Radiant: Towers Trilogy Book One

by Karina Sumner-Smith

  It shouldn’t be out so early, Xhea thought, panicked. Sunlight burned their eyes, some said, or their skin; and perhaps, given the thing’s scream, there was truth to that story. Yet common wisdom also held that the things spent their days burrowed beneath the ground out in the badlands, far from the Lower City itself, and only drew near as darkness fell—and that, she could see all too clearly, was false.

  Shai had followed her around the corner and back again, mirroring Xhea’s caution if not her fear. Xhea braced for the questions that she didn’t have time—nor could she risk the sound—to answer: who is that person, what happened to them, why are they there, buried, screaming? And even if she could speak, what could Xhea say but “I don’t know”? No one knew where the walkers came from or what had made them the way they were.

  Yet the ghost only whispered, “What can I do to help?”

  The offer was a surprise. Xhea jerked to face her, charms clinking at the movement—and cringed, expecting the sound to draw the thing from cover, sunlight be blighted. After several long moments of silence, she opened her eyes; a few more, and she released her caught breath.

  What could the ghost do? Xhea’s mind spun; she barely knew what she could do, never mind what help Shai might be. If only she could run. If only there were a chance, however faint, that she could sprint to a subway entrance in time; if only her exhausted legs would let her make the attempt. She needed tunnels, concrete rooms with doors that could be locked or barred—a bomb shelter, an old bank safe, the highest floor of a building not yet fallen. And had none.

  “I need to hide,” she said softly, so softly. “Can you see . . . is there anywhere?” Shai nodded and pulled away, struggling against her tether’s limits to search the nearby ruins.

  Xhea forced herself to swallow, then pulled a length of folded cloth from a jacket pocket. Each movement slow and careful, she bound back her hair, wrapping the length with its charms tightly, and tying the whole thing into a knot at the back of her head. She couldn’t let the sound of her hair give her away.

  Shai returned a moment later. “I’ve found a place.” Xhea pointed to the ground, questioning: a basement? Oh, to be underground, where it was dark and safe and nothing in the world could touch her. But Shai shook her head and pointed at the crumbling wall beside them. “It still has part of a floor above,” she whispered. “There are enough gaps in the bricks that you could climb up.”

  At Xhea’s look, she added, “There’s nothing else, not as far as I could reach.”

  “Okay,” Xhea whispered. “Lead me there.”

  She climbed as quickly as she could manage, attempting silence as she hauled herself up the crumbling brickwork. If she were to fall, she had to pray to break her neck. It would be faster than the death that thing would grant her.

  Xhea made it to the top of the narrow platform and crawled across the triangle of rough flooring to the corner where she curled, pressing her shoulder blades against the walls and pulling her knees tight to her chest. Shai sat at her side, the magic inside her flickering at the edges of Xhea’s vision. They looked out across a stretch of ruins, jutting girders and twisted lampposts where there might once have been trees. The walls of her shelter blocked most of the setting sun’s light, casting darkness across the ground, black on gray.

  As the shadows lengthened, the thing freed itself from its daytime shelter. Xhea heard it rise to its feet and slowly exhale as dirt and rubble clattered to the ground around it. In the Lower City streets, these once-human creatures never spoke, and this one seemed no exception. Yet she listened as it stumbled and began to walk, each step echoing through the ruins’ silence; listened as its gait steadied and breathing slowed as the land grew dark.

  Xhea trembled, not from weariness now, nor hunger, but fear. There was nowhere to run. No escape. Only the hope that on this tenuous perch she might pass the night unnoticed, with untold hours to wait until dawn.

  She drew out her knife with shaking hands and extended the tiny blade. Where was her magic now? She had no darkness but that of sky and shadow; no curl of smoke, nor the sweet calm that swelled in its wake. When she breathed, there was only air; and the tears that trailed down her cheeks were just water, warm as blood.

  Clutching her knife, she waited for the walker to see some scuff-mark she’d left in the dirt; to hear her breathing or the thud of her heart; to smell her, terrified and drenched with cold sweat. She’d heard people die at the hands of these things, distant screams and pleas that she’d tried to block out. Once she’d even found the bodies of two people caught outside when darkness fell. At least, she thought there had been two.

  It seemed hours before the night walker moved away. Longer still before she could draw breath without shuddering.

  It was cold now and the wind had picked up. In the distance, Xhea could just see the cluster of buildings that was the Lower City, huddled together as if for warmth. Lights flickered in the skyscrapers’ upper windows, but whatever lamps still burned in the smaller structures were masked, rare glimmers creeping from around drawn curtains or windows boarded tight.

  The City above showed no such fear. Xhea watched through a veil of tears as the Towers came alight. Within moments, every structure was haloed, twinkling as stars did, and brightening until they lit the whole sky on fire. As each Tower’s shape was unique, so too was the energy displayed: in sheets and tendrils and waves, the power and status of every Tower was writ large across the heavens, brighter than any aurora. Xhea knew Towerlight for what it was: defensive spells and spell exhaust set alight, flagrant displays of power meant to show wealth and intimidate rivals. With spells that moved like living things, the Towers tested each other’s defenses and guarded their own boundaries, their shimmering halos as much weapon as defense.

  Brightest of all was the Central Spire. Vast beyond imagining, the great needle stretched like a luminous pillar set to pierce both the Lower City and the darkness above. It was gold, she knew; but even seen as silver and gray, it was beautiful. Beautiful and distant and so very cold.

  It was probably the last thing she’d ever see, Xhea thought, and no matter how tightly she clenched her fists or curled her legs to her body, she could not stop shaking. Again she heard footsteps. More footsteps—two sets, three, more—all moving closer, all perfectly steady as if walking to the beat of an uncaring heart.

  “Sweet gods,” Xhea whispered. “There are more of them.” How many hours until sunrise—eight? Nine? Without meaning to, she made a low sound in the back of her throat, almost a moan.

  “Xhea?” Shai pressed close, ghostly hands against Xhea’s right shoulder. Not real hands—for despite the girl she saw so clearly beside her, Xhea knew she was alone. Only empty stretches of nothing between her and safety, nothing and no one with her but the things that walked the ruins. Below her perch, the walkers circled as predators might, tracking the scent of their prey.

  Her teeth chattered. She shoved the knuckle of her left thumb in her mouth and bit down hard, tasting dust and sweat.

  “Xhea, please . . . look at me.” Shai’s hands were on her face, the touch cool and tingling. Xhea turned at the ghost’s urging, silent. There was nothing she could say, nothing so important that she dared voice it.

  Yet the very sight of Shai was enough to give her pause. Had she thought the ghost lit by mere glints and glimmers? Here, in darkness broken only by Towerlight, Shai was luminous. It seemed the Spire’s light fell full across her face, shone from her hair, caught the shining folds of her dress. Even the hands pressed to Xhea’s face felt . . . different. Like a ghost’s hands, yes, but somehow more present—as if the bright magic bound to Shai’s spirit gave her a physical presence, a strange radiance that brushed across Xhea’s cheeks lightly as breath.

  The ghost caught her gaze and held it. Fear etched her features, and Xhea imagined the expression a mirror of her own. Yet there was something in the set of her jaw, the faint creases between her eyebrows, that spoke of determination.

  “I d
on’t understand what’s happening,” Shai said, no louder than a whisper, but careful and steady. “I don’t know what’s wrong with those people and . . .” She shook her head. “I don’t need to know. Not now.”

  The walkers gathered below, the crunch of their footsteps echoing. Shai’s hands slid from Xhea’s cheeks. Xhea felt where the ghost had touched her, as if the shape of Shai’s fingers might still shimmer there in the darkness.

  “I know you’re out here because of me.” Shai glanced down at her hands, glowing as if in moonlight, Towerlight. “And I can’t do anything. Except I know what it’s like to be afraid, like you are. I know how it feels to fear dying.”

  Not like this, Xhea wanted to say, hopelessly, angrily. Oh, not like this. She could hear them less than a stone’s throw away. She could hear them breathing.

  And yet . . . looking into the silver of Shai’s eyes, Xhea reconsidered. She had but the fear of pain and suffering at a mindless thing’s hands, and all the terrible moments that would come before death. Shai had not just feared pain, but felt it; she knew to fear suffering, for she had known it. And death? What could Xhea know of dying that a ghost did not?

  “I remember that there were times . . .” Shai’s voice seemed to catch, and she closed her eyes briefly. “Things got bad. But I also know that my father used to sit with me—hours at a time, hours upon hours. I think he used to stay even when I was asleep, just to be there when I woke. When the pain came, or when I was afraid, he would hold my hand and tell me stories. Sometimes it was bad enough that I couldn’t understand him, couldn’t even think—but I knew he was there. It was enough, somehow, to just hear his voice.

  “Isn’t it strange? There’s so much I don’t remember, but that I can’t imagine forgetting.”

  Footsteps drew nearer, and nearer still, until Xhea realized that one of the walkers stood directly beneath her. Not daring to move, Xhea watched as Shai looked to the City then back down to meet her eyes.

  “It’s going to be a long night,” Shai said, “but I think I can remember a story or two.”

  A moment passed before Xhea realized that it was an offer. She felt the hours before dawn stretch before them like a unbroken highway, and forced her head to nod.

  Please. No sound: Xhea only mouthed the word, too-dry lips cracking.

  “Okay,” Shai said, and rested one hand palm-up on her knee. “So this was a long time ago, when I was just a child, and my parents took me to see the sky gardens in the Central Spire . . .”

  It was impossible to forget where she was, or why. Yet something in the rise and fall of Shai’s voice made Xhea think of a lullaby. It was not the words, but merely the speaking of them, that had the power to comfort. Listening to Shai’s story, Xhea could almost pretend that she didn’t see movement out in the darkness; that the sound of things creeping all around her was only the wind, or rubble shifting under its own weight, or her imagination.

  Hours had passed before Xhea truly noticed the hand that Shai had reached toward her. Story after story the ghost had told, pulling tales from her gap-ridden memory—all without withdrawing that hand, or moving it from its place on her knee. Xhea remembered what Shai had said of her father: When I was afraid, he used to hold my hand and tell me stories.

  Xhea’s grip tightened on her knife’s mother-of-pearl handle. She could only think of one person who had held her hand—one person who had even tried—and that had been a very long time ago. She felt immobilized, not knowing what to do with the gesture, or the strange and sudden wanting for such a thing: another’s hand closed around her own. Distrusted the urge.

  But what did it matter, for her fingers’ tight grip seemed locked upon the knife. She was too tired, too bone-dead weary to gather the courage to reach across the small gap that separated them.

  Yet it was there, an offering, and somehow that was enough.

  The walkers moved off just before dawn, heading out to the badlands, leaving only a tense, echoing silence in their wake. Xhea tried to stifle her whimpers as she uncurled. Failed. Each movement hurt, muscles locked tight from fear and exertion and cold, and her swollen eyes burned with every blink. Yet morning brought gifts: the chill dew was just enough to ease her thirst, each bitter, metallic drop tasting as good as fresh rainwater; and the sun, when it rose, made her weak with relief.

  Safe at last. She unbound her hair and let it tumble down her back in a ringing choir, then raised her face and arms as if the sun’s pale light could wash her clean.

  “Xhea,” Shai murmured, and her voice sounded strange.

  She felt she could dissolve in sunlight; felt its warmth enclose her, granting the freedom to breathe. Even years living underground hadn’t purged her desire for sunlight—especially the rare moments when it shone unbroken by the Towers’ shadows or cloud. Despite morning’s chill, she pushed up her sleeves so the light could reach just a little more skin.

  “Xhea,” Shai said more urgently, and Xhea opened her eyes. Before them hovered the small, blinking shape of a City elevator.

  After the long night, Xhea felt she’d lost her capacity for surprise. But she paused, staring at the palm-sized elevator and its flickering lights as one might look at a particularly difficult puzzle.

  “Why’s it here?” Xhea had tried to reach the City for years, only to be frustrated at every attempt. Yet now an elevator simply appeared—for the second time in three days. They’d done nothing—made no sound, no signal; she’d barely so much as breathed for hours.

  She raised a hand and waved. No response. She made her gesture broader, as if trying to attract the attention of someone across a crowd, but the thing’s lights only flickered, as if confused.

  “It’s blinking yellow, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Shai said.

  Yellow meant it was thinking. It wasn’t denying her passage, yet neither was it offering. It seemed the thing hadn’t quite decided whether she was human.

  What was different? Could it sense her strange magic, newly risen? Yet her magic was calm, once more the dark lake she’d so long envisioned. Besides, she reasoned, an elevator couldn’t have sensed her magic that first night, smothered as it had been by Shai’s father’s payment.

  Struck by a sudden thought, she turned to the ghost in a clatter of charms. Maybe it wasn’t reacting to her or her magic; perhaps it sensed Shai. She watched as the elevator seemed to tremble in its orbit, as if turning to face her, then Shai, then back again. Almost as if it saw a body with no magic, and magic . . .

  “. . . with no body. Shai, it can see you. Quick—do something.”

  Shai hesitated, looking at her hands and the glimmers of magic that ran through them, then waved her arms as Xhea had done. Again, the elevator blinked.

  “Still yellow,” Shai said.

  “I think we’re confusing it.” Sweetness, she was so tired; just thinking felt exhausting as slogging through mud. Still her thoughts churned: a living body and bright magic. They had everything they needed for the elevator to whisk them away, only in separate forms. If only . . .

  At the same moment, Shai extended her hand. “If we . . .” she said, and their eyes met.

  “Yes.”

  Xhea reached for Shai without thinking, as if she had not struggled in the attempt but hours before. With her hand above Shai’s, the ghost seemed but a shadow that Xhea cast, a bright reflection shimmering in midair. The magic within Shai had grown strong enough that it pushed against Xhea, and for a brief moment they seemed to touch. Then they merged, fingers melding into a single hand.

  Shai gasped, and Xhea barely kept from doing the same. It didn’t hurt—not exactly. Not quite pins and needles, she thought, but ice and the ache of bruised muscles grown cold. As one, they lifted their joined hands and beckoned to the elevator, banishing the confusion from its wire-spelled mind. It blinked a pale gray that Xhea knew to be green, and descended.

  Xhea’s breath caught as the elevator brightened and broke open like a flower. Shai drew close as ribbons of light
arced up and around them, surrounding them in a shimmering bubble. Xhea looked down, watching as the concrete of their shelter seemed to ripple as the spell lines joined beneath her feet.

  “Oh sweetness,” Xhea whispered, and they were rising.

  Xhea had always been afraid of heights. Her bed in Orren had been next to the window, seventeen stories up. Cold in the winter, too bright during the day, beaded with moisture when it rained hard, it was the worst space in the girls’ dorm. She used to lie curled with her eyes squeezed shut, trying to avoid even glimpsing the world stretched below.

  Yet that distance had been contained by grimed windows and rusted girders. Now, with only ribbons of magic between her and a fall, Xhea’s stomach dropped as quickly as the ground. Beneath her, she could suddenly see the whole of the ruined building in which she’d sheltered the night. Then more: the shapes of neighboring buildings and the gridwork of nameless streets that stretched in the cardinal directions, vanishing into the distance.

  Instinctively she grabbed for a handhold, heart pounding with a sudden surge of adrenaline. She wasn’t just afraid of heights, she realized in panic; she was afraid of falling.

  “You won’t fall,” Shai said. “It’s safe.” Their hands were still linked, flesh and spirit entwined, and though her fingers were numb from the contact, Xhea did not pull away.

  It was easier to breathe once they’d risen higher. The ground was so far it seemed unreal, like a picture beneath her feet, and the elevator’s veil of light only added to the illusion. She stared at the Lower City below, fascinated, realizing that the scurrying specks were people. Stranger still, the whole of the Lower City was little more than a tiny patch of life in the wasteland of the city that had come before. Xhea had known the ancient city had been large, yet she could barely comprehend its vastness or the extent of its decay. Ruins stretched as far as she could see and beyond, crumbling into nothing.

  Then she looked up.