by Claire Luana
“I went in the next day to collect her body, but she was still alive. She was crumpled into herself, babbling about the sunburners and King Ozora. The loss of blood had made her delusional. I decided that Geisa didn’t deserve a clean death. She deserved to suffer. So I had her stitched and cleaned up and gave her food and water. I planned to keep her in that cell one day for every day she’d imprisoned one of our sisters in that facility. I figured we could execute her then.”
Chiya had turned white at the mention of the facility but seemed emboldened by Nanase’s statement. She nodded her approval.
Kai shook her head with disbelief. “How could you keep this from me? You unilaterally sentenced a moonburner without my consent or knowledge.” Anger flared to life within her. “Nanase, you have served me faithfully, but this…this borders on treason.”
Nanase slid to her knees before Kai’s bed, bowing her head. “I accept full responsibility for the wrong I have done you, and I will accept whatever punishment you deem appropriate. I know it’s no consolation, but I had hoped…to spare you. The knowledge that she still lived. The pain it might have caused you. The decision that would need to be made. I know it was wrong, but that is why I did it.”
Kai’s council was still and silent around her, their collective breaths held at the scene.
Kai’s anger dimmed. “Get up, Nanase,” she said wearily.
Nanase rose in a lithe movement, her head still bowed in deference.
“Each of you hear me. No one makes critical decisions without consulting me, and no one keeps information from me, no matter how benevolent your reasons.” Kai’s voice was hard as she looked from face to face.
They nodded, and Kai saw in Nanase’s dark eyes that she understood. They were her friends, her family, but she was their queen, too. They needed to see her as such.
“I can’t condone you keeping Geisa alive behind my back, but I suppose it’s good that you did.” Kai stood. “Anyone else have any secret prisoners they’re hiding from me?”
Her question was met by silence. Master Vita shook his head.
“Very well,” Kai said, steeling herself for what was to come. “Let’s interrogate a prisoner.”
Kai and Nanase descended the stone steps into the citadel’s dungeon. The twisting staircase was dimly lit by moon orbs. Kai’s cheeks were hot with anger at Nanase, but a secret part of her felt relief as well. What would she have done if Nanase had brought this information to her in her first week as queen? She would have been paralyzed with indecision about how to deal with Geisa. Public execution? Kill her quietly? Keep her prisoner? Each of the choices left a bitter taste in Kai’s mouth—even now.
The dungeons were empty but for one cell. Nanase nodded her head to the guard, who unlocked the door. The stench hit Kai like a physical thing. She looked crossly at Nanase, who set her jaw and crossed her arms before her.
The woman inside was hardly recognizable as human. She shied away from the light, her eyes covered by stringy hair that appeared more brown than silver. She was gaunt, barely more than skin and bones. The tattered dress she wore hung from her frame, and goosebumps pebbled her flesh. It was a miracle she hadn’t frozen to death down here with nothing to protect her from the seeping cold of the stone floor and walls. Her forearms were covered with ragged gashes, some more healed than others.
“What happened to her arms?” Kai murmured.
“Self-inflicted,” Nanase said. “We thought maybe she was slowly succumbing to madness. The gashes weren’t deep enough to kill her. But now, hearing your tale, I can’t help but think she was trying to summon divine help.”
Kai shivered, and not from the cold.
“Guard, move her to a clean cell where we can interrogate her,” Kai ordered, moving back into the stairwell, where the smell wasn’t so pungent.
“You know we don’t mistreat prisoners here,” Kai said to Nanase in a low tone. “I wouldn’t have thought it of you.”
Nanase looked at the ground, two parts contrite and one part defiant. “I wouldn’t have thought it of myself. But every time I started bettering her conditions, I thought about what she and Airi did—right under our noses. How she abused the students and women that I had sworn to train and protect. And I would get so furious that I wanted to storm down those stairs and kill her with my bare hands. She’s lucky neglect is all she got. She didn’t treat her own prisoners with such courtesy.”
They both watched as the guard half-carried Geisa from the cell, moving down the hallway. The woman was too weak to walk on her own and leaned against the guard for support. Kai couldn’t condone torture or neglect, but…thinking of what Geisa had done to Chiya and the others made Kai’s blood boil even now. She laid a hand on Nanase’s shoulder. “I understand. But the mistreatment ends now. And no more secrets.”
“Agreed. I don’t regret what I did, except that. Keeping it from you. It wasn’t right.”
The guard poked her head into the hallway. “She’s ready for you.”
Kai straightened her uniform and nodded.
The room where Geisa now sat was clean and well-lit with oil-lanterns—a vast improvement over the overwhelming filth and stench of the burner’s former habitat.
Kai sat down in a sturdy wooden chair across a table from Geisa. The woman’s wrists and ankles were chained in heavy iron manacles attached to each other through a ring in the table. Nanase stood behind Kai with her lean arms crossed, her stern face a still mask.
Kai examined the woman across from her. Geisa was painfully thin—her eyes hollow and sunken in dark rings. Yet she did not seem weak. Hatred coiled in the woman, waiting patiently for its time to strike. Geisa had not been broken.
“Did she come?” Kai asked. Kai had decided to try the direct route in the hopes that she could trick Geisa into thinking Kai knew more than she did. She prayed it would work. She didn’t have the stomach for torture, even of a woman like Geisa.
“Who?” Geisa asked, her voice soft and hoarse, as if she had not used it in many months.
“Tsuki,” Kai said, motioning to the ragged cuts on Geisa’s arms, still angry red and puffy. “Did she come?”
Geisa met Kai’s eyes, searching, evaluating. Kai stilled her heartbeat and stared back, unflinching.
“Yes,” Geisa finally said, a knowing smile growing on her face. “She did come.”
“I understand that you will not give us all of your mistress’s secrets freely,” Kai said, “but if you provide us with some information, we can make your time here more…comfortable.” She motioned to the room around her. “Otherwise, I can put you back in Nanase’s capable hands.”
Geisa flinched slightly at that, her eyes flicking to Nanase and back. “Ask your questions.”
“What does she want?” Kai asked. “What is her endgame?”
Geisa chuckled quietly. “They want you to die. All of the burners. They plan to remake this world, to usher in an era of blood and darkness where they reign supreme. Those who follow them will be rewarded. And those who oppose them will be crushed.”
“Oh, is that all?” Kai looked back at Nanase, who rolled her eyes. “Who are they? Tsuki and Taiyo?”
“My mistress and her lover.”
“How do they plan to bring about this era of blood and darkness, etc.?” Kai willed her voice to remain disinterested, though inside she was chilled to the bone.
“Even I don’t know that. Free me, and I might be able to find out,” Geisa suggested.
“I’ll pass, thank you,” Kai said. “It doesn’t make sense. Taiyo and Tsuki created the burners. Why do they want to destroy them now?”
“Maybe they tire of you and your endless questions.” Geisa said.
Kai looked at her, pursing her lips. Geisa was toying with her.
“I won’t tolerate my time being wasted,” Kai slapped the table. “Answer truthfully or I will send you back to your cell and let you waste away to nothing.”
Kai kept her eyes locked on Geisa’s. They glittered
dangerously. If it was a battle of wills the woman wanted, Kai was here to play.
“Tsuki and Taiyo rule the sun and moon. Why would they want to usher in an era of darkness?”
“Simple Kai,” Geisa said. “Always a step behind.”
“That’s your queen you speak to,” Nanase growled behind Kai’s shoulder. “One more comment like that and you’ll never see moonlight again.”
Geisa sighed, like she was speaking with a small child. “Tsuki and Taiyo wouldn’t want such a world.”
“What?” Kai asked, frustration welling in her. “You just said that was your mistress’s plan.”
All of a sudden, realization dawned on Kai. She remembered joking with Quitsu about how the fearsome spirit they had seen seemed more like Tsuki’s evil sister than the goddess herself.
“Your mistress calls herself Tsuki, but she isn’t really her, is she?”
Geisa’s face split into a grin and she released a wild, raucous laugh. “How bittersweet it must be to finally understand, only to find out you are too late.”
“Where is Tsuki?” Kai asked.
“Tsuki is dead!” Geisa said through peals of hysterical laughter.
Kai stood up, backing away from Geisa, knocking her chair back. She clasped her hands to keep them from shaking. “Back in her cell,” Kai growled, storming from the room.
Kai hurried back up the stairs, her need to feel the open night air around her overpowering any worries about maintaining an aura of queenly serenity. Despite the darkness, the heat still permeated, hanging over the citadel like a thick blanket. It felt just as suffocating as the low stone ceiling of the citadel dungeons.
Kai leaned against the wall, willing her breathing to return to normal. Tsuki could not be dead. Gods and goddesses didn’t die. They were divine. Immortal. That was the whole point.
Nanase joined her, her face full of questions.
“I believe that the being I saw, the being Geisa worships, is something other than Tsuki. It would make perfect sense,” Kai said. “But I can’t believe Tsuki is dead. I won’t. Not without proof.”
“What do you want to do?” Nanase asked.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “We need to know more about this creature Geisa worships. What she is. Get the others on it.”
Nanase nodded.
“Don’t tell them what Geisa said about the real Tsuki being dead,” Kai said after a moment of indecision.
“Shouldn’t the council be working with all the facts?”
“Normally, I would agree,” Kai said crossly. “But this would be incredibly demoralizing news, and it may be a ploy by Geisa. We keep this between us—at least for now. Am I understood?”
“Of course, Your Majesty,” Nanase said.
“In the meantime, life needs to carry on. Word may have traveled that I was ill. We need to assure the people that I am healthy and strong. Tomorrow I will do my ride through the city.”
As Nanase nodded her assent, three dark shapes swooped through the night sky. They were but shadows against the stars and the lights of the citadel, but Kai could tell from the shape of their wings that they were eagles, not koumori.
Nanase’s sharp eyes had caught the same. “Are we expecting anyone from Kita?” she asked.
“Not that I know of,” Kai said. “Let’s go see.”
As they arrived at the koumori landing field, a large figure dismounted from one of the eagles and strode towards them, a cloak billowing behind him.
“General Ipan?” Kai asked.
He gave them a courtly bow, flourishing his cloak.
“I hear you gave everyone quite a scare, Majesty,” General Ipan said in his deep baritone. “Don’t you go dying and leaving the hard work to the rest of us.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Kai said. She was overcome by a sudden urge to give the sunburner general a hug. He had a comforting presence and an easy way with people.
“Headmistress.” General Ipan nodded to Nanase.
“To what do we owe this pleasure?” Kai asked.
“To cut right to it, I am here to deliver good news and bad news. Which do you want first?”
“Bad news?” Kai’s stomach lurched. She didn’t think she could handle more bad news.
“Very well,” the general said, stepping his huge girth aside to reveal a scowling figure striding towards them. “The bad news.”
A hiss escaped her lips. Kai couldn’t think of anyone, save perhaps evil-Tsuki herself, who she dreaded seeing more. It was Daarco.
It took all of Kai’s self-restraint to not pull her knife from its sheath.
“What. Is. He. Doing. Here?” Kai asked, not taking her eyes from his face.
Daarco stood next to General Ipan, his muscled arms behind his back. They wore matching red sunburner uniforms tailored in gold thread, General Ipan’s straining a bit in the middle.
Though he was trying to keep his face impassive, Daarco’s perpetual scowl crept back into place. She supposed an impartial observer could find him handsome with his close-cropped golden hair and heavy brows. Perhaps his crooked nose could be endearing in the right setting. But not to her. She knew the venom that lay beneath that exterior.
“He is here to learn and serve at your pleasure.”
Kai ground her teeth. “It would serve my pleasure to see him get back on his eagle and return to Kistana.”
“I don’t want to be here any more than you want me here,” Daarco hissed.
General Ipan held up his hand and Daarco fell silent, his eyes dropping to the ground.
“A few of our officers, Daarco chief among them, are having trouble…embracing our new alliance. Overcoming old ways of thinking.”
“You mean old prejudices,” Kai said.
General Ipan ignored her quip and went on. “King Ozora thought that it would be best to send some of these individuals—not too many at a time of course—to Miina to get to know who the moonburners really are. He is confident that once they spend time with you and your subjects, they will come to see you with the same respect that the rest of us do.”
It wasn’t a terrible idea in the abstract. She had a few moonburners who could use a month in Kistana to humanize the sunburners in their eyes. But it was a risk and a distraction she could little afford right now.
“It’s an unnecessary security risk,” Kai said. “Daarco tried to kill me. Twice. I don’t have the manpower to watch him while he’s here.”
Daarco crossed his arms but kept his eyes to the ground and said nothing. He must have gotten some lecture from the king before being shipped off to Kyuden.
“I can assure you, Daarco will behave like a perfect gentleman while he is here. Hiro will oversee his behavior himself.”
Kai recoiled slightly. “Hiro has agreed to his?” How could Hiro not have told her that he was bringing a monster on a frayed leash into her very sitting room?
“Well, he hasn’t agreed…so much. But his father was sure he would be willing.”
“Ah,” Kai said, her temper cooling slightly. She was familiar with the whims of meddling parents who thought they knew best. “I suppose I needn’t remind you that Daarco was under Hiro’s watchful eye the two times he tried to kill me.”
“I know Daarco regrets his actions very much,” Ipan said. “Respectfully, circumstances have changed, Your Majesty. The burners are allies now. Daarco will present no danger to you. I stake my life on it.”
She sighed. This wasn’t a battle she could fight right now. “He may stay, under guard, until I can take this up with Hiro. But this isn’t decided. Nanase, please find Daarco and General Ipan quarters while they are here.”
Nanase nodded imperceptibly.
“And Daarco,” Kai said, taking a step towards him and fixing him with her gaze. “General Ipan is right. Circumstances have changed. I am queen of Miina now. If you step even a toe out of line while you are here, you will be punished to the full extent of Miinan law.”
Daarco’s lip twisted slightly as
he said two words through gritted teeth: “I understand.”
“Well,” Ipan said, clapping his hands, “now that the pleasantries have been exchanged…we can’t forget the good news.”
Kai grumbled. “I hope it’s very good.”
“You can be the judge of that. Ah, here he comes.”
“He?”
“He’s not a very strong flier,” General Ipan whispered conspiratorially. “He needed a minute or two to get his legs back under him.”
A man approached from the landing ground and bowed low before her. A bulging leather satchel slipped from his shoulder to the ground with a thud.
“Queen Kailani, meet Jurou, King Ozora’s chief historian.”
Jurou had a long nose with a slight hook, a narrow mouth, and oversized glasses. His shabby clothing was faded and too big for his thin frame. The only thing remarkable about the man was his hair. It was golden and thinning slightly. So he was a sunburner. She hadn’t known they came in this scholarly variety.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Jurou. Welcome to the Lunar Citadel. Though I did not hear that you were coming…” She looked to General Ipan and back again.
Jurou spoke first. “It was I who asked to come. Forgive my impertinence for inviting myself into your house, so to speak.”
“Not at all,” Kai said. “But I am curious why you made the trip.”
“We live in quite remarkable times, as you no doubt realize. I have been poring over the libraries of Kistana seeking an understanding of the events of the last few months.”
“The drought?”
“Yes, the drought, the sickness, the gods’ apparent distaste for the burners, whom they once held dear. The trail of my research has gone cold in Kistana, and I thought I might pick it up here. I know the citadel has an extensive library with many volumes Kita does not have.”
“You seek the cause of the gods’ anger at us?” Kai said.
“Yes, and hopefully a remedy.”
A measure of hope bloomed in Kai’s chest for the first time in several weeks. “Then you are very welcome indeed. Master Vita, our librarian, has had little luck finding answers, but perhaps you two can combine efforts.”
