The Heartwood Crown

by Matt Mikalatos

  She found a tree in sight of the firethorns and climbed into the upper branches. Then she lit it like a torch. She dropped to the ground, the Elenil already on their way. They moved faster than expected—definitely faster than her. She raced for another tree, lighting this one at the trunk. Then a third. Now the Elenil were peeling away from the firethorns, trying to intercept her before she lit another tree.

  “Hold the line,” Rondelo called. “You fools, hold the line! Stay near the firethorns!”

  A crossbow bolt appeared in the chest of an Elenil soldier, knocking him backward into the flames. Sparks blew into the sky. Soldiers with buckets ran to put them out, while another pulled the Elenil from the flames. A shower of bolts rained down from the Pastisians.

  Then Break Bones was upon the Elenil, a savage whirlwind of fury who swung his stone ax with unexpected speed and lashed out with feet and fists, his monstrous laugh striking fear even in Shula. She ran toward the battle.

  Rondelo engaged with Break Bones, shouting at his soldiers to guard against the spread of flame. “Leave the trees,” he shouted. “It is the flames from the firethorns we must protect against.”

  To see these two mighty beings in combat was like nothing Shula had witnessed in war before this. Break Bones, larger than a human, and Rondelo, slighter of frame but nearly as strong, attacking one another with brutal blows that would have felled a human instantly. In the firelight Rondelo’s armor shone like a fallen star, and the black tattoos on Break Bones’s grey skin seemed to shift and move like living things.

  Evernu, the stag, bounded up behind Break Bones. Shula shouted a warning, and Break Bones, distracted from Rondelo, managed to turn in time to grab Evernu by the antlers and swing him toward the trees. The stag hit a trunk and fell, writhing, to the ground. Rondelo, in the same moment, sliced the Scim warrior’s left shoulder. Break Bones stepped backward, using his ax to keep space between him and the Elenil. He examined his wound for the barest moment, and Rondelo burst forward, jabbing the hilt of his sword into the wound. Break Bones cried out and stepped back again, but Rondelo was moving forward, bringing his fist hard into the Scim’s nose, driving him even further back.

  Shula ignited herself and leapt between them.

  Rondelo fell back in surprise. “Shula? You fight for the Scim?”

  “I fight for the Sunlit Lands. Whoever is for the people of the Sunlit Lands, I fight alongside them. Rondelo, the Elenil are wrong on this one.”

  “Such is not my decision to make, Shula Bishara. I follow the orders of my archon. He knows far more than you or I about this situation, and I trust him to do right.”

  “We’re going to burn this forest down,” Shula said. “It will restart magic. It will put us all on equal footing for the first time in generations.”

  “What are generations to the Elenil? Less than nothing. And why should we desire equal footing? There is great danger in that sort of society.”

  So she wouldn’t be able to convince him to let the firethorns free. A new idea came to her. The guards had thinned here near Rondelo. What if she turned up the heat to push people away? She shouted to them both, “Stand back!” and lit herself like a supernova, hotter than she had ever been before. Her hair rose in the updraft.

  A warm wind stirred, and the firethorns advanced, like soldiers marching past her into the woods. “The wind!” she shouted. “Break Bones, the wind is here to help.”

  Rondelo yelled her name, but she could scarcely see him through the heat waves. “Do you know what this is?” he asked. She could barely see what he was holding—a small round shape in his palm. The firethorns were already spreading, a strange, magical expansion as they shot ash and flames near her feet, new sprouts growing in seconds. “A flood seed,” Rondelo said. “Elenil magic that takes water from somewhere else . . . and brings it here.”

  He threw the thing to the ground, and a river sprang from it. It hit her like a solid thing, knocking her from her feet and carrying her away from Rondelo. She gasped for air. Her ribs hurt where the flood had caught her in the side, and then the wall of water pushed her through the trees, and the branches whipped at her head and back. She reached for a branch and just managed to pull herself out of the flow. “No!”

  Break Bones was on his feet again, his massive grey hand covering his wounded shoulder. “The wind was not enough. The Elenil and their magic always win.”

  “That’s right,” Rondelo said. “Now throw down your weapons. It is time for you to come with me to see the archon.”

  Shula took quick stock of their situation. Several Pastisian soldiers lay crumpled on the ground, and a few others had been captured by the Elenil. At least one still fought an Elenil in the woods. Break Bones was wounded. The spread of the firethorns had been stopped by Rondelo’s flood seed.

  Break Bones threw down his ax.

  “What are you doing?” Shula shouted. “Don’t give in to him—we can still run!”

  “We would run only to a place unchanged, despite all our sacrifices,” Break Bones said. “I will live my life in an Elenil prison if I cannot return to my people with news of victory.”

  Then, to Shula’s astonishment, a flying cat glided into view, hovering over the firethorns. At least, that’s what her mind told her she was seeing. This was the Sunlit Lands, and anything was possible, but a flying cat? She studied it more carefully. She could not deny that it was a cat with wings. Maybe this wasn’t a normal thing in the Sunlit Lands, either, because several of the Elenil stopped to stare as well, and Rondelo gave the cat the careful attention she had seen many times on the battlefield, assessing it to see if it was a threat. Break Bones seemed unconcerned.

  “Excuse me,” the cat said. “Did someone here say, ‘The wind is not enough’? And why is no one bowing in my presence?”

  Break Bones, Rondelo, and Shula exchanged perplexed looks. “I said these words,” Break Bones said. “What of it?”

  “What of it? Why, I am a Guardian of the Wind, and you, sir, have insulted the wind.”

  “Insulted the—? Begone, cat, we speak of weighty things here and have no time for your ridiculous interruptions.”

  “Cat?” Her eyes boggled. “DO CATS HAVE WINGS?” She began to beat her wings, hard, and a wind unlike any Shula had ever felt whipped around them, howling, drying her hair and clothes almost immediately. “I am a Guardian of the Wind. How dare you say the wind is not enough? Behold the power of the wind!”

  The wind blew Shula backward, knocked Break Bones into a tree, and sent Rondelo tumbling away from them both. Then the firethorns began to move, writhing like snakes, curling in on each other, falling over, spitting sparks and seeds and smoke. They expanded into the forest, leaping over the water of the flood seed, igniting grass and brush and trees.

  Lamisap appeared at Shula’s side. She had multiple wounds on her arms—her blood was red. “We must run to safety or be burned. Run!” The Aluvorean didn’t wait for her but leapt through the trees. Break Bones did not follow, turning instead to separate the captured Pastisians from their Elenil captors. The Elenil fell away easily enough, and he sent the Pastisians running from the flames.

  Rondelo watched Shula from across a meadow engulfed in fire. Evernu stood beside him, then tugged at him to move away from the flames. He leapt onto the stag’s back, and they disappeared into the forest.

  Break Bones came to her, his left arm hanging useless. “Where is Wu Song?”

  “North,” she said. “Near the Queen’s Island.”

  “Then that is where I must go. And thou, Shula Bishara? Whence away?”

  She did not know. Her parents were gone. Her sister gone. Her brother, too. And Madeline. Now even the Sunlit Lands were burning, changing, becoming something else. Her eyes stung, whether from the smoke or the anger clawing its way out of her, she didn’t know. It wasn’t fair, none of it. She’d had to fight her old allies, even a friend like Rondelo. She had nothing left, nothing. The fury tore through her. “I’m going to make it burn,”
she said. The fire grew hotter and hotter, hot enough to melt metal. She could barely think, could barely see through the flames. Break Bones was gone, and she hadn’t seen him go, had been so furious she hadn’t heard whatever he might have said.

  Then she was running, barely able to keep up with the magic flames of the firethorns. Everywhere she stepped blossomed into flame. She ran faster. The flames grew hotter and higher. She would burn it all, burn everything until there was nothing left.

  31

  INVASION

  The magic of the Elenil has given me a deep knowledge of who you are.

  FROM “JELDA’S REVENGE,” A SCIM LEGEND

  The archon was not in his chambers. Darius pushed a plush couch against a wall so no one could come up behind him, and fell onto it. He was covered in sweat and gore, and his muscles burned with the exertion of fighting to reach the top of the tower. It had taken nearly two hours. The Pastisians were here now, the first waves having come via the gondolas, and more were arriving by the minute in airships, descending to the ground on long ropes. He watched them through a nearby window for a few minutes. He knew more Elenil would come upon him soon, and his legs were starting to stiffen. He needed to get up and move.

  He had been wounded several times, but the adrenaline had kept him from slowing much. He had to keep going, had to find the archon. The sword, too, demanded that he continue. Rest was not an option when there was so much Elenil blood to be spilled nearby. He hadn’t seen his mask and had no idea where they would keep it. It would be helpful if he could find it. It would prevent him from further harm. It should even heal the wounds he’d already received.

  Not that it mattered much if he couldn’t find the archon. Was it possible the ruler of the Elenil had left the city and gone with his army to Aluvorea? It seemed unlikely. He had never been much of a fighter. Darius had never seen him on the front lines. There could be a hidden room here, of course. Or a hundred hidden rooms. Far Seeing was a big city, too—he could be hidden away in any number of places.

  A shadow moved over the tower. Darius slipped to the window and looked up in time to see the king’s airship floating overhead. It was black and enormous—larger than any other ship in the fleet—with sturdy fins on the sides of the blimp and propellers on the fins. Ian had pointed it out to Darius in Pastisia, and even then he had been astonished by its size. Darius suspected they would use the archon’s garden as a place to enter the tower. King Ian would be here soon. The garden was only a floor below, so Darius set off at a trot to meet him there.

  A Scim servant barred the entrance. “You cannot enter here,” he said. This sort of Scim had been “civilized” by the Elenil. Though they still wore their war skins—the intimidating public face of the Scim community—these had been softened and brought under control. They wore Elenil clothing and spoke with distinctly Elenil diction. Their tusks were nearly always shaved down or removed. Break Bones called them traitors, but Darius saw something else. He saw Scim who had been abused, broken, told they were worthless. He felt a mix of compassion and anger: compassion for them, anger at the Elenil, and anger, too, that they didn’t break out and rebel, even though he knew that they had been worn down. But when he compared a creature like this to a glorious Scim like Break Bones, he scarcely could believe this was a Scim at all.

  This servant did not make an intimidating doorman. He had none of the fire of the Scim left in him.

  “Is the archon here?” Darius asked. “Hiding somewhere?”

  The Scim’s eyes darted left, then right. “N-n-no.”

  “My mask, it is here?”

  “Your mask?”

  “A black skull, with great curving horns.”

  The servant’s eyes grew wide. The Black Skulls were the famous fighters of the Scim army. Even a civilized Scim would have heard their names often. Darius opted to take it one step further and showed him the blood-slicked sword in his hand. The Scim leaned forward. “The Sword of Years!”

  “Yes, and it is here to bring justice at last, friend. So if you know where your master is, speak.”

  “I don’t, sir, truly I don’t.”

  “Then make way. I need to get to the garden. The invading king has arrived.” He brushed past the Scim, who seemed too startled to do anything about it. He hesitated, then grasped the Scim’s arm. “Find a weapon—even a kitchen knife will do—and join your people in this fight.” But the Scim hurried away.

  The airship was making lazy circles around the tower, moving closer with each pass. A black-clad airman was hanging from a bottom port. Darius waved to him, letting him know he could take a rope, and the airman threw one. The rope unspooled, landing in a rosebush. The garden still looked sick, half broken from the confrontation here two months ago, when Yenil had cut off the archon’s hand. Darius tied the rope onto a dry fountain, then waved to the airman.

  The airman didn’t throw down a ladder, though—he jumped onto the rope and slid down, landing with a practiced flourish. He had no weapon, only big boots, a black uniform, and a bronze mask. “Darius,” he said.

  “Your Majesty?”

  “Yes, it is I.” Ian’s voice boomed in the mask. He signaled to the airship, and more of his soldiers swarmed the rope, bringing a ladder and a series of ropes as they began to moor the ship. “Have you found the archon?”

  “He’s hiding,” Darius said.

  The king walked to the edge of the garden. The battle raged throughout the city. Smoke rose from several of the gates. Pastisians flew on gliders and dropped burning bottles from airships. A flurry of messenger birds filled the air. At the western gate, it appeared that the Elenil had built a significant force to fight back. Then the ground collapsed beneath them. “Ah,” the king said. “The Scim’s sentient tunnel friend, I think. The Elenil have never believed they were at real risk of an armed revolution, and now that folly has led to their overthrow.”

  “Regime change, surely,” Hanali called. He descended a spiral staircase that had been lowered from the airship. He wore a more practical outfit than before, though this one still had a long cape which dragged on the ground behind him. “Not revolution, King Ian. Merely a change of leadership.”

  Mrs. Raymond was not far behind Hanali, with some of the king’s soldiers. She said, “It was less than a season ago that the Scim breached the walls at the Festival of the Turning, and yet they have left the walls unguarded again. It is not like Thenody to be so careless.”

  “Where’s Break Bones?” Darius asked.

  “He went ahead to find Madeline,” Hanali said. “He said he has certain obligations to her and to Mr. Wu. He said he would wait for you in Aluvorea or leave word of where to find him.”

  Darius’s heart sank. Had he done the right thing in coming here instead of racing to Madeline’s side? He thought so. They would find the archon soon, and then he could finish this business and move on to find Madeline. The sword sent warm feelings of affirmation to him. It would not be good to leave the archon unpunished.

  The king spoke to his soldiers. “Every ornament, every brick, every stone of this tower is to be thrown down. It was built on ill-gotten gain, every piece of it squeezed from the lifeblood of the Scim or some other people of the Sunlit Lands. So tear it down, brothers and sisters, and let all people know that a time must come for all injustice to be undone.”

  Hanali’s eyes widened. He leaned toward the king and said, quiet enough that the soldiers couldn’t hear him, “Your Majesty? This is a grave injustice to the Elenil. Surely the tower should be preserved. Changed in its use, perhaps. But one unjust action is not negated by another.”

  The king regarded him coolly, then asked him to repeat his objection to the soldiers.

  Hanali gladly took this invitation and said, “Pastisian friends! What good is it to throw this tower down? A wound to the Elenil will not heal the wounds of the Scim.” Darius said nothing to this, but he couldn’t help but think that this was precisely the way the Elenil magic worked. Hanali went on. “Let us ta
ke the tower and use it for some new, more noble cause.”

  When he was finished, the king said, “Hanali, son of Vivi. The archon had his hand cut off. Was this just?”

  Hanali straightened his gloves. “I do not know. It was a child who did it. The archon had, of course, killed the child’s parents.”

  “Oh? Why did the archon order such a thing?”

  “Because the Scim attacked the city at the Festival of the Turning.”

  “Why, I wonder, did the Scim attack the city?”

  “Yes, yes, I see where you are going,” Hanali said. “I strike a blow, then another strikes a blow, and twenty years later we are still punching one another, and who is truly to blame?”

  “Not at all,” said the king. “I only say this. If two people came together with no history of violence or wrong-doing between them . . . let us say a Pastisian and a Kakri. If the Pastisian cut off the Kakri’s left hand, would that be just?”

  “For no reason? Surely not.”

  “Then would it be just for the Kakri to remove the Pastisian’s hand in return?”

  “I suppose.”

  “Wait,” Darius said. “That’s not fair, though. The Kakri didn’t agree to lose his hand. It’s not like they made a bargain. What if the Kakri had just wanted to keep his hand?”

  “Even so,” the king said. “So there should be a greater price for the injustice done to the Kakri. Perhaps we take two hands. But then the Pastisian thinks, ‘Is this a fair price for what I have done?’ He sees a debt between them.”

  “You are saying justice is complicated,” Hanali said.

  “I am saying that justice may be impossible,” the king replied. “I am saying that unless the creator of the Sunlit Lands himself were to bring his wisdom into the situation, there may not be a true solution. One injustice imbalances the world.” He looked out over the city. The smoke had begun to obscure the buildings below. “I am saying that mercy and forgiveness are deeper truths than justice, and yet we cannot set justice aside. We cannot allow the merciful and forgiving to be destroyed by the violent. It is an impossible question, best answered by those who have been wronged, not those in power. Yet this is the responsibility of kings.” He took off his mask, looking into the eyes of his soldiers. “I say to tear down every ornament and brick and stone. I say this not to shame the Elenil. I say this not to punish them, or even to bring true justice, if such a thing were possible. If the Elenil choose to rebuild this place, so be it. But let them know that if they do it by thievery and deception and slave labor, we will return and tear it down again, and again, and again, until they build something that can last. We do this so that the Elenil may remember that justice does come, even if it does not come swiftly.” He dismissed the soldiers, and they immediately headed into the tower to begin their work, armed with swords and sledgehammers.