Lady Smoke

by Laura Sebastian

  He finally meets my gaze, expression inscrutable.

  I continue. “I haven’t told anyone else, not even Blaise. I’m sure he and Art assume I didn’t get the chance, but I did. I just wasn’t strong enough to take it. And it feels good to tell someone else. It feels good to tell you.”

  Heron chews the meat slowly, looking down at his plate. He breaks off a corner of a piece of hardtack, then breaks that piece in half.

  “I told you about Leonidas,” he says quietly. “We met in the Air Mine when we were first brought there, became friends right away. He was one of the only things that made surviving there bearable. He was there when they killed my mother in front of me; he was there when my sister missed too many quotas and they took her down to the submine. He was there when they brought her body back. And I was there when they took his brother, then his oldest friend. We held each other and sobbed and somehow, in that ugly nightmare of an existence, we found love. It wasn’t a story like the ones parents tell their children about romance and happily-ever-afters, but it was love. It was all that kept me getting up in the mornings.”

  He crushes one corner of the hardtack into crumbs beneath his thumb, eyes unfocused and narrow.

  “The symptoms started slowly, but we both knew what they meant. His skin was hot to the touch, like he was always running a fever, and he slept less and less until he finally stopped altogether. We never talked about it, not in so many words, but we hid it as best we could from the guards. We managed for a while, but there’s no hiding mine madness forever.”

  So the weight on his shoulders isn’t about Elpis, then. I lean toward him.

  “Did they kill him on the spot?” I ask, hoping they did. At least then it would have been a quick death, a less painful one. A mercy killing, though I know the Kalovaxians aren’t capable of mercy.

  But Heron shakes his head, swallowing. “They took him away. For his execution, they said. But now we know that might not have been true.”

  My stomach sours. It’s possible they sent him into battle as a berserker, but there are even worse fates than that. There were experiments—I’d seen them myself, performed on the last three of my mother’s Guardians, kept in the palace dungeons for a decade. Blood had been drawn, fingers amputated, skin sliced open. It’s possible that happened to Leonidas, but I will never tell Heron that.

  He continues. “I fought the guards when they took him away. I knocked one unconscious, even. So they threw me in the submine,” he says, shuddering. “I hope you never see such a place, but it haunts my nightmares. There was crusted blood on the walls, and I knew some of it must have belonged to my sister, Imogen. And the smell—sulfur and rot so pungent you never get used to it. When they brought others down there, their screams would pierce the walls of the cave, but I never screamed. I curled up and waited to die.

  “I had nothing left,” he tells me, leaning across the table to take my hands in his much larger ones. His expression is strange, not horrified or sad, the way I’d expect him to look. Instead, he is alight with hope for the first time since I met him. “That was when the gods blessed me, when Ozam gave me his gift. I’d thought it was a gift so that I could get revenge, but what if it’s so I can save him?”

  “You think Leonidas might be alive,” I realize.

  “It’s possible.” His grip on my hands tightens. “I never felt like he was really dead. It never felt real. I know I would have felt it if he were dead.”

  Part of me wants to tell him that isn’t necessarily true. Part of me wants to tell him that sometimes I still don’t feel like my mother’s really dead, even though I saw her die with my own eyes. A feeling isn’t proof. But I can’t bear to kill the scrap of hope he’s found, though I don’t want that scrap of hope to destroy him when it leads to nothing either.

  “Most people with mine madness don’t live longer than a few weeks,” I point out carefully.

  “I know,” he says quickly before giving me a heavy look. “But we both know it’s possible to survive much longer.”

  I shake my head. It isn’t that I’m surprised Heron has seen Blaise’s symptoms—he’s suspected mine madness, I’d assume—but it still has the weight of a secret, and one I’m not keen on talking about with anyone. Not even Heron.

  “It’s possible, that’s all I’m saying,” Heron says. His grip on my hands has gotten so tight I can’t feel my fingers anymore.

  “It’s possible,” I agree gently. “But I’m not sure what we can do about it, Heron.”

  He’s quiet for a moment, and I can tell he’s trying to figure out the right words. “Søren might know something. About mine madness and bersekers. About what might have happened.”

  I shake my head. “He used berserkers, but I don’t think he knew much about them. He was following orders.”

  “It’s possible, though,” he says, his voice turning more desperate.

  I shake my head. “It isn’t a good idea for me to talk to him, Heron,” I say. “But if you ask—”

  “I tried. He won’t talk to me,” he says. It feels like someone dropped cold water down my back. Heron has visited Søren? Ignoring my surprise, he continues. “One of his guards told me that he hasn’t said a word since we brought him aboard.”

  “He’s being held hostage,” I say. “That doesn’t usually make people like Søren very chatty. I doubt he’ll talk to me either.”

  Heron looks at me like he can see through straight to my deepest thoughts.

  “He’ll talk to you,” he says. “Please. I know it might be a dead end, I know that chances are Leo is already in the After, calling me a fool right now, but if he isn’t—if there’s even the slightest chance that he’s still out there—I need to know. If anyone can understand that, you can.”

  My mother is never far from my thoughts, but now she overwhelms them and I can’t help thinking about what might have happened if I hadn’t seen her killed with my own eyes, if I hadn’t felt her hand around mine go limp as the life left her. If there was a sliver of a chance that she was still alive, what would I do to find her?

  The answer is simple: there is nothing I wouldn’t do.

  “We’ll visit him tonight,” I tell Heron.

  * * *

  —

  Blaise has a late-night shift but agrees to stay with me until I fall asleep. Though I’m grateful for the company, my conversation with Heron weighs heavily on my shoulders. I don’t mean to lie, but I also can’t bring myself to tell Blaise about going to see Søren tonight. I don’t want to know what he’ll say about that.

  “If we get to Sta’Crivero and Dragonsbane still tries to push this marriage business,” he says, keeping his back to me as I change into a nightgown, “we can leave. There are plenty of other ships in Sta’Crivero. You, me, Heron, and Art in the kitchens.”

  He doesn’t mention Søren, which only affirms my decision not to tell him about my plan. In his mind, Søren is Dragonsbane’s problem now and nothing more. He wouldn’t understand. He would only wonder if there was any truth to the rumors that are swirling about our involvement.

  “We need Dragonsbane for more than her ships,” I remind him with a sigh, pulling the cotton nightgown over my head. “And she knows that. You can turn around, I’m decent.”

  He does, and his eyes dance down my body before working their way back up to meet mine. He smiles slightly.

  “You’re never decent,” he tells me, making me smile back. It’s another fleeting glimpse of a simpler, more playful life we could have had. His smile fades too quickly, though, and we fall back into the life that’s actually ours. “And you can’t really be considering her proposal.”

  “Of course not,” I scoff. “But it isn’t as easy as leaving, you know that. Anyone else we accept help from will want something. Everyone wants something from me.”

  I don’t realize how true the words are until I
say them out loud, but once they are said, they are undeniable.

  I stretch out under the covers and turn to face the wall my bed is pressed up against, hearing him shuck his own boots off before the mattress gives as he crawls in next to me.

  I still feel the lie hanging uncomfortably between us even as he fits his body to mine, his chest pressing against my back, his bent knees curling behind mine, his forehead touching the back of my head. Tentatively, his arm comes around my waist, his skin hot.

  He smells like Astrea, like spices and hearth fire and home.

  “I just want you,” he whispers, the words tentative.

  I trace the tips of my fingers over his arms, words that I want to say back lodged in my throat.

  I PRETEND TO SLEEP UNTIL BLAISE leaves for his shift, trying to ignore the pool of anxiety that has taken up residence in my gut. I’m going to see Søren tonight, and though I’d like to pretend my biggest worry about that is being caught, that’s not the whole truth of it. The last time I saw him, I had betrayed him and he had told me he loved me anyway. He doesn’t. He can’t love me. But something tells me this meeting won’t be any more comfortable.

  I did what I had to do, I tell myself again, and though that might be the truth, it doesn’t ease the guilt that’s worked its way under my skin.

  Luckily, I don’t have long to think about it before Heron arrives with a knock so soft I almost miss it. I push Blaise’s words out of my mind and throw off the blankets, climbing out of bed.

  “Come in,” I call out, slipping my boots back on.

  The door opens wide and then closes again, and I’d think it was only the wind if I didn’t know better.

  “Did you tell Blaise what we were doing tonight?” Heron asks, shimmering into view. The Air Gem chandelier earring I stole from Crescentia is now hooked through the material of his shirt, just above his heart like a badge. In the aftermath of its use, the tiny, clear gems glow in the darkness for a moment, giving enough light to see Heron’s face, creased with worry and a grim kind of hope.

  “Would you have?” I reply, tying the laces of one boot, then the other before pulling on my cloak over my nightgown. “We both know he would have tried to talk me out of it. No one can see me go down there.”

  Heron holds a hand out to me to help me stand up, and when I take it, our joined fingers begin to fade from sight, leaving behind a tingling feeling, like they have fallen asleep. The feeling travels up my arm, erasing it as it goes, along with Heron’s. Our shoulders, torsos, heads, and legs all disappear, until the room looks empty and my whole body is buzzing.

  “I won’t be able to hold it over both of us for long, so we’d better get moving now,” he says, shifting his grip so that our fingers are linked before pulling me out the door and letting it slam behind us.

  I stay close to him as he hurries down the hallway, nimbly sidestepping the handful of skeleton crew members bustling about.

  A couple of them must feel us as we pass: they look around uncertainly, a shiver of fear dancing down their spines as they imagine ghosts and tell themselves it’s only the wind.

  I have only a vague idea of where Søren is being kept, but Heron knows the way well enough, twisting and turning down passageways and rickety spiral staircases. I only have to follow along and try to keep my thoughts from lingering too long on Søren.

  I am only going to ask him questions, I remind myself. We aren’t going to talk about his suggestion that Blaise was mine-mad or how he insinuated I might have real feelings for him.

  I don’t. Maybe I did once, but that was before he’d led his men to butcher thousands in Vecturia. That was before I saw him for who he really was. But even as I think that, I know it isn’t the full truth. No, I don’t love him, but I do care for him. I don’t want to see him in chains. I don’t want to know that I was the one who put him there.

  Two men stand guard outside a door at the end of the final passageway, both holding crudely made spears at their sides and looking sleep-drawn. Seeing them makes my whole body tense, though I should have expected them—there’s no way Dragonsbane would have left Søren unguarded.

  Heron feels my panic and he squeezes my hand before uncurling his fingers from mine and moving my hand to his forearm instead. He keeps walking toward them, so I imagine he must have a plan. Stepping out of the shadows, he lets his invisibility fade so that he comes into focus before the guards, startling them.

  I wait for visibility to come over me, too, a bevy of poor excuses flying to my lips, but my invisibility holds. I cling to his arm tightly, my heart pounding in my chest.

  “Evening,” Heron says, nodding to each of them in turn.

  “Looking for a shot at him?” one of them asks.

  I’m not sure what he means, but Heron only nods. “I’ll be ten minutes,” he says.

  The two guards step aside and let Heron pass, me half a step behind him, trying to puzzle out his words.

  A shot at him. It doesn’t mean what it sounds like. It can’t mean that. Dragonsbane would never allow—but as soon as I start to think it, I know she would. Heron would have told me if he knew, though. He would have tried to stop it. That much I am sure of.

  But when the door closes behind us and my eyes adjust to the dimly lit room, my stomach sinks.

  Søren is slumped against the far wall, an open porthole the size of my hand above his head the only source of fresh air. Heavy, rusted iron manacles are clasped around his wrists, old and new blood on the skin around them. He’s wearing the same clothes he wore the last time I saw him, though now they’re tattered and bloody. He doesn’t look anything like he did only two days ago; his close-cropped hair looks more crimson than blond and his face is covered in bruises and open cuts.

  He doesn’t lift his head when he hears us enter, though he does flinch away from the sound.

  There is a plank of wood on the ground near him, the edge of which is covered with blood.

  Bile rises in my throat and I recoil from Heron, breaking our connection when I do. I turn and retch in the corner, emptying my stomach.

  I feel Heron behind me and he reaches a tentative hand out to touch my shoulder, but I shove him away.

  “You knew about this,” I hiss. Even with this rage and nausea racking my body, I’m aware of the guards on the other side of the door.

  Heron’s eyes don’t leave mine; he doesn’t cower from my anger. He lets it wash over him.

  “Yes.” He doesn’t sound quite like the Heron I know. It’s like he’s been broken into two jagged halves, sharp enough to draw blood.

  I swallow the fresh waves of sickness that come over me, placing a hand on my stomach.

  “Did you take part?” I ask, though I’m not sure I want to know the answer.

  “No,” he says, and I let out a breath of relief. “Though it was tempting.”

  “You didn’t tell me—”

  “It’s the same thing they did to you, Theo,” he says.

  But not Søren, I think, even though I know that’s a poor defense. I understand how this happened, how so many people on this ship would want to come here and take their fury and grief out on the only person they can reach who is responsible. I understand the desire to take something back from the Kalovaxians, I do, but it isn’t right.

  “Thor…Theodosia?” Søren’s voice is hoarse and cracked, barely stronger than a whisper. He tries to lift his head but winces in pain and lets it drop again.

  I shoulder past Heron and hurry to Søren, dropping to my knees beside him. There have been times when I’ve hated him so much I’ve wanted to kill him—I almost did—but this is something more. I know all about the blood on his hands, the lives he’s taken, the wars he’s waged on innocent people. I haven’t forgiven or forgotten that, and I can’t imagine I ever will. Maybe he deserves this. Maybe it’s his due. Maybe it’s justice.

&nbs
p; But it is not a world I want to live in.

  I reach out to touch his face, and he flinches.

  “Theo,” Heron says behind me, though I’m not sure if it’s a warning or an attempt at an apology.

  “You’re going to fix him,” I say, without looking at Heron, my voice shaking. “Use your gift. Heal him.”

  “No,” he replies.

  “That wasn’t a question,” I snap over my shoulder. “It’s an order. From your queen.”

  Heron is quiet for a moment.

  “No,” he says finally, though he doesn’t sound as sure.

  “Then consider it leverage,” I say through gritted teeth. “You need me to get you answers, and I’m not getting them for you until he’s healed.”

  “You know what he’s done, Theo,” Heron says. “You know what he is.”

  “I do,” I say. “But I also know that we’re better than them. We have to be, or what is the point of the war we’re fighting?”

  He hesitates again. “If I heal him, they’ll only do it again.”

  “I’ll stop them,” I say, though I’m not sure how.

  “Elpis’s mother seems to find some comfort here. Is that something you want to take away from her?”

  Tears sting at my eyes and I hasten to wipe them away.

  “Heal him,” I say again. “Or I won’t get you your answers.”

  With a loud exhale, Heron drops to a crouch on Søren’s other side, taking his limp, broken hand in both of his.

  As Heron’s healing power starts to leak into his body, Søren forces his eyes open and they find mine. There is so much pain there that it takes my breath away.

  “I’ll fix this, Søren. I promise.”

  I shouldn’t make promises I have no idea how to keep, but the words spill out before I can stop them.

  “ ’S’not so bad,” he says with an attempt at a smile. “Could be worse.”

  With Heron’s touch, the torn skin of Søren’s wrists closes and smooths beneath the heavy manacles; the bruises that cover more of his skin than not turn yellow before fading completely. The broken bones of his face, the cut lip, the black eyes, all of them fade before my eyes as if weeks have passed. When Heron is done, Søren almost looks like himself again. But there is no way to magically heal the weariness in the set of his mouth, or the way his eyes are sunken deep into his sallow skin, underlined with harsh purple half-moons.