by Trudie Skies
“Get back, you fool,” Salasar hissed.
She stepped in line with Prince Ravel, and not another inch. “Saeed was a monster. But he didn’t speak for me, or any of the Fire Walkers—”
“You warned me your fire could harm,” Wulf said.
“So could my sword.”
The Prince’s guard once again thrust their blades forward. She didn’t need Hartnord Sight to know they were a heartbeat from ending her life.
“I mean you no harm. Not by sword or flame. But Saeed did. Does it matter that he used fire rather than steel for murder? The method doesn’t change the intent of a criminal—”
“Such a constructive point to make at this serious time, Lady Arlbond,” Prince Ravel said with a sneer. “Perhaps some Fire Walkers mean no ill intent, but as we have seen today, some mean to murder. Such power is deadly and impossible to defend against.”
Her eyes flickered to the melted metal shields. Their silver armor had done nothing to save them.
Behind her, Samira sobbed. She’d been left abandoned on the floor. Forgotten. Mina couldn’t let the actions of one lone man cost more lives. “Fire Walkers spent hundreds of years locked away because of the actions of one House—”
“And yet, peace reigned in those hundreds of years. There were no wars of a Fire Walker’s making, no cities burned, no kings murdered. My apologies, Prince Wulfhart. This is no time for political debate, and it is despicable for Lady Arlbond to be pushing her agenda onto a grieving man. You deserve justice.”
She wanted to laugh at the Prince’s blatant hypocrisy. Surely the Hartnords would see through it?
“What justice would you offer me?” Wulf said. “What justice would be worth the life of my father, of my people’s king? You wield your Fire Walkers as weapons against my people.”
“Release my son,” the King said, his voice carrying across the hall. “And we will discuss what we can do to put this right.”
The King’s words squirmed in her stomach. What did he mean by putting it right? Imprisoning the Fire Walkers again? Killing them?
By the slight smile on Prince Ravel’s face, that’s what he had in mind.
Wulf lowered his knife. The room breathed with a collective sigh as Prince Rais staggered down the dais steps and into his father’s arms. Salasar kept his sword drawn, but his face sagged in relief. Only Gareth and Talin remained tense, ready for anything.
“We will return home and bury my father,” Wulf said. “Then we shall discuss your Fire Walkers. You will listen to us, fire king, or we shall consider this attack a declaration of war.”
“We will listen, Prince Wulfhart. You have my word,” the King said.
Both sides lowered their swords. Mina joined Talin and they watched as Salasar personally escorted the Hartnords out of the throne room. The silver giants carried their dead, and as they left, a smoky mist trailed behind their bodies—their Shadows. Why hadn’t they communed with her, or turned into wraiths to gain their revenge? Was it because they were Hartnord Shadows?
Jonan came to her side and wiped sweat from his brow. “That could have gone worse.”
Talin forced a weak smile. “It could have gone better.”
Prince Ravel approached them with a trail of guards. He pointed at Jonan. “Arrest him.”
She stepped in front of him. “What? Why?”
“The Fire Walker who murdered King Reinhart claimed allegiance to the great old House Rhaesbond. I don’t believe in coincidence.”
“Are you a fool? Saeed wasn’t a Rhaesbond—”
“And yet he burned in their name. He made it quite clear. Stand aside, Lady Arlbond, and allow me to prevent our kingdom from falling into war.”
She grabbed her hilt and drew Hawk an inch. “You’re not touching him.”
The guards responded in kind. The action caught the King’s attention. “What’s going on here? On who’s command do you act?”
Prince Ravel didn’t flinch. “On mine. A great injustice has taken place here this night, and I intend to set it right in the name of peace. That Fire Walker claimed to speak in House Rhaesbond’s name—”
“To pin the blame on them!” she yelled.
“I mean Lord Jonan no harm. I merely wish to question him. Are you so frightened of mere words, or is your House hiding more secrets from their king?”
Jonan put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine. I have nothing to hide.”
“No, this is foolish—”
“There are no secrets of House Rhaesbond that you yourself don’t already know, my Prince,” Jonan said. “But if my testimony will prevent war, I will assist.”
Jonan patted her shoulder and approached the guard. They gestured for his sword, and he unbuckled it with a casual smile. It was all a show to put her at ease, but his anxiety, and Talin’s, rang through the bond.
Prince Ravel didn’t even carry a sword and yet he commanded this crisis as though the crown sat on his head.
“What about her?” Mina pointed to Samira still slumped on the tiled floor. “She was in league with Saeed all this time. If anyone can explain Saeed’s attack, it’s her.”
Samira scrambled to her feet. “My Prince, my King, I know nothing, I—I swear it! Saeed would never—”
“Yet he did!” Mina roared. “You and Saeed planned this. All of this.”
Leila sprawled into her usual, pointless bow. “My Prince, this will not be necessary. As you can see, my acolyte is distraught—”
“This ceremony was your responsibility!” Mina shoved a finger into the High Priestess’s face. “You let this happen. Perhaps you should be questioned, too?”
Leila spluttered.
Prince Ravel gave Mina an odd look. It was almost a look of admiration. “Take the Fire Walker acolyte. She’ll be questioned. I’ll require your assistance on this matter, High Priestess. I plan for my investigation to be thorough.”
Samira pleaded as the guards grabbed her arms and dragged her from the throne room. Mina’s gaze was drawn to the pile of ash that had once been Saeed. A Fire Walker who believed protecting his people meant locking them up for their own good.
Now their continued freedom might mean war between the two kingdoms. That couldn’t have been his plan all along?
“I hope you’ll be there for them, Mina Hawker, when the kingdom burns.”
8
THE BAKER’S BOY
The evening streets of Solus were quiet. The drunks kept to their taverns, the families to their homes. Mina heard whispers as she passed—city guards at their posts. They fell silent when she turned to face them. As though it was all her fault, somehow.
It felt it.
Alistar and Raj followed her wordlessly into the back alleys that led to the Neu Bosan quarter. It remained just as quiet here. Alistar chewed on a nail, lost in thought. Raj kept opening his mouth to say something, but stayed silent. None of them had the strength for idle talk.
She turned the corner away from Alistar’s favorite tavern and toward the lower city.
“I thought we were getting a drink?” Alistar said.
“I never said that.”
“You haven’t said anything.”
She came to a halt and rounded on them. “I’m getting some air. If you want to drink, go ahead. I’m not stopping you.” She turned heel and strode down the alleyway.
The alleys here were cramped; Sandarian braziers stuck out from sandstone walls on one side and Neu Bosan glass lanterns hung from brass posts on wooden walls on the other. A mismatch of cultures.
“It’s dangerous to be wandering the streets at night,” Alistar said, with Raj trailing behind him.
“I have my sword,” Mina snapped. “You’re more likely to be attacked than I.”
Alistar pulled a face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You look like a Houseman, that’s all.”
“And you look like a girl.”
“Do I?”
Neither Alistar nor Raj had bothered to change out of their fancy noble clothes, but they had the good sense to tuck away their sahns. Wearing a sahn signaled status, but also painted a target. There were men desperate enough for gold to risk threatening a Houseman. She’d chosen her clothes carefully to avoid such attention, but Alistar and Raj… they stuck out like shiny gemstones in a clay pot.
She wove in and out of the alleyways, pausing at each corner to spy who else sneaked amid the shadows. No one lingered. And no light followed. Night swallowed Solus whole and not even Lune saw fit to grace them with her presence. As Mina moved away from the Neu Bosan homes and their canals, the scent of brine and fish and salt were replaced with more repugnant smells. Ale, sweat, piss, rot. Dirt and grime coated the walls of the lower city and the darkness here felt thicker. Not all of the braziers were lit, and guardsmen were few and far between.
It was her first time venturing into the lower city. She’d heard tales of its crime-infested streets, of pickpockets and beggars latching onto any Housemen who’d lost their way, and of guardsmen making hurried patrols either to win some bet or as punishment.
When she first came to Solus, she’d never expected a city as great and rich as the jewel of Sandair would be home to street rats. Surely the crown owned enough gold to pass on their riches? But no. Besides Arlent, it seemed every city was host to its own nest of rats. And, as Mina knew from personal experience, any city that tried to flush out their rats only sent them down the gutter. To the docks and waterways. Solus’s street rats hid within the underground cisterns and aqueducts of the island.
Alistar grabbed her arm and pulled her into the alcove of a boarded-up townhouse. “What are you doing?”
“I told you, I’m getting some air.”
“Air? In the lower city? What’s this about?”
Raj ducked into the doorway beside them, forcing them to shuffle aside. “Um, we shouldn’t be here.”
“Mina?” Alistar prompted.
“Saeed said Fire Walkers were threatening families in the lower city. He said they were burning trees in Gaisland, too, but I can’t very well get to Gaisland in one night. Would either of you know anything about that?”
“Stars,” Alistar hissed. He ran a hand through his hair, messing up their sleek threads. “Why would I know anything about Fire Walkers?”
“Because your father is apparently the ambassador now. Surely you’d hear news if Gaisland was on fire?”
“I hear reports about trade, mostly—”
“Raj?”
“Um… I don’t really listen to news.”
Mina threw up her hands. “Well, you’re both helpful.” She shoved between them and continued her walk.
Alistar strode beside her. “You’re looking for trouble? Is that it? You think finding some Fire Walkers in the lower city is going to fix what’s happened? Because it won’t.”
“I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Then enlighten me.”
She stomped around a corner. Nothing. No one. She’d found no signs of trouble, not even a street rat or a pick pocket. No Fire Walkers. No proof behind Saeed’s accusations. She sat on a crumbling stone wall and cradled her head in her hands.
Raj sat beside her. “Talk to us.”
The words churned in her gut. Twelve weeks of freedom… Is that all she’d earned for her people? Saeed had destroyed it all. He’d reignited those old prejudices. He’d practically signed the laws that would imprison the Fire Walkers, or see them executed. He’d condemned Jonan to arrest again because he shared blood with a traitorous House long dead. Saeed had looked her in the eye and blamed everything on her, on the freedom she’d earned for them.
Had any of it mattered? Her tournament win? Keeping Prince Ravel off the throne? The King embracing his blood and denouncing an ancient law?
“I hope you’ll be there for them, Mina Hawker, when the kingdom burns.”
“Do I really need to explain? It’s going to happen again. They’ll be locked away, and what then? Prince Ravel wanted to kill everyone with blood fire. Isn’t that the next step?”
Alistar leaned on the wall. “You don’t know that. The Hartnords want sanctions, not genocide—”
“You weren’t there. You didn’t see. That Hartnord Prince latched onto Prince Ravel like a leech.” She shuddered at the thought of the two princes’ embracing their mutual hate for Fire Walkers. “Sanctions first, imprisonment next, then genocide. That’s what Jonan told me—that oppression of the Fire Walkers took time. Saeed… he just sped it up.”
“The King won’t let that happen.”
“The King’s a Fire Walker. He’ll be the first to go.” She looked Alistar in the eye. “And I’ll follow.”
“Don’t say that.”
“It’s true, isn’t it?”
“The other Houses—”
“Support the Prince. They don’t care.”
“Um, my House doesn’t,” Raj said. “We support the King. We support the Fire Walkers.”
“What does your support mean, Raj? Didn’t your House lock up Fire Walkers and persecute them like the rest?”
Raj shifted on the wall. “Well, um, we followed the King’s law. We all did. But my House never hurt them. We let them serve as gardeners—”
“You let them serve. How nice of you.”
“That isn’t fair,” Alistar said. “We all followed the King’s law because it was the law. Of course we locked Fire Walkers away. We live in Gaisland! Can you imagine a Fire Walker on the loose in our forests? Can you imagine the destruction they’d cause if they lost control?”
“Weren’t you paying attention over the Solend? Fire Walkers don’t lose control for no good reason, Ali. They were poisoned.”
“Saeed wasn’t.”
She scowled at him.
“Look, all I’m saying is that people are frightened.” Alistar reached to tug a braid that wasn’t there and his hand dropped uselessly. “Some people think Fire Walkers want revenge for their imprisonment and that’s why they’ve started burning people. That’s why Saeed did what he did.”
“No Fire Walker wants that! What Saeed did was unforgivable, but he doesn’t speak for the Fire Walkers. They just want to be left alone.”
“Do you know that for sure?”
She leaped off the wall and stomped away.
“You think you’re the only one to be hated for who you are?” Alistar called.
She whirled around. “Oh, so you’re a Fire Walker now?”
Alistar strode an inch from her nose and his emerald eyes sparkled in the dark. “There are plenty on the King’s Council who would see my House burned and my people run from Solus. We’re Sandarian, too—no matter where our ancestors came from.”
“That’s not the same!”
“How isn’t it? Because we don’t have power, like you?”
“Power? What kind of power do we have when we’re imprisoned for it, killed for it?”
“My people have been imprisoned, too. Killed in the streets—”
“I’ve not heard of any Neu Bosan being murdered—”
“Why would you? You don’t hear about it because who cares about us? The King likes to pretend we’re close allies, but he turns a blind eye when we need his support. How is that any different from Fire Walkers?”
Raj pushed between them. “Stop fighting, stop it!” He held them apart with his long arms. “Why are you fighting about this? Just stop!”
She took a deep breath. “Look, I—”
Shouting echo
ed down one of the alleys.
“We really shouldn’t be here,” Raj said.
“It could be a Fire Walker.”
Alistar made a face. “It could be a Bosan.”
They both ran into the alley. Raj moaned and ran after them.
A woman screamed as Mina turned the corner and skidded to a halt. A small group of men surrounded a young Solander boy. His flaming fists lit up the alley. A Fire Walker.
The mob brandished knives and sticks and thrust them at the boy. He spun his fire in a circle to keep them back.
“I beg you!” a woman cried. “Leave him alone!”
Mina recognized her—and her son. The baker’s boy. The one Salasar had arrested on the day Mina first arrived in Solus. He wasn’t a threat to anyone, certainly not to these men.
Mina drew her sword. “Stop in the name of the King!”
The men whirled their weapons at her. They were older men, but Solander street rats nonetheless, clothed in patchwork rags. None carried a sword at his hip. Green Hands like Raj might walk around without a proper weapon, but other than priests and healers, no respectable man would be caught dead in public without a sword at his belt—which could only mean these were criminals, forbidden by law from carrying a blade. Pickpockets, thieves, or worse.
A skinny rake of a man sneered with missing teeth. “It’s a little far out for you, isn’t it, Houseman?” He brandished a sharp shiv.
Alistar and Raj flanked her. Even if they weren’t wearing silks worth a season of food in the lower city, the way they walked and held themselves spoke of wealth and confidence—the swagger of a Houseman.
One of the men pointed a sharpened staff at Alistar. “His face isn’t welcome here.”
Alistar drew his sword in response.
The mob began to spread out, each dark eye assessing Mina, Alistar, and their swords. There were seven of them in all, not counting the baker’s boy or his mother cowering by the wall.
She raised Hawk into the Solaran stance: hilt above her head, blade tilted down across her chest. “Return to your homes and leave these people be.”
“What homes?” The street rat pointed his shiv at the baker’s boy. “That there fire-breather burned down my shack.”