by Sarah Dalton
Stefan had to agree. Whatever his stupid brother had become embroiled with, it led back to sorcery and the Menti. He closed his fist around the grip of his sword. He hated them.
Drip-drip-drip.
He suddenly felt afraid. His tactics at Unna Castle had worked, but they had suffered great losses. With Matias murdered and Luca on the run, he anticipated a great disturbance occurring in Estala. Unna Castle was a mess of death and injury, and that had unsettled the towns and villages around it. There had already been double the usual cases of thievery and fighting in Ilkta Markets. The northern men were unsettled, and that was never a good thing. But that was not all; he sensed his father’s disquiet, too. The king was more anxious than ever to destroy the Menti. That all seemed to be leading to one inevitable conclusion: war.
It was brewing. He prayed to Anios every night for war, but he had never felt the stirrings until now. It was, of course, where the glory was, and the purest way to cleanse their kingdom of the scourge that blighted it. Menti. Yet, he was afraid. He was sixteen and he had the promise of war at his feet.
“My brother is in Xantos,” Stefan said. “We must send scouts ahead to find out more. I want to know what he is planning to do there.”
“They say the Menti fled to Xantos after the rebellion,” Brother Mikkel said.
“Menti? There cannot be many left.”
He floated closer to Stefan and laid a hand on his shoulder. “You would be surprised, my prince. The Menti breed like rats and spread as far and wide, too. Perhaps you can find your brother and quash your enemies at the same time. Anios would delight in the cleansing.”
Stefan nodded his head, but his palms were sweating. “Do you think Luca has joined the Menti?”
Mikkel removed his hand from Stefan’s shoulder and shrugged. “Perhaps.”
Stefan liked that idea. It made it easier for him. If Luca truly was with the Menti, that meant he was an enemy. He did not need to worry about Luca being his brother anymore. Luca was the enemy and enemies were to be killed.
“Um… Excuse me, Yer Highness. Am I free to leave now?” The sea captain wrung his hands together as his nervous eyes flitted around the dark cave.
Stefan shared a glance with Mikkel. “The man has told us everything he knows.”
“Yes,” Mikkel said, “but he leaves with more knowledge than he came. His blood would strengthen you, my prince.”
Stefan smiled, but it was to hide the grimace. Mikkel brought blood-red potions to him every night to give him strength. They tasted foul and turned his tongue crimson. But it was worth it if they worked.
“You mean to sacrifice him?” Stefan asked.
“The death of three is for him,” Brother Mikkel replied.
“No! No! Ye don’t have to do this,” the sea captain begged. “I won’t tell anyone, I swear. I’ll sail to Xantos, climb the Ash Mountains and never return. Ye’ll never see my face in Estala again. Please spare my life.”
“Drowning is a good fit for a man at sea,” Mikkel continued. “Then hanging, and finally, my prince, you must stab him through the heart. Anios would like to see your strength.”
Stefan fingered the pommel of his sword. He was as strong as Anios, and he would cleanse the world, starting with the unfortunate captain.
Drip-drip-drip.
Luca
On the first night in the Shadow Valley, Luca sat around the fire with Axil and the traders they had found passage with, and he thought about Reva. It surprised him to think of her. His thoughts had been consumed by Matias. He had imagined the funeral, and the bones of his brother lifted slowly into the stone tomb in the Hall of Enlightenment in Reyalon. He had imagined the smell of the herb bouquet that would rest on the lid of Matias’s tomb. He had thought of the words spoken by the Brothers: Only the Enlightened God knows the truth of death. Matias’s time has passed. He will remain in our memories. Simple and truthful; the Brothers were always truthful.
He pictured his father’s reaction to the death of his heir, and it always ended in a fit of rage, followed by quiet, seething anger with spittle flying from his father’s lips and landing amongst his wiry, grey beard hairs. He had even thought of Matias’s mother, the beautiful Christina, dabbing her tear-filled brown eyes with a handkerchief. But that night, his mind drifted to thoughts about Reva. She would love the Shadow Valley. Reva had been kissed by the sun, or so they said. He still remembered the warmth of her skin and how it shone like copper when it caught the light. She was golden to him. The Shadow Valley was not as dark as he had expected. There were times when the sun lowered behind the great volcanoes to the west, and that did plunge the valley into shadows, but most of the day was warm, bright, and golden.
The grass was rough, but it covered the valley. Tough but colourful flowers grew in abundance from the packed soil. The land rose and dipped like waves of the ocean. And above all, the great volcano, Zean, stood grand and proper, like a father overseeing his children. Reva would love the colour of Xantos. She would love the excitement of meeting new people. She had hated being cooped up in Nesra’s Keep as a girl, but there had been little choice after Reva’s parents had been murdered during the rebellion.
Father’s soldiers had found her hiding in her parents’ chambers. The young girl had been found cowering and muttering to herself in the corner of the room, her eyes fixed on her own mother’s blood. His father’s soldiers had taken Reva to Nesra’s Keep, where the king took pity on her and allowed her to stay. The king had seemed taken with Reva at first. He even decided to betroth Reva to Luca, though that could well have been architected in a way to obtain Avalon Towers and the men who had remained faithful to Lord Avalon during the rebellion, but Luca had thought it was because he liked Reva. Or at least he had thought that until the day she was given to Lord Unna like a prize pig at Ilkta Markets.
Luca unclenched his fists and sighed. A lot had happened since that day. He thought of the girl who had arrived at Nesra’s Keep, so dirty and little, half-wild, with eyes that had seen too much. She never talked about it, but Luca knew the depths of her grief. Now he knew it all too well. What would Reva make of him now? Would she still love him like she had when they were children on the cusp of adulthood? Could anyone love him now that he was a murdering monster?
They rode atop the merchants’ wooden cart pulled by two hardy but slow donkeys. Axil had not been joking when he said they were short of coin. The horses and provisions had been too expensive, but at least this way they had company during the dark, chilling nights in the Shadow Valley. The two men they travelled with—Simene and Zhoren—were the traders on their way to the foothills of the Ash Mountain range. Simene cooked a good stew out of the strange little rodents that scurried through the valley. He was older, in his fifties, and wore layers of cotton tunics and scarves of all colours. His skin was almost as dark as Axil’s though his eyes were a dirt green, like the rough grass on the valley floor. Zhoren was Simene’s son, tall and wiry with buck teeth and the same dirt-green eyes. They did not talk much. They were too smart to ask Axil and Luca questions. They shared bread and offered up mats to sleep on. That was good enough for Luca.
During the day, Luca rode in the back of the cart with Axil. They had not spoken about Luca’s Menti powers since the day in the tavern. Luca hated the silence, but he could not think of a way to break it. Instead, he thought of Matias, and his father, and Reva, and even his mother, whom he had not thought of for years. He thought of Stefan, and Serena, and Carolina, and little Alberto. He was not foolish enough to think he could ever go back to Reyalon, but he could not help but wonder if he might see them again. Many years from now they might not know him by sight. He could grow a beard and wear ragged clothing and pretend to be a traveller visiting from a distant city. The Xanti sun would tan his skin and he would no longer look like Prince Luca of Estala.
On the third day, Axil decided to break the silence. At first, Luca did not want to listen, but as Axil continued to speak, he found his interest piqued.<
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“Your mother was Menti,” Axil said. “I knew that from the start. She was a fire wielder too, but her powers were not as strong as yours. She fought those powers day in and day out. Sofia was determined to never use them, so determined that the fire consumed her one day. The fever burned bright and through her system in a matter of hours. It came so fiercely that I left the room to fetch a healer. When I came back, she was delirious, and an hour later she was gone. You were just a babe when it happened. I wish you had known her. If she had been able to counsel you, none of this would have happened. As it was, I made a fatal error.
“I took your illness to mean that the Menti powers had not passed to you. The circumstances between your illness and your mother’s illness were so different that I saw no connection. She was already a fire wielder when the fever took her. You had not shown any affinity for fire. The candles burned brighter when she walked into a room. Braziers glowed. Flames always reflected brightly in her eyes. But none of that happened for you. Her fever had been sudden and consumed her in hours. Your illness came on slowly and the fever was a slow burn. If I had been blessed with the foresight to think about how Menti powers affect people differently, I might have caught it.” He sighed. “It was God’s way.”
Luca bristled. He hated it when Axil blamed everything on God. It had been he who burned his brother, not God. It was little more than an excuse, and he could not have that. He needed the weight of his guilt. He needed to be buried beneath it.
“I work for the Menti because they have been oppressed for too long. What your father has done to them is an abomination. Menti are not to be feared. They are to be celebrated. Your gifts are a gift from God.”
“It is sorcery,” Luca said sullenly.
“Magic, yes, but still a gift.” Axil pressed Luca’s hand gently. “You will see. I am taking you to the rebels for you to see the possibilities that are available to you. I know you will understand once you see them. Once you get to know them. Your world has been too small, Luca. It is always the way of princes. Kings keep their princes inside their castles, instead of letting them out into the world to get a taste of it. A prince should know what the common folk desire, otherwise how will he rule?”
“I have been sick almost my entire life. How could I see the world?”
“Yes, that is true. But you are not sick anymore. You are well, and you are powerful, and you have the world at your feet.” Axil leaned forward and clenched his fist. “Open yourself, Luca. Open yourself to possibilities.” Luca watched as Axil’s fingers unfolded slowly like a flower blooming. He frowned and turned away.
The cart crested a hill so that Luca got his first glimpse of the camp below. It stretched out beneath the Ash Mountains, with Zean a monumental giant keeping watch over them all. Here the soil was black from the volcano ash. The flowers were sparser, and the grass was shorter and even drier.
In amongst the sparse flowers and rough grass were huts, tents, horses, and people. It was the people who caught his attention first. He had never seen such differing faces. Some had skin as dark as the ashen ground, others were as pale as milk. The people there were tall, short, dumpy, and muscular, every kind of differing build you could imagine. But their numbers were small. He estimated three dozen people milling around the tents, including a few young children clutching onto their mothers.
As the cart followed a steep path down towards the camp, there was a strange ripple in the air, and a barefooted teenage boy with short trousers knocked a girl off her feet with a blast of wind from his hands. The girl stood, brushed off her tunic, and sprayed the boy with soil. A blast of bright light turned Luca’s head. There was a young man walking through the camp bouncing a ball of fire from one hand to the other. Behind him, two boys fought with wooden swords while a man shouted commands at them. Repose, lunge, parry.
The cart came to a stop in the middle of this chaos, and if Simene and Zhoren seemed fazed by the strange behaviour around them, they did not show it. Instead they methodically unpacked their cart, working around Luca and Brother Axil as the two clambered ungracefully onto the ground.
“This looks a little light.” A man walked towards the cart carrying a box filled with bottles. Luca thought they must be potions and ointments, from the strange array of coloured liquids. He gestured towards Simene’s cart.
“We have brought you guests,” Simene said. “The guests needed to eat on the way here.”
The man carrying the box assessed Luca from top to toe with his ice-blue eyes. Luca had never seen a man with eyes bluer than Brother Axil’s before. From the thinning hair and lines around his eyes, the man appeared to be around forty years old. His face had a sunken quality, with deep-set eyes and taut skin.
“You brought us guests and less food? Maybe I should throw away a few love potions.”
“You do not dare,” Simene said angrily. “They fetch a pretty penny. We will bring more next time. You have my word.”
The man spat on the ground. “That is what your word is worth, merchant. Oh, be done with it. Take your loot, dump the food and be gone.” He turned his attention away from Simene to Luca and Axil. “So you are the guests. Estali?”
Luca nodded.
“Menti?”
Luca’s cheeks burned, but he nodded. It was the first time he had admitted it. His palms seemed suddenly clammy.
“The boy is a fire wielder but he has no way of training. I have brought him to you,” Axil said.
The man looked him up and down once more.
“Fire wielders are a pain in my backside. But they can be useful. I’m Geraldo. Welcome to the rebel camp, or what’s left of it.”
Reva
She was clamped between two other girls and forced to walk without her cloak because one of the Sisters had decided to wear it. Valeria also took her horse. A pinched-faced woman with eyes the colour of soil took Ammie’s horse. Reva watched them closely as she limped along in her ripped dress, hating every one of the Sisters. Rage spread through her blood, hot and heady. They were not true worshippers of God, they could not be. They were false.
The party moved slowly, jangling their chains as they took each step. The Sisters led the song, and even though Reva now knew all the words, she refused to sing. Light our path, light our life, Anios, oh Anios! They could whip her bloody for all she cared; she would not sing. Chained together, they stumbled up the Market Road as far as the Hareno Village before entering the Dourwood Forest.
“There are outlaws on the Market Road past Hareno,” whispered the girl behind Reva. She talked as the others sang. She talked and talked in the accent of the common folk, barely even stopping for breath. “That’s why we’re goin’ through Dourwood. The Sisters would never go into the forest otherwise. They say wolf-ghosts and other spirits walk through the trees. Every shadow holds a secret. So they say.”
Reva tried to block the girl’s whisperings out as she walked. She managed to block out the aches and pains of her body (though she longed for the tincture to soothe her hurts), the dry thirst on her tongue, and the rubbing of the iron chains. She blocked out the image of her one friend, loyal Ammie, laying with her life’s blood mingling with the muddy earth. She even partially blocked out the Sisters’ incessant song. But she could not quite block out this girl.
“Sister Valeria is in charge,” the girl continued. “I’ve been with them since Reyalon. It’s been a long, long walk. Valeria is in charge and she’s mean as a starved boar. That whip of hers has a terrible kiss. It stopped me shifting in an instant. I saw you try to shift, too. Looks like you’ve never done it before.”
There was a lull in the singing for a moment, as well as a lull in the girl’s chattering, but the blissful silence did not last long. While the girl was quiet, Reva concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other and trying to ignore the soreness emanating from her abdomen. The Sisters had taken her cloak, but they had left her boots, and for that alone she was grateful. Some of the other girls walked barefoot. Being of good
birth, Reva had never gone barefoot in her life. Her skin was too soft for the tough, forest floor filled with sticks and sharp stones.
Dourwood Forest was a cold, sharp place. Dark green moss spread up the trunks of the trees, reaching even the tallest of the branches. There were no leaves on those twisted branches. They reached over the top of Reva’s head like empty hands begging to be filled. With what, Reva did not know, and she did not like to think about it. All she knew was that the air felt thick with possibilities; as though magic hung in a cloak of low mist.
She stumbled on and longed for the girl to speak again. When the girl was silent, she started to watch Sister Valeria, and a great ball of hatred worked itself up from her core. This woman had taken the one friend she had in the world and killed her like a pig. She had forced Reva into submission and put her in irons. But worse of all, Reva knew she had changed. She had seen the scales on her skin and felt the bones move in her body. Reva was a monster. Reva was Menti.
“I’m sorry for what happened to your friend,” the girl said. “She didn’t deserve that.”
The singing resumed. Reva bit into her lip until it bled.
“She’s not the first I’ve seen ’em kill,” the girl whispered. “They’re s’posed to take girls to the Gardens. They round up young girls that are destitute, or are Menti, and between the Dourwood Forest and the Tasme Mountains we work. Work. Work. Work. That’s what they’ve been whispering up and down the line, anyway. They work us ’til we pass out and feed us the barest amount to keep us working. Those that grow old and weak and collapse throughout the day are taken away and never seen again. Some say they let ’em go inside the Dourwood Forest for the wolves to take ’em. Others say they slit their throats and pray to Anios while they do it. No one knows for sure.”
The girl’s words might have been distracting, but they brought Reva little comfort. After all she did to escape Prince Stefan’s men, she had ended up a captive anyway. All those lives taken for naught. Her heart felt shrivelled and dry, unable to withstand any more hurt. She wanted to give up. But instead, she put one foot in front of the other until the Sisters let them stop. One of the girls collapsed to the ground. Another began to cry. Valeria gave her a taste of her whip.
