  “It was an object,” he corrected. “Now it is broken apart in living strands. Scattered. Each piece buried and concealed. The masters did not want them to be found, so seductive was their power. You will have a difficult task to locate each and bring them together once more. It will stretch even my abilities to create a map for you.”

  Mor hopped up again. “But you’ll try?”

  “Se. I will try. We begin today. But first”—he rubbed his hands together—“we shall eat.”

  Warmil grunted. “Just like a Meridioni. Always about their stomachs.”

  “Warmil Bo-Awirth,” Insegno answered, “if I had to eat Tirian food every day, I would not wish to recline at the table long, either.”

  Father stifled his laugh with a cough. “Yes, let’s eat and then we will begin.”

  Everyone filed out of the room, but I lingered, gazing at Insegno’s sunset.

  “You have seen the power of which I speak.” Insegno’s voice was quiet.

  “I . . . think so. Art has a way of revealing truth, Karlith said. I always thought of the white light as truth.”

  “Se. Something is stirring. Power that hasn’t been seen in many centuries.”

  “And we’re poking it with a big stick.” A dull ache pulsed at the base of my skull and spread like ink over the back of my head. “Master Insegno, are we . . . that is, are we making a mistake?”

  Insegno never pulled his gaze from my face. “Everything from the Source is good, including this power. But the sad truth is that all good things are corrupted by weak men.”

  “Aye.” I knew he was right, and it sure didn’t settle my spirit. After a moment of silence, I turned to leave.

  But Insegno reached out and gripped my arm. “Beware, Tanwen En-Yestin. Where there is great light and true power, always nearby lurks the darkness.”

  Then he released me and strode from the room. Just in time for a bubble to pop in my head and remind me of my curse.

  Darkness, indeed.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  NAITH

  Naith waited in the cold, still temple. Master said it would be any day, any moment, but Naith felt he had been waiting forever. Nearly a week now.

  Not that Naith doubted. Not anymore. The Master knew their business better than he, and Naith was beginning to feel the familiar comfort of complete trust in his shadowy Master again.

  Naith brushed a speck of dust from a carved stone idol of Noswitch, the goddess of the night.

  He had been a faithful servant. Far more faithful than Dray, who never really believed in the Master. That man believed in nothing. Naith had been more faithful even than Gareth, who had truly thought the Master divine. A god.

  Or . . . goddess? Naith eyed the feminine curves of Noswitch’s statue but shook the thought from his mind. He’d long ago given up trying to figure it out. The Master wished secrecy of identity, and secrecy the Master would have. Naith was powerless against the Master’s magic, and he knew it.

  Just to test the new trick, Naith flexed his fingers as he and the Master had practiced all week. Wisps of inky smoke curled from his fingertips—power by proxy. Not his own ability, but a borrowing of the Master’s, so to speak. He had been warned not to practice often. Such careful manipulation of idea strands had taken years for the Master to perfect, and still it drained the Master. Having to proxy it to Naith? Doubly draining. But Naith had been given some allowance. After all, to pull off the deception, Naith’s performance would need to be flawless.

  The door to the sanctuary flew open.

  The priest calmed his heart with one long, slow breath.

  “Oh. Sorry.” The lad in the doorway scratched the back of his neck. “Didn’t know someone would be in here.”

  “Sit, my son.” Naith gestured to a padded bench on the opposite side of the altar.

  The boy sat like a great boulder coming to rest after a long trip down a mountainside.

  This might be easier than Naith had thought.

  “You are troubled.”

  The lad looked up. “Aye. You could say that.”

  “A broken heart.”

  The lad’s eyes widened. “How’d you know?”

  Naith pushed as much warmth into his smile as he could muster. “The goddesses reveal things to me.”

  The lad’s gaze dropped. He fumbled with something in his lap and was silent for several moments. “Can I tell you something, Your Eminence? Something secret that might’ve got me in a mess of trouble a few moons ago?”

  “Of course, my son.”

  “I’m not sure I’ve ever believed in the goddesses.”

  Naith didn’t bother feigning shock or outrage as he would have done a few moons ago. “Ah, yes. Many peasants have felt the same and have not dared say anything until now. Now that our world has been turned upside down, most unpleasant.”

  “Is it unpleasant?” The lad frowned. “Seems like a false king being overthrown ain’t a bad thing.”

  “Does your life seem better since Gareth was deposed?”

  “No, but that’s something else entirely.” He folded his arms across his chest. “That ain’t got nothin’ to do with royalty.”

  Naith smiled again and produced a loaf of ceremonial bread from the shelf beneath the table. “Eat, my son.”

  The boy looked concerned. “Are we supposed to?”

  “I am High Priest of the Tirian Empire, son. If the food sacrificed to the goddesses is not for me, who would it be for?”

  “High Priest?” The lad’s throat bobbed. “Flying fluff-hoppers. I didn’t know, Your Holiness.”

  “You have nothing to fear. Shall I show you something? Perhaps it will restore your faith in the power of the unseen.”

  Naith made a great show of flexing his fingers again. Black smoke curled from Naith’s fingertips once more, and this time, Naith pretended as though the smoke were speaking to him.

  “You loved a girl.”

  “Still do.”

  “She . . .” Naith trailed off, leaned his ear toward the smoke. “She has used you badly.”

  “Don’t know if it’s fair to phrase it like that, exactly . . .”

  Naith paused. Closed his eyes, pretending to divine the truth from the smoke. Really, he gave the Master a moment before the finale of this charade.

  Then came the loud, dramatic cry. “Anwyl’s heart!” Naith threw one hand forward as he called a goddess’s name, and the smoke turned to lightning.

  A bolt zapped the lad’s wrist. Two leather engagement bands sizzled and dropped to the floor. The boy nearly fell backward off the bench.

  “She’s left you,” Naith said, as though the smoke, the lightning, or the goddess herself had spoken it to him. “Your betrothed has left you . . . for another.”

  The lad’s face crumpled. “It’s true, then. I knew it, of course. Why else would she jump aboard that ship, last second. She has left me for that . . . that . . .”

  “Sailor.”

  “Pirate, more like!” There was such pain and rage in the boy’s words, it was all Naith could do to keep his satisfaction in check.

  Far, far too easy.

  “Oh, my son.” Naith came around the altar, and though it cost him a bit of pride, he lowered himself beside the boy. “We shall set it all to rights. Your heart, the pirate, and this upside-down world.”

  The lad frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “Do you think it coincidence
you came here this afternoon?”

  He shook his head, as if it were full of chaff. “I don’t know why I came. I felt . . . pulled here, somehow, though I never visit the temple. I can’t explain it.”

  “You do not need to. I understand. For you were pulled here by something quite a lot bigger than yourself. Something . . . divine.”

  “Divine?”

  “Indeed. If you did not believe before, you will soon. Trust me, Brac Bo-Bradwir.”

  He gaped. “I don’t understand. How did you—?”

  “Ah, Brac.” Naith put his hand on top of the lad’s blond head. “You do not understand yet. But you will come to see the truth soon.”

  “Wha—?”

  “You, my son, are the Chosen One, and you will save Tir.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  BRAITH

  Queen Braith sat like a statue on her throne before the council table.

  She had put it off long enough, and now it was time for the most dreaded of announcements. Nothing in her newborn reign had been so potentially explosive as this—not her father’s murder, not even the announcement of her ascension to the throne of Tir.

  “If we are through with our court business for the day, I have something I wish to say.”

  Sir Fellyck and the other councilmembers fell silent and stared at the queen. If only Yestin Bo-Arthio’s kind, fatherly gaze were among them.

  “As you know, I have sent my councilman General Yestin Bo-Arthio on an ambassadorial mission. He and those accompanying him set sail from Tir over a week ago, and I would like to tell you what their business was about.”

  Braith took a deep breath. Her voice was firm.

  “I have emancipated the countries and territories my father conquered. Meridione, Haribi, Minasimet, and the Spice Islands are free. We are no longer the Tirian Empire. We are simply the Kingdom of Tir, as we once were.”

  Half the council jumped to their feet. Raucous shouts arose from every corner of the room.

  “Why, Majesty?” a councilman called. “Why would you do such a thing?”

  Braith rose and held up her hands. “Your queen commands silence.”

  The clamor died down.

  She turned to the councilman. “It is because my father’s conquests were not right. He spilled Tirian blood and the blood of our neighbors to satisfy his lust for land. And what has it brought us? What has it brought you, my fellow Tirians? Wealth? Fortune? Health? Happiness? Our peasants are starving. Our own territories are unstable. My call as your queen is to address these problems for you—for us—not to fill my palace with slaves, my table with imported foods, and my treasury with foreign gold.”

  She lowered her hands and scanned the room. “Do not let my father’s affinity for conquest become your own. Realize that he gained much while Tir’s people gained little and our neighbors suffered greatly. We get to decide what the Tir of the future will look like. Let this be the first step toward a better way of living—the first step toward a better Tir.”

  Braith stood in silence now, as though awaiting a hail of arrows from an execution squad.

  But the arrows did not come. The court did not form a mob. They did not rush her throne or arrest her.

  One by one, the councilmen sat. The ladies at court resumed fanning themselves, and the lords stood silently and expectantly, as though simply waiting for the next agenda item.

  Braith pondered them. Could it be they truly heard her? Could it be that, for once, they understood her heart and didn’t find it wanting?

  Perhaps there could be a different Tir—something better than had ever existed before. Something that could reflect the values Braith had always longed to see her countrymen hold as dearly as she did.

  Perhaps she would get to be the queen she had always dreamed of being.

  She lowered herself back onto her throne and turned to one of her governors. “Orellwin.”

  The Governor of the Western Wildlands bowed. “Yes, Majesty?”

  “How are the silver mines of Clofay yielding these days?”

  “Oh. Ah . . .” He shook his head, obviously surprised by her query. “Tolerably well, Your Majesty.”

  “Good. I should like to commission a new circlet.” Braith removed the jewel-studded gold crown that had belonged to her mother. “This was Queen Frenhin’s, and it’s the crown of an empress—the empress of an ill-gained empire. I should like something simple and fine, something that befits the Queen of the Kingdom of Tir.”

  Orellwin bowed low to the ground. “It would be my honor, Your Majesty.”

  Braith was surprised as others began to bow. Not all, and some perhaps because they felt pressure to do so. But many nobles and officials around the room lowered their heads to her. The peasants might riot when they heard of the emancipation, but it seemed perhaps she had won over the nobles. At least for now.

  Braith smiled, relieved. “Thank you. Together, we shall dream about what the future of Tir might hold.”

  And she prayed that it might be so.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  TANWEN

  I leaned back and drummed my fingers against the plaster wall outside the room where the others spouted opinions around a half-finished map.

  “Yes, I agree,” my father’s voice carried to where I stood. “It’s definitely the Ancient Meridioni word for Haribi, but see this character here? I think that means north.”

  “Northwest, I think.” Warmil’s frown could be heard in his words. “Unless that mark changes things.”

  “It does,” Master Insegno said. “Northeast, and lucky for you. If it were northwest, you would be docking in Haribi and traveling many leagues overland to Haribi’s western coast. The sea north of Haribi is too rough for most ships.”

  “Traveling overland takes longer. That’s time we don’t have to spare,” Mor said.

  “Nor do we have the proper supplies for such a journey.” Dylun sighed. “That is one bit of luck in our favor. It appears the ancient masters kept largely to the coasts when hiding these strands.”

  “Perhaps they did not have the threat of death looming over them,” Insegno said, “but they did have threats of other kinds. It would not surprise me if the strands are located in places you find convenient.”

  “Convenient would have been if they’d not destroyed the cure in the first place.” Mor. Angry. Frustrated. The sound of a heavy book smacking shut punctuated his sentence.

  “They did not destroy it,” Master Insegno reminded him. “They only broke it apart. It, and many others like it, for the abuse of the weavers’ power was great. You do not understand how dangerous it was because you have not seen the full measure of the ancient strands. And you are bitter and frustrated about your personal situation with these two sick ragizzis. It is clouding your perception of this journey.”

  Heavy silence followed that observation.

  “Two sick girls?” Dylun cut in. “Then it’s true that . . .”

  He didn’t finish his sentence. I wanted to step into the room and change the subject. But my head still ached. Three more little “bubbles” had popped since the one that morning with Master Insegno. I didn’t know what it meant, exactly, but all I could think of was the time I saw Gryfelle have a full-blown fit in the Corsyth, when treasured knowledge of the healing arts slipped from her mind before my eyes.

  What was I losing when those little bubbles popped in my head? Or when I had full-blown fits? And would I even know enough to miss it? Gryfelle always said it was sadder for us to watch it than for her to live it, because she didn’t remember all she had lost.

  “Yes, Tanwen is cursed,” Mor finally spat.

  And his words stung like drops of poison all over my skin. As if he hated me for complicating his already-messy life.

  I pushed myself from the wall and rounded the corner into the stifling air of the gathering I’d stepped into the hallway to escape.

  “Aye.” I tried to keep my voice firm, but it was shaking. “It’s true. Seems I didn’t me
et you all soon enough. Apprenticed under Riwor too long, practicing those blasted crowned stories too often, and it was too late by the time you got me to the Corsyth. And now I have what Gryfelle has, and I guess we’ll both die if we can’t figure out how to finish drawing this map.”

  “Is there an indication of a landmark?” Mor spoke as though I hadn’t just mentioned my death and Gryfelle’s death or admitted to the room I was sick. “If there’s a landmark of some kind, that would help a lot once we get to the Haribian plains.”

  Warmil shared an uncomfortable glance with Dylun, and my father’s eyes remained steadily on me. Commander Jule’s brows rose, and Aeron looked like maybe she wanted to give me a hug. I just glared at Mor. My warm, smirky sea captain who told me never to change had been replaced completely by this cold, unfeeling man on a mission.

  “Yes,” I said, hopping back up to my feet. “Let’s see about that blazing landmark, and then maybe we can plot out a course directly off the edge of the blasted map while we’re at it.”

  I spun toward the door, ready to make a big, flouncy exit. Instead, the room around me ripped to shreds. I inhaled to scream, but my cry was choked off by a blanket of darkness, wrapped all around me in half a heartbeat.

  My body dropped to the floor. The impact jarred my bones, but I didn’t feel pain.

  It was happening again. I lay on the ground and wondered if I could control it, somehow. I knew what was happening. I had accepted that this was what those fits of mind-wiping looked like from the inside.

  Could I choose what I lost?

  I rose and turned a slow circle in the blackness. I tried to take a step, but everything wobbled. It was like I was back on the ship, except worse. Like the world was made of pudding. I didn’t venture another step. I waited for the silvery strands of memory to begin spinning by, out of my head forever.

  Apparently, it wouldn’t be my choice. Of all the memories that might have zipped by me, the one the curse chose was from my childhood.

  A silver strand snaked toward me, ribboned around my body, and swirled over the top of my head.