Fire in the Star

by Kamilla Benko

  But it wasn’t until Claire turned the spyglass onto the path leading upward, toward the higher peaks, that she found who she was looking for. A grin broke across her face as she realized Gryphin had been successful in relaying his message.

  “It’s Nett and Sena! And Thorn!” Claire said. “They’re running toward us! And so is Kleo! And Lyric and Lapis and—and everyone!”

  Grandmaster Carnelian rode Lixoon, while Mathieu and Sylvia carefully led the chimera up the narrow path. And behind them, finally, Aunt Nadia!

  She was slow, however, and Claire worried that her aunt was injured, but then she saw she was helping a smaller woman with thick gray hair and rosy cheeks make her way up the path. And behind them walked Mistress Weft and Scythe, each one holding the arm of a taller man across their shoulder. The man moved stiffly, as though he’d forgotten how legs were supposed to work, but the double-headed battle-ax across his back gleamed as bright as ever.

  “It’s Anvil and Aquila!” Claire shouted, lowering the spyglass in delighted surprise. “But how?”

  When we asked stones to move, you also asked the rock in other things to waken, too. Everyone Estelle rubified should be back to who they were, a little stiff but otherwise all right.

  “We’re here!” Claire called, waving her arms at them. She could see Sena’s red head and Nett’s black one break away from the group as they broke into a run. “We’re safe! We’re—”

  But Claire stopped as a sudden chill hit her back. Suddenly, it felt like a cloud had come between the sun and her. The unicorn had drawn away.

  I can’t face them. Not yet.

  “But—”

  Claire’s protest was cut off as Nett and Sena finally appeared, followed by all the others. And in the next second, many hands were reaching for Claire, pulling her in tight. And Claire let herself be enveloped by warm hugs, which made it easy to hide the few tears that dripped down her cheeks, as silent as the unicorn who had already slipped away.

  CHAPTER

  29

  When Sophie had first gone to the hospital, Claire had gotten used to days with no answers … but that didn’t mean she liked it. And so now she knew enough to keep busy, and with Aunt Nadia’s inauguration only two weeks away, there were plenty of things that needed to be done.

  It had been one month since the unicorns’ return to Arden. And in the time since, the four guilds of Arden had met at Drowning Fortress to discuss a new way of living. A new structure of how Arden could be: a republic.

  Every grandmaster from every guild had been considered, but at the end of three long days of discussions and deliberations, the vote had been unanimous: Nadia Martinson would be Arden’s first Prime Minister.

  “I didn’t vote for you because you’re a d’Astora,” Grandmaster Bolt had boomed from his boat when the results became clear. “I voted for you because of how equally you’ve treated the members of Woven Root.”

  “And here I thought it would be my chimera-riding skills,” Nadia had murmured, loud enough for Claire, the Malchains, and the Steeles to hear, but no one else.

  Aquila had shrugged, adjusting the weight of her twin battle-axes. “That’s why I voted for you.”

  Aquila and Anvil had completely recovered from the weeks of rubification, and Nadia had selected them to join her personal guard. Not everyone was pleased with the changes in Arden, though most of the Royalists like Mira Fray had been caught and were currently being held in Drowning Fortress awaiting their trial, the Grand Council of Arden couldn’t be sure they had caught all of Estelle’s most loyal followers. In fact, they knew they hadn’t.

  Commander Jasper had not yet been found. Anvil suspected he had sailed across the Sparkling Sea, and had at least reached the Sunrise Isles by now.

  “But there will be time for us to worry about that,” Anvil had told Claire as she had spent one afternoon helping him scrub moss off a lynx-squirrel chimera they had found on the edge of the Sorrowful Plains and Petrified Forest. For the inauguration, Nadia had wanted an entire regiment of the copper beasts behind her. Once the lynx-squirrel was properly shiny, Anvil rode it over to the alchemists so they could awaken the beast.

  And luckily, the alchemists weren’t far away from Aquila’s cabin—at least, for now. Woven Root had set up camp in the Sorrowful Plains, the only place big enough to hold the vast crowds they were expecting to witness Nadia’s Vow.

  Though the alchemists were no longer outlaws, many of them couldn’t imagine setting up stationary homes. Besides, Nadia herself had said that she wanted Woven Root to keep traveling. That way, she would be able to spend equal time with all the guilds’ many towns, villages, and cities. Not one corner of Arden would be overlooked on her watch. As soon as the inauguration celebrations were over, Nadia had plans to move Woven Root to Starscrape Mountain.

  “If ever a place needed some love and care,” she’d said with an arched brow, “it’s that dilapidated castle.” Maps had been spread over her desk, and Claire had been helping her update the villages with all their most current names.

  “I don’t know,” Claire had said as she blotted ink from her paint brush. She’d just finished adding “Spyden’s Lair” to a currently empty bay near the Sparkling Sea. “I think you just want an excuse to look at their mosaics and art collection.”

  “Their collection is impressive,” Nadia had agreed. “I must admit, I’m looking forward to exploring all those forbidden corridors and secret passageways. Imagine what treasures might be hidden there!”

  But Claire had chosen not to imagine.

  It was too hard without Sophie by her side.

  Sophie.

  Claire had seen many unicorns in recent days, racing one another across far-off hills, free and unrestricted. But she knew, with a sister’s intuition, that none of the sparkling creatures she saw were Sophie. She hadn’t seen her sister since she’d slipped away on Starscrape Mountain.

  “I … I think she’s just busy,” Claire said when Nett and Sena had asked last week at dinner. And it was true. Arden had been without unicorns for three hundred years, and everything needed their attention.

  “She’ll return when she’s ready,” Sena said sympathetically. The girl had become less sharp with the return of her parents. The Steeles had moved into Francis’s old cottage and had, of course, already asked Nadia’s and the Grand Council’s permission to officially adopt Nett. Claire had spent many cozy winter evenings with them, enjoying the warmth of a family. But most of the time, she stayed with Nadia in her Woven Root tent.

  Thorn, like Claire, had chosen to stay within the Woven Root community, and Nadia had offered to train him to be her scribe. It wasn’t very heroic, but Thorn seemed to take to the work happily, and Claire often saw him carrying armloads of tapestries and scrolls from tent to tent, helping with all of the guilds’ matters.

  She and Thorn didn’t talk much about what they had lost, but sometimes, Thorn would share a funny tidbit about her sister or Claire would surprise him with something Sophie once said.

  They were just waiting.

  One week before Nadia’s inauguration, Claire found herself hauling home a collection of diamond bits that needed to be polished into Gemglows. They were a gift to Nadia from Stonehaven, and Zuli and Lapis had been very specific over dinner about how hard they’d worked to make sure all the pieces were the same size. It was a generous gift, only Claire wished it wasn’t quite so heavy—or so big.

  As she wove between the tents that seemed to multiply overnight, Claire calculated where she would put this particular gift. Next to the racks of Flying Cloaks from Needle Pointe? By the vat of Swamp Berry cordial from the Tillers of Foggy Bottom? Or maybe, Claire thought, she could move the jumbled tapestry of golden thread and silk that had come from Mistress Weft, Kleo, and Lyric, and which depicted a life-sized portrait of Nadia herself.

  Claire was still problem-solving when she rounded the last row of tents to arrive at Nadia’s many-quartered Pavilion. To her surprise, the tent was lit. N
adia must have finished her meetings early! She usually didn’t get home until well past midnight.

  Claire walked in and set the diamond bits down with a soft clink.

  “Aunt Nadia?” she called, but her aunt didn’t respond. And then—

  “Hi, Clairina.”

  Every hair on Claire’s neck rose. She knew that voice. And it sounded … totally normal, though maybe a bit more bell-like at the edges. She whipped around to see Sophie—two-legged, two-armed, ponytailed Sophie—standing in front of her.

  “Sophie!” She threw her arms around her sister’s neck and felt her sister squeeze her back. Claire broke the hug. “You’re you! But are you still a—?”

  “I’m still a unicorn,” Sophie said, “yes, but this is how I feel the most comfortable. After all, girls and unicorns aren’t that different, really.”

  And Claire could see it was true. While Sophie looked almost the same, down to the freckles on her nose, there were two things impossible not to notice: the ring of silver in her eyes and a pale-pink scar on her forehead, one that perfectly matched the pale-pink star on Sophie’s collarbone.

  But those were small things and easily explained away in the world of Windemere Manor.

  “You can come home after all, Sophie!” Claire practically squealed, sounding more like Lyric than her usual self. Quickly she began to think of all the ways they could conceal Sophie’s new—and there was no other word for it—sparkle.

  “Maybe Mom will let you get contacts, to explain your eyes, and you can grow your bangs out a little more to make sure the star is covered. Though,” she said with a grin, “you can start wearing a unicorn headband to school and …” She trailed off.

  Sophie wasn’t jumping in to agree or make a joke or laugh or say of course.

  Because there was no of course.

  And in the moment before Sophie took a breath and opened her mouth, Claire held up her hand.

  “Please,” she said, sadly. She felt a tear leak out and she hastily wiped it away. “Don’t say it—not yet.”

  Sophie reached out and squeezed Claire’s hand. Her touch held the echo of the great, magical song that bubbled throughout Arden, and though Claire’s heart still felt heavy, it didn’t feel as though it would crush her anymore.

  Taking a cool, calming breath, Claire managed to sound somewhat normal as she asked, “So, are you going to tell me where you’ve been?”

  “Actually,” Sophie said with a grin, “I can show you.”

  “Show me?” Claire asked, surprised. “Show me what?” But at that moment, she heard a slight rustling, and she turned to see that since she’d left the tent that afternoon, another silk corridor had been added, leading to a newly woven apartment.

  “Well,” Sophie said, moving toward the new cloth door, “I had a sense, when I was on the mountaintop, that perhaps you, me, and Nadia weren’t the only, uh, travelers in Arden. And so I followed my sense, and I listened, catching wind of a tale of two travelers who appeared the morning of Starfell, and carried with them the strangest rucksacks ever to be seen in Arden. Unfortunately, the travelers ran into some trouble—chased by Royalists, took a few wrong turns, ended up in an inescapable labyrinth, etcetera—but before they did get stuck, these travelers were inquiring about a pair of missing children. Missing daughters, actually.”

  With a small flourish, Sophie pulled back the curtain, to reveal—

  A man, with round glasses that looked not Arden-made, and a woman, whose curly hair had been pulled into a topknot on her head.

  “Dad!” Claire yelled. “Mom!” And then she was flying across the room, throwing herself into her parents’ arms.

  “Claire! Claire! ” They wrapped her up tight, and Sophie too, a tangle of happy tears and laughter and questions and love.

  The Martinson family had been reunited, once more.

  CHAPTER

  30

  The day of Nadia Martinson’s inauguration broke bright and clear and cold—though Claire felt warm in her many-layered gown of rose pink, sky blue, and gold. It could have been the strands of heat that had been woven into it, courtesy of jumbled Spinner and Forger magics. But then again, it could have been the pride she felt as she watched as Nadia greeted the four grandmasters who stepped into the center of the ring of stones that had once surrounded Queen and Unicorn Rocks.

  Next to her, Nett practically bounced on his toes.

  “I told you to wear your thicker cloak, but no,” Sena grumbled out of the side of her mouth. Sena’s red hair had been pinned into delicate coronet braids, but her golden armor with a growling griffin on the breastplate declared strength and respect. (And the real Gryphin, lounging across her shoulders, would make sure Sena got it.) Sena Steele looked like a heroic knight, and the only thing missing was a sword. Since Sena had lost Fireblood in the Battle of the Wraiths, she’d been unable to find a blade that felt, in her own words, “hers.”

  “I’m not cold.” Nett did a double jounce. “I’m excited!”

  He, too, was dressed up for the occasion. His pine-green sweater brought out the flecks of hazel in his eyes and his leather boots had been trimmed in shiny holly leaves, and here and there, shiny golden acorns: gifts from Sylvia and Mathieu.

  Sena grimaced. “Still, stop it. Everyone can see you.”

  That was true. As one of a few people allowed inside the ring of rocks during the Vow, they were clearly visible. But she was pretty sure all eyes were on Nadia, who was about to make her pledge to the guilds and become Arden’s first ever Prime Minister.

  “My dearest Arden, I vow,” Nadia said, looking out over the Sorrowful Plains, which had been transformed into a field of candy-colored silk tents, leafy Tiller dwellings, Forger ReflecTents, and Gemmer-made gazebos, “to water all things green. I vow to mend all tears. I vow to polish all that may rust. I vow to move mountains.”

  The crowds cheered, and four figures moved into the ring of rocks where Nadia stood—the same place Unicorn Rock and Queen Rock had loomed for all those years.

  Grandmaster Bolt, the Spinner director, Grandmaster Carnelian, and the newly reinstated Grandmaster Iris of Greenwood stepped forward with the crown.

  “The guilds of Arden accept your words, and bind them to you for the next five years,” the director said. “As our thanks to you, for your promise, will you accept the Crown of Arden?”

  Claire held her breath as Nadia shook her head. “No,” she said, startling a gasp from all, even the shining regiments of chimera riders who stood proudly with their mounts. “I have no need of it. While magic exists in all things—in all worlds—” she said with a significant look at Claire, “it is people who bring it out. Who are responsible for wielding it, who live and die, love and grow and change. Magic may be in the material, but we are the ones who put the magic there.”

  She paused, then smiled. “Besides, I’ve been told the magic of this Crown is to let the monarch know how united the guilds feel, but we have no need of it now, when we are blessed by unicorns.” She gestured toward the edges of the Sorrowful Plains.

  As one, the crowd and Claire and Nett and Sena turned to look. Surrounding the Sorrowful Plains like pearls bordering a music box stood Arden’s unicorns. They had come to witness this new and exciting change in Arden’s history. They had come to give their blessing, and their gifts sank into the land, making the snow whiter, the cloaks brighter, and the hope inside Claire’s chest almost unbearably sweet.

  “Instead,” Nadia continued, her voice magically amplified to roll across the great open space, “I choose to gift the Crown of Arden to the unicorns, as a thank-you and a promise that from now, they shall be cherished and protected by all the guilds.”

  At that, the crowd parted slightly and Sophie appeared, dressed in a flowing gown of white silk and lavender gauze, and trailing silver ivy. Her hair fell in shining black waves to the small of her back, the white streak still clearly visible. She moved with a grace unusual to a girl but common among unicorns, and Claire felt her breath
catch slightly. But as Sophie drew nearer, Claire was relieved to see her smile was still the same. Still Sophie.

  Nadia bowed to Sophie and presented the Crown. Sophie took it with an elegant nod. “We thank you for this gift,” Sophie said. “And we will hold you to your vow. The unicorns, too, have a gift for Arden. Gifts,” she stressed to the crowd, “not artifacts. Nettle Green, will you come forward?”

  Nett immediately stopped fidgeting. He looked as surprised as Claire felt. Sophie hadn’t told them there were going to be Unicorn Gifts!

  He stepped forward while Sophie reached into her gown’s pocket and produced a fuzzy little plant, perfectly round and glowing with a pearly light.

  Nett gasped. “It’s a marimo!”

  “It’s your marimo!” Sophie corrected with a smile. “In thanks for your boundless curiosity that helped our return, we unicorns healed the plant that was your mother’s. It’s the same but changed. It will never run out of sunlight. May it always light your way … and the darkest corners of the library.”

  Nett’s smile was so bright Claire wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d started to glow, too.

  “Sena Steele,” Sophie called, and a bemused Sena clunked forward … as did her parents. Extended between the older Steeles hung a gleaming sword, its pommel in the shape of an arched unicorn head.

  As Sena grasped it and drew the blade into the air, Sophie spoke: “The unicorns gift this blade to you, Sena, for your fierce loyalty and even fiercer heart.”

  Sena gave it a few practice swishes. “Thank you,” she whispered, her voice tight with emotion. “It’s beautiful.”

  Sophie leaned forward, and lowering her voice, spoke so only the four of them could hear, “The same starfire that the crown was forged from makes the core of this sword. Listen to it, so you can always know who deserves your loyalty.”