Cast in Firelight
Page 1
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2020 by Dana Swift
Cover art copyright © 2020 by Charlie Bowater
Map art copyright © 2020 by Virginia Norey
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Swift, Dana, author.
Title: Cast in firelight / Dana Swift.
Description: First edition. | New York : Delacorte Press, [2020] | Summary: “Adraa and Jatin are royal heirs of their respective kingdoms, masterful with magic, and their arranged marriage will unite two of Wickery’s most powerful territories—except, they don’t get along. Now, with the criminal underbelly suddenly making a move for control, the pair must learn to put their trust in the other if either is to uncover the real threat”— Provided by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020007030 | ISBN 978-0-593-12421-5 (hardcover) | ISBN 978-0-593-12422-2 (library binding) | ISBN 978-0-593-12423-9 (ebook)
Subjects: CYAC: Fantasy.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.S947 Cas 2020 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
Ebook ISBN 9780593124239
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
Deities and Their Powers
Prologue I Meet the Love of My Life and Slap Him in the Face
Chapter One: An Unromantic Love Letter
Chapter Two: Homeward Bound and Hating It
Chapter Three: A Little Thief
Chapter Four: The Burnout Girl
Chapter Five: An Interrogation
Chapter Six: I Have Some Explaining to Do
Chapter Seven: Delivered to Destination
Chapter Eight: I’m Caught in Azure Palace
Chapter Nine: Casual Chatting Turns Chaotic
Chapter Ten: Into the Underground
Chapter Eleven: Getting into Trouble
Chapter Twelve: Getting Him Out of Trouble
Chapter Thirteen: Lessons Learned
Chapter Fourteen: I Watch Snow Fall
Chapter Fifteen: Fixing a Friend or Flirting with a Stranger
Chapter Sixteen: Pier Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen: Truth Revealed, Mind Blown to Bits
Chapter Eighteen: I Go on a Date (Not Like a Romantic Date, but Maybe, Sort Of…)
Chapter Nineteen: Colorful Note Coordinates a Meeting
Chapter Twenty: Listening to Torture
Chapter Twenty-one: Staging a Deception
Chapter Twenty-two: I Acquire a Name for Myself
Chapter Twenty-three: Caught and Catching Fireballs
Chapter Twenty-four: I Fall
Chapter Twenty-five: Embarrassment Has Its Day
Chapter Twenty-six: The Showdown of Champions
Chapter Twenty-seven: Return of the Rightful Ruler
Chapter Twenty-eight: The Enemy and I Have a Talk
Chapter Twenty-nine: I Learn the Truth
Chapter Thirty: Fighting for Forgiveness
Chapter Thirty-one: Stuck Between Truth and Lies
Chapter Thirty-two: A Performance for the Gods
Chapter Thirty-three: A Dance and Its Destruction
Chapter Thirty-four: The Loss of a Loved One
Chapter Thirty-five: I Come to Meet Death
Chapter Thirty-six: I Awaken into Another Nightmare
Chapter Thirty-seven: Sacrifice to Save Someone
Chapter Thirty-eight: Mount Gandhak
Chapter Thirty-nine: Awake
Chapter Forty: A Burned Destiny
Chapter Forty-one: The Saturation of Rumor
Chapter Forty-two: Confronting a Choice
Chapter Forty-three: We Survive
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
To Kaethan—for, you know, loving me and stuff.
And to nine-year-old me—we did it.
Deities and Their Powers
The Nine Touches
Erif, Goddess of Fire: Rules over volcanoes
Red Fortes: Ability to create and manipulate fire
Renni, Goddess of Inner Capability: Oversees personal growth
Orange Fortes: Ability to manipulate and heighten senses and the body’s physical capabilities
Ria, God of Air: Governs tornados and wind
Yellow Fortes: Ability to create and manipulate air, especially for flying
Htrae, Goddess of Earth: Reigns over fields and crops
Green Fortes: Ability to create and manipulate wood and plant life
Retaw, God of Water: Controls flooding and tsunamis
Blue Fortes: Ability to create and manipulate water
Raw, God of War: Stands on the battlefields of soldiers
Purple Fortes: Ability to manifest weapons, shields, and boundaries
Laeh, Goddess of Healing: Watches over the sick and injured
Pink Fortes: Ability to heal and enchant potions to fight illness
Dloc, God of the Cold: Dwells in blizzards and avalanches
White Fortes: Ability to create and manipulate ice, snow, and other winter precipitation
Wodahs, God of Shadow: Lives in darkness
Black Fortes: Ability to camouflage and cast illusions
The door was made of ice—glowing blue, crystalized ice. And behind that door was my…I guess I should say destiny, even though it sounded absurd. Meeting a boy who might be my husband one day should not qualify as destiny.
Yet here I stood with my parents in a gaping black mouth of an entryway, with columns that jutted out like fangs to a blue-stoned palace so massive I had to turn my head side to side to take it all in. The last beams of dusk caught the glassy surface and danced. I glanced at my parents, both of them unconcerned. I guess we weren’t going to talk about how strange it was to make a door using only white magic. Had that been in their lectures? And, Adraa, don’t mention the creepy door situation.
My father lifted a fist to knock and I lurched forward, tugging his arm down. But it was my mother’s words that stilled us both. “Maybe…maybe we should wait.”
Snow flurries whirled. The winter
wind howled. Then Father gave us both the look. “We’ve been talking about this for years, Ira.”
I hadn’t been involved in these annual discussions, obviously. I was eight. My parents had been considering my arranged marriage since forever.
“And after all those steps,” Father huffed.
I didn’t even want to glance behind me at the slope of stairs we had climbed. My legs ached, quivering in confusion as to why we hadn’t flown here on skygliders like sensible witches and wizards. By stair twenty I had begun imagining the Maharaja of Naupure made us walk up here, not to fulfill tradition as everyone had told me, but to weaken me. By stair sixty-two, a nagging thought crept in like the cold—I approached a prison, not a palace.
I could see from the crinkle of my mother’s crooked nose that she was about to laugh. And my one opportunity in this nightmare of steps and cold and weird doors was about to slip away.
“I’m with Mom. This is a bad idea!” I said.
Both pairs of eyes shot to me. Father immediately bent down and clasped my shoulders. “Just think of this as meeting a new friend, Adraa.”
“But, but he’s—a boy.” A boy I would one day be expected to…kiss. I knew marriage also meant living with someone in the same dwelling, but it was the idea of kissing that rattled me. I would be expected to do that regularly and supposedly like it? I tugged Father’s arm again. With Mother’s help this could be over, forgotten. We could turn back from this mountain, board our skygliders, and return to our own palace and the coast, where winter didn’t try to freeze you to death.
But I had said the wrong thing. My father laughed and even my mother shook her head and covered her mouth with a gloved hand to conceal a smile. Sometimes I think they only had me for my unexpected one-liners.
“Yes.” Father chuckled, the warmth of his breath marking the frigid air. “Yes, he is a boy. And so am I, and you like me well enough, right?”
I didn’t like this logic. I had missed something stark and obvious, or my father had. My potential betrothed in all his boyishness meant something completely different from my father’s broad frame and comforting arms. The question was a trap, so I answered the only way possible: “Yeah.”
Father laughed, tilted his head to Mother and repeated “yeah” to try to make her smile again. Then his green eyes thawed. “I know this must be scary.”
“I’m not scared,” I rushed out, but I couldn’t tell if I was lying. Naupure’s winter stung and I shook with it. Rising behind the palace, Mount Gandhak pierced the sky and the last beams of daylight bled onto the rocks in a yellow-orange paint. In the far distance, from my bedroom window, the volcano appeared as dormant as ever. Up close? The light mimicked lava.
Father peered at Mother and held her gaze. “It’s just a first meeting. Nothing will be written in blood. Tonight, it’s just a meeting,” he repeated. And before I could say anything more, even protest one last time, Father finally knocked.
Nothing happened. I was saved.
“No one’s home! Let’s go!” I shouted.
“Adraa,” Mother snapped. She opened her mouth to say more, but the ice groaned. Cracks splintered out in branchlike streaks. I stumbled back, listening as each glacial shard shattered and fell. And when the door was done pulling itself apart, only darkness greeted us. No flesh had touched that marbled ice. Wisps of blue smoke fluttered in the periphery of my vision. I spun to catch its potency. Magic!
The dim entryway awoke with light as candles pop, pop, popped to life, illuminating a wide staircase and an elaborately dressed man descending toward us.
“Greetings!” the man bellowed. This had to be Maharaja Naupure. But he was…skinny and short, which was unexpected. You don’t go imagining the most powerful wizard of our neighboring country as skinny or short. Both? This couldn’t be the man. But on his chest, he wore the Naupure emblem, a mountain embedded in blue wind.
He strolled toward us, and he and Father pressed their forearms together before hugging. Father laughed and said, “It’s been too long.”
Mother placed her fingers to her throat and bowed in dignified honor. Words garbled together and I retreated, the wind biting into my back.
Forget skinny and short. Forget first impressions. I had been utterly wrong. My parents knew this wizard well. Which meant this was more than introductions and pleasantries. This was a decision, already decided. What about “It’s just a meeting, Adraa”? What about “It’s only a visit before Jatin goes away to school” as I sat and memorized what to say, word for word?
Father turned. “Adraa.”
I froze. Move me and I would break apart like the door.
Father didn’t notice. He reached for my hand and pulled me forward, into the hall. Arches upon arches, adorned in paisley and gold, glimmered down at me. Candles burned. The smell of crisp winter air mixed with bouquets of white frostlight blossoms. Yeah, it was pretty, but fear whispered that it was all a facade.
“Come on in. Get out of the cold.” Naupure motioned as though to swat away the wind. With a quick spell, blue smoke gushed off his arms, ran straight for me, and then spilled into the night.
I gaped as the ice shards picked themselves up and refroze in place. Frost crystals trailed over the wall’s marble veins, weaving across the door’s hinges and stopping only when they touched the bright-gold silks draped across the ceiling.
I was so busy watching the show I didn’t notice the orange wisps of my father’s magic thawing me. Lingering snow on our cloaks sizzled into steam. When I turned around again, everyone’s attention focused on me.
“This must be Adraa.” Maharaja Naupure crouched, and now even I was taller than him. It didn’t help. “Pleasure, little miss.”
Here, I was supposed to say “Pleasure” and maybe add a “thank you for inviting us.” Silence. I would give them silence.
Mother frowned.
Maharaja Naupure continued to stare. “You are a pretty little thing, but I’m sure you know that, huh?”
This man obviously only had a son. “Pretty”? Really? He knew how many stairs I had just climbed, right? Where was my compliment for surmounting his torture? I glanced at my mother. She bit her lip, probably scared of what might tumble from my mouth. My mind buzzed with all sorts of retorts. My parents had lied. So I accompanied a shrug with something special: “I know.”
Mother took a quick, sucking breath as if preparing a spell, but Maharaja Naupure barked out a laugh. “That’s right. A pretty girl should know.”
What? What kind of response is that?
Maharaja Naupure swung toward the stairs and yelled, “Jatin! Don’t keep our guests waiting.”
A muffled thump echoed from upstairs. My throat dried, but my hands began to sweat. That thump was him, the boy, like a real monster in the depths trying to scare me.
Naupure guided us to the open room on the right. A prayer table cloaked in red stood before us. Tapestries in various colors covered the nine-sided room, every paneled wall praising a different god or goddess. Mother grew up on Pire Island, where they have long given up the idea that the gods bestowed our magic. But even though her eyes lingered on the tapestries uncertainly, Father had taught me enough about each peering face. I knew it would be under those eyes that we would spill our blood. I quickstepped to my father and tugged his hand. Please let him understand my concern. Please.
He nodded. “Adraa’s a little nervous about meeting Jatin.”
Betrayal. White-hot betrayal. I dropped his hand like it had scalded me.
“Of course,” Naupure said, just as I cried out, “No I’m not!”
Mother’s eyes seared into me. Our alliance, however short-lived, had fallen.
“I’m sorry. She’s normally not like this.” Mother pointed to the spot next to her. “Adraa, come here.”
I obeyed in a fumble of pink-and-orange skirts that I trie
d to straighten as I sat down next to her. I didn’t know what to do anymore to get out of this. To rebel even further would mean punishment. Or maybe I was past that. Maybe whatever I did—
“Have you come into your magic yet, Adraa?” Maharaja Naupure asked.
And just like that, the anger died. “No, sir.”
“She will, of course. She is a year younger than Jatin, if you remember,” Mother said quickly.
“Oh yes, I remember.” He peered at me, inspecting.
“She has her Touch. Adraa, show him.”
I automatically turned my left hand over, palm up, and placed it on the red cloth. The fabric was itchy, with little barblike tufts instead of nice velvet softness. Why would anyone buy an itchy tablecloth? The Naupures were monsters.
I displayed my Touch, a small marking that had flourished upon my left wrist. It was a reddish branchy swirl the size of a silver coin, darker than my brown skin. It held the only true indication that one day I would become a witch, and therefore was one of the only things that gave me hope as I crept closer to age nine. One day, if I was powerful enough, the design would spring up each arm, wrapping itself up to my shoulder like those of my parents, Maharaja Naupure, and half the country. Like a plant, I must nurture my Touch. I must study.
“And your other arm?” Maharaja Naupure asked.
Cautiously, I set my right arm on the table. My parents froze, because there was nothing there, only bare dark skin. The real concern, and the reason I feared I would be powerless, lay in this fact: my right arm was unnaturally naked. Everyone I had ever met reported their Touch appeared on both wrists simultaneously. There are the Touched and the Untouched. I’ve never heard of anything in between.