by L. Penelope
Gerda’s blood pooled, inching towards Jasminda’s face. Soon it would mix with her own. Had the old woman’s sacrifice been in vain?
A memory tickled her mind. The spell Yllis had taught Oola in the last vision. A blood sacrifice.
The link opened between herself and whoever the persistent Earthsinger was—Osar, she recognized the feel of his Song belatedly. Some part of her skin must be in contact with him, though numbness had begun to erase her pain. He offered her control of the link and his powerful Song.
Jasminda startled at the feel of every heartbeat of every person nearby inside her body. She breathed with the breath of thousands. Insects burrowed deep under the ground came into crisp focus. Every blink of every eye was loud as a camera’s shutter. She sensed the True Father’s spell, the tunnel of wind and water separating the Elsirans from the Lagrimari. She could see how it was made, perhaps even copy it. She filed the knowledge away.
Instead, she centered her attention on the ground beneath her and reached for the memory of Yllis’s spell. With her enhanced power, she could almost taste Gerda’s blood mixed with the dirt and sand. Jasminda twisted the energy of Earthsong, mixing it with the woman’s lifeblood.
Power swelled within her as she wove the threads of the differing energies together. The spell came to her as if channeled from another mind—in a way it had been. The complex fabric of intermingling energies was nothing she could explain, but she sang the spell as if possessed.
When she was done, her eyes blinked open again. Gerda’s face was now peaceful before her. Underneath them, the ground had become glassy and smooth. Dark as midnight, it extended all around, like fast-spreading molasses. Though she couldn’t see more than a few paces in front of her face, she could feel it. The earth beneath them had been transformed into the polished rock surface of the caldera. Just as in the caves.
The True Father’s strange tunnel barrier died.
Osar’s small face dropped between hers and Gerda’s. The little boy watched her grimly.
The smooth surface beneath them echoed with the residue of magic that required death. There was something unnatural about it that made a shiver go up her ravaged spine.
The True Father roared. The sound was filled with anger, frustration, shock. Chaos erupted, and his scream cut off in a strangled cry. Emotions beat against her, but Jasminda’s vision was narrow. She blocked it all out.
The ground is like the caves now? Osar asked in her mind. They were still linked, his mighty power under her control.
Yes, no one can sing. Jasminda wanted to laugh, but her entire body was numb. No one but me. She couldn’t even feel her lips.
The caldera? she asked.
Osar’s face disappeared, and the chaos surrounding her intensified. She sensed him motioning to Rozyl, communicating with gestures. Via the link, Jasminda watched through Osar’s eyes as Rozyl rose from the ground and broke into a run. She leapt into the air to tackle a figure with his back to her. Tensyn.
Rozyl brought him down effortlessly and wrenched the stone from his grip. She walked back over to Jasminda and kneeled before her, placing it in her hand.
Though Jasminda could not feel the weight of the caldera, she didn’t need to. The vision came anyway.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
This is good-bye. The last time I will see my brother.
We have given him everything he wanted. We stand at the border of what will now become two lands, two peoples. Songbearer and Silent, separated for all time.
Once Yllis’s barrier spell falls into place, there will be no crossing—those were the terms of the treaty. That stipulation was put in by our side. Many Songbearers have grown weary of the fighting. It is against our nature. Some feel if they never see another Silent, it will be for the best.
Already I miss the way things were, but this was my decision and I must stand by it.
“Will you embrace me one last time, sister?”
The odd, smooth bracelets adorning Eero’s wrists hold the magic of Yllis’s binding spell. The blood magic that ensures Eero doesn’t use whatever stolen Song may be left inside him. He can cause no further harm before the Mantle is erected.
His eyes shine, and I see the boy I once knew within them. One last time could not hurt.
I step closer. My arms wrap around him. We came into this world together, and I thought we would stay that way forever.
A sharp pain pierces my side. I pull back from him and stare at the dagger sticking out from between my ribs. I gasp up at him in horror, but Eero’s face is a mask.
I reach for Earthsong, trying to knit the wound, but something is wrong. My Song is weakening, slipping out of my grasp like a wisp of smoke. I breathe in, and in some more, but the breath never makes it to my lungs. Eero whispers a string of foreign words, and I fall to the ground.
Everything goes black.
Voices call my name.
One voice.
Yllis.
“Oola! Oola! Please come back to me. My love, please.”
He begs and pleads, apologizes and bargains.
I try to go to him but am locked in place. My breath is gone, and I am separated from my body.
Three archways loom before me. The widest leads back to my body. Another leads to the World After.
But the third calls to me, though narrow and ominous. I step through it, sealing my fate.
The World Between is a smoke-filled antechamber full of endless images of the living. Neither here nor there, it is vast and lonely, only grazed by the living in their dreams. Some believe all dreams take place here.
For me, it is a nightmare.
From here I bear witness to my body on the ground. Eero smashes the bespelled bracelets. He is full of my Song, stolen from my last breaths.
Yllis gives a great cry. He gathers a swell of Earthsong and sings the spell to create the barrier between the lands. The cornerstone engages, and I feel its power pulsing through the energy.
Eero steps away from his Silent followers, over to the band of astonished Songbearers. Yllis is too focused on his spell to notice. The barrier slams into place, leaving him holding my body on one side with the throng of Silent and Eero, bursting with my Song, on the other with the rest of the Songbearers.
This was his plan all along.
He never wanted to be shut up alongside the Silent forever. He merely wanted to have an inexhaustible supply of Songbearers to steal from.
Eero stands at the barrier, his expression smug. “Worry not, Yllis. She is not dead. She will awaken at any moment and live quite a fine life without her Song. She will know what it is like to be me.”
Two archways still stand behind me, the one leading to the Living World pulsing brighter than the sun. Calling to me. Pleading with me. I am being given a choice.
Eero’s look of triumph changes to a frown. “She will awaken,” he says, a tremor invading his voice.
Yllis growls and pulls my body closer.
Eero tries to move forward, but the barrier stops him. He beats against the invisible wall with a fist. “Oola! Oola!” he screams.
Both archways dim and begin to fade. I must make my choice quickly.
If I go back to the Living World, I can resume a life without my heart. The World After holds no appeal, though Mother and Father are there. How can I face them with what I have done to Eero?
Here, in the World Between, I may watch. That will be my punishment.
Justice finally served for my crimes.
I will watch.
The archways fade and disappear.
I watch Yllis bear my body back to the city and cut a chamber into the mountains to house me. Above the chamber, the Silent construct a magnificent palace.
Yllis chooses a loyal Silent to rule. A young man of character and honor, Abdeen Alliaseen, to lead the people in the absence of their Queen.
Yllis makes Alliaseen promise to ensure that history is kind to me and bears no recollection of my fault in the start of the war. He spend
s weeks, months, years locked in his laboratory, scouring the libraries of the Cantors, searching for something. Doing what he does best, studying magic.
I watch on the day he finds what he has been seeking. He chants words in the ancient tongue of the Cavefolk, words I don’t understand. He takes the pendant bearing my father’s sigil, the one I always wore around my neck, and cuts himself, spilling his blood over it. He calls for Alliaseen, who, when asked, spills his own blood on the sigil without hesitation, binding the spell. The blood congeals and the magic grows, encasing the pendant in a bloodred stone.
Blood magic will do what Earthsong cannot.
Blood magic may be broken only by those who bear the blood.
Yllis journeys back to the barrier he created and crosses it, using another bit of magic.
He gathers those unafraid of standing against a now impossibly powerful Eero. Those who want to learn to fight. Songbearers are peaceful by nature, but these men and women have been broken. They become something new. He crafts the words of a promise to me, one these new soldiers vow to keep.
I watch as my beloved Yllis wages war on my beloved brother, and I watch when Yllis is slain. Eero is too strong, and the stolen Songs have twisted his mind and made him far more ruthless than even the broken Songbearers.
Yllis dies with the stone in his hand.
His final spell traps his own Song in the stone.
The Keepers of the Promise are supposed to take the stone, cross the border, and present it to the prince, whose touch will unlock the magic. But the Keepers he commanded to hold back and stay safe, rush in seeking revenge. None survive the battle.
The stone sits where it lies. Yllis’s gift to me, his whispered spell to bring me back to my body and gift me his own Song, lies under the rubble of the fallen city as his body turns to bones.
The archways are long gone now.
If they were here, perhaps I would pass into the World After to be with him. To thank him for trying to save me.
But being with Yllis is not punishment enough.
So I watch.
For a very long time.
Sometimes, a dream will find me and pierce the loneliness.
But more often, it is endless agony. Standing by watching while the centuries pass.
And now, Jasminda, you have heard my story. Judge me for my faults if you must. But you bear the only evidence of Yllis’s love for me. His Song is in your hands.
Release it.
Release me.
It is time for me to end this.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Beseeched a new father to the Mistress of Eagles, Bless my baby, for her mother died in childbirth.
Eagle replied, Your loss is like a volcano’s flow which increases the land. New worlds are born out of destruction.
—COLLECTED FOLKTALES
Jack gripped the edge of the seat as the airship descended from the clouds. What he saw on the ground below was mystifying. Judging by the presence of Lagrimari troops, the Mantle had already been destroyed. But where he’d expected a battle to be raging, there was relative calm.
The Lagrimari sat in even rows on the ground with Jack’s troops maintaining the perimeter. Had they surrendered? Could that be possible?
No enemy guns had been drawn, there were no environmental disasters as in the Seventh Breach. What was going on?
Clove set the ship down at the edge of the gathered crowd. “That was some bloody fine piloting, Clove,” he said, clapping the woman on the back.
“Thank you, Your Grace!”
Flying through the vicious storm had been just as difficult as he’d imagined. They’d been bandied about by the wind and rain, and nearly struck by lightning twice. But Clove was unflappable, gripping the steering wheel with bloodless hands and navigating them safely through.
With a nod to Vanesse, who had insisted on coming as well, Jack opened the carriage door and tore across the ground, intent on finding Jasminda.
Several soldiers approached him. The base’s high general, Verados, was in the lead. “Your Grace, the enemy has surrendered.”
Jack looked on, incredulous. “How is this possible?”
“They laid down their weapons as soon as this witchcraft began.” He tapped his foot and looked down. Jack peered at the strange, hardened ground.
“It’s like the caves, Your Grace.”
He turned toward the familiar voice to find Rozyl standing at the edge of the group of soldiers. He motioned her forward, and the men let her pass.
“No one can sing on it?” he asked.
She shook her head solemnly. “No one but Jasminda.”
He opened his mouth to ask about her, but Verados cut him off. “The True Father has been captured. Once he was rendered powerless, his troops dropped their weapons. It was just a matter of bringing him into custody.”
Jack’s eyes widened. “Where is he?”
Verados motioned toward the base.
The king could wait. “Where is she?” he asked Rozyl. Her expression was grim. “Take me to her.”
Rozyl turned on her heel and marched over to a group of refugees. They sat in a spiral around a prone figure in the middle. Jack’s heart stuttered when he recognized Jasminda. He tore through the group to kneel at her side. “They can’t heal her?”
“Osar is linking with her. She’s controlling his Song but won’t heal herself.” Rozyl’s voice was bitter. “She says she needs to save the power.”
He turned back to Jasminda, his stomach clenching at her condition. All of her limbs were twisted at strange angles, and her eyes were barely open.
“Jasminda, my darling, I’m here. I’m going to get you off this blasted thing so they can heal you up, all right?”
She lay impossibly still, her eyelids the only movement. Osar sat by her head, stroking her hair. The boy looked up at him pleadingly, then looked to Rozyl.
“He says she wants you to stay with her.”
Jack glanced at Osar, who’d never spoken a word. “Of course I will.”
“She knows how to awaken the Queen. But there isn’t much time.”
Jack’s pulse sped. “What do we have to do?”
“Take her hand.”
Her hand lay palm up, and though her fingers were mangled, the caldera was held loosely in her grasp. He stared at the rock, the way it lay in her ravaged hand.
“Please.” Rozyl’s voice was a whisper.
Jack’s heart broke. Jasminda was so weak. If this was what she wanted, he would do it. He whispered a kiss across her lips, not daring to press against her and cause more pain, then closed his hand over the caldera.
Searing pain shot through his body, as if he were being pulled apart one organ at a time. He might have screamed out loud, he wasn’t sure, but the burning agony was like nothing he’d ever felt. His blood was on fire, burning bright and hot. Then it was gone.
Breath returned to his lungs. He was once again kneeling on the glossy surface of the unnatural ground, next to the woman he loved as she slipped further and further away.
An explosion of light above his head blinded him. He squinted against the small fireball, which rivaled the sun in sheer brilliance. It grew brighter, shining with a white-hot glare before disappearing.
In its place, a figure floated, wrapped in ivory fabric. Her skin shone gloriously. Dark, curling hair swirled around Her head, blown by a nonexistent breeze. She moved like liquid, spinning and stretching. She righted Herself and hovered before Jack, dark eyes piercing him with intensity.
He swallowed and lowered his head in deference.
The Queen had awoken.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Spider squabbled with his brothers and sisters over their parents’ inheritance.
I am most deserving, he said, for being the youngest, I had them the least amount of time.
One by one, the others grew exhausted by the discord, leaving Spider standing alone in a prison of victory.
—COLLECTED FOLKTALES
> The normally tingling buzz of Earthsong was an earthquake against Jasminda’s consciousness. She was no longer linked with Osar, but another Song shook her to the core. The swelling force pulled her under, leaving her sputtering, coughing, gasping for breath.
She could now fill her lungs completely. Feeling came back to her body. Her bones were in their proper places, her body whole again.
A warm, solid hand rubbed her back in gentle circles. She focused on the feeling, the comfort, and leaned into a familiar embrace. Hands stroked her head, her face. Lips brushed her forehead. She wanted those lips someplace else, so she rose to meet them.
Jack.
His kiss was like air to her. She breathed him in and held him there inside her, never wanting to exhale. His arms tightened around her, and he pulled his lips away. She whimpered, wanting to keep kissing him. On his chuckle, she opened her eyes.
His smile undid her. She stared at him, drinking in the beauty of his features.
“I thought I’d lost you,” he whispered.
“I thought I’d lost me as well.”
His expression shuttered, and he blinked back tears. He pressed her to him again, wrapping his arms around her as she became aware of her surroundings.
Shell-shocked refugees—healed of their injuries—rose from the ground, staring in awe at a point behind her. She pulled away from Jack, craned her neck around, and nearly fell backward.
Floating above them was Queen Oola, ethereal and beautiful, fierce and overpowering. Jasminda gaped at the Queen’s familiar face. Looking at the woman was like looking into a mirror.
Something hard jabbed Jasminda’s closed fist. She uncurled her fingers to reveal a bronze pendant bearing the Queen’s sigil attached to a thin metal chain. The caldera surrounding the pendant was gone, burned away by the awakening spell.
A hush of quiet descended. The refugees began to kneel. Jasminda climbed off Jack and kneeled as well, bowing her head.
“Jaqros Alliaseen. Jasminda ul-Sarifor.” The Queen’s voice rang out, rich and thick as raw honey. “Rise.”
