Witch's Pyre

by Josephine Angelini

  “Say I did tell them. Say I give them the whole story—that I was the one who told you in mindspeak to take her willstones away in that split second when Alaric was going to slit her throat. Then I tell them that you were going to break Lily out of her cage tonight while Alaric was away from camp, and we were all going to ride off into the frigging sunset together. What then?”

  He looks at me, still not understanding.

  “Do you know Lily at all?” I ask. “Because if you did, you’d know she’ll never forgive either of us. If she ever finds out the truth, she’s going to hate both of us for doing this to her, even if it was for her own good.”

  “No, she—” he starts to argue.

  I cut him off. “Yes, she will. I’ve known Lily since kindergarten, and I’ve never seen her forgive anyone. Do you know I’m her only true friend in our world? That’s because if someone picked on her for her red hair or her rashes or her weird mom, that person was never allowed to play with us again. She held a grudge against pretty much every person in our town. She pushed everyone away until I was the only person left in her life.”

  Uncertainty flashes in his eyes. There’s only one nail left to drive into this coffin, and I hope it’s enough.

  “Now, what if Lily hates both of us?” I ask. “Who’ll take care of her if she’s sent us both away? Who’s going to love her? She’ll be alone, Rowan.”

  He drops his face into his hands. I don’t know if he’s crying or not, but I can’t let that stop me. The guy had his chance with his Lillian and he blew it. He can’t have mine. She was always supposed to be mine, since we were little kids. I feel bad for him, but getting Lily back is all that matters. I know I can make her happier than Rowan can. I know it.

  He picks up his head. I don’t see tears, but the hollowed-out look he gives me is even worse somehow. “Juliet says Lily wants to go west. You’re going to need me. The coven’s going to need me,” he says. His voice is thin and lacking conviction.

  “She won’t want you there,” I say.

  “Still. I’ll follow, just in case. She doesn’t have to know.”

  And then he can swoop in and save everyone at the last minute. Be the hero. Win her love. What can I say to stop him? Maybe only the truth will work.

  “Look, she’s gotta hate someone for what we did. That’s how she works. Let her hate you.” I’m begging the guy now. “Give me a chance to make her happy. Stay away.”

  Finally he nods. He looks lost, like he just woke up in a room he doesn’t recognize. I feel like shit about it, but at least she’s mine . . .

  The memory ended and Lily stood staring at Tristan. He looked ashamed but relieved for finally getting it off his chest.

  “Why didn’t you tell me before?” Lily asked, still too shocked to feel the hurt that some small part of her knew was coming eventually.

  “For the same reason Rowan doesn’t want me telling you now,” Tristan said, seeming fed up with the whole thing. “Because your Tristan was dead and we didn’t want to tarnish his memory. Because Rowan was convinced you’d still hate him anyway for not catching up with us in time to save him. Because you don’t forgive and you never forget.”

  Lily couldn’t look at him. She was too ashamed of herself. She blindly reached for Tristan’s hand.

  “Can you forgive me?” she asked. He made an uncertain sound and she mustered the courage to glance up at him. “I’m sorry, Tristan. I’ll try to change.”

  This wasn’t the reaction he’d expected. “You’re not angry?”

  “No,” she said. Lily squeezed his hand tightly and then let it go. “I have to find Rowan,” she said, and ran into the throngs of people preparing for battle.

  She felt her way to him, calling out in mindspeak, and quickening her pace until she was bumping into people as she passed. Everywhere she looked, scared people were girding themselves for war. Couples were embracing. Children were being separated from parents they might never see again. Friends were exchanging daggers and swearing oaths to look after the others’ families if only one of them came back. Lily could hear it all as she ran past. Her claimed were whispering about their fears and their loves and their losses in her mind.

  As she plowed on, seeing the surprised stares she was drawing, Lily finally figured out how he’d always been able to find her. She’d always know where he was because it was where she most wanted to be. Rowan was standing in a clearing surrounded by braves, distributing arms.

  He spun around as she skidded to a stop a few feet from him.

  “Rowan,” she said.

  Everyone dropped what they were doing to watch. Caleb, Tristan, Una, and Breakfast caught up with Lily a moment later and regarded her cautiously while she confronted Rowan.

  “What happened?” he asked, his eyes worried, and the sword in his hand drooping by his side.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, breathless.

  “Tell you what?” he asked, and then confusion turned to understanding. His eyes flicked to Tristan. “You told her.”

  Lily strode forward, her cheeks red and her eyes shining with unshed tears. “How could you keep that from me? Especially after what Lillian did to you?” Her voice broke. Words like “hypocrisy” and “irony” floated around in her head. Instead she inarticulately blurted out, “It’s like . . . the exact same thing only backward!”

  She stormed right up to Rowan and he braced himself, like he thought Lily was going to hit him. Instead she threw herself into his arms and kissed him. After one stunned moment he dropped the weapon in his hand and lifted her up against his chest, holding her off the ground as he kissed her back.

  “When this is over, you and I are going to sit down and tell each other every secret we’re keeping from the other,” Rowan said when he finally set her back down.

  “Okay.” She smiled up at him. “You go first,” she said, winning a laugh from him.

  “Ah, guys?” Una interrupted. “So glad you two worked it out, but we need a little more direction here. What’s the plan?”

  One quick squeeze that promised a proper reconciliation later, and Rowan released Lily.

  “Tristan,” he said, every inch the general again. “I want volunteers who can handle heights and who are good shots with a crossbow to ride the raptors.” He turned around and glared at the rabbit-like stares he was receiving from the ranks. “Step up! If you don’t volunteer I’ll hand you over to Una and she’ll put you on the back of a lion.” He grinned. “If the Pride doesn’t decide to eat you first.”

  “You heard the man,” Una repeated crisply as she clapped her hands, snapping the gawkers to attention. “Raptor riders with Tristan, Pride riders with me.”

  “Caleb. I need you to coordinate between Alaric and the Pack,” Rowan said. “I’ll introduce you to Alpha, the Pack’s leader. Are you going to be okay fighting with the wolves?” Caleb nodded once. He didn’t like his assignment, but he knew what was at stake. “They speak our language, you know. That’s why I’m putting the Outlanders and the wolves together. I think we have more in common than you realize,” Rowan told him. Caleb looked stunned by this for a moment and then he seemed to rethink it. Rowan turned to Breakfast. “And you—”

  “Guard Lily while she’s on the pyre,” Breakfast finished for him. “This ain’t my first rodeo.”

  “Exactly,” Rowan said, and turned back to Lily, his demeanor softening. “Reach out to Lillian. Stay linked with her. The two of you are going to have to work as one for our armies to synchronize.”

  Lily called out to Lillian.

  I’m here, Lily said. My army is in the redwood grove.

  I’m climbing my pyre now. Keep your army hidden until I tell you to join us and then stay open to my call. You’re going to have to jump your army out of the blast zone as soon as I tell you to.

  Listen to me. You can’t use the bomb, Lillian, and if you’re counting on using it to save you in the battle you’re going to die. Carrick—

  Lily felt heat and pain
as the fire rose around Lillian and their connection was severed as all of Lillian’s concentration went into changing heat into force. Lily called her over and over, but Lillian didn’t answer. She looked up at the swaying treetops, unsure if Lillian had understood her. Lillian’s witch wind began to howl through the grove, whispering and moaning around the branches like ghosts summoned to the battlefield.

  Lily looked around her, taking this one moment to be right where she was, right at that moment. Rowan was marshaling her army into shape. Men, woman, and Woven were running this way and that. Axes were being put to the trunks of the redwoods and every thump of the metal biting into the venerable wood was like a sin inside her heart. But this was war, and Lily knew that the trees were just the first of many to die this day.

  Toshi, Lily called. Where are you?

  She caught a glimpse of the streets blurring past as Toshi ran through Bower City.

  I’m a bit busy at the moment, he replied. She could hear him counting in his head. He got to ten. I’m not dead. He seemed surprised by this.

  Lily could feel sweat streaking down his back and the bubbling hysteria of a squashed laugh in his chest. He looked to his left and his right and she saw rough-looking men carrying rope on either side of him. Lily recognized them as hers by their willstones, and called each of them by name. Avery. Michelson.

  We’re trying to get crossbows from the Hive’s lookout platforms so we can use the pesticide we developed, Toshi continued.

  Does it work?

  Don’t know yet. But the antidote does.

  They’re still building my pyre, but I’ll give you what power I can, she replied. Where is the antidote?

  Ivan has it, Toshi replied.

  Good. Let me know if you succeed with the pesticide, Lily told him. I have an impossible task for you when you’re done with that.

  Oh, good. My favorite.

  Lily smiled to herself. She transmuted as much energy as she could spare and filled Toshi’s, Avery’s, and Michelson’s willstones with force. She felt them revel in it and smiled. A wave of exhaustion hit her and she staggered to the side. Juliet caught her.

  “You need to sit,” Juliet said, leading Lily through the confusion and to a mossy rock.

  “I just need salt,” Lily said as she sat down. She looked over Juliet’s shoulder and noticed that Alaric’s painted guard had shadowed every step Juliet took.

  “Alaric really meant it when he said you were going to stay out of the fight, didn’t he?” Lily asked, gesturing to the guard.

  “Yes.” Juliet rolled her eyes. “I feel so useless, and so do they,” she said, indicating her entourage.

  Lily got an idea. “I need your help. I’m going to jump someone here, and he’s going to have a whole bunch of antidote for the Workers’ stings. Do you think they could help you distribute it? I’d need you to fan out and give it to as many as you can,” Lily said.

  “Definitely,” Juliet said.

  Lily reached out to Ivan in mindspeak and found him in his lab, frantically making more antidote and pesticide. She called his name softly.

  Lily, he replied, surprised but polite as always. Forgive me. I’m out of practice being someone’s claimed.

  This is going to be a little strange for you, she told him in mindspeak. But I need you to pick up as much antidote as you can carry.

  Ivan did as she asked and Lily jumped him to her. He appeared before her, his arms laden with bags full of vials.

  “That was one of the most singular experiences I’ve ever had,” he said with a quaver in his voice.

  “Ivan, this is my sister, Juliet,” Lily said, smiling. “She’s going to help you distribute the antidote.”

  Ivan nodded at Juliet politely as he handed her what he carried. He then turned back to Lily. “Send me back to my lab,” he asked. “I’ll keep making it for as long as I can.”

  “Contact me when you’ve got more, and I’ll jump you back here,” Lily replied, and then sent him back to his lab.

  Toshi looked up at the Warrior Sisters’ platform, still wondering how he was supposed to get up there, when he felt a rush like he’d never experienced before. His body felt light, his head clear, and every sense was sharpened.

  He heard Avery and Michelson groan. They felt it, too. The three of them met one another’s eyes with small, secret smiles on their faces.

  “So that’s what all the fuss is about,” Avery said, his smile breaking into a grin.

  “I guess we’ll die happy, then,” Michelson added.

  Toshi let out a shaky laugh and redirected their attention to the platform. It suddenly didn’t seem difficult to climb at all. The three of them clambered up the bare scaffolding with ease. They didn’t even need the rope.

  The top of the platform was deserted. All the Warrior Sisters were at the perimeter. Toshi looked toward the tiny orange glow of Grace’s pyre on top of the wall. Above her the Hive was swarming. A strange, circular cloudbank was forming in the darkening sky. It started to rotate over Grace’s pyre, and then there was a pause in the mounting tension like the end of an inhale just before a scream. A single beam of light shot out of the pyre and into the sky.

  The Hive was unleashed. They streamed over the wall and flew down upon the waiting army. A moment later, Toshi felt the ground shake and another beam of light pierced the sky from the direction of the battlefield. The Salem Witch answered Grace’s call to battle.

  “Here,” called Michelson. Toshi went to him and saw crossbows hung neatly inside a wall box.

  Toshi took down one of the crossbows, fitted a dart into the firing mechanism, and aimed over the side of the platform. Down below at street level, a swirling mass of Workers was flying past. Toshi shot the dart into the swarm. He heard a pop as the dart exploded in its center. Nothing happened.

  “Damn,” Avery said.

  “What do we do now?” Michelson asked. “Do we go back to the lab?”

  “Wait,” Toshi said, holding up a hand.

  The cloud of Workers seemed to be thinning, and a trail of dark specks was starting the litter the ground. Then all at once, the swarm fell out of the air, dead.

  Toshi reached out to both Ivan and Lily. It worked. The pesticide worked, he told them.

  Try to kill as many swarms inside the city as you can, Lily said. The more you kill there, the less will be able to join the Warrior Sisters on the battlefield.

  We’re on it, Toshi replied.

  The raiding party stripped the box bare, tied the crossbows across their backs to climb down, and left them at the base of the tower before moving onto the next. Toshi passed Ivan an image of what they were doing so Ivan could send other rebels to gather the crossbows and start exterminating the Workers.

  Toshi contacted Lily again. What was that impossible task you were going to give me?

  I want you to go through the back door of the Hive and kill the Queen.

  Ah. Toshi’s insides liquefied.

  You should be able to get to her easily. The Warrior Sisters are aboveground, fighting, Lily said, trying to give him confidence. She sent him images of how to get to the Queen.

  “You two keep at this,” Toshi said aloud as his team approached the next platform. “I’m going to need all the rope.”

  “Where are you going?” Michelson asked, taking the coil off his shoulders and passing it to Toshi.

  Toshi didn’t dare say it, he merely gestured to city center. “Our witch has given me an impossible task,” he said.

  He kept one crossbow for himself and took as many darts as he could. He left them to it and ran toward the Hearing Hall, pausing every chance he got to shoot down swarms of Workers.

  The first wave of Warrior Sisters started flowing over the wall and raining down on Lillian’s soldiers.

  The sky over the battelfield darkened as the wheel of Lillian’s storm clouds began to rotate above her. A ray of blindingly bright light shot up from Lillian’s pyre into the center of the wheel, knocking everyone back with a p
ulse of energy.

  Lily locked the iron-and-diamond cuffs around her wrists as she ran to her pyre. Rowan ran beside her, pulling her crown out of his satchel. When they got to the base he carried her up the uneven mountain of cut logs to the stake waiting at the top. Lily had never seen a pyre this high before.

  “I have an ax crew stationed below with Breakfast to keep the fire well fed,” Rowan told her hastily. He started threading the chains on the stake through the rings on Lily’s cuffs. “Tristan will keep a squadron of raptors over you to repel any air attacks by the Warrior Sisters. Una will lead the Pride and the ranch hands on the left flank. Alaric, the Outlanders, and the Pack will be to the right. I’m leading the insect Woven straight up the middle.”

  “How will you lead them?” Lily asked. “The insects don’t understand language.”

  “I’ve become stone kin with all the queens,” Rowan said with a troubled look on his face. Lily stared at him, knowing how much it cost him to do that. “The point is,” he continued, “they’d have to get through our entire army before they could get to you—”

  Lily put her hands over Rowan’s and made him look up at her. “I love you.”

  “And I love you.” He placed the blackened crown on her head and kissed her hard, crushing her against him. “I’ll be with you,” he whispered, and then turned and climbed down.

  Lily looked up. She could hear her chains, her breath, and the wind. High above her the tops of the redwoods rubbed up against the storm-dark sky. Thirty feet below, her army went about their frenetic last-minute arrangements for battle. Weapons were checked. Ranks were ordered. Strategies were concocted. Former enemies became stone kin to coordinate in battle. Only Lily stood alone. Waiting to burn.

  She smelled it first—just a hint of smoke teased out from the pulpy smell of the wood, and then suddenly there was so much smoke she was choking on it. Her eyes streamed as she coughed and sputtered, her body bent double as she hung in her chains. The heat rose, and Lily knew three full seconds of terror.

  Gift me, Rowan called out in mindspeak.

  The heat began to build until Lily was shrieking. A hurricane wheel of her own began to form over the creaking redwoods until a boom sounded out and light shot up from Lily’s smoke willstone.