by E E Rawls
Instead of using one of the lattice tables, Master Nephryte spread a large blanket out on the grass underneath a gnarled cherry tree. From the shoulder bag he pulled out a basket filled with sandwiches, salad, slices of cheesecake and raspberry tarts.
“Master, you really are the best!” Bakoa’s face lit up.
The sights and smells were calming after the encounter with the Corpsed. Master Nephryte said a prayer of thanks, then they dug into the food. Bakoa snatched the salt shaker, and Cyrus watched as he made a blizzard on his sandwich.
“Ew, that is disgusting.” Hercule leaned away.
“Wha?” Bakoa said around a bite. “It gives flavor—I like flavor. Salt’s the best flavor!”
Hercule squinted at the sandwich, his palor turning green. Bakoa dashed on some extra salt, and the noble had to get up and leave with a hand over his mouth.
Cyrus nibbled, and tried to ignore the heavily salted bread being swallowed across from her. Maybe his sand Ability had messed with his sense of taste.
After finishing a raspberry tart, the memory of that morning’s cinnamon rolls turned her stomach. And after watching Bakoa grab for a second sandwitch, she was a swirl of nausea and had to stand.
Aken gestured with his hand, urging her to follow him away from the picnic and deeper into the park. “Don’t get lost!” he laughed and suddenly raced ahead of her, weaving through the paths of trees and petals.
The scenery eased her stomach, her being, and she breathed in the sweet nectar air. Thrusting her feet forward with each step at a run, she tried to catch up. But with so many petals swirling like a shower of spring snow, she could barely see, and in the downpour lost track of him. She slowed to a halt under a hefty, tangled tree and caught her breath, resting back against the bark. Sunlight pierced down between gaps in the canopy, and orange and indigo birds trilled. She eyed a cicada, its abdomen making a low rattle.
Here, she could almost forget about the past and half-blood problems and her wrists. If she rested her head back, there was no such thing as pain. The world was warm and sweet and paradise.
Something rustled, and her head jerked up. She could sense eyes crawling up her back.
Slowly, Cyrus turned to face the source. But there was nothing but empty grass. Furrowing her brow, she turned back around and almost bumped into a head hanging upside down.
A scream caught in her throat.
“Guess you did get lost,” said Aken, hanging upside down like a bat from the branch above, his nose almost touching hers.
She jumped back, pulse racing. He looked ridiculous, pointy ears and hair dangling, and he made it worse by dancing his arms and head about. She accidentally snorted a laugh, then threw a playful punch when he laughed back at her.
She climbed up the tree after him, careful to put weight on her feet and elbows instead of her wrists. The world was nothing but blue sky and cherry blossoms up here.
“Aken, do you ever feel fear?” she asked once she found a secure enough perch.
He folded his hands behind his head, leaning precariously on a thin branch. “Sure I do. Everybody does.”
She frowned. Remembering how he’d faced the dragon, she doubted that. “I want to help people, and use my Ability, but...I don’t think I could face something as scary as that Corpsed.”
Aken’s lips pursed in thought. “Don’t let it get to you, Cy. We won’t be fighting those things until we’re older. And hey, I’ve got your back.” He winked.
She half-smiled, and tried to put the gruesome incident out of mind.
NEAR THE PICNIC, NEPHRYTE leaned against the old tree’s knotted base, watching the two far-off students play about. A breeze brushed hair into his eyes.
Student Lykale approached, also observing the duo who were now climbing trees like squirrels. “Is it right to let them be so carefree?” said the eldest boy.
Nephryte kept silent for a moment. Sunlight dappled across the surface of his vision. “Taking time to appreciate life is also a part of training, Lykale. It will remind you of what it is we’re fighting for.”
Lykale glanced at him sideways, then made a sound through his nose before returning to the picnic desserts.
Chapter 15
Dusk was a stretch of black velvet sky studded with a trail of stars beyond Cyrus’s window as she returned to her dorm room. She and Aken had spent the evening writing an essay-long apology to the bakers, and then an hour in the kitchens slicing fruit and rolling out pie crusts. Aken still smelled like baked apples and cinnamon.
“Are you adjusting okay?” he asked her. His back rested against the bed frame as they sat on the rug. “Moving from the Outskirts to here was a lot for me, sort of like culture shock. So I get it if you’re feeling overwhelmed.”
Cyrus smirked, doubting he could ever understood her situation. “Hm, I’m fine... What was your life like in the Outskirts?”
Aken hesitated and scratched his arm. “My mom and dad were busy or away most the time. Our neighborhood was rough. They didn’t want us there, and I couldn’t make any real friends.”
“I thought you were an orphan?”
He picked at the rug. “I am, now,” he said. “My animal friend, Sabe, got killed by Denim’s group. And on that same day my house was targeted by humans and burned to the ground—with my parents trapped inside.”
A part of Cyrus went numb. She fought back a sudden lump in her throat.
“Nephryte should’ve been doing his job that day—been the hero there to save them. I can’t forgive that, or forgive the humans responsible. Wicked creatures,” he growled.
Cyrus winced. It stung—a reminder she didn’t really belong, that she was an enemy in their eyes.
“Not to change the subject, but what is a Scourgeblood?” she asked. “I heard Denim call you that.”
Aken’s gaze fell away, his features overcast by invisible clouds. “It’s just...something people called my family.”
Cyrus waited, but he said nothing more; maybe it was a touchy subject. To be honest, it was surprising he’d shared anything about his past with her. What did he have to gain by befriending an awkward redhead? She really didn’t want to be involved with a troublemaker, and yet, he probably had more in common with her than anyone else here.
“How about you? What was life like?” he asked.
She felt a little compelled to share something. “My mother was killed when I was little,” she said finally. “I was left with my dad, a spoiled step-sister and bitter step-mom. They never liked me, and I never had any friends. Like you, I was bullied.”
“Why would they not like you?” He looked stunned.
Her shoulders lifted to her ears. “Because they didn’t like my real mother. She was...an outcast. But anyway, when my Ability awoke, people were terrified, so I ran away.”
Her voice sounded cold, even to her own ears. She couldn’t care about relatives who were no doubt glad she was gone. How could Aken miss his indifferent parents?
The room fell silent. Beyond the walls, faint chatter and padding footsteps echoed the rhythm of school night life.
“It puts a hole in your heart, doesn’t it?” Aken said, and watched a moonbeam as it rippled across the floor. His tone sounded heavy—the kind of heavy when your soul has been crushed to pieces for a long time.
“Yeah, it does.”
Aken’s gaze shifted to her, suddenly intense, and her cheeks heated. He grabbed one of her hands, wrapping his pinkie finger around hers. “Let’s make a pact.”
She swallowed, trying to inch away. “You mean, a promise?”
“Yes. A promise that we’ll keep moving forward, despite everything. That we’ll never let the past weigh us down. That we’ll look out for each other, to the end.”
He waited expectantly, and she almost gave a nervous laugh.
“Okay. To the end of this Draev Guardian business,” she added.
Pinkies shook.
Aken hopped up on his feet. “Hey, wanna do something fun before call
ing it a night?” He gave her a mischievous wink.
“Like what?” she asked, uncertain of that wink.
He unlatched the window and a flood of cool, damp air breezed in through the room, pushing hair back off his shoulders. Climbing up onto the windowsill, he made the clay swallow Limitless appear.
He turned, held out a hand for her to take. “Come fly with me?”
She eyed the clay skeptically, but his eyes—deep-as-sky eyes that made anything seem possible—drew her in like a moth to the flame.
She took his hand and he closed his fingers around hers, pulling her up onto the sill with him. He stepped out across the air onto the swallow’s back—a steep drop to the courtyard beneath them—then pulled her onboard and seated her behind him, showing her how to grip the clay-feathers like the pommel of a saddle.
Limitless flapped forward.
Cyrus’s chest tightened as she gripped the spongy feathers. Fear and thrill raced her pulse. She’d once wondered what it was like to be a bird, nothing to weigh you down, no shackles to the ground. But it was almost too free. And Aken’s eager grin was making her second-guess this decision.
“Hold on,” he said. “Away—We—Go!”
Wings beat hard as the bird took off and soared over Draevensett’s steep rooftops and dark, piercing spires. Their hair whipped back in a tangled mix, and she squinted against the rush of wind.
“Woo-haa!” Aken spread his arms, his shout almost drowned out. Wind stole her breath away as the bird veered up, up, and up.
Her ears popped as they reached above the cloud line; thin clouds rolled in waves across a starry sea, and the half-disc moon bobbed ahead. The swallow dipped in and out of the fluffy ocean, and Cyrus drew her hand along the milky white, feeling misty condensation.
They approached a group of bats out hunting the skies. Purple flesh wings glowed in the moonlight. One bat screeched and swerved aside as she tried to touch it.
Aken glanced back at her, and she nervously looked elsewhere. He continued to laugh, arms raised—wind filling his shirtsleeves as if they were wings of his own.
THEY LANDED OUTSIDE the city in the grasslands, and sprawled on their backs atop a low rise. Clouds gathered on the horizon, though overhead remained clear.
Aken had brought her to his favorite viewing spot, a place without city lights interrupting the night’s splendor. Where staring up at the ethereal expanse was like peering into a whole other world just beyond reach.
“Look.” Aken pointed up at a curving line of stars, “The wings of Cyrus the Swan—just like your name.”
Cyrus furrowed her brow. “I didn’t know I was named after a constellation.”
Aken looked at her. “Really? Then you don’t know about the legend that goes with it?”
She shrugged, ”Just vaguely.”
Aken shifted to one elbow so that he faced her, a mysterious gleam in his eyes. “The legend says Cyrus was the keeper of the world’s Pure Light—the special energy stuff left over from the planet’s creation after Lord God created it, an immeasurable power. Cyrus was the princess of a great human kingdom, and also the guardian who watched over the Pure Light.
“But when the Pureblood Emperor learned of the power, he came up with a plan to steal it. He activated a weapon that was capable of obliterating whole cities, and as it worked to create havoc across the world and distracted everyone, he went to where the Pure Light was kept, determined to rip the power from its sacred pedestal and use it for his twisted desires.
“Only the Shoshana Prince blocked the Emperor’s path, and their duel was bloody, but the Emperor eventually defeated him. Before he could lay his hands on the ultimate power, though, the Swan Princess came and grabbed the Pure Light and absorbed the power into her body, where it melded with her very being. And then, she willed it to take her life.
“The princess disintegrated in an explosion that killed the Emperor and took the Pure Light away from this world with her, away from evil’s hands, forever...”
Aken drew out the last word dramatically, his arms outspread toward the starry heavens.
Cyrus blinked. “That’s...depressing,” she finally said, playing out the story in her mind. “Do you think there’s any truth to it?”
His shoulders shrugged, and he tucked his hands back behind his head. “Who knows. It’d be cool if there was!”
“Why call her Swan? What’s the meaning behind it?”
“Mm, I think it’s something to do with the Pure Light resembling swan feathers, or something like that. But who really knows?”
“So, let me get this straight: we celebrate the Swan Princess for taking the Pure Light away with her as she died, even though the world got ruined anyway by the Emperor’s crazy weapon?”
“Ah,” Aken held up a finger, “The world got ruined, but not obliterated. Life survived to rebuild, all because she didn’t let the Emperor get his hands on the ultimate power.”
Cyrus’s cheeks dimpled in a sour smile. “Why in the world was I named after her?”
“Hm,” Aken’s mouth puckered, thinking. “Maybe your mom saw you as a Pure Light to the world? Cyrus the Swan is seen as the world’s great mythical hero.”
She tilted her gaze back, considering it. “And maybe it was Mother’s favorite constellation?” Pieces of Mother she never knew. What other things had she loved? She wanted to collect those pieces.
Birch trees...scarlet hair...panicked footsteps...blood... She shut out the nightmare’s flashing images. Thinking of her must have brought them up again.
“What do you think the Emperor was? What is a Pureblood?” she asked.
Aken’s mouth opened, then closed, halting whatever he’d been about to say. Instead, he mumbled, “Who knows. People with anger issues.”
The gathered clouds on the horizon mounted higher, carried on a spring wind that started to pick up around them. Soon, the stars would be obscured.
“The Swan Festival starts this week,” Aken reminded. “The Trials that’ll decide who gets to be in the Duel are Monday, and the day after is the Festival Duel itself.” There was a giddy edge to his voice. “I have to pass the Trials. I have to.”
“One step towards your dream of becoming the greatest Draev Guardian?” she asked with a smile.
He nodded. “I don’t care about the King’s request part, but I really want to be in that Duel and win.”
Cyrus shook her head, having no desire at all to be part of some crazy battle.
Aken picked a sprig of grass, twiddling it between his fingers before touching it to his lips. He blew, and a whistling tune carried across the firefly-speckled grasslands. A mystical tune, a melody reminiscent of something far gone and forgotten. She knew the lullaby from somewhere, though she couldn’t place how, or from when.
Night birds in the distance whistled back warnings as the wind picked up.
Then came a different sound.
Kreeeah!
Cyrus sat bolt upright at the eerie cry. She tried to see through the vanishing moonlight. “What is that? Is it a Corpsed?”
Aken peered across the sea of grass, his night vision better than hers. “There’s something moving,” he said. “But it doesn’t look big like that freakish thing we saw earlier. I doubt it’s anything.” He craned his head, “We can go, if you’re worried.”
Cyrus nodded, rubbing her wrists.
Kreeeah!
As they road Limitless away, the cry echoed after them.
CYRUS HELD A PEN TO the diary’s blank page. Stretched out on her stomach on the bed, she pondered what to write as wind beat at the window panes beyond the lamp.
Birch trees flashed again inside her mind...rippling red hair...the patter of running feet in her ears. Desperation. A death-chilling scream in the dark...
She rubbed at the sudden shiver in her arms. Why did she keep thinking of that nightmare? It couldn’t be real, yet it played on repeat when it chose, as if to torment her.
The nightmare still bothers me, though I
try not to remember it during the day. So far, most people here have been nice. I know it’s only because they see a young vempar and not the real me, but it’s been a refreshing change not to be made fun of day in and day out. I’m finally living a normal life—well, as normal as an Ability user can get.
I wanted to ask the principal or Master Nephryte if they knew my Mother, and if she’d attended this school. Problem is, they might figure out my secret if I ask. If anybody knew Mother and knew she’d married a human, they could figure out the truth about me. I can’t take that risk...yet.
With a yawn, she finally laid the diary aside for the night.
IT WAS DARK. COLD. A cool winter gust lacking snow.
Damp. A dirt tunnel laced with roots.
Cyrus struggled to move, to crawl in the tunnel, but stark terror immobilized her knees in the soggy, rotting leaves that made up the ground. She couldn’t see. There was nothing for eyes to grasp onto. She tried feeling around with her fingers.
There were sounds. Dripping sounds. Cruel chuckling sounds.
Then a shrieking wail trembled the air—so loud, so piercing, her head stung with needles. She attempted to cover her ears and blot out the noise, but it refused to be muffled or ignored. Over and over, it shrieked. She trembled from the pain, from the vibrant horror her body could feel coming from that voice. It wouldn’t stop—It wouldn’t stop. She had to find it. Had to end it.
Through utter blackness she crawled toward the cry—mashing leaves and mud with every move on hands and knees—and a dim tunnel mouth took form up ahead. It drew her forward like a beckoning light, until her head emerged on the other side into billows of mist. The scene of a forest met her wide gaze through the haze.
Moisture clung to the dim atmosphere. Swirls of fog fingered around birch trees, who stood white and silent as ghosts. The shrieking had stopped.