We Rule the Night

by Claire Eliza Bartlett

  Their journey ended at an impromptu military compound that had sprung up in the night. The wide double-story houses of the governor, the factory owners, and the wealthiest merchants hadn’t escaped the Dragon fire, but a few stood with little damage. Dust coated their pane windows, and debris had been swept between ridged decorative columns. More men in silver coats directed the rebuilding effort, checking papers and generally doing whatever it was they did when they weren’t arresting people and shipping them off to the far north.

  The Skarov led them to a grand structure with a green tile roof. The front garden held a few battered flowers, clinging grimly to life. Nothing had escaped the fine sheen of dust from the bombardment. In peacetime Revna would have wept for such a house. Now she was glad for a less ostentatious one in a neighborhood the Dragons had ignored.

  Mama wheeled her up the little flagstone path to the front door and eased the chair over the threshold, jostling Revna into the entryway. The front hall alone dwarfed any private residence she’d seen before, but the finery couldn’t outshine the chaos. Muddy footprints crusted a wooden floor inlaid with a stark geometric pattern. A dark stain crept up the blue wallpaper, though the exact nature of the stain was something Revna didn’t dare contemplate. A tree heavy with tiny green fruits had been overturned in the corner, and no one had bothered to sweep up the dirt or even turn the pot right side up. Bottles lined the grand stair—empty bottles, if she had to guess—and the entire foyer had a sour smell to it. Upstairs, someone screamed. Revna’s hands clenched around the arms of her chair.

  The Skarov with the torn coat trotted up the stairs. “Your chair, miss,” said the tired one. A slim hall next to the staircase stretched to a series of rooms beyond. Her bulky old chair wouldn’t fit.

  “We’ll have to carry you, miss.”

  “No,” she replied, before she thought better of it. The word came out strong and angry. She flushed. But if this was her end, she didn’t want to meet it in the arms of an enforcer. “I’ll walk.”

  She gripped the banister at the bottom of the stairs and pulled herself up, taking care as she disentangled her feet from the little shelf her father had carved for them. When she had her balance, she looked back at the Skarov. The tired one stared outright at her legs, frowning at the pointed metal toes. The bruised one looked everywhere but her feet. Neither of them met her eye.

  “This way,” said the tired one, shoving past her.

  She’d expected to be taken into an interrogation room. She hadn’t expected it to be so… pink. The walls were a paler shade than the couch, which had a rose pattern woven into the silk and likely hadn’t been in style since before their last war with the Elda. A walnut desk had been pulled into the center of the room to act as the interrogation table. The Skarov she’d saved took an upholstered chair. The bruised one shut the door in Mama’s face.

  The tired one gestured to the couch. “Take a seat.”

  Revna sank into an overstuffed cushion. Papers had been dropped on the floor in an unceremonious stack, and more had been shoved over the books on a small bookshelf in the corner of the room. Through the window she could see a square of hazy blue sky. The city jail must have been bombed. Why else would she have been brought here?

  “Revna Roshena,” Tired said, picking up a file on the desk and flipping it open.

  He paused as if she was supposed to say something. “Yes?” He must’ve known who she was, and the file in his hand must’ve told him exactly what she was—child, traitor, amputee, factory worker.

  “Age?”

  Doesn’t your fancy paper tell you? “Seventeen,” she said. Her hands knotted together in front of her. It was getting hard to breathe.

  He checked her face as he ticked off her physical description, and for a few moments the room was silent aside from the scratch of his pencil. His companion leaned against the door. Revna bit the inside of her cheek to hold back a hysterical laugh. After expecting the Skarov threat in every back alley, in every official building, she was about to meet her fate in an ugly pink room, sitting on a squishy rose-patterned couch.

  “How long have you been experimenting with the Weave?”

  “I—” Never. Six months. A year. She’d practiced each of these replies, and all of them were so obviously wrong.

  “There’s no point in lying.” He looked at her for the first time since he’d come to the house. “I was there.”

  “I don’t know anything,” she blurted out. Which was a ridiculous thing to say, because everyone knew that she did.

  “I flew twenty feet through the air because of you.” He tapped her file on the table. “You saved my life.”

  “I didn’t mean to.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Didn’t mean to save my life?”

  No. “Everything was dark, and the buildings were falling, and we didn’t have shelter—and I never knew I could do it. I’ve never done it before, and I’ll never do it again.” The words tumbled out of her, and as she watched him lick the end of his pencil and press it to paper, it all became worse somehow. She wanted to be proud, to own the truth and accept her fate with grace. But she kept talking, hoping to talk until she said something that saved her. “I’m useful here. I’ve never done anything wrong and I’ve never been late for my shift. You can ask my supervisor. Mrs. Rodoya. I do factory work, for the army—”

  He leaned forward. “I don’t care,” he said, setting his hand on the table. Revna stopped, mouth half-formed around a word. They sat like that for a moment. Then he drew back. “Your father taught you to use the Weave?”

  “No.” They couldn’t pin another crime on Papa.

  “Your mother, then.”

  “No.” Panic flushed her. “I taught myself.”

  “Impossible. You used a complex tactic—”

  “My mother never knew—”

  “Don’t interrupt me,” he snarled. His features twisted into something enraged and animal.

  Revna’s spine turned to ice. This was when they broke her limbs and scored her skin until she told them all about her life. She wondered how thin the walls were. Would Mama hear her scream in this makeshift cell? Revna wanted to think she’d stay strong under torture, for her family. But she couldn’t be sure.

  The latch clicked as the door opened. Revna jumped. Then she drew a shaky breath to tell Mama to get out.

  But it wasn’t Mama who stepped through the door. The woman who came in was short and dressed in a sharply tailored uniform that said army. She wasn’t what Revna had expected some Skarov bruiser to look like. In fact, something about her was familiar. Revna wanted to recognize her but didn’t quite know from where.

  The woman looked from Revna to the bruised one to the tired one. “I told you to let me know when she arrived.”

  The bruised Skarov shifted, as if he was trying to edge out of the room without attracting attention. The tired one leaned back, clasping his hands in his lap. “We have a very particular procedure.”

  The woman smiled. It wasn’t a kind smile, like Mama’s, or even a patronizing smile, like Mrs. Rodoya’s. It was a smile that begged the Skarov officer to take one more step in the wrong direction. “My procedure has precedence. Or would you like to check that with Isaak?”

  His lip curled up, but he said nothing. He wasn’t the same kind of predator that he’d been with Revna. He shoved his chair back. “I was sick of listening to her, anyway.”

  That was it? Some big interrogation and retrieval, all to be abandoned on an ugly rose couch?

  The bruised Skarov slid out, and the woman stepped aside to let the tired one pass. “Shut the door when you leave.” She waited until it had slammed before she took a seat in the vacant chair. “Sorry about that. The Extraordinary Wartime Information Unit can be pushy. But I was the one who wanted to see you today. Not them.”

  Revna’s head swung between the door and the woman. The woman stuck her hand out. “I’m Tamara Zima.”

  Revna felt her jaw go slack. The woman seemed famili
ar because her image had been on every newspaper and magazine cover; her words had been branded into the minds of thousands of young girls. Tamara Zima was the foremost aviator in the Union, practically the only aviator in the Union. She’d flown the very first Union plane to the war’s front lines, she’d crossed the Union in a twenty-hour flight, and she was on record as being the only person to have told every general on Isaak Vannin’s staff to go stuff himself.

  Her hand was still outstretched. Revna wiped hers on her uniform and shook.

  “You’ve pleased our Skarov troops,” Tamara said. Revna couldn’t help checking the door. “Believe it. They put on a stern face, but they were impressed. Otherwise they wouldn’t have called me. I heard about you, and I had to come down to see for myself.”

  She was in league with them. As Tamara flipped through her file, Revna tucked her hands under her thighs and waited for the first question.

  Tamara seemed to notice her unease. She leaned forward, crinkling her eyes in a smile much warmer than the one she’d given the Skarov. It was the kind of smile that made Revna want to smile back. But she didn’t. This was only another technique in the Union’s interrogation arsenal. “You can relax, Miss Roshena. No one’s here to arrest you. In fact, we’re quite interested in you.”

  Revna didn’t answer. Of course they were here to arrest her. They were interested in her because they wanted to get as much out of her as they could, before breaking her irrevocably.

  “You have something the Union desperately needs,” Tamara said.

  That did give her pause. “Sorry?”

  “What do you know of Elda aircraft?”

  “They fly?” Revna guessed. Tamara raised an eyebrow, and Revna flushed. “I mean, they distort the Weave, and they use it to fly.”

  Tamara tilted her head. “Mostly true. In fact, what they do is an elaborate version of what you did last night. Which is why we find you so interesting.”

  So that was the game. “I’m not a spy.” The words came out sharper than they should have. The Union could accuse her of treason all it liked. They weren’t going to call her a turncoat, too.

  Tamara took a deep breath. She scratched at the pages of Revna’s open file with a pen. “I think we’re coming at this from the wrong angle,” she said at last. “I want to help you.”

  “Why?” Mama would have hissed at the impertinence of the question, but Revna was curious. When had the Union ever tried to help her?

  “Because the Elda are winning this war from the air. If we want to fight them, we need air regiments of our own, and Weave pilots to help us. We need people who can do what you do. What we do,” Tamara corrected herself, meeting Revna’s eye.

  “You use the Weave?” Revna said.

  “How do you think I fly my own plane?”

  She hadn’t thought about it. “But—you’re famous. Everyone knows you. And you’re Isaak Vannin’s—” She stopped just shy of saying lover. That was only rumor, anyway. “Good friend,” she finished.

  “I learned to fly in Elda, before the war. And what I learned there convinced me that the Weave’s not as fragile as we think. Isaak Vannin believes that the risk is worth the reward, and he’s given me permission to recruit as I see fit.” She leaned forward. “I want you to help me save the North. Will you do it?”

  Her eyes sparkled with promise. She seemed so certain, so sincere. All the same, resentment bit at Revna’s belly. Tamara Zima had broken a law that was hundreds of years old, and she had a Hero of the Union medal. Revna’s father had taken some unwanted scrap, and he’d pay for it the rest of his life.

  Perhaps Tamara noticed her reluctance. She pressed on. “As a junior pilot, you’ll be paid twenty-three marks per month, with room and board and a bonus for every successful mission. And…” She drew out the and, tapping the file in front of her. “Only Protectors of the Union are allowed to serve, so your family will be regranted status. As long as you’re not discharged dishonorably… or convicted of treason.”

  She’d added that last part a little too casually, like an afterthought. Revna didn’t care. The sound of her heart—the sound of her hope—could have drowned out the roar of a Dragon. “You can do that?”

  “I’ve already put in the request. I’m really hoping you’ll say yes.” Tamara winked conspiratorially.

  Revna had never imagined a life at the front. She’d never wanted one. She’d never wanted to work in the factories, or anywhere the Union could press down on her with its suffocating fingers. After all, it hadn’t wanted her, with her metal legs and traitor father. But… Protector of the Union. All this time she’d been a curse, and now Mama and Lyfa could get something back. They’d regain their status, be provided with firearms and an extra ration card and entry into the safe shelters for good Union citizens. As long as she fell in line, it was a status they could keep.

  Of course, Tamara might have talked to the Skarov first. She could have arranged to terrify Revna so that her timely offer would be even more miraculous. Knowing one way or the other wouldn’t change Revna’s answer, though.

  “What do you say?” Tamara pressed.

  You know what I say. But she said it anyway.

  4

  FOR EVERY GIRL A PLACE

  Intelgard was not the front. The nearest front was over the mountains to the south, close enough for planes to fly there, but far enough that the regiment could tear down the base and retreat if the Elda marched over the mountain range.

  The front had been muddy, cold, terrifying. But her friends had been there, and she’d always known what to do. Here Linné felt helpless, and her new comrades dismayed her. The girl recruits disdained their breakfast, complained when they had to march to the field, complained when they had to march around the field, and one was stupid enough to ask Colonel Hesovec what time they’d be served lunch. The only thing they could all wrap their heads around was the firing range. Given that citizens were registered for mandatory firearms practice from the age of ten, they impressed no one. When Colonel Hesovec was forced to supervise them, his criticism rained like bullets. But he never gave them instruction. He was waiting around, Linné thought, for the first opportunity to remove them from his base.

  The girls took it personally, of course, and they clamored for Zima. The name Tamara Zima rang in Linné’s ears from breakfast to dinner. Every girl wanted to see her, and Linné was no exception. She’d never met the woman her father called “Isaak’s harpy,” and she wanted to see the legend who controlled the Supreme Commander’s heart and wore an army uniform as a woman without consequence.

  Linné had been the first girl to arrive at Intelgard. The base had consisted of one long building for the men to sleep in and another to eat in. She’d been refused when she reported to the construction crews, so while the rest of Intelgard rose up around her, she and two staring raw recruits had inventoried supply palanquin after supply palanquin. She’d slept under a blanket in Hesovec’s office until a separate barracks had been built—then she had that hall to herself, while the men crammed two to a bed. For three weeks all she’d heard was mumbled misses from the soldiers and inventory notes from the colonel. When the rest of her regiment arrived, she welcomed them with enthusiasm… for about five minutes.

  She hadn’t expected the girls to be so girly. While she sewed up tears in her jacket, they embroidered their cuffs and buttonholes. They used their spark to make ice roses that melted at a touch. They’d brought dresses and fancy shoes. Olya even had a crystal radio to listen to her favorite radio play. When Linné warned her it would get confiscated, Olya smiled in challenge. Didn’t they know anything about being soldiers?

  Of course not. They hadn’t jumped through hoops and cut their hair and bound their breasts and learned the foul language of the marching army. They hadn’t walked an extra half kilometer to pee to make sure they weren’t spotted. They’d sauntered in and expected to be treated like ladies.

  Linné tried to help them at first. By evening she gave up. She sat alone
, ate alone, and went out for inspection alone.

  The day’s assignment saw them on the far side of an unused laboratory, crammed together with a map of the western Mariszkoy Mountains and orders to memorize peak heights and notable landmarks. Linné got to work. The others burst into complaint as soon as Hesovec left.

  “I don’t see the point,” Olya said, shoving her topographical map away. She had fine fingers and the sort of soft face that adorned the pinup pictures Linné had seen in her old regiment. She pushed her curly brown hair out of her eyes. And she kept smiling at Linné as if she wished Linné would drop down a well shaft and never come out. “I was chosen to make bombs, not draw routes.”

  Linné couldn’t let it be. “The Elda are on the other side of those mountains. What if you lose your way on a flight back? What if you crash?”

  Olya smiled wider. “I can survive the mountains. I was at the top of my outdoor class in preparatory school.”

  “Surviving a park in Mistelgard isn’t the same as getting lost in the mountains in wartime.”

  Olya kept smiling. The other girls weren’t even pretending to work; their eyes darted between Linné and Olya as if they were watching a competition. “You always take the boar’s side,” Olya said.

  “Don’t call him that,” Linné warned. Hesovec might make an ass of himself and waste resources, but it didn’t mean the girls could make a habit out of bad-mouthing their superiors.

  “Ha,” Olya said. She probably thought Linné was only proving her point. “Why bother kissing up to him? He’s never going to like you.” She pulled the map back toward her and ran her hand through her short hair again. “No matter whose daughter you are.” Olya had been the first to ask if Linné was that Zolonov. Linné’s status seemed to make them hate her a little, and she struggled not to return the favor.