For a Muse of Fire

by Heidi Heilig

  Kneeling on the floor of the wagon, I lay out the pieces around me in a long arc, the way the dragon will look when it’s done. Should I string the joints with knotted leather, or will cords only fall apart mid-show? Absently, I shoo the kitten away from the tasseled tail. Then I frown as the roulotte slows and stops, rocking gently as someone hops down from the bench. A voice drifts in from outside—Leo’s.

  “—another three days to the capital. We should make it well in time for the coronation. Might pick up a bit of extra cash there, if you want to do a play.”

  He sounds in high spirits, and his voice is richer than I remember. There is a creaking sound, and suddenly—light. Even filtered through the scrollwork, the sun is blinding after so long in the dark. I lift my palm against the glare, then marvel at the scarlet glow limning the thin skin of my hand.

  The roulotte rolls forward and a cool breeze pushes in, carrying a hint of greenery and the smell of rain. My ears feel like petals as they catch the light patter of droplets on the roof. We are back above the ground in the realm of the living. “Nuriya?” Leo shouts. “Das?”

  I listen, but the only response is the wind in the leaves and the winnowing of a snipe. Leaving off my work, I crawl across the floor of the roulotte. The handle of the door feels strange in my fingers. But when it swings open, I’m looking out on a familiar clearing: a cottage, a kitchen garden, a grove of dragon-eye trees, the glossy green leaves shining with rain and the last flare of the setting sun through the clouds.

  La Fête des Ombres always marked the end of the dry season, when rains like these—light and sun-dappled—would chase us back home to Lak Na. Is it raining in the village too? As I let the droplets kiss my cheeks, the soul of the kitten leaps down from the roulotte to stalk the grass outside the hut. I half expect Daiyu to open the door, tottering toward us with her faded sarong and her wicked humor. But we are alone. No one answers Leo’s call; when he ducks into the cottage, he comes back out shortly after, shaking his head.

  “They’re gone,” he says. Then he sees me and stops in his tracks. “You’re outside.”

  I shift a little on my feet. “So are you.”

  It’s a glib answer, and he opens his mouth to retort—but Papa interrupts. “What do you mean, gone?”

  Leo shrugs, affecting nonchalance, but I can see the little worry line, just between his brows. “They’ve packed and left. I don’t know why. There’s no sign of trouble. Just . . . no sign of them, either. This is still the best place to stop for the night,” he adds. “There’s good grazing for Lani and a spring behind the cottage. And we can all sleep indoors for once.”

  Papa nods a little, but he studies the trees, the cottage, the dewy clearing. “They must have left for a reason.”

  “Not all reasons are nefarious.” Leo glances at me again, hesitating, but by then Maman has seen me. She rushes over and smooths back my hair; under her hand, it feels lank and tangled.

  “Are you hungry?” she says, standing a bit too close. “Will you finally eat?”

  It takes me a moment to recognize the gnawing feeling in my stomach as emptiness—as hunger. Thinking back, I can’t remember my last meal. “D’accord, Maman.”

  “I’ll make coconut rice. Your favorite.” She gives me that look I hate—the careful one, as though she is not sure if too strong a glance will push me over the edge.

  But my mouth is watering at the thought, and I only nod. She takes the black pot behind the house to the spring while Papa unharnesses Lani and leads her to a stand of thick grass. I linger at the back of the wagon, a bit at odds with the world. My legs feel shaky and my skin, too delicate—like the outside air has a texture that isn’t entirely pleasant. Rain sticks to my shoulders; the air is too humid. And Leo is still standing there on the grass, watching me. A flush creeps up my neck as I remember our last conversation—his rejection, his mention of my malheur. “What?” I say at last, and he blinks.

  “I just . . .” He shakes his head. “How are you feeling?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Because I haven’t seen you in over a week!” His tone is incredulous, as though the answer were obvious—but it takes me aback. A week? The memories are dim and distant: sleeping, waking, the long journey underground.

  “I was working on a new fantouche,” I say, which is not technically a lie. Trepidation turns to interest on his face.

  “Oh?”

  “Look,” I say, gesturing inside the roulotte; he peers over my shoulder, frowning at the pieces scattered across the floor.

  “Look at what, exactly?”

  I scowl, crawling into the roulotte to gather the scraps—the horned head, the fearsome jaw. “Here, see? Like this.”

  I lay them out under the eave, along on the back step. He traces a finger along the curve of a scale, then picks up a section, holding it to the light, so the fading flame of the setting sun rushes red through the thin leather. “It’s beautiful.”

  Pride floods in; I try to summon some modesty. “It’s hard with the rationing. Copper rivets are impossible to find.”

  He puts the piece back down, out of the rain, and gives me a crooked smile. “I’ll keep that in mind the next time I want something from you.”

  I widen my eyes, taken aback. Is he toying with me, or have I misunderstood him? A week ago, his look might have made my heart beat faster, but after the temple, I’m not sure what to think. And more than that . . . I seem to have lost my rhythm during the long days in the dark; the spark has flared out, along with the manic energy of my malheur. Is that why he pushed me away in the first place? Not because I am mad, but because he knows my madness clouds my judgment? “I . . . I was only talking,” I say at last, leaning back, just a little. But he takes the cue, shifting on his feet, giving me space.

  “And I’m just listening.” His smile softens; I return it. Around us, vana shine, bright spots in the gathering dark. “We should go in,” he adds then. “I don’t want to miss out on that coconut rice.”

  Carefully, so as not to brush my skin, he reaches past me into the roulotte, gathering an armful of bedding and starting toward the cottage. Bemused, I watch his back as he goes, and after a moment, I follow.

  The hut is a typical Chakran home, lifted a little off the ground on poles of thick bamboo and thatched with palm leaves. More bamboo makes up the springy floor, covered with an old woven mat. There are two rooms, separated by a curtain, but aside from the grass screen hanging from the ceiling, there is not much left behind.

  A flat stone fire pit, some broken bowls, and a few chipped pots full of brine. Pickled vegetables float in the pungent liquid, too old to risk eating. Papa has a fire going to chase away the damp, and Maman is boiling rice fragrant with sweet oil. But despite the scent of food and the cheery flames, the cottage is anything but welcoming. The fire casts long shadows against the bare walls, and the rain rustles in the wet thatch. It’s not a cool night, but I sit close to the fire.

  While the rice is cooking, Leo ducks outside once more, returning with a bottle of rice wine crusted with earth—stored in the dusty dark beneath the hut. He breaks the twine seal and lifts the jar by the neck. “To those who aren’t here.” He takes a deep draft and whistles before passing the bottle to Papa. “And everything they leave behind.”

  “To those we miss,” Papa agrees. He drinks and passes the bottle. Maman wipes the rim with her sleeve before she takes a mouthful. Then she adds a splash to the pot and passes the wine to me. The glass is cool and heavy in my hands; I watch the three of them across the fire, feeling a bit at loose ends. Something has happened over the last few days—some sort of harmony between them, a melody coalescing while I wasn’t listening. “To Akra,” I whisper under my breath. The wine is bittersweet.

  We pass the bottle around again. My cheeks get warm and my head begins to float. I haven’t eaten enough to drink deeply. The next time Papa takes the bottle, he holds it awhile, turning it over in his hands. “The people who lived here. They were your fri
ends?”

  “Oh,” Leo says, leaning back against the wall. “Nuriya worked at La Perl years ago. Das was a cane cutter who came in to see her. My mother got them a post here when she heard Nuriya was pregnant.” He gives Papa a little smile—sad, or mocking—and gestures to himself. “La Perl was clearly no place to raise a child.”

  When dinner is ready, Maman gives me a heaping bowlful—the silky rice salty sweet and rich with coconut meat. My mouth waters as the fragrant steam purls across the back of my throat. Still, I send another quick prayer to my brother before shoveling the rice into my mouth, and I leave a bit of food in the bottom of my bowl. Maman does too, though she can’t see the souls collecting in the air, or the kitten that has wandered in to circle the offerings.

  I watch the little arvana as she plays at eating, then curls up beside the fire. Around us, tiny spirits dance and dip. What do they do with the things we give? Can they smell but not taste? See but not touch? Or is it not the substance but the sacrifice that they cherish? The value we assign when we deny ourselves something they can never consume? Or is it something else entirely? Something I will never understand in this life? Maudlin thoughts swirl around me like the souls, broken then by the sound of a violin.

  Leo has set his empty bowl aside and settled his instrument in the crook of his arm, and as the last of the daylight fades, he plays a song that brings the dark to life. He is even more beautiful to watch than his shadow was, that night at La Perl. In concentration, his mouth is soft and his eyes are distant. He moves as though the music inhabits his body—or perhaps it is the other way around. Embers drift up with the notes of his song, another tune I know. The one about the lovers—the one we perform each time we visit a new town. Papa joins in at the chorus as Maman drums gently on her knees.

  A smile creeps across my face. This is the rhythm I had missed, and I am more hungry for the kinship than the coconut rice.

  The fire is still high enough to cast a good shadow. I rush outside to the roulotte to rummage through the fantouches. The rain has stopped, and the tattered clouds drape a lacy shawl over the half-moon. I search by the silvery light—I know I have something here, at the bottom of the pile. An older puppet, soulless silk—a swallow on a stick. It will paint a graceful picture on the walls as I twirl it in swooping circles overhead. Grinning, I shut the door of the roulotte just as a filthy hand clamps down over my mouth and an arm snakes around my waist. Struggling, screaming into a stranger’s palm, I am dragged backward into the jungle.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I am thrashing, biting, my fingers like claws, my mouth a maw. I am an animal, vicious, tasting blood. The man curses and rips his hand from between my teeth. For a moment, I can breathe again—I turn a shallow breath into a short scream. But the man behind me muffles his own curses and clamps his hand back over my mouth. The lights of the cottage disappear quickly as he pulls me deeper into the wet green.

  “Arret,” he growls. “Stop fighting!”

  But I don’t—not until another man comes into view, his gun glinting in the dim and dappled moonlight. At the sight of it, I go still. My first thought is that the soldiers have found me. My second thought is that these men aren’t soldiers.

  Both are wearing the green uniforms, but they are dirty, disheveled—stained and wrinkled and open at the throat. There is stubble on their chins, which the armée never suffers, and the man before me is wearing leather sandals instead of the armée boots. Deserters—or grave robbers? Defilers of the dead? I don’t know which is worse, or if it matters.

  “Qu’est ce que c’est, Jian?” the bootless man whispers—armée words in a Chakran accent. The smell of unwashed flesh scrapes the roof of my mouth. Even more stomach turning is the look on the man’s face: recognition. “What do we have here?”

  With a grin, the second man tosses me to the muddy ground. I start to scramble up, but Bootless cocks his gun—a warning. I sink back as Jian gives me a gap-toothed smile. “I know you saw the wagon,” he says to his friend. “A carved roulotte, just like the lieutenant said. And a Chakran girl inside it who might just be wanted for questioning.”

  “Sound familiar?” The bootless man squints at me. “Ever had a run-in with Capitaine Legarde?”

  I blink at him, wide-eyed in the low light, acting. “Who?”

  Bootless hesitates, but Jian lashes out, driving his foot into my stomach. “There’s a recherche for you, girl. It describes your wagon perfectly! And I think the lieutenant will forgive our little leave of absence if we come back bearing gifts.”

  Wheezing, I clutch my belly, but my mind is racing. I try to remember the terrain south of Luda. What had Leo said? Three days from the capital? What was nearby? “I don’t know what you mean,” I croak, my weak protest stirring in the damp leaves. “We’ve only just come from Dar Som—”

  He kicks me again, this time in my ribs. “Now I know you’re lying,” he says through his teeth. “No one escaped Dar Som.”

  “Wh-what?” Blinking away the tears in my eyes, I stare up at him through a haze of pain. Little souls float between us on a night breeze. “What happened at Dar Som?”

  Bootless drops to a knee on my chest, pushing me into the sodden earth. I gasp for breath as he takes my wrists and binds them. “Lieutenant Pique.”

  Then his hand clamps down over my lips and both men go still. I hear it in the distant dark. Leo’s voice, calling my name. Renewing my struggles, I try to respond, but Jian’s fist collides with my temple in a spray of stars that fades to fuzzy black.

  The first thing to break the blackness is not light, but sound. A distant wail—high and familiar and chilling—but it draws me back to the world. When I wake, I almost regret it. My head is throbbing in time with a bruise on my ribs that makes it hard to breathe. My wrists are tied painfully tight, and my fingers are cold and numb. But I am alone—or at least, the soldiers have gone. In the corner, an akela sits, bright gold, playing with a scrap of cloth twisted into a makeshift doll. The arvana of mice scramble in the thatch overhead.

  Painfully, I use my knuckles to push myself to my knees—slowly, slowly. A wave of nausea ripples through me and I clamp my lips together, trying to keep from retching, taking deep breaths through my nose. Cold sweat beads on my forehead, but at last the feeling passes enough for me to look around the room.

  I am on the packed-earth floor of an empty hut—no, not empty. Abandoned. Unlike the smugglers’ cottage, people left this place in a hurry, unwilling or unable to stop and pack their meager possessions. A thin woven mat makes a humble bed. A faded orchid blossom wilts in a shallow stone cup, the water dark with algae. Coconut-shell bowls are still stacked on a rickety bamboo shelf, along with a metal cooking pot—a prize for a poor family. They wouldn’t have left it behind if they’d had a choice in the matter. My heart sinks as I look back to the akela. Perhaps they didn’t make it far.

  Gingerly, I take a deep breath, wincing at the pain in my ribs, at the sour taste of smoke on the air, and something else . . . something sweet: the swampy smell of rot. Then the sound comes again—the one that woke me. High and long, a howling wail. It is answered by another and another; they overlap in a mournful song. It’s the sound of the ke’cherk—I know it well. A pack of them used to roam the mountains above Lak Na. When I was a girl, I found their music beautiful. Then came the Hungry Year, when all the death tempted them into the valleys and they flitted through the fields like white ghosts under the moon.

  Everyone said they were afraid of humans, but I saw the aftermath of their scavenging—the opened graves, the carcasses rent and torn—and that year, I became afraid of them too. The howls fade away, but the dread remains, coiled under my tongue like a snake beneath a stone. Death draws them near. I glance once more to the akela in the corner, but she pays me no mind. And then I hear laughter outside—the soldiers’ voices, and they are much closer than the ke’cherk.

  “I’m telling you, it’s not desertion if you’re in pursuit of the enemy.” Bootless’s voice.r />
  “We weren’t when we deserted,” Jian replies.

  “We don’t have to tell him that.”

  Slowly, quietly, I creep toward the door on my knees, peeking through the tattered flap of woven reeds hanging over the doorway. Beneath it, I can make out the merry dance of a cookfire, and one of the men . . . Bootless, maybe, though I can only see his back.

  I cast about the hut for another way out. The windows are small and high up, near the roof, to let out heat—but this was not a rich family. The walls are not bamboo, but thatch.

  First things first. Lifting my hands to my mouth, I pick at the knot with my teeth, but it’s tied tightly, and soon blood fills my mouth from the split on my lip. So I spit on the rope and curl my numb finger to draw the symbol of life on the fiber. The akela wavers briefly, but returns to her doll, uninterested in such humble flesh. Something slips in, though—something small. A vana, maybe a worm. At first it grips me tighter, coiling up in its new skin. The pain makes me gasp, but I stay as still as I can, trying to soothe the little soul. Finally it begins to relax, to twist itself free of its knots. Gently I try to help, to pluck at the rope, and the blood starts returning to my hands.