Monsters & Mist

by Taylor Fenner

  Andromeda can practically feel Carina grinning approvingly at her admission.

  Cygni arches an eyebrow impressed with Andromeda’s boldness. “This revelation will work nicely in our favor, I think.” Glancing over Andromeda’s head at Carina, Ajax, and their entourage Cygni adds, “Welcome to the rebellion. Come inside, there’s much to discuss.”

  Daegan and Andromeda exchange a look before he insists on walking in front of her like a human shield as they follow Thane and Cygni through the gates of the Warrior encampment.

  ❖

  Thane

  Every remaining member of the Watierai Warriors lines up and stares as Andromeda and the Mistborn follow Cygni and Thane to the war room. Some curious, some fearful, but as far as Thane can tell none of them cast a hateful glare. It’s a good sign. Cygni and the Warriors need all the allies they can get regardless of where they hail from.

  The male that went after Thane for hugging Andromeda and two others sweep the room before allowing Andromeda and the rest of their party to enter the war room. The rest of the council is already assembled since they’d been in the midst of a meeting when the horns sounded the arrival of strangers. Cygni and Thane had gone to see what the interruption was against the council’s advice.

  “Andromeda,” Hugo is the first out of his seat as Andromeda crosses the room and embraces him. The strange male does nothing to stop him from embracing Andromeda. Lester, Cutter, and Rian follow Hugo’s lead warmly welcoming Andromeda back to the encampment before the male ushers Andromeda to an empty chair urging her to sit. Leaving no chance of getting any closer to Andromeda than half a table away, the male sits close to her side as if shielding her from the council.

  Thane takes his seat across from an older woman who can only be the Mistborn Queen. The resemblance between her and Andromeda is unnerving and Thane wonders how he could ever have thought Andromeda was an ordinary Vacantian girl. Her striking beauty looks soft on her despite her rough edges but the unearthly image of what she will someday resemble reflected in the queen’s features is beyond that of any Landborn woman.

  A silver-haired imposing figure stands at her shoulder one hand on the hilt of a broad sword that could easily cut down every man in this war room without the wielder breaking a sweat. On either side of the queen sit two younger females, presumably the queen’s other daughters and a male somewhere in age between Andromeda and the queen.

  “So, Cygni, what brings you to the Warrior camp?” Andromeda shatters the silent tension filling the room.

  “Haven’t you heard, Andromeda?” Cygni smirks, “I’m a fugitive prince. Lyra has a bounty on my head.”

  “It appears we’re in the same boat,” Andromeda shares a predatory grin with her former step-brother.

  Cygni’s smile fades into a grimace, “She killed my father.”

  “She has my sister and the man who raised me and has burned down every village on the coast.” Andromeda adds. The queen remains silent, allowing her reunited daughter to act as ambassador between the two worlds she’s walked between.

  “She needs to be stopped,” Cygni states the obvious.

  Clearly Andromeda thinks the same. She rolls her eyes, “Obviously.”

  “She’s also enlisted the king of Shroudania to poison marine life the Perscesians feed on.” The queen pipes in as she laces her fingers on the tabletop. Her voice is cold as stone with the same steel as Andromeda’s.

  Cygni and the Perscesian queen discuss the atrocities dealt out at the usurper queen’s hand thus far, the queen’s tone turning accusing as she thrusts accusations at Thane about his involvement in Garlyn’s destruction of the coastal villages.

  Thane raises his hands defensively, “My people had nothing to do with that. A former Warrior who was not happy being led by someone half his age broke off with a fraction of our numbers after a failed rebellion. Unfortunately it appears as if he is now in the usurper queen’s inner circle as one of her generals.”

  “Is this the same Warrior who tortured my daughter and left her close to death?” The queen looks nothing less than bloodthirsty.

  “Yes,” Thane admits as a muscle twitches in his jaw. He wishes he’d killed Garlyn when he had the chance.

  “Look at her,” the Perscesian queen demands. “Look at her face. Do you see those scars? She will wear them forever, a grotesque memory of your underling soldering an iron mask over her face. Thankfully the rest of the injuries she sustained at that animal’s hands are not nearly so visible. So do not think for one-second General that I do not blame you for what you allowed to happen.”

  Thane watches the expressions on the male beside Andromeda’s face flicker from rage to guilt and empathy as he squeezes her hand on the tabletop. Narrowing his eyes Thane studies the male closer. Even taller than Thane himself the unnamed male wears his long black and silver hair in thick braids with carrion feathers and silver beads woven into the strands. One of his eyes is gold, the other a sightless milky white. A tangle of lines is tattooed over his left eye and he sits bare-chested at the council table. His reaction to Andromeda’s every movement combined with his body language reveal the strange male’s true feelings for his reclaimed princess.

  “The past is the past,” Cygni cuts in. “What’s important now is whether you will stand with us to overthrow the usurper queen or whether you plan to watch from the sidelines and pick off the victor once the main battle is over.”

  “Do you really think I would call my banners and drag my entire armada here to sit by and watch?” the queen smirks, the look on her face so like the fierce determination on Andromeda’s.

  Chapter 20

  Vanyia

  The streets of Vanyia were stained red the day the armies marched out to war. Scores of men and women had been put to the Mistborn test and found guilty.

  Adulteresses, shameless flirts, and anyone even the slightest hint charismatic were subjected to the water test and thrown into deep, dark, musty wells. Those who sunk were deemed innocent yet died anyway. The unlucky ones who floated to the top were declared to be Mistborn as no Vacantians were allowed to learn to swim.

  The Mistborn accused were hung upside down and beaten and tortured while being interrogated by the Queen’s guard to suss out the location of other Mistborn. Only if a subject cracked under the torture would the ministrations cease resulting in the mutilation of nearly all accused.

  Their heads were placed on pikes on the city parapets as a message to the Mistborn invaders and death masks were made from their horrified, silent screams. Word spread through the city that the queen herself ate their hearts on platters of gold, their blood staining her teeth and dribbling down her chin when she smiled.

  Suspected Mistborn sympathizers were publicly burned by the dozens in front of the palace. Even a member of the Queen’s Council was suspected of being killed by a Mistborn when, after eating a plate of crab cakes, smoke and foam poured from his mouth and blood flowed from his eyes in thick rivulets. That day the executions tripled.

  Fear and suspicion tainted every corner of the city. The people that had been cheering in solidarity only days before now cowered in their homes hoping they would not be next. Neighbors turned on neighbors, ratting each other out to the guard in the hopes of sparing themselves. Fights broke out in the poorer areas of Vanyia and innocent blood flowed freely.

  Above the city, high in her tower, the queen saw this all and reveled in glee.

  ❖

  Lyra

  “Lyra,” King Alem threw his arms wide, the deep pockets of his sleeves fluttering like butterfly wings as he greeted her. His golden cloak dragged through the rivers of blood flowing through the streets but the king didn’t seem to notice or care even as his boots squished through the loose gravel.

  Lyra had to stop herself from sneering at King Alem’s ostentatious outfit. His scarlet pants ballooned out from his hips to his calves where they were tucked into soft leather boots fitted with gold toes inlaid with rubies. His long blonde hair was hid
den away beneath a gold and red turban trimmed in fur. But Lyra couldn’t sneer, snort, or chortle at the sight. She had to make the young king believe he was her beloved. She needed his armies.

  “You grow more and more beautiful each time I see you,” Alem croons as he kisses both of Lyra’s cheeks. It was a Shroudanian custom of greeting that Lyra had always hated.

  “Thank you, my dearest one,” Lyra cringes internally as she keeps up her ruse. “It is I who am humbled to have a man as powerful as you gaze upon me.”

  This strokes the King’s ego and he beams, pleased with her praises unsuspecting that he’s being played.

  “I do love what you have done with the city,” Alem remarks as he winds the Queen’s arm through his and guides her through the palace gates. “Pavo was a good old friend but he lacked your vision for keeping your people in line. To truly keep a kingdom running smooth a little blood must be shed now and then.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Lyra smiles genuinely for the first time and her hold on the young King’s heart strengthens.

  ❖

  Dao

  “Is that it?” The teen standing at the rail next to Dao asks eagerly. “Is that Vacantia?”

  “Aye,” the old man nods. Overhead the wuju that signaled the freeing of Lostero’s people soared, sloughing water off his massive wings that drenched the deck on the ship below. “The southern tip of it anyway.”

  Dao doesn’t add that this was the homeland that stripped their home down to the basics and transported their people — their parents, children, friends - as slaves for themselves and to be traded with Shroudania. There was no need to remind the boy of the scars all Losteroans bore at the hands of the richer kingdoms. At fifteen the boy didn’t know anything different. He’d been born into slavery and until now had never breathed a free breath in his life.

  “What’s that there?” The boy points to a structure rising from the coast.

  “That’s the Warrior encampment on Ravenwing’s Point,” the old man explains as he peers through his spyglass. “Where the fabled Watierai Warriors live and train.”

  “Is that where the prince wrote to you from?” The old man was growing tired of the boy’s endless questions.

  Almost as if in answer to the boy’s question the wuju shrieks and circles toward the coast.

  “Aye,” the old man answers as he pushes away from the rail and retires to the galley.

  It has been a rough journey crossing the sea from Lostero to Vacantia. The rain had been unending, cooping the passengers aboard the twenty or so ships the Losteroans had stolen back from their invaders in the hold for most of the voyage. Even the wuju came down from the skies and huddled on the deck when the wind became to wild for his wings to fly through. The constant rain and wind had spawned violent storms that tossed the ship back and forth in open sea causing sickness for many of the elderly aboard.

  The damp unsanitary conditions and the closeness of no fewer than seventy-five souls per ship crammed below deck bred sickness that claimed the lives of a quarter of their numbers.

  Things had been bleak, morale plummeted, but now their destination was in sight. Lostero would rise again and gain its independence from the other two kingdoms or its’ people would die trying.

  ❖

  Octavia

  “This will be your mount going into battle,” Adventrya leads Octavia to a large cloud-gray beast in the palace aviary.

  Holding her breath Octavia studied the creature as her eyes roved from its’ blade-sharp talons and thick legs to its’ muscular body that reminded her of the torso of a giant horse. It’s long neck disappeared into a bulb shaped covering that bloomed like flower petals to reveal an eagle-like head with intelligent blue eyes and a sharp beak. Octavia never could have dreamed up a creature as fearsome as the stormrider and she pitied the opposing armies that would be prey for a fleet of beasts like this one.

  “Her name is Sturmfyre,” Adventrya murmurs as she places the stormrider’s lead rope in Octavia’s open palm. “She’s been waiting for you.”

  Sturmfyre studied Octavia in much the same way Octavia had just inspected her and, approving of what she saw, the stormrider nuzzled Octavia’s shoulder with the top of her feathered head.

  “Hi there,” Octavia’s voice wavered as she stroked the creature’s head. Sturmfyre made a noise that sounded like a cross between cooing and a cat’s purr in the back of her throat at Octavia’s attention.

  As Adventrya watched Octavia bond with her stormrider, more Starborn girls trickled into the aviary and began saddling their stormriders. Eleven other creatures roosted with Sturmfyre, one for each of the highest ranking Starborn warriors who’d proven themselves to the goddess. The lieutenants and lower ranking warriors housed their stormriders in a larger bank of aviaries on the four curves of the kingdom, ready and waiting for Octavia’s command.

  “Octavia,” Adventrya placed her hand on Octavia’s shoulder and turned her toward the waiting warriors. “These eleven Starborn warriors are your closest allies, your generals, your sisterhood. No other will be as close to you as they will become. Trust them with your life as they trust you with theirs.”

  “I will,” Octavia nods as she glances at each girl in turn. Each girl was marked with some variation of the Starborn map on their face and each one had long hair in varying shades of blonde like Octavia’s. Their bodies were muscular and compact filling out their white leathers. Some girls stared back with looks of curiosity, others with fierce determination and a few with oddly vacant expressions that chilled Octavia.

  “I will leave you to get to know your sisterhood,” Adventrya takes a step back. “You leave at sundown.”

  “I’m Imelda,” the warrioress nearest Octavia steps forward to introduce herself once Adventrya had disappeared. Her appearance clicked with Octavia at the same time the girl added, “I’m sorry about the illusion of severed heads. It was my first time assigned to participate in that part of the trials and I remember how much I hated it when it was done to me.”

  Now that Imelda’s face was no longer cast in hate and condescension she was almost pretty.

  “It’s all right,” Octavia shrugs away the apology. “I’m sure you were only following the goddess’s instructions.”

  “Exactly,” Imelda nods grateful for Octavia’s understanding. “I’m your second-in-command, or at least that’s how the goddess marked me. You’re free to choose your own second and third if you so choose. And this is Ranger, your third.”

  A girl with strawberry blond hair and a sprinkling of stars across the bridge of her nose waves shyly and murmurs a barely audible hello.

  “She looks like a total sweetheart but she’s a vicious sparring partner.” Imelda mock whispers.

  Octavia laughs as Ranger turns a pale shade of pink and glares in Imelda’s direction. The other girls take turns introducing themselves and swearing allegiance to Octavia but their names flit in and out of Octavia’s mind in a wave of unusual sounding names.

  “I feel like I should address you somehow, or address the whole fleet,” Octavia scratches her neck in embarrassment. “You don’t know me, you don’t know the opposition we face, and as far as you’re concerned I’m untested in battle. But I promise to be the best leader of the Starborn fleet that I can be. I’ve been training in hand to hand combat since I was a child and although your battle methods are new to me I swear to you that I will not let you down.”

  The girls whoop and gather round Octavia, dropping to one knee and tapping their fists to their chest in solidarity. It’s Imelda who offers Octavia her own set of white fighting leathers in a neatly folded pile.

  As Octavia slips on the smooth, stiff fabric she notices the gold thread used to stitch together the leather and the star embroidered at her throat setting her apart from the rest of the fleet and marking her as the ride leader. Finally, for the first time in her life, Octavia feels like she’s right where she belongs.

  ❖

  Cygni

&nbs
p; Cygni leans against one corner of the watchtower’s railing, arms crossed over his chest as he watches the Warriors, Perscesian soldiers, and soldiers sworn to the Order below scattering like ants scavenging for food.

  It’s a strange sight, seeing former enemies working together to prepare to face their common enemy. Across the tower General Cruelseas of the Warriors converses with Rolfe about the number of Order members expected to make their way across the kingdom to the encampment. Thane is arguing about where they’re supposed to house the extra assassins and warriors with the encampment already playing host to the Perscesian queen and her entourage.

  “Most of the Perscesian army camps on their ships and among their draco mares at sea.” Rolfe argues. “It’s only Queen Carina and her family and high guards taking up residence in the perimeter of the encampment. Princess Andromeda herself is back in the hut you assigned her when she trained under you so at the very most they’re only taking up an extra ten or so dwellings. Surely the members of the Order can set up camp in your training fields.”

  “But what about the Losteroans Cygni wrote to?” Thane protests. “Where will they sleep? Or the Starborn fleet?”

  “If or when they arrive we will make room.” Rolfe looks over at Thane. “Really, General, you should be overjoyed at being full to capacity. The Warriors haven’t had these kind of numbers in their ranks in generations.”

  Thane exhales hard, about to form a retort when Cygni stands up straight and butts into the conversation, “This is war, gentlemen. It’s not about who is going to sleep where or what organization you belonged to before combining sides. It’s about coming together to overthrow a common enemy. You can go back to sniping at each other after the usurper queen is dead.”

  Rolfe smirks at General Cruelseas, “The King is right. This squabble is pointless.”