by C. C. York
Alik shook her head, "What? No, my Queen. I would never. I don’t know what’s harder to believe---that the Edicsi is real or that you actually believe he’s real as well.”
Legends claimed that the Edicisi monster came when an unfit ruler sat on the Efendian throne. Is she trying to stop the Rifter from bringing him? Or is he already here, and she’s preparing for battle?
Firtina said, "I believe that there are powers far greater than even my own. I believe that we've only begun to tap into our potential and that worlds are waiting for those smart enough, bold enough, to take them."
Alik glanced at the wall that hid the maps and notes in her mother’s secret room and the stacks of books surrounding them now. She recalled her father’s nickname for Firtina, The Bloody Scholar. He once joked she spent as much time studying in the Catacombs as she did hacking people apart. Alik did not remember Firtina ever laughing at that.
The engraving behind Firtina’s secret room flashed in her mind. The initials certainly don’t belong to my father. "Who is H.B?"
Firtina's step faltered behind Alik, the fire orbs sputtering. She pinched Alik's cheeks with her forefinger and her thumb, wrenching Alik's face painfully to her own. "What did you say?"
This is the first time she's physically touched me in years. Alik wasn't sure why that thought shot through all the rest spinning in her mind. She also wasn't sure why the initials felt so important or why she suddenly felt the need to press this question most of all. "H.B and F.I. You are F.I aren't you, so who was H.B?"
Firtina shoved Alik's face away, the force knocking Alik down to her hands and knees.
A thick band of air wrapped around her waist and lifted Alik into the air. Alik’s hands scrabbled at the second band of Airwerk tightening over her throat as her mother said, " I want you out of Efendi. You are stripped of your title as Pillar and Iktidar and no longer an heir to the throne.” With each Airwerk, Alik twisted and tumbled in the air, gasping for breath. “You should have never been my daughter in the first place, and my mother’s soul will rest easier knowing the Iktidar line is without your taint. I will find this Rifter myself.”
The study doors banged open to the Atrium, revealing several gawking courtiers as Alik flew through several feet in the air. She landed with a thud on the opal floors, the pain ricocheting through her bones. The breath was knocked from her, stunning her for a few painful moments while black dots marred her vision. She curled into the fetal position when air finally hit her lungs again.
Alik willed herself to stand despite the confusion and the pain and the mortification, but she remained curled up on the floor, voices murmuring around her. Her eyes blurred with tears as her brothers herded the handful of courtiers out of the Atrium. Agnian came to her side first.
He lifted her off the ground, scooping her as if she was a child. She buried her face against the soft linen shirt stretched tight across his hard chest, unable to look anyone in the eye. She squeezed her eyes shut and breathed in his scent of the sea and new leather as he carried her down the hall in the direction of the guest quarters.
What just happened? She banished me because I asked about the initials? She would have helped me if I didn’t press that. She panicked more with each racing thought. I can’t do this on my own. If the Edicisi is real, I need her to get Shauna and the others. Oh Goddesses, Shauna, please be alive.
The thought of Shauna in the clutches of a demon pulled her from the well of sadness she wallowed in. She lifted her head enough to meet Agnian's eyes. "I think I can walk now."
Agnian nodded, "I know you can."
He cradled her tighter, though, around her knees and waist as he continued down the white stone corridor, thankfully devoid of anyone else. He carried her into a room where sunlight filtered through delicate linen curtains and a soft cream blanket adorned the neatly made bed. He gingerly sat Alik down in a leather chair near a cold fireplace and pulled the curtains aside to reveal a wide window seat that overlooked the Magaran mountains in the distance. Agnian stacked the books strewn across the seat into a neat pile on the floor. He moved the pillows and blanket from the bed to the window.
Alik tracked him, finding strange comfort in his efficient movements and the way his shirt pulled across his forearms as he rearranged the room. Neither spoke. He was a stranger to her, and yet she felt safe in the silence of this small, cozy room far away from the Atrium and the tall doors closed off to her.
Agnian scooped her once more in his arms, dragging her mind back from the morose path it gravitated towards. He placed her among the pillows at the window seat, and slipped off her shoes. He walked to the bathroom after draping her with a soft linen blanket, leaving her alone. Focusing on his small, regular movements helped Alik from drowning in her thoughts.
Agnian returned with the glass bowl of water and a white cloth. Kneeling next to her, he raised the damp cloth raised close to her face, and at her nod, cleaned her bloodied temple and lip. His face hovered a few inches from her own, and she focused on his chiseled jaw as it tightened each time she winced with his featherlight passes.
Alik swallowed, breaking the peaceful silence. Her words ushered in the reality of her situation. "I have to find a particular Rifter before my mother does.”
At his cocked head, she poured out everything that occurred moments before with her mother. “I don’t know what she wants to do with this Rifter or if the Edicisi is real and already here. I don’t even know what I will do once I find Shauna. My whole focus has been to find her, not what will happen once I face her kidnapper. The Canavar Company has to be working for the Edicisi, so Shauna and the others must be with him. What if he’s eaten her as the legends claim?” She felt like her breath did not fill her chest with each ragged pull.
“And I have no home now. I am exiled. She expects me to leave. Immediately. But I can’t go without finding Shauna and the others. I’d rather be dead at the Edicisi’s hand than leave her. I don’t care if I am worthless, and I do this alone. I will not leave her to that fate.”
Agnian stopped dabbing at the blood on her face and turned her to face him directly. He held her face in his hands and said, “Breathe, Alik. You are not alone. And you are more capable than you know. We’ll find her together, and when we get her and the others away from this monster you believe is real, I will make sure you have a home in Dvari.”
“Why would you help me even after we find the missing girls?” Alik looked down, recalling their conversation from the café, though it felt a lifetime ago now. “I thought you hated me?”
“I should never have lashed out like that, and for that, I am sorry. I hate a lot of things about your family and your country; nothing will ever change that. But I don’t hate you.”
Not exactly the heart-pounding words I would have liked from this man, but I suppose that’s an improvement.
Alik gave a mirthless laugh. “It seems I am bound for Dvari no matter what. Before she exiled me, my mother threatened to marry me off as a bride to the prince of Dvari like beads to be traded and strung into a pretty but useless necklace. I didn’t think there could be a worse fate than an arranged marriage to a stranger, but as it turns out, I was wrong.”
Agnian stilled. He did not meet her eye as he asked, "Which prince?"
"What do you mean? I thought there was only one?"
He walked away, setting the bowl and now pink-hued cloth on a side table. He spoke over his shoulder, "There's only one that matters, but there are two princes of Dvari. They look similar but are two completely different souls."
He sank in the cushions across from her on the window seat, resetting her blanketed feet in his lap. Sunlight danced over the salt and pepper stubble along his jaw as he leaned back against the window.
Alik leaned her temple against the cool glass. "It doesn't matter anyway. All that matters is that I find a way to Shauna and the others. The life I thought I'd live has been taken from me regardless of which prince I'm given to or if
I'm simply thrown out of the gates."
Agnian absently rolled his thumbs over the arch of her foot, and she bit back a sigh at the comfort of his touch. She imagined Shauna and the other girls huddled together somewhere, terrified, and shame washed over her. She dropped her feet from his hands and stood.
She said, “There’s no time to waste. I need your help.”
Elaine
Elaine ran through the fabric tent door of the Hadishi's home and stopped suddenly at the sight of Farisha at the kitchen table.
"Elai! You scared me. Is everything OK?" She asked.
Elaine’s mind raced, each thought tumbling into the next. Well, I’m a Rifter that’s about to be hunted by everyone in Efendi, including the kingdom’s most terrifying gang leader. The only scrap of hope is that I might have my real family somewhere in this world, but I have no idea how to find them. My skin is crawling, and I feel like if I don’t Rift right now, I’ll jump out a window. And I’m beginning to think the creepy laugh in my head is the Edicisi calling me to him. Ohmygod am I going to want to drink blood soon?
She swallowed all the troubling thoughts and put a hand to Farisha’s back. "I'm...good. Everything is good. You good?"
Farisha tilted her head and watched Elaine with narrowed eyes but didn't press. "OK...Kanne Da'Neen has been looking for you, Little One. Would you like to see her?"
Elaine wanted nothing more than to bury herself under the ragged blanket in the loft above them, but she needed to formulate a plan. She had no idea where she could hide in Efendi but figured Kanne Da'Neen was the most knowledgeable woman in the Low Tiers.
If anyone can help, she might.
She fought past tears at the thought of being alone, but she had to hide somewhere if a Rifter Hunt began. She worked through how to broach the subject as she walked to her small tent at the Cluster’s edge. Kanne Da'Neen stirred something in a cracked clay pot over her fire, muttering to herself.
Kanne Da'Neen said without turning, "It's about time you showed back up. Have you found your Dua yet, child, or are you still cowering beneath the covers?"
"Just plain me still. Did you hear the news?" Elaine said as she hopped up on top of the table and worried a cuticle at her thumbnail.
Kanne Da'Neen swatted her cane into Elaine's knees and pointed the stick to the low stool instead. "What news now?"
Wincing, Elaine hopped down. "They're saying there are Rifters again, and they’re ones kidnapping the girls around here and--"
The old crone interrupted, clearly not as surprised as Elaine expected, "...which means the patrols will start soon. I remember the drill."
"You were alive during the last Rifter Hunt? But you seem so young..." Elaine trailed off. She felt hot and wafted a hand in front of her face that did absolutely nothing.
The woman grunted something between a "Harumph" and a snort, so Elaine continued.
"What was that like? Did they find Rifters?"
Kanne Da'Neen paused before finally taking turning to the slip of a girl sitting in her kitchen. "It was terrifying. Everyone thought that they were seeing Rifters, but the patrols never came through the Low Tiers. The Towners began to patrol our own streets at night with torches, and when that Iktidar queen announced a reward for Rifters, neighbors turned on neighbors. By the end of the first week, over ten women were 'captured.'"
To Elaine's disgust, Kanne Da'Neen spat on the floor at the word 'captured' before continuing without pause. "None of us could capture a Rifter. Or if they did, the Iktidars didn't hang them like they did those poor girls."
Elaine stopped rocking back and forth on the rickety stool and wiped the sweat from her brow. She jiggled her foot on the hard-packed floor, trying not to think about torchlit hunts. "So, there were no Rifters after all?"
"Oh no, I'd imagine there were a few among us then, but most Rifters found their way out of the kingdom and to the Magarans or lands beyond decades before." Kanne Da'Neen tossed Elaine some grain to shuffle through, and she began the laborious task of husking the grains with the heel of her palm.
I could find another Rifter. They’d help me. But what if they are as terrible as the stories? I don’t want to skin anyone. And I definitely can’t drink blood.
"How do you know where some went?" Elaine asked as she smashed the grains beneath her palms. Her mind raced with ideas to slip out of the Perimeter Wall and find a Rifter.
"Because I am ancient and know all." Kanne Da’Neen said before sighing at Elaine's dubious face. She kept talking over a slow stir at the pot.
"I knew one once. In the next Cluster. She was a young seamstress that was part of an immigrant community that came over from a rescued slave ship taken back from the Perisiens. Shy, but beautiful. She confided in me once when she felt like her Cluster was beginning to suspect something was off about her. She lived a quiet life, alone, and would have found her way here had things not taken a turn."
Elaine stopped grinding the grains. "They caught her?"
"No. Before the Rifter Hunt, she caught Hvard's eye. He pursued her relentlessly, but she would have nothing to do with him. She came to me one night and told me he forced himself on her. That was when I told him he was no longer welcome in my home."
Elaine’s already sick stomach turned. She pushed the meager husks she'd pulled and said to Kanne Da'Neen's back, "That's awful."
"It was the worst night of my life." She shrugged, her bony shoulder piercing the air under her ear. "What could I do?"
They both stopped talking for a few moments; the only sounds the crackling fire and folks gathering outside.
Elaine finally asked, "What happened to the seamstress?"
"She told me once that her people came from the land of sand called Bakilar. Everything I heard about Bakilar sounded like she had found a much better home here," she grimaced. "Miserable way to live. Anyway, she said that she was leaving to find her way back there. I never saw her again after that night, but perhaps Hvard saved her life."
"What? How did Hvard save her life if he raped her and made her leave?"
"The Rifter Hunt began the following week. I don't know if anyone else knew for sure what she was, but if they even suspected it, they would have turned her in. No one wanted to defy that Iktidar queen."
Kanne Da'Neen looked beyond Elaine out to the courtyard, where several people rushed past. She said to herself more than Elaine, "Queen Firtina is even more terrible than her mother. We have a dark time ahead of us if she sanctions a Rifter Hunt."
***
Elaine left Kanne Da'Neen and headed back to the Hadishi home, too busy thinking about the desert called Bakilar on the other side of the world to notice the people gathered in the Cluster. The amber sun sunk below the top of the wall, casting deep shadows over Low Town. She felt the eyes of the other matriarchs of the Cluster on her, and they whispered to each other as she passed.
Elaine heard a man's laughter and a singsong voice. The Edicisi. Does he know I can hear him? She stopped walking, waiting to see if he would speak to her directly again. She was so focused on the voices in her head and trying not to cry that she didn't hear the commotion inside the Hadishi home until she heard a sharp cry from inside.
She rushed through the grimy flap. Reiki held Otum's arms, and Kara bent over him on the table. Kara's blood-soaked arms wrapped a bandage over the mangled mess of his right leg. Farisha ground foul-smelling herbs together at the counter.
"Elai, thank Yapi, you're home. Don't go outside tonight, child. Fear makes people do terrible things." Farisha nodded to the basket of linens at the edge of the table. "Now start ripping bandages. We need long, thick ones."
"What happened?"
Otum winced as he spoke, "Walking home. Two men in black cloaks pulled me into an alley. I told them I didn't have anything, but they didn't say anything at all. Why couldn't they have clubbed the bad leg?" His attempt at a laugh turned into a hiss as Farisha patted the poultice over his leg.
Rei
ki held his arms so he wouldn't shift and picked up where his dad left off. "He said they had a C tattooed around their eyes." He was talking to Elaine but watching Kara, who would not meet his gaze. "No one knows why the Canavar Company would have targeted him."
Silent tears spilled down Kara's face. She looked ashen, and her hands shook as she wrapped the bandages tighter. All thoughts of the voices in her head vanished as Elaine realized what this meant.
I did this. I brought this to them.
She sunk to the floor and ripped bandages, each harder to rip than the last with her shaking hands. The four of them finally finished the bloody task after what felt like hours, and Farisha gave Otum a liquid to help him sleep before slipping out to clean more bandages. Reiki made up his parents' pallet in the corner and lifted his father gingerly down to it. Kara caught Elaine's eyes before slipping outside and walked beyond their Cluster. Elaine followed close behind.
A low horn sounded as the moons rose, and they looked up at the sound of a group of people running past in the Tier above them. Kara whispered, "There will be chaos in Efendi, Elaine, while they look for these Rifters."
"Kara, I---" Elaine started.
"I know. I know you're sorry. I know how you got here, and I know what happened today. I know what you are. I've always known." She wouldn't make eye contact with Elaine. "Someone saw you. That’s why he came today to the stall. Someone must have told him." Kara whispered more to herself than Elaine. She didn't sound accusatory, just flat.
Elaine glanced around them, seeing only grain bags and discarded broken tools. She whispered, "I accidentally Rifted in front of someone today. I was running from him when I came into your tent. I'm so sorry; I was so stupid."
Elaine thought she was tough. She had been through hell with her parents several times over and gained some satisfaction that she rarely cried in front of them. She cried now, though, folding over herself.
