Kesia narrowed her eyes. We need to find you someone. Then you’ll understand.
“Ah yes,” Miren swept a hand around their village. “Will all the eligible young men please line up!”
Kesia rolled her eyes again, but Miren thought her anger was fading. This conversation was so overdone that Kesia could probably argue Miren’s side for her.
“Come on,” Miren said. “Let’s get bread.”
Etela’s cabin was toward the center of the village, just by the dock. Miren glanced out toward the horizon, where a large brown hull sliced the water only a few hundred paces away. “The ship’s almost here.”
Kesia looked past her and opened her mouth in surprise. That ship is fast.
“It is.” Miren swallowed a muted panic. It might be of Avi’ori make. “Maybe we should go back to the cabin.”
Kesia grimaced. I want to see!
“I know, but—”
A slow-rolling noise of excitement grew from behind them as fishermen and farmers and their eager children hurried past. Miren felt a tug at her chest at the sight. There were so few reasons to be happy these days.
The flag, sporting an odd symbol of a sword parting an ocean wave, flew high on the tallest of three masts. There was no royal seal on the hull, and if the ship had been military, it would’ve docked closer to the baron’s estate at the northern end of the village.
So they were either traders or pirates.
Miren shuddered.
The crew were on the deck now, all male, their clothing rough and weathered, their skin darkened from the sun. Some carried crates between them as though they weighed nothing.
Kesia patted her arm and walked past Miren, signing, I want to see, again.
“No.” Miren grabbed her arm but kept walking. Curiosity was overriding her fear.
One man dressed more extravagantly than his shipmates stepped down the loading dock. His coat was long and deep blue with angular patterns embroidered in golden thread—Miren had the ridiculous notion that it was somehow real gold. His fingers glinted with jewelry, and glittering threads were woven into his gnarled beard as well. He flashed a gold-toothed grin at the crowd.
“Greetings, Crescent Bay!” the man said grandly. “I am Captain Edom of Darkcrest, the most adventurous trading ship on the sea. Please come see our wares, the finest goods from all of Kaleo and Avi’or.”
Avi’or. Miren swallowed. “Are they Avi’ori?”
Kesia glanced at her, an eyebrow raised in confusion. He doesn’t have an accent, she signed.
“Proving nothing,” Miren said. “They have wares from Avi’or.”
And?
“Well, there’s a war, see?”
That’s not strange. Must you worry about everything?
Miren shook her head but said nothing. Though the war had officially halted trade between the two countries, there were active trade ships on both sides. Still, ships willing to risk being caught rarely bothered to come this far south.
Captain Edom continued, “We hope, in return, you’ll show us your own finest quality goods.”
Miren stiffened, not sure why she heard that as a threat, but already her Crescent Bay neighbors were surging forward, inviting the traders to their booths, insisting that theirs were the best hand-sewn gowns or the thickest fleece throw rugs.
Miren’s fishing knife nudged her hip, light and useless like a child’s toy. She felt she would more likely cut her own finger accidentally than successfully defend against these men.
Kesia made to approach one of the traders, a lumbering man with a sharp jaw, but Miren snatched her arm and held firm. Kesia glared.
“We can come back,” Miren said. “I want to visit Etela’s first, before the bread gets stale.”
Kesia rolled her eyes. You are cynical, she signed.
“Come on. We probably can’t afford their wares, anyway.”
Miren pulled until Kesia relented, and they continued down the main road.
Just as expected, the smell of bread and butter wafted over the warm breeze. Miren smiled as she spotted the baker leaning out of her window. “Good morning, Etela.”
Etela’s thin face wrinkled with a smile. “Hello, ladies,” she called. “I see we have a few new customers today.”
“Are they?” Miren asked. “I mean—” She came closer and murmured, “Do you think they mean well?”
Etela frowned. “They seem to. We should assume they’re peaceful until they prove otherwise.”
Kesia signed, Do you have bread?
“Of course I have bread, silly girl!” Etela said cheerily. “This entire village would revolt if I did anything else with my life.”
Etela produced two large loaves of bread. Kesia held out four copper coins.
“Oh no, my dear.” Etela waved her hand as though offended. “These are gifts for you.”
“Etela,” Miren said. “That’s not necessary—”
“The two of you have done an amazing job keeping that lighthouse going without your parents, and you were always the least troublesome children in the village. I don’t think your mother would object to a couple loaves of bread.”
Miren glanced at Kesia and suppressed a sigh. “Thank you, Etela.”
Miren took the gleaming, paper-wrapped loaves as Kesia started to sign. Miren pulled her around so Etela couldn’t see.
I hate that.
“I know,” Miren whispered.
I feel like I take advantage of people.
“You don’t. They’re compassionate.”
Because they think I went through something terrible.
“You did go through something terrible.” Miren pulled a large chunk off one of the loaves. “Have some bread.”
Kesia glowered, took the bread, and shoved it into her mouth.
Miren smirked. “Do you still want to complain now?”
Kesia slapped her arm, fighting a smile. Miren tore off another chunk—warm and soft, with hints of salted butter—for herself. Her stomach clenched. Hunger was an old, stale companion in this village.
“Do you want to go see if Cari will buy our candles? She might have honey, and you can show her your jewelry—”
But Kesia was staring ahead with an excited smile. Miren followed her gaze and groaned.
Just past the gates of the baron’s estate stood a young man with a shock of straw-blond hair. He waved shyly as they turned to look at him.
Miren hooked her arm in Kesia’s. “Come on, we need to sell these candles.”
Kesia tugged, but not hard enough. She twisted in Miren’s grip and waved back, her face flushed.
Miren rolled her eyes. “You should be glad I pulled you away. You look like a tomato.”
Kesia tried to pout but couldn’t hide her smile. Her infatuation with the baron’s son had not waned as Miren had hoped. Davri was a Water Singer, but his noble status had exempted him from the draft. He hid on his father’s estate most of the time, but Kesia would steal away to meet him.
So much about their relationship seemed reckless to Miren, but little else made Kesia smile like this. And at sixteen, marriage was a real consideration. Miren just didn’t believe that Davri was considering it. She wondered what her mother would do if she were here.
“Hey!” a voice rang out. “Stop that!”
Farther down the row of booths, a group of the traders crowded the dirt road. They chuckled as one of their number—a tall, broad-shouldered man with more hair on his chin than on his head—dangled a piece of jewelry just out of Cari’s reach. Pistols glinted in men’s hands.
Miren froze. These were not traders.
Pirates.
The village men gathered around, looking helpless and uncertain as the pirates leveled their weapons. A few villagers hefted hammers and shovels, but most of the weapons in the village had been taken to war.
Kesia turned to face Miren. We have to DO something. Kesia’s hands slapped together loudly on the word do.
“No.” Miren grabbed her hands an
d held them. “Go to Davri and get inside.”
A scream. A crash.
Jewelry spilled from an upturned table and littered the dirt road as Cari stumbled back, terror on her face. Her mother and husband surged forward, shouting, but a pirate grabbed Cari, pulled her toward him, and pressed his knife roughly against her throat.
The villagers froze as one, their feeble excitement shattered.
Then Captain Edom was there, sweeping everyone’s attention to him with a grand wave of his hand. “Ladies and gentlemen, we mean no harm,” he announced. “Do not interfere, and this lovely young woman will not be hurt.”
Cari whimpered in the pirate’s grip, flinching from the long, curved knife that he held against her neck.
Edom seemed to find confirmation in the crowd’s silence. At his gesture, the crew of Darkcrest dispersed among the remaining booths, inspecting the goods, their pistols swinging casually in their hands.
Why, why had Miren left the lighthouse without her father’s revolver?
“We have to get you out of here. Don’t sign!” Miren shoved Kesia’s hands down. “They’ll see you.”
Kesia glanced at the pirates, nodding vehemently in Cari’s direction.
“I know.” It was too late to seek refuge in the baron’s estate now. That would draw attention to Kesia. “Just—stay close to me.”
Slowly, subtly, Miren edged Kesia toward the nearest booth, Gilad’s collection of handmade fishing hooks. Gilad caught sight of the girls and beckoned them over.
“What do we do?” Miren whispered.
Gilad shook his head, his brow pinched. “I don’t know. We can’t do anything.”
Miren pushed Kesia around the rear of the booth. “Stay behind me,” she whispered.
The pirates took their time, plucking items from booths like vultures on a carcass. A few raised their pistols threateningly or lingered over the younger women.
Another pirate, this one with lanky hair and narrowed eyes, sauntered over to Gilad’s booth. He glanced at the fishhooks and snickered. “Where’s the money?”
Gilad yanked the coin purse off his belt and slid it across the table, his hands shaking. “That—that’s most of what I have. I mean—a few silvers in the—the house—”
The man laughed derisively and snatched the purse from the table. He glanced between the girls and eyed Miren up and down. A shiver crawled up her spine, but the pirate snickered again and ambled on. She choked back a sigh of relief, Kesia’s hand tight and sweaty in hers.
The captain returned to the middle of the street, sweeping his gaze approvingly over the mess of tables and food, a proud fisherman admiring the day’s catch. Behind him, Cari squirmed in her captor’s grip. “What a lovely day,” Edom said. “And not a single drop of blood to be seen.”
Cari’s husband hobbled forward on his cane. “Sir, please, let my wife go.” His desperation made Miren’s stomach churn.
Cari strained against the pirate’s grip.
Captain Edom smiled. “I’m sorry, good sir, but she must come with us. Insurance, you see. And she’ll sell well in other places.”
The pirates chortled.
“No,” Cari sobbed, struggling as her captor dragged her toward the dock.
Cari’s husband waved his cane. “No! Stop!”
“Cari!” her mother wailed.
Other villagers shouted at the pirates, surging forward.
“Let her go!”
“We won’t attack you!”
“You got what you wanted!”
But the pirates kept their weapons trained on the crowd as they made their way to the docks, and no one dared to follow.
Miren ached for Cari, but she didn’t move. She could see their mother in her mind, signing, Keep her safe, keep her safe. She squeezed Kesia’s fingers; Kesia squeezed back.
And then released.
Miren felt Kesia’s hand slip away as her sister bolted down the street, past the villagers, their faces slack in confusion.
Before Miren could shout or go after Kesia, a sound erupted, a ringing Song of Fire.
Kesia’s Voice, cracking with disuse, took a moment to catch. Miren felt the familiar notes warm the air, saw her sister’s lips curve as she summoned heat, a biting flame, and flung it at Cari’s captor.
The pirate shrieked and dropped his knife. Cari staggered away from him as he fell to his knees, slapping at his arm as flames licked his sleeve.
The Song ended, and the silence filled Miren’s ears. She knew something terrible had just happened, something that would shatter the life she had constructed for herself and her sister. But her heart throbbed with Song, drowning out thought and fear.
The captain’s sharp gaze darted between Kesia and his crewman.
And then a smile split his features.
“Well, bless the seas,” he said. “A Fire Singer.”
Two
Kesia
Joy was such a rare thing in Crescent Bay.
There were days Kesia was happy, she supposed, days when she and Miren weren’t fighting, or she had visited with Davri, or the garden had produced something edible. There were times she felt pleasant, almost content, cleaning the chicken coop and cooking dinner and polishing the lighthouse mirrors. On those days, the ocean winds didn’t sting her cheeks or tangle her hair but instead made her think of seagulls and full white sails on boats.
Kesia had always known that to refuse to Sing was to deny a part of herself, to suppress the hum in her bones that her mother had taught her to listen for. She just hadn’t realized—or perhaps she had forgotten—how much of herself was Fire, how much she had missed it.
She was Singing.
Even after all this time, she could hear it. The power rose from deep within her, living and swirling and pulsing in her chest. The notes were clearer and brighter than she remembered. It was the Song for a fireplace, a Song of home and cooking and her mother. But there was no fireplace here. Instead, she stood in front of a pirate crew, doing the only thing she could think of to save Cari.
She threw the power at the man’s sleeve, and he screamed, releasing Cari.
His pain burst her focus. She broke off her Song, and the man crumpled, whimpering as he cradled his sweltering arm.
Pain—she had never thought to use her Voice for destruction. Shaken by the Song’s effects, she took a shuddering breath as the bright joy inside her burned and died.
“Incredible,” the captain said, his voice soft with admiration. Then he barked to his men, “Take her.”
Kesia stumbled back, her throat seizing up in panic. The pirates encircled her like a pack of wolves cornering a deer, their weapons drawn. They eyed her warily, waiting for her to Sing again, ready to shoot.
Sing.
She felt a hand clutch her arm and nearly squealed a note that would’ve sparked, but it was Miren, her face taut with horror. “Run!” Miren screamed, and yanked Kesia away from the pirates.
Kesia sprinted up the incline toward the baron’s estate as the villagers looked on with wide, disbelieving eyes.
They knew.
It was no longer a secret.
Kesia had no attention to spare for the villagers, though. She hadn’t really run since she was a child. Her legs burned, her chest tightened. Miren pulled her toward the estate.
Davri—Davri would protect her.
“Open the gates!” Miren shouted.
Kesia wheezed as they ascended the steep incline.
“Someone help!” Miren screamed. “Pirates!”
Oftentimes the baron had two guards stationed at the gate, but Kesia couldn’t see anyone from here. Not even Davri.
Please, Davri, she thought. Please help me.
Kesia stumbled and fell to her knees.
“Get up!” Miren yanked at her, but Kesia shook her head. She tried to sign, but her arms were shaking too much.
“Someone help, please!” Miren shouted.
But the pirates were upon them, spreading in a loose half-circle, t
heir weapons trained on her.
Miren stepped in front of Kesia and pulled out her knife.
No! Kesia took a breath and exhaled, trying to slow her breathing as her mother had taught her, but her heart hammered against her ribs.
A few of the pirates snickered at Miren’s feeble weapon. Panic pushed the air from Kesia’s lungs.
“Stay back,” Miren shouted.
Captain Edom stepped forward. “Ladies,” he said gently. “Please don’t make this difficult.”
“You—” Miren took a breath, shoulders heaving. “You have what you came for. You’ve taken everything—you can’t have my sister!”
“Now, my dear,” he said with a smile. “I don’t think you understand how much your sister is worth.”
“She’s sick,” Miren said. “She gets winded easily, she can’t even run. She’s of no use to the military. They already have our mother!”
But the captain was shaking his head. “I run a business, dear,” he said with a hint of impatience. “Step out of the way, or we will kill you.”
Kesia gulped down air, reaching for the fire in her. She could hear the Song she wanted, but she had no breath to Sing it. Sing, Sing, Sing.
The knife shook in Miren’s hand, but she didn’t lower it. “You can’t have her.”
Sing, Sing, Sing.
The captain tilted his head and flicked his hand. The pirates surged forward.
Kesia raised her Voice.
The sudden note made everyone flinch away—even Miren.
Kesia cringed against the wrath of her own Song. There was nothing comforting about this Song. Not warmth and security and home; this was a forest fire, a burning ship—unfamiliar to her, and yet the notes came with ease.
A wall of flame erupted between the sisters and the pirates.
Kesia raised a hand, letting the power flow unhindered for the first time in years. The fire within her danced gleefully, like a caged animal that was now free. Kesia altered her Song, and the wall pushed the pirates farther away.
Miren stumbled back from the flames. “Help us, somebody!”
Kesia kept Singing. Surely someone would see this, someone would come to help them.
Davri.
But the fire had nothing to cling to, so its life had to come from Kesia herself. She felt it suck the marrow from her bones and fill her head with wool. Her breathing was too shallow—the flames sputtered and died.
Divided Fire Page 3