Cry of Metal & Bone

by L. Penelope

  Lizvette’s fingers flew to her mouth on a gasp. Darvyn looked away, his face burning with shame. Of course Tai would assume that was the only reason. In truth, Darvyn had been thinking of nothing but Kyara.

  “I met them two years ago,” Tai continued. “Her father and twin brothers.” He closed his eyes. “I watched them die on my ship, killed by a Physick who was hunting them.” When his eyes opened again they were red, rimmed with tears. “But somehow they survived.”

  “How?” Lizvette asked.

  Tai shook his head. Darvyn stared at the ground, his guilty eyes unseeing. For the first time in his life, pure selfishness was his only motive. Not Oola’s mission. Not bringing the Dominionists who’d helped orchestrate the temple bombing to justice. Not even determining where the next attack would be. Though he’d made vows he intended to keep, they all faded when compared with the thought of Kyara at the mercy of the same vile mages who had killed his mother …

  No vow could stop him from pursuing Kyara a moment longer.

  He squeezed his jaw tight to hold in the rage that was forming, a rage that had no outlet until he found her and made sure she was safe.

  “So that is the real reason you were sent?” Lizvette asked Tai. Darvyn struggled to bring himself back into the conversation.

  “Yes.”

  “And you knew this, too?” She looked over at Darvyn, but he had a hard time meeting her eyes.

  “I did,” he said through clenched teeth. “But there’s something else.”

  Both looked at him with trust in their eyes. He swallowed the knot in his throat as his own eyes filled with tears. Shame was heavy on his shoulders, but it would not deter him. Nothing would.

  “I need to tell you about Kyara.”

  He forced out the story of the assassin he’d met in the desert, a woman who had been tasked with capturing him. He showed them the pendant he wore that had stayed her hand when she was about to strike. Told of how she’d had the matching half of his pendant given to her by his own mother, who’d taken Kyara in long after Darvyn had been sent to live with the Keepers for his own safety.

  When he’d been taken prisoner in Lagrimar’s glass castle, she had risked herself to save him. Now there was nothing he wouldn’t do for her.

  “I don’t know if I can make you understand,” he said, squeezing the back of his neck.

  “I understand.” Tai’s voice was low. “You love her.”

  Darvyn looked into the other man’s eyes. Comprehension lived there, more than he’d given Tai credit for.

  A wave of exhaustion tugged at his knees, and he leaned back against the wall.

  “You must be hungry,” Lizvette said, rising and walking toward the telephone. “We can’t go anywhere until you’ve at least had breakfast.”

  Darvyn’s stomach rumbled just then, punctuating her words. An extra few minutes for food couldn’t hurt. Much.

  But Tai’s brows furrowed. He swiveled around to face her. “We?”

  She held up a finger as she called for room service. When she’d replaced the handset, she squared her shoulders and faced Tai. Darvyn sighed. He really didn’t need their bickering right now. His Song grazed their emotions, then jumped away sharply. Best for him not to get involved in whatever was going on there.

  “Yes. It is possible that Queen Jasminda’s family is being held in the same place as Darvyn’s Kyara,” Lizvette said.

  His Kyara. He liked the sound of that.

  “Possible, yes,” Tai said cautiously.

  “As that is the best lead we have for the Goddess’s mission, it seems prudent to follow up on it immediately.” Her hands fluttered in front of her as she moved to the window. “My chance to catch my father is likely gone. The race begins in under an hour, and when Clove shows up right as the river, he’ll know he cannot trust me. I don’t know how he’ll react to that. I don’t think I should stay if you all are leaving.”

  Tai ran his hands through his hair, making it stand up in blue tufts. He muttered to himself in what must be Raunian and began to pace again. “You know I won’t let him harm you, don’t you?”

  The emotions in the room were in flux again, and Darvyn let go of his Song completely. “What’s happened to Clove?” he asked.

  Lizvette clutched the neck of her gown, appearing flustered. It was Tai who growled out the story of Nirall’s scheme for Lizvette to sabotage the race by harming Clove. Vanesse had stuck close by her side all morning, and the Foreign Service had not let the pilot out of their sight.

  “I owe Queen Jasminda a debt,” Lizvette said quietly. “If I would not be in the way, I would very much like the chance to repay it in some small measure. I’m certain the return of her family would be of great comfort to her.”

  “Perhaps it would help with your situation,” Darvyn said.

  Lizvette crossed her arms and lifted her chin. “I’m not looking for praise or gratitude. You don’t even have to tell her I did anything. I simply want to help.”

  Darvyn held up his hands in apology. Tai glared at him, and Darvyn was never more grateful for the knock at the door and the arrival of breakfast.

  When the bellman left, Lizvette spoke up. “If we leave during the race, we’ll arrive in Dahlinea before it ends.” She left unspoken what her father might do to her if she stayed in Melbain and Clove won. Tai looked ready to fight someone.

  “Should we leave Vanesse and Clove a note?” she asked.

  “No, considering how easily Nirall was able to get in here,” Tai replied. “We’ll leave a message with Zivel or one of his men.”

  “So we’re agreed? We go to Dahlinea to find Kyara and search for Jasminda’s family.” Lizvette blinked, waiting for a response.

  Tai took a deep breath before nodding slowly. He seemed reluctant to bring Lizvette along, but Darvyn was glad she’d be with them. Though he knew she didn’t yet believe it, she’d done well so far and brought a wealth of knowledge and experience they lacked.

  He closed his eyes and pictured Kyara. I’m coming for you. Please hold on.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  At the summit of the mountain lay an eagle’s nest, where a mother bird fed her young. “Best turn back,” the eagle said. “Where will you go next, the sky?”

  Ayal looked past the clouds, with their portents of doom, trying to see where the sky ended. But she could no more see the top of the heavens than she could the future.

  —THE AYALYA

  Varten was fully awake and eating for the first time in days. His skin remained ghostly pale and coated in a sheen of sweat that soaked his clothes, but it gave them hope for the first time in a long while. He and Roshon eagerly wolfed down their evening meals. Dansig ate more slowly, watching his sons with a preternatural patience Kyara envied. He turned to her and frowned, likely at the fact that she hadn’t been brought any food.

  He looked as though he might offer her something from his plate when the outer door opened and Asenath arrived. However, the woman’s slow, pained movements were alarming. Kyara approached the bars, regarding Asenath’s struggle to shuffle over and place the dinner tray on the ground. It fell with a clatter.

  “What’s wrong?” Kyara asked. “Are you unwell?”

  Asenath remained bent over, one hand on her waist, the other curled around the bar. “Just a bit of weakness.” When she looked up, Kyara swallowed a gasp. She hadn’t seen the old woman since she delivered the hairpin, but in a few short days, Asenath had aged rapidly. Sagging skin framed her eyes, and her cheeks were drawn and thin. How was this possible?

  Kyara’s eyes widened. “What’s happened?”

  “Everything has a cost. Even doing what’s right.” Asenath’s gnarled fingers released the bar. “Here,” she said, dropping something into Kyara’s hand.

  The round, flat gold coin engraved with strange but familiar characters was hot in her palm. Embedded in the metal, a pink crystalline stone winked at her. Kyara stared dazedly at Asenath. “How … how did you get this?” She immediately
thought of the girl at the graduation ceremony that she’d assumed was Asenath’s granddaughter. The girl could have provided the medallion, but given the elaborate ceremony, they must be unimaginably valuable. “What do I do with it?” Kyara asked, pressing it deeper into her palm.

  Asenath opened her mouth to answer but promptly collapsed in a heap on the ground. Kyara cried out and reached for her, grasping the woman’s frail hand and stroking her tissue-thin skin. Roshon and Dansig began shouting for help. A guard poked his head in and swore when he saw the crumpled body. He rushed over, picked up Asenath, and carried her out of the chamber, hopefully to get her medical attention.

  Kyara stared at the door for a long time, but the chances were slim that a guard would bring a prisoner an update on the condition of a servant. Asenath had mentioned others who believed as she did. Was she working with anyone who knew of her ill health? Would they be able to send another to apprise the prisoners?

  Both cells remained quiet with unspoken worry. Kyara turned her attention back to the medallion in her palm. Unlike the hairpin amalgamation, this bit of magic didn’t vibrate or give her any kind of feeling at all. She wasn’t sure how to even use it. Her only other experience with amalgamation magic had been back in Lagrimar, when Ydaris had given her a locket full of stored Nethersong. It had allowed Kyara to overcome the blood spell that bound her actions. But if this medallion contained death energy, she could not sense it.

  “May I see it?” Dansig asked on a breath.

  Kyara handed it to him through the bars. “It’s one of the medallions they created the last time I was drained. Or at least one just like it.”

  He bounced it in his palm a few times, as if testing its weight.

  “I think they must all have them, at least all the initiated Physicks. Ydaris certainly does.” She shivered to remember the extent of Ydaris’s brutal power, always thought to be Earthsong since no one in Lagrimar knew much of other magics.

  Dansig frowned. “If the Cantor had one, then they must be truly powerful.”

  “I got the impression that some are more powerful than others. They said the ones created using my Song will last the owners their entire lives.”

  “I wonder if there’s a way to discover its usage without the guidance of a Physick.” He squeezed his fist around it and closed his eyes. The only sound in the chamber was Varten’s labored breathing. Both twins watched their father as long minutes passed. Finally, he opened his eyes and shook his head.

  “Maybe the bracelets block the amalgam magic, as well,” Kyara offered.

  Dansig turned his wrists, encased in the caldera bracelets that obstructed his Song. “Perhaps,” he muttered.

  Roshon stood up and approached his father. “Physicks have no inborn magic, right?”

  “Right,” Kyara said, nodding slowly.

  “Like me?” He held out his hand. “Kyara said the Cantor mimicked having a Song for decades using something like this. Perhaps it will work for me since I don’t have a Song, either.”

  A moment passed in which something seemed to be communicated between father and son. Begrudgingly, Dansig gave the medallion to Roshon. “Be careful with it. We don’t know how it works, son.”

  Roshon studied the circle of metal. “It must behave like a Song—at least a little bit. How do you sing, Papa?”

  Dansig ran his hands through the coils of his hair. He sat down on his bed and leaned forward, elbows on his knees, jaw clenched. Kyara sat, too, her dinner forgotten on the floor. Was it possible only a non-Singer could work the medallion?

  “To use Earthsong, you open your inner Song to the source—the endless sea of mingling energy of every living thing. You are essentially dipping your toe into the waves of the ocean and trying to draw in as much water as you can and then hold it in your body and reshape it.”

  Roshon eyed the medallion. “And Nethersong?” he asked, turning to Kyara.

  She sighed. “Nethersong is like holding on to the leash of a wild boar. Its tusks swipe at you and it nearly pulls your shoulder from its socket. Holding on is hardly even possible, but if you don’t, everyone around you will die.” She could not hold in the bitterness that seeped from her voice. Dansig winced, but Roshon nodded as if he understood.

  “And amalgam is both,” he added. “So if I have no Song, how would I attempt to weave some mixture of the two energies?”

  Kyara shook her head. “The ocean on a leash? I don’t see how it’s possible.”

  Dansig rubbed his chin. “The Physicks trap the energies in objects, so instead of connecting with Earthsong or Nethersong and bringing it inside you, I suspect the medallion does that for you. Perhaps use it to focus the combined energy and manage it.”

  “What’s the first thing you taught Jasminda?” Roshon asked. “When you linked with her when she was young?”

  Dansig’s focus loosened. A pang went through Kyara to watch the softness in his face as he thought about his eldest child. “A bit of wind,” he said. “It’s easy enough to control, being so insubstantial, and it’s something you can feel. A breeze across the face is the first thing my mother taught me, and it’s what I showed her.”

  Roshon stood in the center of the cell, his eyes squeezed shut in concentration. Sweat beaded on his forehead, and his veins stood out in bold relief on his neck. He looked pained but held the rigid posture as the minutes ticked by.

  Nothing happened.

  Varten stared up at his twin, worry creasing his face. His eyes were heavy, the exhaustion of his mysterious illness weighing him down. He was struggling to stay awake.

  She was about to ask Roshon if he wanted to take a break and try another tack when a whistling disturbed the air by her ear. Her head shot around, thinking she’d imagined the sound, but Dansig’s astounded gaze met hers. He’d heard it, too.

  A puff of air lifted the edge of her tunic. The breeze rose to echo off the stone walls of the chamber. Then the gentle wind grew stronger and swelled rapidly into a violent gust that blew over the cup on her tray and made the whole thing slide nearly out of the cell. Their clothing blew around their bodies. Kyara’s braids trailed out behind her as the blast nearly knocked her on her side.

  Varten gripped his mattress, struggling to hold on. Dansig stood, reaching for Roshon, whose eyes were wide with terror.

  “I can’t stop! I don’t know how to control it!” he cried.

  “Don’t try to control the energy,” his father yelled. “Control yourself!”

  The gale grew even more frenzied. Kyara clung to the rail of the bed, which was bolted into the ground. The sturdy metal creaked and swayed, in danger of ripping out of the stone floor. Her tunic flapped and tore.

  “Roshon!” she screamed. “Tighten the leash!”

  She squinted against the wind and could only see in flashes. Roshon was barely holding his ground against the storm. She wasn’t sure he would be able to reel in the outburst of energy.

  Dansig launched himself forward, hurtling his body into Roshon’s. The medallion fell from the boy’s hand, and the wind died to nothing.

  They all lay there gasping for breath, their few belongings strewn around the cells.

  A guard came thundering in. “What’s all the ruckus in here?” he asked in a gruff voice. The translator buzzed in her hair.

  Dansig approached the bars and grinned sheepishly. He motioned to his sons and mimed a fight between the two.

  The guard narrowed his eyes, but there could be no reasonable explanation for the condition of the cells. If he suspected any magical involvement, they would be in trouble, but he took another look around, told them to keep it down, and stalked away.

  As they put their cells back together, Kyara began to laugh. She shook her head slightly and faced three incredulous faces.

  She shrugged. “It really was a valiant effort, Roshon. Next time, we’ll have to bundle everything up a bit.”

  “Next time?” he bit out, his voice rising an octave.

  “Oh yes,” she said
. “The first try is always a little rough. But you’ll get the hang of it.”

  His mouth hung open. It snapped shut at the sound behind him. Varten sat on his bed, arms across his belly, his face turning red as his body shook. Panic stiffened Kyara in place, until she realized what she was seeing. The teen wasn’t in the midst of some sort of seizure, he was laughing.

  The sound, so little heard of late, warmed and soothed her. It must have had a similar effect on the others, for the tension in the cells dissolved. If Roshon could master the medallion without killing them all, there was still hope.

  * * *

  Tai jerked awake as the slow rocking of the train became a frenzied jitter. To his left, Lizvette peered out the window. Across from him, Darvyn sat ramrod straight, staring at nothing. Due to the Yaly Classic, the air station had been closed, with no airbuses arriving or leaving until late that evening. So they’d headed for the train station in search of passage to Dahlinea. The overnight journey took far longer via rail than through the air, but at least they’d been able to get out of the city quickly and away from whatever spies Lizvette’s father may have been working with. Zivel and his men were guarding Vanesse and Clove, but Tai was still apprehensive about Nirall’s sabotage plans.

  He stole a glance at Lizvette again. Though she sat next to him, it was as if she were a world away. She’d met his earlier attempts at conversation with clipped answers until he left her to her ruminations. Now, as the train shook and swayed, her arm brushed against his. The car lurched and she was knocked off-balance, sliding in her seat. Tai gripped her wrist to stabilize her. She sucked in a breath and stiffened. When he went to release her, she covered his hand with her other palm, locking him in place. He dragged his gaze up to meet her eyes, heart beating out of his chest. His rapid pulse made him feel warm and his hand, sandwiched between hers, was on fire.

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  He nodded, unable to find his voice with the heat storm raging through his body.

  The train’s intercom crackled to life, announcing their arrival in Dahlia City. She pulled her hands from his but didn’t look away. He couldn’t read her expression and wished he knew what was going through her head. Neither of them had mentioned the kiss, but it was not something he could forget. Though he needed to. A Raunian besotted with an Elsiran elite? Such a thing was foolish and impossible. He would have to find a way to squelch this longing before it pulled him under.