Lodestone

by Katherine Forrister

  Roses weren’t the only thing that hid behind the Crossing’s Square wall. The Blackspire Prison lurked there as well. It had been a cathedral of the Luxian Order before that religion had been banned. Supposedly, it held many of the Luxian Order still, the ones responsible for the mass executions of lodestone-makers and other supposed heretics. They shared cells with all the other worst criminals of Centara. From what she’d heard, the prison was close to the palace, but its proximity to the Overlord wasn’t a good thing, even to Melaine. No one ever came out of Blackspire, yet somehow, stories did. Horrific stories.

  Melaine banged on the side of the cart, again and again, sending reverberations through the walls and floor. No response.

  When the cobblestones started to smooth and the rumbling grew quieter, Melaine tried again. Soon, the cart hardly shook at all anymore, but the guards continued to ignore her.

  Melaine’s gaze settled back on the tiny window, and all of her attention latched onto the new, unbelievable sights. No matter her fear, she couldn’t look away from the glittering, gleaming spectacle outside of her moving jail.

  After leaving Stakeside, the buildings had grown increasingly taller, but here in Crossing’s Square, they were shorter again, no more than three stories at most. Their shorter heights made them classy and elegant, as if a building tall enough to block the view of the trees’ autumn leaves and the blue sky above would be offensive. Melaine eyed the trees as she passed by. Even Crossing’s Square’s leaves seemed more vibrant than Stakeside’s.

  The leaves were nowhere near as bright as the shimmering colors that enveloped the aristocrats who sauntered by arm-in-arm on a leisurely stroll or rode about in open-air carriages drawn by fine horses. Their elegantly tailored clothing adorned impossibly clean bodies. The fabric was even finer and more varied than in Middun. Some of the women’s dresses were lined with fur, and they wore pristine, white, kidskin gloves in the light autumn chill.

  A couple, who seemed to enjoy each other’s company more than their fine surroundings, passed under a wrought-iron streetlamp that glowed with a green flame, despite it being daylight. Melaine’s eyes widened as she saw the green everflame, something she’d only heard about in stories. It was highly expensive, flaring from enchanted powder that guaranteed the fire would burn forever—or so the stories said. Perhaps there was a time limit, but it must be a long one to have allowed the flame to gain its name.

  Everflame or not, Melaine couldn’t believe people were wasting fuel on the lamps when the sun shone down so brightly that the flames were hardly visible. Yet they glowed not only from streetlamps but from lanterns attached on either side of the fine houses the cart passed by, as well as from other carriages.

  Stretches of tall, spotless white walls hid all but the roofs of many houses, no doubt encircling large estates. Shields were posted along the walls and under everflame streetlamps, wearing glinting metal armor—buffed cuirasses and helmets with the regimented symbol of a shield embossed onto their surfaces. No Shield ever wore fine metal armor into Stakeside. The thugs and thieves weren’t as intimidated by the Shields when they were in their territory or in great numbers. Shining armor would only attract unwanted attention. In Stakeside, Shields like the ones who’d taken Melaine wore inconspicuous black leather.

  Though the Crossing’s Square Shields all stood stiff and tall, they also looked bored. Melaine watched several Shields nod or salute passing civilians in respect and deference. She narrowed her eyes in disbelief. The upper-class citizens of Centara weren’t afraid of the guards. The Shields were not the authority, not really. The true authority was money.

  Why did the Overlord not intervene? Why did he let his guards get so complacent?

  The Followers weren’t that way. Melaine knew it. They weren’t petty Shields in the street. The Followers guarded the palace itself, direct servants to the Overlord, just as they had served him as right-hand battlemages during the war.

  Melaine felt a thrill when she pictured them, as she always did. No doubt their armor was even shinier than the Shields’. Her stomach roiled again. Would she ever see a Follower where she was headed? Was she going to die before she ever met the Overlord?

  Where were they taking her?

  She chewed the inside of her cheek as the cart turned another corner. She wanted to shout at her captors, but her lips were still glued shut by the Shield’s spell. She could hardly even swallow.

  Then Melaine’s heart slowed. A view far better than any she had seen so far glimmered through the window.

  The Centara Palace.

  Its stone pinnacles looked like they aspired to touch the clouds, thin and delicate as black lace but sharp as daggers. Every straight section of the roof’s ridges was bedecked with wrought-iron railings, twisted into all sorts of strong and beautiful flourishes and angles. The eaves and windows were all pointed arches set in deep hollows where stained glass dwelled, the colors only glinting in the narrow shafts of sunlight that could reach inside each recess.

  It had been the palace of the White City once—under King Malik’s rule. Much of it was destroyed during the Overlord’s attack, and he had rebuilt the wounded sections in a much more modern style, full of wrought-iron and copper, enchanted to stay lustrous forever, regardless of age or weather. The sharp points and overhanging arches had a menacing nature, but Melaine thought the architecture reflected the Overlord’s might. There were many ways to express one’s power—fear was one of them. Fear was something Melaine had learned to live with and something she strove to overcome. Fear was something she could appreciate. Fear was something she could use if given the chance.

  Her chances were looking slim, however, and her bright glimpse of the palace was fleeting. The cart turned down a narrow alley, where it was flanked on either side by buildings too tall to keep the palace in view. Melaine grew hot as her legs started to feel wobbly. They really were taking her to Blackspire Prison. Her insolence in approaching an overseer and her knowledge that he visited the Hole on a regular basis had done nothing but earn her a cell in Blackspire. Salma was right. She was a fool to think she would ever lay eyes on the Overlord.

  The cart reached the ends of the buildings and slowed to a halt in the back alley. Melaine huffed a wry, silent laugh. Even the alleys of Crossing’s Square were spotless.

  She jerked as the door on the opposite side of the cart opened. Sunlight streamed in, making her squint and unable to dodge a Shield’s firm grasp as one of them dove inside to grab her. She let out a closed-mouth scream and kicked the guard’s shin. He grunted but didn’t loosen his hold on her arm as he dragged her out of the cart.

  “Get in there, you bitch,” he ordered gruffly as he shoved her out of the door and straight into another confined space. She fell onto a seat and righted herself just as he slammed the door shut.

  Melaine’s eyes flew about her new surroundings. She was in a carriage, not a cart. A carriage. A fancy carriage. The seat beneath her was soft and bouncy, covered by a thick, black velvet cushion. Another seat faced her, empty. The inside walls of the carriage were plastered with silk paper painted with curling, golden designs. Two caged, wrought-iron candlesticks were bolted to each side by the doors with two dim everflame candles shedding soft, green light. Melaine stared at the nearest flame. It wasn’t flickering at all, steadier than she’d ever seen a fire before.

  She whipped her neck the other way when the door opposite from the prison cart opened. Her eyes widened as Overseer Scroupe slid into the carriage and snapped the door shut again.

  He took the seat opposite from her, leering with his salacious grimace in the light of the sun and the everflame candles. His wrinkles looked even deeper in daylight and his jowls heavier, but he also looked far more respectable. His black overseer uniform, with its single, diagonal white lapel and series of white buttons down the sides of his trousers, squared his figure. His silver cufflinks and buckled shoes glittered. He folded his arms across his chest and eyed Melaine. A silent question gleamed in his
eyes, like he was trying to discover a vein of gold that someone claimed lurked in a chunk of quartz.

  He snapped his fingers, and her tongue released from the roof of her mouth. Her lips parted, breaking the spell the Shields had used to shut her up.

  Melaine took a full breath and met his eyes. Her mouth was so dry she barely managed the word, “Well?”

  “My, you are a rude one,” Scroupe tsked. “That is no way to speak to an overseer.” His eyes glinted dangerously, but they were glazed with age and had lost their edge.

  Melaine raised her eyebrows, not saying a word. Waiting.

  He laughed. “Oh, what I would do to put you in your place if I had the time. But no such luck. It seems you are the one with all the luck today.”

  Melaine’s stomach flipped.

  “The Overlord will see me?” she whispered, her voice not cooperating further.

  “He’ll see you,” Scroupe said. “Why he would see you confounds me, but I do not pretend to fathom what goes through our Lord’s head. I do suspect that he will kill you as soon as you open your mouth if you speak to him as you did me just now.”

  Melaine swallowed, and her hands began to tremble. “I won’t,” she said.

  Scroupe chuckled. “Changed your tune, now?” He snapped his fingers, and the spell holding her palms together released. She twisted her wrists in circles, working out the tight joints.

  “This carriage will see you to him,” Scroupe said.

  Melaine’s eyes widened. “Now?”

  She glanced down at her torn dress and dirty hands from her fall before she’d been thrust into the prison cart.

  The man let out a biting laugh.

  “No amount of soap would clean you up, Stonegirl,” he said. “You’re lucky I’m letting you dirty my carriage. Though this is far from my finest, of course.”

  Magic crackled at Melaine’s fingertips, but her nerves smothered her anger. She eyed the carriage, trying and failing to imagine one any grander.

  “Time to go,” Scroupe said as he opened his door. Melaine stiffened, uncertain if she should bolt after him to escape, or remain in the carriage and hope for the best. It was still possible that Scroupe didn’t want to risk having a stone-peddler knowing of his activities in the Hole, and this was all a ruse to get her somewhere private and do away with her. But why would he go to the trouble? Melaine might be well-known in Stakeside, but as Jianthe had said, no nobleman would ever listen to her tales, true or not.

  If the Overlord really did want to see her, then all of that could change. She could become important enough to influence the city.

  Scroupe stepped out of the carriage with grace befitting his station, but Melaine heard one of his knees pop as he reached the street.

  “I thank you for your delicious stones, Melaine,” he said with a simpering grin. “Perhaps, if you survive, I’ll find you again.”

  Melaine glared as he stepped away, and the door snapped shut by itself with a twang of springs. She didn’t know if Scroupe was mocking her or not, but either way, the thought of his disgusting mouth inhaling her magic from no less than six of her stones affirmed that she never wanted to see him again.

  She wrapped her boney knuckles around the silver handle of the paper-lined carriage door, both crafted from finer materials than she’d ever touched. The luxuries bore both a promise and a threat. This carriage would either take her to a powerful, decadent life or sentence her to a swift end.

  She didn’t turn the handle. She breathed deeply the smothering air. It smelled of expensive cologne and flowery perfume—the real stuff, not the cheap imitation scents used in an attempt to mask the stench that clung to Stakeside’s streets. A faint whiff of some woodsy scent also drifted into her nose. It had the faint bite of alcohol, but she had never smelled or tasted any alcohol so smooth before.

  She eyed Scroupe through a window of frosted glass with silver gilding curled around the frames. Scroupe hadn’t moved from his cocky stance, but now he slid a wand from within his uniform sleeve. Melaine focused on it, jealousy surging in her gut.

  Every human could use magic to an extent. It nestled in their bone marrow, waiting to be tapped into from birth, but only the wealthy could afford wands. Wands allowed the owner to channel their magic like ice melting down a mountainside. They shot the magic outward with more power than a person could possess by hand alone.

  Wands also had the power to collect and store temporary knowledge as Insights could. Learning from Insights took time and energy and magic, but with wands, a person could cast any of the spells stored in the wand without having learned it themselves. Without the wand, they would lose some magical ability, but with it, they could become immensely powerful in an instant.

  Scroupe’s wand was ostentatious, coated in silver and gold with a massive emerald embedded in its pommel. He flicked it toward the front of the carriage, where a metal lever rose to the side of the place a driver would normally sit. Two mechanical rods with hinges began to steer the reins of two fine, black horses.

  The carriage’s navigation was autonomous, metal with cogs and springs and levers, fueled by magic.

  Just days ago, she’d thought she would never lay eyes on a mechagic-assisted carriage. Even if the carriage was taking her to her execution, at least she could die knowing she’d witnessed wealth. The thought wasn’t as comforting as she’d expected.

  “Highstrong Keep,” Scroupe directed the carriage, his voice muffled by the glass of the windowpane.

  “Wait—we’re not going to the palace?” Melaine asked, recognizing the name of the new location. She put a hand on the glass.

  “We’re not going anywhere,” Overseer Scroupe replied. “You are going to Highstrong Keep. The Overlord no longer stays in Centara.”

  Highstrong.

  Melaine shuddered as the carriage fled the city, trading the cobblestone streets and timber-and-stone buildings for a wide, muddy road and tall, menacing trees with ever-thicker trunks. Tangled briars clawed at their roots, not a flower or berry among them in the early autumn. Their twisted, narrow leaves were turning brown, rattling like dried husks in the wind or the scrabbling claws of rats. Crows cawed and beat their wings among the tree branches, their black bodies hunched like hooded reapers on their perch as they watched the carriage go by.

  Highstrong Keep was visible from Stakeside roofs—a small, black spot on a high crag far beyond the south wall. Most people avoided looking at it, as if a single glance would bring a curse upon them.

  It had long been said the ancient keep was haunted. It had been nothing but First Era ruins in the old days before the war. Then the Overlord had used it as a foothold for his attack on the White City. New rumors held that he had started using it as experimental ground for his darkest magic in recent years.

  Now, it was said to be worse than haunted.

  Melaine had never given credence to the rumors about Highstrong Keep. Imaginings of the Overlord’s mysterious experiments thrilled her with goosebumps, but she had never thought it likely the Overlord would use Highstrong for anything. Not when he had a magnificent palace at his disposal.

  Now, she didn’t understand why the Overlord sat back in Highstrong’s walls while his overseers ate into the populace like termites, growing fat as they destroyed the city from the inside. Judging from his face in the beautiful illustrations, she knew he had to have a good reason for being there. Someone as ingenious as he must have a good reason for every little decision he made.

  Melaine hoped one such decision would be to not kill her upon arrival.

  She rubbed her clammy fingers together while the trees crowded round and the horses sped through them. The nervous beasts ran as if the trees were ghastly predators, reaching out to scratch them with skeletal limbs. Melaine kept her eyes on the windows, trying to maintain sharp awareness of her surroundings at every moment, but the closeness of the trees soon blocked out the sunlight. She was riding in the dark.

  She could hear nothing but the pounding beat of
the horses’ hooves and the rolling clatter of carriage wheels. She held on to the seat beneath her, tightening her grip on the velvet cushion with every jarring bump and clenching her teeth so she wouldn’t bite her tongue. The carriage started ascending a steep incline. The metal rods and springs of the navigation mechagic grated and rang with every twist up a narrow trail that deviated from the main road.

  The trees finally thinned, giving way to massive, looming boulders that took on monstrous forms of hulking giants. The sun was low in the sky behind Melaine, and the stones cast mountainous shadows over the carriage. As the road continued to wind upward, the boulders started to fuse into one another along the roadsides. They appeared to be actively closing in, stomping along the landscape in silent threat.

  Melaine shrank against the silk-papered wall and huddled under the everflame candlestick as the carriage made another sharp turn and rolled along a craggy plateau. Trees took over the land again on the left side of the carriage, and the huge boulders on the right fused into an enormous wall of seamless, gray granite that stretched far ahead. It seemed to be a part of the plateau itself, exposed bones of the cliffs, excavated to provide an impenetrable barrier against any army that dare lay siege to Highstrong Keep.

  Melaine watched the natural rock wall with wide eyes as it continued to dominate the plateau. It seemed endless, but after some time, the carriage rolled to a stop with the sharp pop of magic and the twang of springs and hinges. The horses whinnied, their hooves stamping hard at packed dirt.

  A gate loomed over Melaine. With her jaw dropped in awe, she twisted her neck into an uncomfortable position to stare as high as she was able.

  The giant gate was made from countless columns of pure black, iron bars. They extended from the crags at her feet to the top of the towering wall, arranged like a grand pipe organ. Melaine could feel potent magic pushing through her carriage door like the reverberations of a dirge. The magic emanated from the gate’s center—a barrier far stronger than the imposing, impenetrable iron.