Iron Heart

by Nina Varela

  “Fen? What’s going on?” one asked.

  “Found ’em skulking around the last camp. Taking ’em to Dinara,” said the boy, Fen. To Crier and Ayla, he said, “Up the stairs. Go.”

  They climbed the stone steps single file, Crier in the lead. At the top, another wooden door opened into a room small enough that it must have been where the Watchers used to sleep; it would have held three or four cots and not much else. The wall was lined with slit-like windows, wide enough only to aim an arrow through. Late-afternoon sunlight, warm and honey-colored, fell in narrow strips across the dusty floor. There was a doorway in one corner, a blanket acting as a curtain.

  “Boss?” the boy called out. “Got something you might wanna see.”

  Footsteps, then the blanket lifted and another boy slipped into the room. Half his face was pockmarked with what looked like burn scars. He glanced between Crier and Ayla, taking stock of the situation, and then nodded at Fen. “Girl can stay,” he said. “The leech goes.”

  Crier’s heart plummeted, an overripe sun apple falling to the ground, bursting upon impact. Already half rotted, a pulp. She held her breath, refusing to show any emotion, waiting for Ayla to nod and say, All right, then. The leech goes—

  “No.”

  Surely she’d misheard.

  “You can let us go, or we can fight our way out,” said Ayla. “Or, if you’re who I think you are, we can stay and work together. I saw the green feather at your campsite. We’re allies of Queen Junn too.”

  Both Fen and the scarred boy remained silent.

  “Hm.” Ayla took a step sideways, pressing closer to Crier. “Well, either we’re going or we’re staying, but either way, we’re not separating. Make your decision, then. I’ve made mine.”

  “Work together?” said the scarred boy. “With the leech?”

  “She’s on our side,” said Ayla.

  Crier’s heart was—

  Her heart was—

  The boy snorted. “You’re a fool. You think you can trust anything she says? There’s a reason they’re such good liars: they feel no guilt. She’s deceiving you. To her Kind, we’re either servants or we’re corpses.” He addressed Crier, eyes cold. “What’s your ulterior motive, huh? I assume you’re gathering information on the Revolution, reporting back to someone. Who are you working for? The Scyre himself?”

  “No,” Crier said. “I’m not a spy. I would never align with Kinok. I want to stop him.”

  “She defected,” Ayla said loudly. “She defied her own Kind. She risked everything to escape, to find me, to fight at my side. She is our ally. I—” She faltered, then seemed to rally, drawing herself up to her full height, squaring her shoulders and giving the boy the fiercest look Crier had ever seen. “I trust her with my life.”

  “Oh, do you,” said the boy. “And why should I—”

  “Stand down, Edrid.”

  Ears ringing, the words I trust her with my life repeating over and over in her head, Crier turned toward this new voice. It was a girl, tall and solid-looking, thickly muscled. Even though they were in the middle of the wilderness, and it looked and smelled like half these humans hadn’t bathed for a week, this girl’s lips were painted dark blue and her cheekbones shimmered with something like fine stardust. A sword was sheathed at her hip, a bow and quiver strapped to her back. The leader, Crier realized.

  Edrid opened his mouth to protest, but the girl held up a hand and he shut it again, scowling.

  “Come with me,” the girl said, meeting first Crier’s eyes and then Ayla’s. To Fen and Edrid, she said, “Get back to your duties, will you? Show’s over, go on.”

  Crier could feel Ayla looking at her, but she—couldn’t look back. Not yet. Not while her heart was still singing like this, not while her hands were shaking like this.

  I trust her with my life.

  Crier and Ayla followed the girl through the blanket-covered doorway into the room beyond. It was small, barren, a sleeping mat and wool blanket in one corner and nothing else. Once inside, the girl turned to them. “It’s not much,” she said, gesturing at the blanket, “but it’s as private as it gets around here.”

  “Privacy for what?” Ayla demanded. “What do you want from us?”

  “Answers. But first . . .” The girl’s face broke into a huge lopsided grin, and she clapped Crier on the shoulder. “It’s good to finally meet you, Lady Crier!”

  Crier took a step back. “I’m—I’m not—”

  “Oh, don’t worry, you’re safe with me,” said the girl, still grinning. It transformed her entire face, cheeks dimpled, eyes lighting up. “I must have seen you a dozen times over the years. Only ever from afar, and you never saw me. But I saw you!”

  “Who . . . are you?” Crier asked. “How do you know who I am?”

  “I’m Dinara,” the girl said proudly. “Daughter of Red Hand Reyka. If I’m not mistaken, you knew my mother well.”

  Daughter of—

  “That’s impossible,” said Crier. “Reyka never commissioned a child, I would have known—and—you’re human.”

  Dinara snorted. “What can I say? My mother was an Automa, my ma’s a human, they fell in love, they wanted a child. My ma had a good friend, a human man, and he agreed to help out.” She winked. “So that’s how I happened. But my mother had to keep Ma and me a secret—I’m sure you can understand why. I grew up in a village to the south, but I visited the sovereign’s palace a few times, disguised as one of my mother’s servants. That’s when I saw you, Lady Crier.”

  Crier tried to think of a response, but her mind was caught on: My mother was an Automa. My ma’s a human. They fell in love. Was it true? Did Dinara have any reason to lie? How often did this happen? Crier knew Queen Junn had some sort of . . . relationship with her human adviser, but Crier had assumed it was purely physical, because—because how could it be anything else?

  Am I not the only one?

  The thought was a revelation. Sunlight brimming over the mountaintops, spilling into the valleys and villages below. It’s not just me. If that were true, it changed everything. If it wasn’t just Crier, if she wasn’t an anomaly, the only one who had ever felt like this, then—maybe this feeling in her chest wasn’t wrong. Maybe it wasn’t a Flaw.

  After all, who had condemned her for this? Who told her it was wrong? Her father. Kinok. Who would hate her for this? The members of the Red Council, the elite, who didn’t care if humans lived or died. Crier didn’t believe anything any of them said. They didn’t respect her, and she didn’t respect them.

  But she’d respected Councilmember Reyka.

  “The village to the south,” Ayla said, covering Crier’s awkward silence. “It wasn’t called Elderell, was it?”

  “That’s the one,” said Dinara. Her smile faded. “Ma’s still there. I tried to convince her to leave, after—after we found out what happened to Mother. After the Red Council practically paraded her body through the streets of Yanna, pretending to mourn. I don’t think Ma’s safe in Elderell. But she wouldn’t listen.”

  Crier hadn’t known the council had found Reyka’s body. She wondered if Queen Junn had let them find it, as some sort of message. “I’m sorry,” she managed. “I’m so sorry about your mother. She deserved better.”

  “All of us do,” said Dinara. “But as long as Kinok lives, that’s not what we’ll get.”

  “Do you know who was responsible for Councilmember Reyka’s death?” Crier asked carefully.

  Dinara looked away, a muscle flexing in her jaw. “I have my theories,” she said. “No matter who gave the order, I know Scyre Kinok was watching my mother. Tracking her. She’d been working against him ever since he left the Heart to become a Scyre—she knew he was dangerous even then, long before he ever founded the Anti-Reliance Movement. And—I think somehow he found out about my ma and me. He started spreading rumors among the other Red Hands. About how my mother wasn’t fit to be a councilmember, she was too soft, she’d choose humans over her own Kind.”

&n
bsp; A memory surfaced. Crier’s first and last council meeting, when her father had given Reyka’s empty seat to Kinok. Perhaps she’s finally joined the humans, Councilmember Shen had said. That’s where she belongs. And then, from Kinok himself: It was odd for Councilmember Reyka to be so . . . passionate about humans, was it not?

  At the time, Crier had thought the statement was directed entirely at her. That Kinok was mocking her about her fifth pillar. Passion. But if he’d known that Reyka had fallen in love with a human, if he’d been turning the other councilmembers against her . . . He wasn’t just mocking Crier. He was telling the Red Council that Reyka wasn’t worth searching for.

  “We have the same goal,” Crier said, looking at Dinara head-on. “We both want Kinok to answer for his crimes. And . . . it can’t be a coincidence you’re camped here in the foothills, so close to the Iron Heart. You’re trying to find it, aren’t you?”

  Dinara didn’t answer. Her eyes flicked over Crier’s face, as if searching for any sign of deception.

  “Let us join you,” Crier said. “Please. I—I don’t have much to offer, but I am Automa. I have an Automa’s senses. The Iron Heart was built for my Kind, I might be the best chance of finding it.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Lady Crier,” said Dinara. “You and your girl can join us—any friend of my mother’s is a friend of mine. But we’ve already got our best chance of finding the Heart.”

  Crier and Ayla shared a glance. “What do you mean?” Crier asked.

  Instead of answering, Dinara reached under the collar of her shirt and drew out a thick iron chain. There was a battered iron pendant dangling from the end of it.

  A compass.

  Beside her, Ayla sucked in a breath.

  “What?” Crier asked. “What is it?” But even as the words left her lips, she remembered. She had seen something like this before. In that same council meeting. Kinok had taken it out and held it up, letting it swing from his fingers like a hypnotist’s pendulum, and the Red Hands had indeed seemed hypnotized. The presence of the compass had made them sit up straighter, stare at Kinok with wariness, jealousy, awe.

  “This is an Iron Compass,” said Dinara with a sharp, wicked grin. “We don’t need an Automa’s senses to help us find the Iron Heart, my lady. This thing will lead us right to it.”

  Do you think it’s as dangerous as everyone says? The Heart?

  They say it’s the Heart of a great monster. A beast the size of a mountain. They say it’s a living thing and that’s why the leeches guard it so heavily: they don’t want anyone hunting it. But that means it’s vulnerable, right? They wouldn’t guard it if it wasn’t vulnerable. Killable. Everyone I’ve asked says it’s in a different place—always somewhere in the Western Mountains, of course, but nobody knows which mountain, and that range stretches for hundreds of leagues. It would be like trying to find one specific blade of grass in all the golden hills of Varn. One specific gem in all the mines. Madness. But maybe I’m mad.

  If they don’t have heartstone, they don’t have anything. We know that. How it is made? The monster? The mountains? Is it really just a gem they’re mining? I think it can’t be that simple. It can’t be that. I don’t think there’s anything natural about that stone. I don’t think it grows from this world. Not something as terrible as that. Is it Made, like them?

  I want to know.

  Maybe I’m mad.

  If you get this, R, don’t try to stop me. It’s too late.

  —FROM A CODED LETTER INTERCEPTED BY AUTOMA SOLDIERS, CIRCA YEAR 30 AE

  15

  That night, Ayla discovered why the rebels had been camping out in the heartstone keep for three days instead of heading directly to the Iron Heart. They were making weapons. Ayla first heard the strange noises coming from beneath the floorboards as she sat in a circle with Crier, Dinara, and a few others, including Fen—who seemed to have made glaring at Crier his top priority, which meant Ayla had made glaring at Fen her top priority—eating an evening meal of cured fish and hard brown bread. A flask of brandy was passed around. Ayla sniffed it, took a hesitant sip, and shuddered—the only alcohols she’d ever liked were honey mead and watered-down wine, and the brandy was so much worse, somehow sour and bitter and fiery all at once. It tasted how lye smelled. She passed the flask off to the man beside her and caught Crier giving her an amused look. Ayla made a face at her, sticking her tongue out like a child, and the amusement deepened.

  Then Crier cocked her head, like she always did when she was listening intently, and a moment later Ayla heard it too: a hammering sound, like metal striking stone. It seemed to be coming from below.

  “Is there a cellar?” Ayla asked Dinara in a low voice. “Is someone down there?”

  Dinara took a big swill of brandy. “You done eating?” she said. Ayla nodded. “Then I’ll show you.”

  She led Ayla and Crier to a corner of the room and knelt down, and Ayla saw a small metal handle attached to one of the floorboards. Dinara tugged on it and a section of the floor lifted up, revealing an entrance to the dark cellar below. There were no stairs—just a frayed-looking rope ladder. Ayla tried not to squirm. She didn’t want to climb down into the dark. She really didn’t want to go underground. But the noises were coming louder now, and her curiosity outweighed her fear.

  “C’mon,” said Dinara, already lowering herself into the opening. Crier followed after, and Ayla climbed down last, gripping the sides of the ladder so tight she came away with indentations on her palms, the faint shape of braided rope.

  Once she reached the bottom and her eyes adjusted to the gloom, Ayla saw it wasn’t actually pitch-black down here. A couple lanterns sat on wooden shelves along the walls, casting a dim light. And there, in the center of the room, the source of the hammering noises. Three of Dinara’s rebels sat on the floor hunched over . . . something.

  “This is where they would’ve stored heartstone,” Dinara said. “Crates and crates of heartstone dust, waiting to be shipped out.”

  “What are they doing?” Crier asked from behind Ayla. Her eyes were fixed on the three rebels, who hadn’t yet looked up from their work. One was hammering away, the other was taking each shard and carving something into the surface.

  Without waiting for Dinara’s answer, Ayla crept closer, to the edge of the lanternlight. Now she could see the stone wasn’t black. It was a deep, deep blue.

  “The blue smoke,” she said, turning back to Dinara. “This is where it comes from, isn’t it?”

  Dinara hummed. “Got it in one, girl.”

  Bombs. They were making bombs.

  Maybe Ayla should have been scared, but all she felt was fascinated. She wanted a closer look. What was this mysterious blue stone? She’d heard of saltpeter bombs, but never anything like this. Where did it come from?

  She only voiced the last question aloud.

  “The caves of Tarreen,” said Dinara. “You ever wonder why everyone thinks Tarreen’s nothing but impenetrable jungle? That hardly anybody lives there, there’s only a few scattered human settlements, the whole area’s strategically useless?” She grinned, dimples flashing. “Tarreen’s not quite as abandoned—and not nearly as useless—as the sovereign thinks. The Tarreenians hide themselves well, but they exist. And they’re sitting on miles and miles of cave systems full to the damn brim of a gemstone a thousand times more powerful, more potent, than heartstone. If you know the right magick.”

  Ayla heard Crier asking a question—something about the Tarreenians—but she wasn’t paying attention. She was watching the boy hunched over the chunk of blue stone, holding it steady for his hammer. As she watched, he tapped away at the same spot one, two, three times, until the stone split in two, shards falling away like pieces of eggshell. She stepped closer still so she could see what the other boy was carving. Not letters. Symbols. Ayla recognized fire, saltpeter, sulfur.

  A thousand times more powerful, more potent, than heartstone.

  Ayla could be wrong, but she knew in her heart�
�in her blood—that she wasn’t. She had seen this blue stone before. She’d seen it in Siena’s hand, as Siena lowered it into the open chest of a lifeless Automa girl, fitting it into the hollow space where a heart should be. Ayla still remembered how the girl had twitched as if struck by lightning, eyes flying open. Irises burning silver.

  Creation. Destruction. A heart and a bomb. The reason Kinok had brought her to his study and interrogated her about her family’s past.

  Tourmaline.

  Here it was.

  “How is it so much more powerful than heartstone?” Ayla asked. “Aren’t they both just . . . rocks? Crystals?”

  “Oh, but that doesn’t mean they’re the same. Crystals have different properties. Sulfur burns, phosphorus glows, chalcanthum dissolves in water. You feed coal to a hearth fire. You feed heartstone to an Automa.” The nearest shelf was lined with leather pouches the size of a clenched fist. Dinara fetched one of the pouches and held it in her palm, giving Crier and Ayla a significant look. “It all depends on what you do with the crystal, with that materia, doesn’t it?” she said. “Cinnabar is used as both poison and pigment. Inhale cinnabar dust and you’ll die slow and nasty, but you can turn that same dust into the most beautiful vermilion paint. It can take your last breath; it can breathe life into art. Alchemy isn’t the only way of manipulating a substance to serve one purpose or another, to create or destroy. It is not the only magick.” Her lips curved up again, a natural smile. “It’s the magick we’re using, though.”

  “You’re harnessing the energy,” said Crier. “Generating magickal energy by carving those symbols into the stone. Like . . .”

  “Flint and steel,” Ayla supplied. “Is that it? The blue stone is the flint, and if you have the right combination of symbols, it’s like striking flint against fire steel. Except it doesn’t make fire, it makes—like Crier said. Energy. That’s how the Makers create heartstone, right?”