She rounded the corner to where the well, a hollowed-out squat block of stone, sat in the middle of a small courtyard. Prior to the Blood Sun Solstice, the line of people with buckets and cartons never seemed to fade at wells like this. Children would dip their hands into the cool, sweet water pumped up from the fresh reservoir deep below the mines of Storm’s Quarry.
Two tall figures stood before a shorter one. A boy, Nadya realized, heart dropping. Erevan, thin and scruffy, holding a tiny tin cup. And standing between him and the well were two Cressian soldiers.
Oh, damn it all! One of them held a pistol, waving it at the boy. Both were pale, with the blond hair and light eyes of Wintercress. They wore white uniforms much like those of the soldiers of the caravan.
And the woman in charge of them.
Leave it alone, Nadya, she thought as she made to do the exact opposite.
“The well is free to all who live here.” She strode up, putting herself forcefully between the boy and the soldiers. “Is there a reason you guard this place?”
Her nose tickled with an odd scent, sharp and earthy, but the breath of the Cressian soldiers masked it as one leaned down until his face practically touched hers.
“Nomori, huh? Can you understand? You need to stand aside. We are conducting Wintercress business, under the authority of Her Ladyship, Councillor Aster.” His Erevo was heavily accented. Both men were Cressian, so blond their hair almost shone white.
The Cressians of Wintercress and the Erevans of Storm’s Quarry had been a single people in ages past. Now, these Cressian men were as different from the Erevans of Storm’s Quarry as from the Nomori. These soldiers looked capable, though. Corded muscles ran underneath the neat overcoats, somehow still shining white despite the filth of Storm’s Quarry that surrounded them. It was as if they stood outside Nadya’s reality.
She had a mere moment to make her decision, but it was already made. This was her life, her home. Broken and sick as it might be, Nadya would not allow strangers to trample all over it. She could stand for her city in this small way. Without the cloak. Crossing her arms, Nadya made no move to leave. “This is a public well of Storm’s Quarry,” she said in flawless Erevo, “not a stronghold of Wintercress. Conduct your business, but do not keep the thirsty from its waters.”
They blinked in surprise. Whatever Cressians knew of the Nomori, much of it was probably wrong.
“Stand back, or you will spend the next fortnight behind prison bars,” the taller one said, brandishing his saber. “And pretty girls like you rarely do well there.”
Perhaps in the barbaric west. “Only the Duke’s Guard has jurisdiction to make arrests,” Nadya said. “So kindly lower your pistol and leave this place.”
“We are soldiers of the Kingdom of Wintercress, ally to Storm’s Quarry, and—”
“And have no jurisdiction in civilian matters,” Nadya interrupted him. “Bring back a troop of the Guard or the written permission of the Duke to take over this well. Then I will go with you. Until that happens, be gone from here and let us have our water.” Iron filled her final words.
The pistol did not lower, but trained itself on Nadya. “You’ll find our authority in Storm’s Quarry is vast, and we will not tolerate Nomori or Erevan interference. You have lost your chance to end this peacefully.” He nodded to his partner. “Restrain her.”
Protectress, will I regret this? “Do not try to hold me. You are about to lose your chance as well.” Her better sense screamed for her to just leave, that a block of stone and piping, one that dished out tainted water most times at that, was not worth what might happen here if she held her ground.
She was never very good at listening to that better sense, probably because it always seemed to come to her in her grandmother’s voice.
The soldier smirked and surged forward, probably an attempt to knock her to the ground.
He ran into her shoulder and got no farther. Nadya kept her breath steady, trying to remember all Shadar’s lessons at once. She held out a hand. “You really do not want to have this fight.” And I don’t either.
“You little braka!” He charged again.
The word clattered upon her ears. Nadya stepped to the side, letting him get even with her. Then her hand darted out and grabbed his collar. The cloth tore down the side, exposing sunburned skin and a white undershirt. She hauled him up. His fist battered at her. She ignored the blows and focused on disarming his other hand. The saber clanged on the stones.
“Demon!” he yelled, punching up into her jaw.
The contact stung hard. Nadya blinked away stars and tried to pin his arm. Keep control, don’t hurt him. Use only what’s necessary. The thoughts flew through her mind in Shadar’s voice. What separates you from Durriken, from Gedeon, is your compassion. Your heart. Feel what they feel and act accordingly. You are not a machine, but a living being, and you are in control of what is yours.
“Let him go!” The other soldier pointed his pistol straight at the boy, who froze, eyes wide.
“Don’t shoot.” Nadya released her grip. The soldier ducked around her, cursing in Cressian under his breath.
“Whatever mad god birthed you, I don’t care,” the other soldier said, his pistol still aimed at the boy. “You do not scare me.” With a crack, the pistol went off.
Slowly, smoke curled out from the barrel, filling the air with the ripe stench of gunpowder and burning flesh. Nadya did not think. All the mantras of control faded from her mind. She was within herself, inhabiting her senses. Pushing off the ground so hard the stone cracked, she leapt. Reaching out, fast as a blur, she came down between the soldier’s smirk and the boy’s fearful cry.
The silence in the wake of the gunshot shattered. Nadya’s hand burned. She bit back a cry, chest heaving. Slowly, she turned toward the Cressian soldiers, holding out her hand, and opened her fist.
A lumpy round of lead lay in her reddened palm, smoking slightly.
How did I…? Nadya’s thoughts fizzled out, not quite comprehending what had happened.
“By the storm,” the boy cursed, creeping around her to peer at her hand.
The faces of the Cressian soldiers had, if possible, gone whiter. The pistol clattered to the ground from shaking fingers. One muttered in rapid Cressian, eyes staring unblinking at the round of lead. The other gaped like a beached fish, silent.
“That word—braka—what does it mean?”
“What?” He gaped. “I—it does not translate.”
“Try.” She added just a touch of force to the syllable.
It was enough. “Insect beneath the boot,” he said, voice trembling.
She sucked in a breath. “I think you should go,” Nadya said calmly, betraying none of the uproar of her thoughts.
One soldier grabbed the arm of the other, and after a few tugs, they disappeared, bits of debris drifting in their wake. One clutched his belt pouch as he ran away.
No one spoke for several moments. Nadya stared at the bullet. Six month ago, she would have never even attempted such a thing, let alone succeeded. A cold feeling rooted itself in her chest despite the heat of the day. Gedeon’s control over her had unlocked the depths of her strength, and even now it frightened her.
What I could have done to those men accidentally…
But you didn’t. She shook herself and pocketed the bullet. You are learning control. You will not fall like the others.
Right now, she needed this day to be over. To be alone in her little hovel, and to just breathe. But that was not currently possible.
“Oh. Oh, gods. Whoa. How’d you do that?” the boy piped up. He looked at Nadya with open-mouthed amazement.
“Practice.” She crossed her arms. “Now, get some water and go back home.”
“Not gonna.”
He was brave. Not many would stand up to someone they had just seen catch a bullet. She saw the slight shakiness at his knees, the hint of a tremor in his voice. Not wanting to scare him further, she said quietly, “We scared those t
wo off, but there will be more. Hanging around here will only cause trouble for you and your family.”
“I ain’t goin’ back!” He scratched at his arm. “Can’t, so don’t make me.”
“Oh.” The mottled skin of the scouring sickness peeked out from under his frayed sleeves. “I understand.” A lump formed in Nadya’s throat. She knelt in front of the boy. “I—I can’t go home either.”
“Why not?” he asked, suspicion dripping from his words.
Because my mother found out my secret and is afraid of me. “Because I betrayed my parents. I kept things from them, and now I cannot be there anymore.”
He scratched at his arm again. Nadya caught the faintest scent of blood. She reached out, and the boy shrank back. “I will not hurt you. Promise.” Slowly, he extended his arm. She took in in her gentlest grasp, being as careful as she could, and drew up the sleeve. Large gray splotches covered his skin, some leaking blood, some pus. Spots like this were among the early symptoms of the scouring sickness. Thousands of people in the city had already fallen ill from the bad water. What started as a rash, sucking the energy out of even the strongest twenty-year-old, reached the lungs after a time, stealing a breath from a person before they could even try to draw it. Lucky for her, disease seem to have as hard of a time hurting her as blades or bullets.
“Ma said, think about the baby and my brothers. Said I was big enough to fend. Didn’t want anyone else gettin’ sick.” He sniffed, but Nadya could tell he was doing his best to look stoic.
Anger roared in her ears, and she dropped his arms. How could a parent do this to a sick child? For a disease spread through water, no less. Even Erevans had more sense of kin than this. Perhaps she had been shortsighted to assume the solstice had only brought out the best of the city. For this boy, it had triggered the worst.
“What do I call you?” she asked suddenly.
“My name’s Deathtiger,” he said, face deadly serious.
Nadya choked back a laugh. “I am not calling you that. What’s your real name?”
He shifted from foot to foot. “Puck,” he said so quietly that Nadya doubted anyone else would have heard him.
“Well, Puck, come with me. You’re going to get help, okay?”
He froze. “Don’t want any.”
“Too bad.
Despite his protests, she wrapped an arm around his thin shoulders and set out with him. There was no sign of any more Cressian soldiers in the streets she walked quickly through, half steering a squirming Puck, as she made her way to the local outpost of the Duke’s Guard. They did pass several foreigners, their accents placing them farther west than even Wintercress. Most carried tools and baskets, off to the various jobs the Duke was paying them well for. In the throngs of craftspeople, she thought she caught a glimpse of a Nomori face, but it disappeared before she could be sure.
Two guardsmen, both Erevan, stood in front of the outpost, looking bored. She did not recognize either of them.
“The wells still are not clean,” one said, not even looking at her when she stopped. “Take your buckets to the palace tier and wait in line like everyone else, Nomori.”
“I’m aware. Two Cressian soldiers tried to take control of the west district’s well.” She nudged Puck forward. “Tried to take us both to prison, and when that failed, they began shooting. They…they were scared off, though. But I doubt the next of their ilk will be.”
The other looked from her to Puck, who had put his best scowl on. “Wintercress soldiers?”
“Yes. They went on about their authority in the city. I would keep an eye on them.”
He grimaced, an acknowledgment of what needed to be done.
Nadya pushed Puck forward a step. “He needs medical attention, and he doesn’t have family.” She did not have to name the scouring sickness. The blemishes on his skin could belong to nothing else.
“I don’t need anything from a bloodcloth!” Puck declared.
“Please,” Nadya said, ignoring him and looking at the guardsmen.
One smiled and nodded. “I was about to go to the hospital to visit my niece. Perhaps he’d like to join me.”
“She pretty?” Puck asked, face screwed up in thoughtful consideration.
The guardsmen laughed. “She is, but you will mind yourself.”
Nadya let herself smile a bit. She lightly squeezed Puck on the shoulder. “See you around, Deathtiger.”
He looked up at her and winked, and suddenly she was not sure if he knew her secret or not. It didn’t matter; no one would believe a child like him. If anything, she wished for what he had seen to give him some bit of hope, something to use to fight the disease creeping through his body. Her thoughts swirled as she left, cutting her way through several alleys. Now that Puck had been taken care of, her mind flashed back to the Cressian soldiers.
Aster’s voice echoed in her mind. Braka. Insect beneath the boot. Who is the insect, Nadya wondered, and who is the boot?
When she put a hand to the door of her shack, she stopped. Someone was inside, their breath deep and regular. The exhausted part of her mind wailed. She shushed it and steadied herself. The noise could be the Wintercress soldiers come for revenge.
“Show yourself,” she called. “I’m not in the mood for games.”
“Nadya, it’s me.”
Her heart froze. That voice that she had not heard in over two months, the one that brought peace to Storm’s Quarry and warmth to her chest. That one which she feared she might never hear again.
Kesali.
Chapter Three
Nadya flung back the door, and there Kesali stood in the middle of the floor, wearing a dark cloak that concealed half her face. Her clothes, traditional Nomori tunic and trousers, lacked any sense of finery, unembroidered gray as they were. The low lamplight of the street flickered across her frown. Dark circles gave weight and age to her features, sculpting her from the careful Nomori girl into the Stormspeaker, betrothed to Storm’s Quarry’s heir, the city’s future on her shoulders.
“Hi,” Nadya said weakly. Other words, more words, better words got lost in the tide of emotion that rose within her. For weeks, she’d been imagining what her next conversation with Kesali would sound like, what she would say to make right the distance that now lay between them, but with the Stormspeaker standing in her hovel, Nadya forgot it all.
“Hello, Nadya. I—I’ve come to ask for your help.”
Her mind snapped out of itself. Nadya stepped into the hovel. “What do you need me to do?” She kicked some refuse into a corner; she hardly kept a clean house, and she did not want Kesali to notice.
“No pleasantries then?” she asked, and a smile finally broke the tired lines of her face. Too tired, too young.
As happy as she was to see Kesali’s smile, Nadya could not help the worry that gnawed at her. “I imagine your business is urgent. Otherwise, the lady of Storm’s Quarry should not be traveling down to the second tier after dark. Alone.” Nadya gestured to the ground, and they sat. “And don’t tell me you brought the Guard. I can hear them a league away, and none came with you. You snuck out.”
Kesali gave a sheepish grin, and Nadya’s fingertips grew warm. “I am capable of it, as you well know.”
Nadya smiled too. Her neck eased a bit. Growing up, she and Kesali had been twin tornados, getting into everything two respectable Nomori girls should not. More than once, her grandmother Drina had caught them coming home in the middle of the night from a clandestine trip to the fourth tier to spy on the city’s wealthy.
A good memory, from before. Before Nadya discovered she was nivasi, before Gedeon and the solstice, and before the hesitance—sharper breaths, flickering gaze, halted movements—crept into Kesali’s demeanor, hesitance Nadya could only assume was caused by her. She doubted even Kesali realized she did it, but the body language was plain as lettering for someone of Nadya’s gifts.
“Even so, I didn’t come here alone.”
Nadya’s heart tripped. Her hands fumble
d as she clasped them, aching to reach out and touch Kesali’s arm. But she looked at Kesali, at her dark eyes, the way the lantern light turned them into storm clouds, and wondered what remained between them. Or had it all passed the moment Nadya tore off her mask?
Of course you didn’t come alone, not to the lair of the Phoenix. Nadya frowned. “What do you—?”
“Nadya, thank the gods you are here.”
Marko, lord of Storm’s Quarry, stumbled in the door behind her. Sweat shone at his brow line, making his thick red hair gleam even brighter in the dim light. An easy smile spread across his face. “I had begun searching the neighborhood, sure our information was wrong.”
He reached out and grasped her forearm.
The man who was to marry the woman she was in love with. Nadya bit back the surge of resentment that always tripped her tongue when speaking to the Duke’s son.
It would have been better if Marko was cruel or arrogant, but he was always nothing but cordial to Nadya, the daughter of his mentor but still just a Nomori nobody from the sea-scum tier. If that had been the case, she could hate him, rather than experience this weird twist of anger, jealousy, and guilt every time she saw him.
Nadya returned his grasp. She drew back, avoiding Kesali’s eyes. “Good to see you, Marko.”
“I wish it were under better circumstances. For both of us.” He bit his lip, scanning the misshapen interior of her new home. “I—I do not mean to pry, Nadya, but this is far from your parents’ house.”
Kesali cuffed him. “Then don’t pry. We aren’t here to poke into the business of others.”
“Right, sorry.” He inclined his head. “We actually need your help, and I’m off to a poor start.”
“It’s no matter. I am here to help.” She hoped the edge of bitterness she felt did not creep too far into her tone.
Phoenix Rising Page 3
