Bursting onto the beach, she whirled, out of options and out of cover. He was right behind her, crashing out of the trees. Sibba felt like she was facing down a bear after all; a cold sweat dripped down her forehead, stinging her eyes. Before, when she had thought him to be a wild animal, she hadn't been afraid. She tried to remember the confidence she had felt then, tried to push away the fear that threatened to consume her. But people were the scariest creatures of all, with their fake smiles and hidden motivations. At least with a bear or a field cat, she always knew what was coming next.
He swung the great sword and she caught it against the blade of her ax and shoved it aside. He hadn't been expecting resistance, and so when she flung his arm away, the sword sailed out of his grip, landing quietly in the sand.
“Malstrom bitch!” he roared. Sibba didn't have time to be confused at the strange word as he launched himself at her, shoving her backward. She stumbled, arms windmilling as she went down hard on her back, her ax tumbling from her hands and the wooden bow cracking beneath her weight. The cold tide rushed up to meet her, its white foam swirling around her fingers. Gabel landed on top of her, his knees on either side of her hips, his meaty hands around her throat.
“Stop!” she choked out. One hand clawed at his fingers while the other groped in the surf, searching for a weapon. “Stop,” she begged, hating herself for it. “What do you want?”
A wave washed over her face, and she inhaled a mouthful of saltwater. Gabel laughed as she retched, squeezing tighter. “I want your crown,” he said through gritted teeth, his face red with fury and force.
She wanted to tell him that she didn't know what he was talking about, but his hands had completely closed her airway so she only stared, her vision going blurry as another wave swept over her.
It was then, blinking through the saltwater, that Sibba saw the flash of golden-brown feathers behind Gabel's head. Aeris's talons dug into the man's shoulder, ripping both shirt and skin. He released Sibba, his hands going up to protect his face as the bird beat him with wings and claws. The angry sound of his curses was lost to the waves. Sibba scrambled away, deeper into the water, gasping for breath, struggling to understand. Only when Gabel got in a good blow, knocking Aeris back into the sand, did Sibba come around, struggling to her knees and snatching the ax back from the surf.
Aeris screamed, the sharp sound echoing in Sibba's ears as Gabel dove for her. Forcing herself to keep her eyes open and face his rage, Sibba brought the ax in an arc across her body, and the blade made a deep, clean cut across his throat, spraying her with blood. She jerked away from the warm droplets and Gabel's still-reaching hands. His lunge fell just short of her, and he dropped to his knees, blood seeping through his fingers that were wrapped now around his own neck instead of hers.
His eyes were wide, holding her in place just as much as he had when he had been on top of her. She couldn't move, her insides constricting, her breath coming in quick, painful gasps. This would be nothing for her father or for Jary—death was part of life for a Fielding warrior. With the decades-long war between the clans, how many men had Jary killed by now? Dozens? Hundreds? But her mother had removed her from that world when they left Ottar.
Blood stained the beach, and the water that rushed by her as the waves retreated was the color of rust on an old blade. Gabel's mouth gaped open and shut as he struggled to breathe. Sibba couldn't look away, couldn't make herself tear her eyes from his light brown irises. Finally, he toppled face first into the water and grew still.
Sibba pushed herself to her feet, panting. She didn't think she would ever forget how it felt not to be able to breathe. It could easily have been her lying lifeless in the surf. Water wrapped around the body and moved it a few inches toward her. She scrambled away on shaking legs, splashing onto the sand, escaping the reach of the taunting ocean. Aegis, the goddess of the sea, seemed eager to claim the corpse, frenzied by the sacrifice.
Back on the beach, the cold air hit her like a wall and she began to shiver, her teeth clattering together. The bottom of Sibba’s wolf-skin cloak was stained red with the dead man's blood. She shrugged the cloak off first, and then the bow. It was snapped in half, held together only by the string. That was bad. They would starve if she couldn’t hunt, but of all the things she had taught herself in the last five years, how to make a bow was not one of them. Their dried meat stores and pickled vegetables would have to get them through the snows, and then she would have to find a way to procure a new bow, perhaps from the weaver-women on the mainland.
Movement at the edge of Sibba's vision drew her attention away from the bow. Aeris had hopped to the edge of the beach and landed on something shining in the white sand—the discarded longsword.
Sibba dropped the broken bow and crossed the sand, stumbling on shaky legs. She picked up the sword and shoved it down into her belt so that the lethal tip poked out behind her. Aeris came to sit on her shoulder. The bird’s sharp talons and heavy weight had never bothered Sibba. She had saved the orphan hatchling and brought her up as some do dogs in Ottar. But Aeris was more than a pet; she was her constant companion, her only friend on this abandoned island.
Except for her mother.
You and your mother. The words rang in her head.
Darcey. How had the man known about Darcey?
For the second time that afternoon, Sibba broke into a run, the sun at her back, her dark shadow and the widening beach stretching for endless miles in front of her.
✽ ✽ ✽
Sibba burst through the door to their small longhouse, the wooden planks slamming against the wall before bouncing back and closing behind her. She took the heavy sword from her belt and leaned it against the wall.
“Mama?” she asked the quiet room, but one look was all it took for her to know her mother wasn't there. Though someone had been. The house was in shambles. They didn't have much, and what they did have was always kept meticulously clean and organized by her mother. But now, jars had been shattered and food congealed on the walls and floors. Clothes were thrown haphazardly across the table by the hearth. The hearth fire had gone out, and the kettle that hung over it was empty. Her mother would have started dinner. She wouldn't have left, not with a storm coming. The woman hated storms.
Sibba's eyes fell on the loom that took up most of the back wall. The sail that her mother had been working on was slashed down the middle, half of the dark fabric brushing the floor while loose threads dangled from the top piece. Around it, and in fact in all corners of the house, the rushes had been flung aside, the hard-packed dirt disturbed as if someone had been searching for something.
I want your crown. Was that it? Sibba braced her arms on the table, suddenly dizzy with fury. He had just been looking for their hoard, for treasure? Bits of gold and silver to line his pockets? Had she nearly died because of a man's greed? And her mother—gods. Where was she?
That morning, her mother had told her not to leave, had told her that they had enough food stores to get them through the snows, but Sibba had been stubborn and single-minded as always. She had insisted: one more deer, one more excursion before the snow barricaded her in the cabin until the planting season.
“Be home before the storm breaks,” her mother had said. Usually, she would follow this missive up with an ominous declaration of, “I don't trust the rain,” but the white snow clouds hung too heavy to leave any room for doubt that what was coming was not rain, but its white, frozen counterpart. Though to be fair, Darcey didn't like snow any better.
“I will, mama. I always am.” Sibba had donned her cloak and headed out the door without glancing back, but she could see her mother in her mind. Small and slight, with a soft, round face and a gentle smile, yellow hair reaching down to her waist in waves. Not like Sibba, who was all hard angles and long, severe lines.
Pushing herself off of the table, she took another survey of the room and then moved back to the door, pulling it open and coming face to face with a world of white. The first snow of th
e season was going to be a big one, already coating the ground in a matter of minutes. Night had fallen but it was hard to tell, the sky still light with clouds. The tide, visible from the front door, was retreating. She thought of Gabel's body and the bloody water.
Aeris screamed. No matter how many times Sibba heard the sound, it still sent chills down her spine. She stumbled out into the cold. Gerd nickered from the outbuilding—Sibba barely registered the mare's plea for food. Following Aeris's call, she rounded the house to the clearing between the rear of the house and the trees, where Darcey kept her garden. Here, her mother coaxed plants out of the stubborn dirt, using manure to nourish the soil and sheer force of will to make them grow.
It seemed to make sense that she would be there now, face down in the sandy soil that she had fought against for all these years. Her mother's feet were bare and her dress bunched up around her knees. Hair fanned out around her head, golden-white like Sibba's except where it was soaked in blood around her neck. Still gripped in her fingertips was the dagger that Sibba made her wear, the one with the curved blade like Aeris's beak. The warm blood on the steel melted the snow around it, but otherwise, the body was blanketed in white powder.
Sibba took one step forward before her legs gave out and she landed on her knees in the sand. Dropping her head, she wrapped her arms around her waist and squeezed her eyes shut.
This couldn't be real.
But it was. Sibba felt her mother's death as if it had been a physical blow. Some outside force squeezed her until she couldn't breathe. It was no different than having Gabel's hands around her throat. The grip tightened until the pain was so intense she thought she might break in half. That was when the first sob escaped her lips, a terrible, hollow sound from somewhere deep inside. Her body did not belong to her anymore but to the grief. She was just a shell, a vessel for it. It ripped out of her, leaving her battered and numb.
It didn't help her to think that she had killed the man responsible. She played what she imagined to be her mother's last moments over and over in her head—the terror that she must have felt. At least she had fought back, had made Gabel bleed before he took her life.
Forcing herself to look up, she opened her eyes. Aeris stood beside her mother's body, her head erect, her golden wings spread protectively, shielding the body from predators. When their eyes met, the bird let out another cry, and Sibba imagined she heard the grief in it this time. They were both in mourning.
Sibba crawled forward; her limbs were completely numb, and the tracks her tears had made were frozen on her cheeks. She welcomed the cold—if only it could dampen the pain that was eating away at her insides. Aeris hopped away, tucking her wings back to her sides. When Sibba rolled her mother's body, her hair fell away, revealing the arrow protruding from the side of her neck. Blood had long-since stopped flowing, but the wound was deep and the wooden shaft was stained dark red, the iron tip buried deep beneath the ragged flesh. Darcey's head lolled backward as Sibba dragged her closer. Pressing her face into her mother's belly, Sibba screamed, half-expecting to feel Darcey’s small hands in her hair, to hear her quiet voice murmuring soothing words. But she remained lifeless, and Sibba wept as the body grew colder, her mother's blood soaking the ground beneath them.
CHAPTER THREE
Rayne
Rayne had not been within spitting distance of a palace for five years. The royal palace in Iblia was just a part-time residence, a place for Hail's rulers to escape the heat of the southern dry season that did not always reach so far north. But that made it no less opulent. The curved towers were made from stone the color of sand, and the roofs—dusted lightly with snow—tapered to a point, nearly touching the clouds. Each of the narrow rectangular windows shone with a single candle in celebration of the first snow, casting a dim light on the crowd below.
A shoulder bumped against hers and Rayne drew her cloak tighter, tipping the hood down to hide her face behind the fur lining as she pressed herself closer to Merek, who walked just in front of her. Ahead of him were the others—Giles, Rolf, Emma, and Imeyna—Shadderns, Knights, rebels, infiltrators. Children. The Shadderns trained their Knights young. Except for Imeyna, who was in her late-twenties, the others were all teenagers, seventeen or eighteen, young and full of bravado, which was, in Rayne's case anyway, at least half-faked.
“You're more likely to fit in than us old folks,” Wido had said, handing them their fake slaver’s bands. Instead of the silver worn by the household slaves in Hail, these were made out of hollow aluminum and had a hidden clasp so that they could be removed when the job was done. “It will be easier for you to get in and out, especially if you are just insignificant slave children.”
Wido Cliffbane was Imeyna's father and the closest thing the Republic of Shade had to a king, though he would never call himself that. He was the leader, the rallying point, the maker of plans and the dreamer of freedom. It was by his grace that she was alive and now was her chance to prove he had not made a mistake.
Sneaking through the outer gates had been easy. The guards were overwhelmed by the festival crowds, giving the celebrating citizens only cursory glances as they passed. With Imeyna's iron-and-leather armor and long, black braids hidden by her cloak, they had given no thought to the group of slaves being led by the tall guard through the gates. The snow fell gently, dissolving in wet pinpricks on her shoulders and leaving the uneven cobblestones slick beneath her feet.
Children raced by, bells on their ankles jingling with each step. Tonight, their parents would steal the bells and slip gifts beneath their pillows—trinkets and carved toys, sweet, hard candies, and packages tied up with rough, brown strings. These were meant to be gifts from Enos, rewards for good behavior and dedication. Rayne remembered the First Snow Festivals at the palace in Dusk, the way the flakes made the gray city into a blank slate, something with the potential to be beautiful. One of her earliest memories was waking up to find a soft doll tucked into her pillowcase. It had red lips and tight, brown curls so much like her own. She had taken it with her when she left Lerora and lost it in the Silver Hills, where she had wandered for days before Imeyna found her, half-starved and wild with grief.
Vendor stalls lined the walkways. Nearest to them, a man sold bands of bells as quickly as the group of women behind him could string each set. Rayne desperately wanted to buy one, to run through the streets with abandon as she had done when she was a child. But the daggers at her hips reminded her that she wasn't a child anymore, no matter her age. Merek's hand reached for her, and she grasped it, letting him pull her forward, out of the daydream and back into the present.
The palace gates were open to admit revelers and merchants and entertainers. Rayne took comfort in the chaos, sinking into the crowd easily, relishing the sounds of jingling bells and raucous laughter, the crush of joyous bodies. Here, it was easy to get lost and to lose, to blend in and become someone else, or no one at all.
The five intruders stopped in sight of the kitchen entrance and made sure that their bands were showing, glimpses of metal beneath their cut sleeves, a fashion trend that was used by Hailians as a way to distinguish rank. Slaves wore bands and were identified not by their names, but by the metal used and the embellishments on the band; a bare arm meant a free man. As the Shadderns fell in with the crowd of slaves coming and going through the nondescript side door, her eyes sought out other bands, those of dark iron that indicated a slave of Dusk, her home country. It was her way of remembering why she had to do this. A life for a life. A princess for a slave. Her sister for Imeyna’s sister. Edlyn for Madlin. Her father would suffer for what he did to her friend. Rayne would exact her payment in blood.
In the hallway beyond the kitchen, the press of bodies was even worse, intensified by the roaring kitchen fires and the clang of metal dishes, the sloshing of dirty water, the sticky stones and dirty rushes beneath their feet. Rayne worried about what Giles and Rolf carried hidden beneath their cloaks. Giles, whose mother was an alchemist in Bricboro, had warn
ed them not to jostle the firewater as he had carefully added the different powders to the vials and then filled them with the clear liquid that, if it weren't for the sharp smell, could have been mistaken for water. But not even he seemed concerned, and they plowed on, pushing through the crowd and past the bustling kitchen, finding an empty alcove just before a stairwell.
Merek pulled her close but there was no tenderness in the way he held her. He kept things like gentle touches and sweet words confined to when they were alone. At a time like this, he was all business, posturing for Imeyna, the leader of their little group. Rayne fixed her features into a blank slate to match his. She was a Knight, a rebel, an assassin. Nothing else.
“Let's have it,” Imeyna said, gesturing to Giles and Rolf. They produced the small, cut-glass vials full of the colorless liquid and gave one to everyone except Rayne. Rayne had her knives and her blood, and that was all she needed.
But it was her blood that betrayed her, too. Because it was the same blood that ran through her sister’s veins and the same blood that she was supposed to spill tonight. Her hands were balled into fists and she pressed them against her thighs so that the others wouldn't see the tremors that threatened to make their way from her fingers into the rest of her body. She was already certain that the Knights didn't fully trust her, not even the ones she considered her closest friends. It was a relationship based on mutual need—she needed them to survive, and they needed her to kill the princess.
“Dinner is on the third course,” Emma said, reappearing in the alcove. Rayne hadn't even noticed her disappearance. The small, pale girl was like a ghost. Wido wasn't wrong about them coming and going easily. The rest of them squeezed together to make room for her.
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