Riwenne & the Bionic Witches

by Kristen S. Walker

  “I trust him,” Amena said. “I mean, not like I trust you guys, but I know what kind of person he is. He cares about helping artists develop their talent so they can make him money.” She tossed her hair back. “And I’ve made him a lot of money—way more than he was making coaching hopefuls for contests like Star Search.”

  “So you think he can make the government stop chasing you?” I said in awe.

  Amena tilted her head to one side. “For now, I think so? I don’t know what kind of evidence they have on any of us, but if Minister Rennu is the only one who saw my face, then that might just be, like, circumstantial.”

  Tika hopped onto the radio console. “It still seems risky. We should test the waters before making any public announcements.”

  I slipped my way past the others and grabbed Amena by both hands. “This is going to be so amazing! You’ll finally get a chance to sing again!”

  Her eyes shone with happiness in a way I hadn’t seen in a long time. “Do you think my fans will want to see me after everything that’s happened?”

  “Of course! Everyone loves you so much. And we’ll be right there in the front row to cheer you on!”

  Amena grinned. “Oh, there’s no way I’m going on stage alone. I want to make you guys my back-up dancers!”

  Janera coughed. “Wait, what?”

  My eyes widened with terror. “I can’t dance. You know how uncoordinated I am.”

  “Yeah, she’d probably fall off the stage and ruin the whole thing,” Kyra said. I shot her a glare, but she just smirked at me.

  Amena clutched my hands tighter. “Relax, I’ll teach you. Dances for pop concerts are simple and repetitive. It’s easier than learning how to fight, believe me.”

  My stomach dropped like the airship was falling out of the sky. All I wanted to do was watch a concert, not be in one. I’d dreamed of being a pop singer, what little girl didn’t have crazy dreams of becoming famous? But when I tried to picture myself performing in front of a crowd, I could imagine so many ways it could go wrong.

  Fortunately, Amena was too busy with her own preparations to teach us any dance routines. While Deryt and Janera flew us to Ruraqie and found a safe place to hide the airship, Amena was writing new songs.

  This was a side of her I’d never seen before. Unlike the cold, calculating spy she’d been for the rebellion or the energetic pop singer on the stage, the songwriter Amena was more quiet and thoughtful, like she was lost in a daydream. She carried a notebook around with her everywhere and would stop to jot things down in it no matter what she was doing, humming snatches of melodies to herself. She’d even wake up in the middle of the night and switch on the light, which disturbed everyone else in the sleeping cabin.

  Kyra complained the loudest. “If you can’t save it until the morning, why don’t you switch spots with Deryt in the galley? The rest of us need to sleep.”

  Without any discussion, Deryt had set up a hammock in the galley to sleep when he wasn’t flying at night. He’d slept in a separate hut in Jabin Village, too. All the girls (and Vilqa) didn’t worry about privacy around each other, but there was an unspoken rule that the boy kept his distance.

  Amena gathered her things and stood up from her bunk. “Don’t bother him, I’ll go to the cockpit.”

  “Good night,” Kyra snapped, and jammed the light switch off.

  The next day, we hid the airship in a ravine outside of Ruraqie. Amena and Uqra rode the train into the town to meet with her manager alone. We didn’t know of any nearby rebel hideouts where we could sleep, so we had to make do with the ship. Kyra and Deryt went hunting for game while Janera, Vilqa and I went to find other food.

  Ruraqie wasn’t quite a town or a city, but it was bigger than any settlement we’d seen. The river delta limited Damondytti and Pisan was small. Ruraqie was a huge, sprawling urban area around a mountain lake. It was actually several towns which had merged, with railways to connect to the rest of the empire.

  Lake Totdo took up most of the plateau. Ruraqie was the largest town at the west end, taking up most of the shore with housing, administrative buildings, entertainment centers, schools and shops. In the north, there were factories, including a huge airfield—they might have built our own ship there. Higher slopes to the west held luxury homes above the smog, while the south was a deep coal mine. The mountains ended in the east with stepped farms and llama ranches to feed the growing population.

  Our little ravine was at the far end of the coal mine. Larger mountains blocked the rainfall so there was only enough water for scrub brush and grass to grow. The empty land reminded me of the area where we’d first met the rebels—used for grazing herds during the wetter months, but abandoned the rest of the year. We were near a river but not much else. Smog and coal dust drifted along the ground, making it hard to breathe.

  I didn’t like stealing again, but there wasn’t much choice. We snuck into the nearest fields and picked food by hand—potatoes, peppers, beans and squash. It was backbreaking work in the hot sun. Hopefully, what we took wasn’t more than would have been eaten by the local wildlife.

  We came back with bags full of vegetables to find Kyra and Deryt skinning guinea pigs. Janera started dinner while we waited for either Amena to return or word from Uqra that things had gone wrong.

  Amena came back on the evening train carrying a guitar and wearing a big grin. “It went really well,” she gushed to us. “I showed Bymonten the new material I’ve been working on and he had a lot of notes for me, very helpful. He also said his legal counsel is working to get the charges against me dropped. If all goes well, we can move into a hotel in town tomorrow.”

  I perked up at the mention of a hotel. “All of us? Staying in a real building?” I clasped my hands together, picturing a bed with clean sheets and a bathhouse with hot running water. All the familiar luxuries Rennu had dangled in front of me, but without his hefty price tag.

  Amena held up a newspaper. “Look, he’s already got a publicist working on the story.” She opened to a page with a headline that read, “Teen Star Amena—Deadly Terrorist or Victim of False Accusation? Manager Says Officials Have No Real Evidence to Charge Her!”

  Deryt took the paper and skimmed it. “Maybe the obnoxious fool can actually deliver on his promise. I’m just glad it wasn’t a trap.”

  Amena patted Uqra on her shoulder. “She would’ve gotten me out of there in a flash if it’d been a trap.”

  Kyra nodded at the guitar. “I didn’t know you could actually play any instruments. I thought you were just a singer.”

  “I don’t play anything on stage so I’m free to move around and dance, but this helps me write the songs.” Amena sat down with the guitar on her lap and started fiddling with some knobs on the end. She’d pluck a string and listen to the sound, turn a knob, then play it again. I didn’t understand, but it seemed like she knew what she was doing.

  Then, to my surprise, she looked up straight at me. “I was hoping you could help me out, Riwenne.”

  “Me?” My voice came out in a squeak. “I don’t know anything about music.”

  She pulled her notebook out of her pocket. “With the lyrics. I want to write new songs about all the gods, but I don’t know much about Quilla. We want people to know the truth about her. You’ve spoken to her the most, as her champion, so maybe you can give me some descriptions of what she’s like?”

  I shifted from one foot to the next. I looked around the galley where we were gathered. Janera was serving food onto plates. “I guess I can try. How about after dinner?”

  Amena set her guitar to one side with a smile. “Great, thanks.”

  After we’d eaten and cleaned up from dinner, the others relaxed in the galley. To keep from bothering them, Amena beckoned for me to follow her outside onto the new gun deck. There was enough space between the guns for us to sit against the wall and enjoy the fresh air. The ravine wasn’t much of a view, but we could see a piece of the night sky with stars and the crescent moon just starting
to slip down below the western mountains.

  I took a deep breath and stretched my arms up, trying to calm my nervousness. “So, um, how do we do this?”

  Amena strummed a note on her guitar, then flipped open her notebook. “I want to sing about all the gods who’ve helped us so far. It’s easy to write something for Sawycha or Omer, because people are familiar with them. Quilla is tougher. But it’s also got to be something catchy, because old religious hymns will bore the audience.” She pointed to a page. “This is the first pop song I wrote for Star Search, ‘The Goddess’s Guide to Love.’ It’s about Qachmy, but it’s not preachy. She’s giving advice to someone who’s falling in love for the first time.”

  I smirked to myself. I’d argued with Kyra about the meaning of this song. Kyra said Amena was bragging about being a goddess herself, but I’d told her the lyrics were passing on advice from a real goddess. Now, as I read the words, I could see how she’d woven in subtle references to Qachmy.

  I tapped a line. “This part about the scent of flowers, and then ‘gentle rain’—that’s the rainforest, right?”

  Amena nodded. “And the ‘red eyes of passion,’” she half-sang. “I added that after the first time I saw Qachmy.”

  I shivered as I remembered the terrifying red eyes the goddess had, whether she appeared like a human or a forest deer. “Those eyes are hard to forget.”

  “So, what details can we include about the moon goddess?”

  I handed the notebook back. “Well, you saw her, too. The midnight-dark skin, the silver hair, eyes sparkling like stars…” As I described her, I could picture her perfectly. “And her dress was like silk spun out of glass, beaded with the most delicate pearls. I’m not sure if it was the clothes or the marble temple, but she seemed to glow like the moon, even in the darkness where we found her.”

  Amena was scribbling in her notebook. “Those are all good physical traits,” she said. “But what about her personality? She’s spoken through you before. Did that give you any special insights into what she’s like?”

  I closed my eyes and tried to remember how it felt. “She’s been talking to me for a while, I guess, but I didn’t know who it was. All I knew is she didn’t sound like Sawycha.” I opened my eyes again. “With the sea goddess, you can tell there’s shifting emotions on the surface but something else runs underneath, and the deep holds mysteries we might never know. I think the crystal prison was just one of her secrets. But with Quilla, it’s like she’s always there, watching over me.”

  I tipped my face up to see the moon. Half of the crescent was out of sight, but it was enough to reassure me. “Whether or not you can see the moon, it never goes away. She protected us even when she was trapped herself. I wish I could be that reliable.”

  Amena looked up from her writing. “Maybe you can learn from her example.”

  I didn’t know if she meant that to be an encouragement or an insult. “Um, thanks,” I mumbled, hoping it was the first one.

  “She will always watch over you,” Amena said in a sing-song tone. “Hm, I’ll have to experiment with the melody. But what should we call her? I’m afraid that using Quilla or moon goddess will raise too many red flags.”

  “What about… the maiden of light?”

  “That has a nice ring to it.” Amena plucked the strings softly. “Twirling in her silken glass dress, she will always watch over you, sweet, sweet maiden of light,” she sang, starting in a high pitch then descending in a soothing way.

  A wave of exhaustion swept over me. I stifled a yawn. “Sounds like a lullaby.”

  She had her head bent over the guitar as she picked out the same sequence of notes, but she smiled at me out of the corner of her eye. “I thought it was fitting. A song for twilight, when the sun has gone.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “The opposite of the morning prayers to Chysa?”

  Inspiration flickered across her face and her fingers flew into a new set of chords. “I offer up my prayers to the sky, knowing it will bring me happiness.”

  A tickle of power rose in my chest. I could sense Quilla’s presence close by, so much that I expected to turn my head and see her. “I think the goddess approves,” I whispered.

  Amena grinned. “I usually get a sense of when I’m on the right track.”

  I sat back and listened as she fingered around with various snatches of melody, writing words as they came to her. It was like she already knew the song, maybe something she’d learned as a child, and she just had to remember how it went. It wasn’t the most complicated piece of music, but it was still fascinating to see how the words and notes came together.

  When she had written it all down, she played through the full song twice. The first time she stopped after every few lines to ask my opinions, and the second she ran straight through with confidence. I could picture her on the stage with a single spotlight and the crowd swaying back and forth to the rhythm.

  “That’s so pretty,” I said at the end. I described what I’d imagined of her performance.

  She tapped her chin. “Maybe I’ll play this one on stage. I can’t imagine dancing to it.” She shrugged. “I’ll have to see what Bymonten and his choreographer think. I don’t know much about making it look good for an audience.”

  “As an audience member, I’d be excited to see you play. It’s a softer image for you.” I nodded at the notebook and guitar. “You make it look so easy. Have you done music for a long time?”

  Amena put down the instrument and rubbed her hands. “I haven’t played since we left. I’ll have to build up the callouses again.” She gazed off into the distance. “I guess I’ve been writing songs for a while. Simple stuff, like, I wrote things to help Mama teach the other children in the village school. Little ditties that were easy to remember. And you know, ‘Road to Freedom’ was an anthem I did for the rebellion. I had to rewrite the words to be less controversial.”

  My eyes widened. “No way!” I leaned forward. “You should sing the original in your concert. That’d get people riled up.”

  She pursed her lips together. “We’ll see. Fans can get upset if you change their old favorites on them.” She pushed up to her feet with a groan. “Should we get some sleep? I think it’s getting late.”

  I tried to stand and found my muscles had cramped up from sitting for so long. “Wow, I didn’t realize how long we were out here.” It only took a moment’s concentration for me to heal the stiffness. It was so nice having magic again.

  I reached out to Amena. “Do your hands hurt bad? I can fix it for you.”

  She shook her head. “It’s fine, the pain is part of getting my skills back. You can’t use magic to fix everything.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Now you sound like Tika. So long as I’m not doing enough to let our enemies know where we are, why can’t I use magic? Things are hard enough for us as it is. The gods gave us these powers to help with our mission, and I think not suffering too much over all the little things should be part of that.”

  Amena chuckled. “Fine, I’ll let Tika lecture you.” She slid open the door and let me step inside first. “I’ll sleep in the cockpit again in case I get any more late night ideas. If I don’t write them down, I might forget them by the morning.” She paused and leaned closer to me. “Are you sure about this plan? Once I make a public appearance, it’ll be hard to go back into hiding. This will draw attention to all of us and it could be bad.”

  I touched her hand. “I’m sure. People love you, so they’ll listen to you. We’ll handle anything that comes after that.”

  She smiled at me and headed for the front of the airship.

  20

  Downtown

  I said good night to Amena and headed the other way for the sleeping cabin. The lights were turned down low in the galley, so I tiptoed past Deryt’s hammock. But when I slipped into the engine room, I found Kyra blocking the door at the back.

  She folded her arms and glared at me. “Well, you guys sure spent a long time alone. Cozying up t
o Amena now she’s a pop star again?”

  I rolled my eyes. “I know you like her better when she’s teaching you how to be a rebel agent. If you cared about her, you’d understand that singing is her dream. She deserves some happiness despite everything else.”

  Kyra swept her long, dark hair back over her shoulder in the way that always made me stare. She was so pretty, even when she was angry. “I don’t care if Amena does what she wants,” she said archly. “I’m more concerned about the people who get hurt by your fickleness. I know what you’re like, bouncing from one person to another on a whim, but Vilqa just met you. You should consider their feelings.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Kyra stepped closer like she was trying to intimidate me. “I mean the way you dazzle everyone with how nice you are, like they’re your best friend. But then you get bored and switch to someone else.”

  I could feel the anger radiating off her like heat, but I didn’t back away. “I think of everyone as my best friend. I try to spread my time around, but sometimes it feels like people don’t want to be around me.” I folded my arms. “What’s wrong with having lots of friends?”

  “Because sometimes people get the idea that you want to be more than just friends, and then they get their feelings hurt.” She kept her voice low, but it was so spiteful that she might as well have been yelling.

  My heart was pounding in my ears and I could feel my whole face flushing. “More than friends? With Vilqa?” I was so confused. I’d never told anyone but Nexita about my crush, but I thought my feelings for Kyra were more than obvious to everyone at this point.

  “Yes, Vilqa, who was sulking the entire time you were outside with Amena,” Kyra snapped. “You’re the only one who’s talked to them, so when you weren’t there, they just sat there and stared off into space. It was awkward for everyone.”