by Claire Luana
In desperation, a plan sprang into Kai’s mind. She had to do what she came here to do. Free the prisoners. Even the odds.
“Burners,” Kai cried, her voice reverberating through the stone room. “We came here to free you from this place. Your captors have come to keep you here, to use you up like animals. Do not let them. Fight with us!”
She drew moonlight from the crown and burned it, melting the locks on each cell door. Splitting the moonlight into that many streams was difficult. She fell to her knees under the strain.
One of the moonburners darted behind her, wrenching her arm behind her painfully. Kai fell forward onto the ground, face in the dirt.
“You are free!” she cried. “The locks are broken!”
Another moonburner smashed the butt of her spear into Kai’s face.
The world turned black, and Kai’s ears rang.
When her vision cleared, Kai saw chaos. The prisoners had swarmed from their cells and were attacking with fists and nails and teeth. Geisa and her moonburner guards were fighting back, slicing at Emi, Leilu and the prisoners with their spears and knives, desperately trying to keep the press of bodies back. It wasn’t working. One of the moonburners went down, disappearing behind a closing circle of unwashed bodies.
Kai tried to pull herself to her knees and saw Chiya, in a white robe and leggings, fighting furiously with Geisa. The two twirled out of the way of stabs and slices of the other’s spear blade, the shafts of their spears meeting with deafening clacks of wood. Where had Chiya gotten the spear? Even in her condition, Chiya was fast, but Geisa fought dirty, landing a punch straight to Chiya’s belly. Chiya doubled over, falling to one knee, and Geisa moved in for the kill.
“Chiya!” Kai cried, her voice sounding strange to her own ears. But her warning was too late.
Geisa’s killing blow fell . . . landing not on Chiya, but on Maaya who pushed Chiya aside to receive it.
Time seemed to slow as Geisa’s spear tip buried itself in the soft flesh of Maaya’s stomach.
Chiya exploded upwards, burying a knife blade in Geisa’s own stomach. Kai hadn’t seen her pick one up, and Geisa seemed just as surprised, eyes wide, hands feeling at the dark blood beginning to flow down her front. The spear fell from Geisa’s grip but stayed embedded in Maaya’s body, the long wooden staff waving like a macabre flag above her.
As soon as it had begun, it was over. Geisa’s moonburners lay on the ground, blood pooling around them.
Kai staggered to her feet, leaning against a nearby cell for support. She made her way to Maaya, pulling the spear from her friend’s body and throwing it to the stone floor with a clatter. She gathered Maaya in her arms, smoothing her hair over her clammy brow.
Quitsu sat on the other side of Maaya, his furry face a mask of sorrow.
“Maaya,” Kai said. “It’s all right. You’ll be all right.”
Blood bubbled from Maaya’s lips and her face was pallid.
Kai’s heart twisted as she tried to ignore the truth her medical training shouted at her. Maaya’s wound was too severe.
“I’m sorry,” Maaya managed, coughing.
“Don’t be sorry. You saved Chiya. Whatever you think you did, we forgive you,” Kai said, the tears beginning to flood in earnest. She held her hand over Maaya’s wound, but her dark blood continued to bubble forth.
Maaya lifted a bloody hand towards Quitsu, hovering over him.
He moved forward so her hand touched his silver fur. She stroked him, smearing her life’s blood along his coat. He licked her face.
“So soft,” she said, with a smile.
Her hand fell from Quitsu’s side and her eyes fluttered closed. She was gone.
A sob wracked Kai’s body, and she closed her eyes, trying to hold it in. Maaya hadn’t deserved this. She was the kindest and most innocent woman Kai had ever known.
“Kai.”
She heard a voice, distant and buzzing.
She couldn’t look away from Maaya’s blood, vibrant on her white uniform. “Kai!”
There it was again. The voice. She pulled her eyes away and looked down. Quitsu. He was looking at her intently. “You have to stop this!”
Her thoughts were sluggish and she looked up at the scene before her through a haze. When it came into focus, she understood his alarm.
Sunburner and moonburner prisoners were standing across the room from each other in an uneasy detente, tensions high, blood lust in their eyes. Emi, Leilu and Stela stood between them, wide-eyed.
“Now let’s all just think about this . . .” Emi said.
Chiya gripped her knife tighter, preparing to spring.
“No,” Kai said. She had tried to shout, but it came out a croak. Blood trickled down one of her temples and stung her eyes. She blinked it away. “No.” This time was louder. “Don’t fight each other. We have a common enemy. The same person put you all in this place. Queen Airi. We need to stop her.”
The sunburners looked to Hiro, who nodded.
“Yes. Stand down. The sunburners are preparing an offensive outside Kyuden as we speak. We must make it to camp. We will find refuge there and can join the fight.”
“Prince Hiro has agreed to defeat the queen, subdue our army, but leave Kyuden and Miina in control of a Miinan authority,” Kai said, lurching to her feet with the help of Geisa’s spear. “That is . . . if our agreement still stands?”
“It still stands,” he said. “General Ipan will convince my father.”
The moonburner prisoners looked to Chiya, who exuded deadly power, despite her advanced condition.
“Queen Airi showed me no loyalty when she put me in this place and so I have no loyalty to her. The world must know what she has done to her own people,” Chiya said. She shook her head, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was saying. “If the sunburners will help us defeat her, then I fight with them.”
The other five moonburners murmured their assent.
“Can you guarantee our safety and freedom in your camp, sunburner?” Chiya asked, turning to Hiro. “I will not trade one prison for another.”
“I can,” Hiro said. “If you ally with us, you will be treated fairly and with kindness.”
“I don’t give a seishen’s ass about being treated kindly,” Chiya said. “All I want is a pair of pants and a sword so I can stick it right between the queen’s eyes.”
Hiro chuckled. “We have those, too.”
“Then lead on, burner,” Chiya said. They grasped forearms and shook, once.
Kai couldn’t help but feel chills. Here in the dark, where no sun or moon could shine, an alliance was born.
Kai led them up through the facility towards the city. They reached the top and the sturdy door loomed before them. Still weak from her captivity, Stela leaned on Leilu for support. Chiya had found her seishen and now carried him lovingly in her arms, as he was still groggy from lusteric. Hiro had picked up Kai’s bag after her fall in the facility. She motioned to him to hand it to her. She pulled the solar crown out. There was a little bit more moonlight in it, she could feel it.
Hiro took the crown from her, his eyes widening in recognition. “Is this . . .” he trailed off.
“Yes,” she said. “It was in our treasury for many years. It holds more than sunlight, though. It holds moonlight too.”
She opened her mind and drew the last bit of moonlight from the crown. When she did, something remarkable happened. It was as if a golden door, into a world she didn’t know existed, opened to her. She could feel Hiro’s qi like warm, buttery light, and beyond that . . . something else. Sunlight.
Through him, she could reach for it.
Hiro’s eyes widened in shock when she reached for the moonlight; his mouth hung slightly ajar. He must be experiencing the same thing she was. Was it possible that through this crown, through the two of them together, a man could burn moonlight and a woman could burn sunlight? Kai reached towards the door. Sweet sunlight beckoned, warm and golden . . .
“Not
now,” Hiro said. His eyes flickered to the others. “Let’s get through the task at hand.”
He was right. Now was not the time to explore a possibly ground-breaking magical discovery.
Kai pushed her spinning thoughts from her head and burned through the lock with the crown’s last bit of moonlight. She shoved at the door with her shoulder, and the lock gave easily.
“Let’s go,” Kai said. “We need to try to get out of the city and find the sunburner camp.”
She pushed open the door and stepped out, a crown of ivy above her. Instantly, she knew that something was very, very wrong.
The warm spring air was punctuated with the sound of explosions and screams. Pungent smoke billowed over the tops of the nearby buildings.
Hiro looked at her with alarm. “What is going on?”
A woman ran by with a baby in her arms, dragging a young child in her wake. Her eyes were wide, her face pale. Kai grabbed her arm. “What’s happened?” Kai asked.
“The sunburners have attacked. They have already breached the city walls. They are assaulting the citadel.” The woman moaned with fear. “They’ll kill us all.” The woman wrenched her arm away, continuing her flight.
When Kai turned to Hiro, his face was grim. “My father has attacked preemptively, so the moonburners lose the benefit of the eclipse.”
“So we’re too late,” Kai said, dismayed.
“Maybe not. My father will be located back from the main assault on the citadel. We need to find him and ensure he doesn’t get too . . . aggressive . . . with his campaign.”
Emi nodded. “I know the way. Follow me.” She began to jog off. Their ragtag group followed.
“Hiro,” Kai said insistently as they took off after Emi. “The Oracle . . . She said . . .”
“I know, the eclipse. But it’s not until tomorrow, according to our sources. The sunburners will be fine.”
Kai struggled to grasp an elusive thought with her mind, but it was like a fish slipping out of her hand. Something the Oracle had said.
“Things are in motion. We will take Kyuden and we will install a regent. Some moonburners will be lost, but I’ll do everything I can to minimize the damage.”
Kai waved his voice away, still wrapped in her own thoughts. “The Oracle said that if the sun and moonburners battle, none will survive. There will be a day of no sun and no moon.” But what else had she said?
Hiro opened his mouth to speak, but Kai motioned him to be silent. And suddenly, things clicked into place. Her eyes widened in horror. “She said that we had just enough time to charge the crown. One day and one night. That would mean that the eclipse is today. Your information was wrong.”
“That doesn’t make sense, our informant clearly said the day after the equinox.”
“That’s what the Oracle told the queen as well . . . I heard her. But . . . why would she tell me something different?”
Quitsu chimed in. “The Oracle said that she was opposing the queen in her own way. That it was all a matter of timing.”
“Do you think the Oracle told the queen the wrong day, so she would miss the eclipse?”
Hiro had grown pale. “Let’s go,” he said and sprinted off after Emi and the others.
By the time Kai and Hiro caught sight of the ornate armor of the king’s guard, they were winded and panting.
King Ozora sat on the back of an impressive palomino stallion, with a golden hide and a snow white mane and tail. His armor matched his horse’s, or perhaps his horse’s armor matched his own, with engraved sunburst designs. His helmet was off, and Kai glimpsed King Ozora for the first time.
She had spent so much of her childhood hating and fearing him, she half-expected him to have his own set of horns. But he didn’t. He was a handsome man with neat golden hair streaked with white. His face was tanned and lined as if he had spent much of his life outdoors in the sun. His eyes were the same vivid green as Hiro’s, she noticed, her stomach tightening.
Next to him, on horseback, sat General Ipan, in his own golden armor. Kuma stood beside him. They made for an impressive sight. The king’s seishen appeared to be a great golden leopard, its spots vibrant against its golden coat.
“Father!” Hiro called. Their group must have looked strange to the sunburner soldiers. They were dirty and dusty from their flight through the city, with sunburners in rags and several pregnant women wearing white robes and leggings.
The King’s face brightened when he saw his son. He dismounted, handing the reins of his huge horse to a nearby servant. He strode over to Hiro and wrapped his armor-clad arms around him in a bear hug.
“Taiyo has smiled upon us today my son! A victory soon in hand, an end to our ancient enemy, and now my son returned to me.”
They looked so alike, standing across from each other—like mirror images. They were the same height and had the same strong jaw and earnest demeanor.
“Father. There is something we must tell you about the battle.” Hiro beckoned Kai closer.
“This is Kai. She is an ally. She freed me from the moonburner facility.”
The king’s face was guarded. “This is the one we held in our camp.”
“Tell him, Kai.”
“If you continue forward with the battle, all of the burners will be destroyed. It . . . it . . . will be the end of us all.” Kai’s voice sounded small in her own mind, her words weak. That wasn’t how she wanted to say it. She had to convince him!
“I’m not one to retreat from a battle I am clearly winning at the insistence of one girl of questionable loyalty. Or two, I should say. Your . . . mother appeared at our camp a few hours ago, demanding something similar.”
“Father . . .” Hiro said, a warning tone in his voice.
The King crossed his arms. “How do we know we can trust these women? Azura apparently faked her death and abandoned her kingdom, not to mention my captain. And this one! Perhaps they ordered her to rescue you to get her right here.”
Hiro looked at Kai. A sliver of doubt crept into his intelligent eyes.
“I serve no queen or king,” Kai said, her anger rising. “I serve the burners. All of them. I am trying to keep our race alive. The Oracle has foreseen that this battle will be the end of us all. It is folly . . .”
The King interrupted her. “Your oracle! A whore of Tsuki like the rest of you.”
Kai ground her teeth together in frustration. “If you don’t care to listen to the prophecies of a whore of Tsuki, as you so eloquently put it, perhaps you won’t care to hear that the eclipse is today, not tomorrow.”
That got the king’s attention. “What did you say?”
But it was too late. The sky was already beginning to darken.
CHAPTER 41
Instead of calling the retreat like Kai had hoped, the king strode away, yelling at his messengers to tell the captains to pull troops into defensive positions. She understood. It was too late to flee. The sunburners would be exposed until the eclipse was over, and when it was, the vengeance of the remaining burners would be swift.
Kai turned to Emi. “Go find my mother. Her name is Hanae. I think we will need her before the day is done.”
“I’m on it,” Emi said, jogging towards the sunburner tents.
“What should we do?” Leilu asked, motioning with her head towards the other moonburners.
“Find arms,” Kai said. “And rendezvous here. If it comes to it, we’ll need to fight.”
She prayed it didn’t come to it.
Kai pushed through the crowd to Chiya, who had somehow acquired a sword in the time it took Kai to talk to the king. Chiya looked ready to fight, her fingers flexing on the hilt. Tanu had awakened, and stood, snarling, at her side.
“I have an idea,” Kai said. “It may be crazy.”
“What type of idea?” Chiya asked.
“We need to stop the fighting. Make them declare a truce. Otherwise, this is going to be a slaughter.”
Chiya’s face was hard, her eyes deadly serious. “I
don’t care if every single sunburner is slaughtered.”
“You can’t mean that,” Kai said. “Do you want this to be our future?” She motioned to Chiya’s swollen belly.
“As far as I’m concerned, the world is better off without burners in it. Maybe this is our fate. What we have become. Let us slaughter each other and leave the world better off without us. Just let me take down a few on my way out.”
Kai put her hand on Chiya’s shoulder and looked into her eyes. There was hurt there, buried deep beneath the anger. “You don’t mean that. The moonburners were your life. Your pride and joy.”
“Look where it got me,” Chiya spit out. “I was wrong.”
“You weren’t wrong,” Kai insisted. “There is good left. There is a part of the moonburners worth saving. Once the queen is gone, we can start rebuilding the moonburners into who they were supposed to be.”
Chiya closed her eyes for a moment. “You are so damn naive. But . . . somehow it makes people want to trust you even more.” She put her hand on Kai’s. “Tell me your plan.”
Kai made her way back to Hiro, who was standing next to his father and General Ipan. The sky was darker now, turning a sickly shade of red. A crimson sky. The Oracle’s words from so many months ago floated to her, unbidden.
“The moon cannot enslave the sun, nor make the day its mistress.
Or victory shall spell defeat, a crimson sky its auspice
The sun and moon must shine as one, or all will be undone.”
Kai’s understanding deepened. The queen had already tried to enslave the sunburners and she’d try again. But it wouldn’t work. The crimson sky . . . if the queen was victorious today, it would mean the end of sun and moonburner alike. Kai didn’t know how it would come exactly, but she felt this truth deep within her. The sun and moonburners needed to work together, or none of them would survive this battle. The weight of her realization settled upon her shoulders like a heavy yoke. She had to get this right.
“I can feel the moonlight,” Kai told Hiro. “They will attack soon.”
As Kai’s words left her lips, a mighty cry rose up from behind the citadel walls. Koumori and riders launched over the walls and fire began raining down from the ramparts. The koumori riders lay down cover as the citadel gate swung open. Navy-clad soldiers poured forth like water through a floodgate. They crashed against the Kitan soldiers who had been battering the gate.
