by Sarah Chorn
He felt like whatever was holding him together was fraying, preparing to snap. Being this close, and yet still so far away, was an acute torture. The weight of this moment, of this city, was bowing his spine. Breaking him. His past and present were meeting in a dizzying cacophony that was making every part of him spin. He felt like he was only halfway in his body now, his soul was cut loose, somewhere else, feeling other things. Unchained. Untethered. Dangerous. Like a god, he could call the lightning down with a thought, and strike this city, char it and unmake it.
He wanted to.
He was afraid to.
He was afraid of himself.
He’d been on edge for a while now, losing control but better at hiding it than Neryan or Seraphina. Being back in the city was throwing him through a loop. Seeing all that blood, seeing the way Lord’s Reach, once the epicenter of their civilization, was struggling, having to face all the things that had fallen after he’d left that night; was destroying him in ways he hadn’t anticipated. There were reasons he’d worked so hard to avoid coming back to the city.
Now he was experiencing all of them, all at once.
All that blood in Freedman’s Quarter. It had dried into brown flakes but still it was obvious how much must have flowed over the uncaring streets.
Bodies piled in carts like cordwood.
Streets full of the waiting dead.
Dust. Despair.
Could he have helped avoid this catastrophe if he’d stayed?
He heard an animalistic yowl claw its way out of his throat, and suddenly he was lost. No longer man, rather something else. A soul without a body. Wild. Elemental. Loose.
He could feel… something. Something down to the south, far away, by the sea. A storm down there just waiting for him to call it forth. Was that even possible? The way his lightning leapt and danced at the thought, he wondered if maybe that was another way he was changing. Could he call the rain? Could he end the drought? Impossible.
No, not impossible. Not anymore. He wasn’t just lightning anymore. He was something else, now. He could feel that other nature burrowed deep, stretching, eager to rise up and Become.
It made him antsy. It made him feel like he was too big to be held in place by walls and a ceiling. Like his body couldn’t hold him anymore. He wanted that storm. He wanted it with a fervor that made him feel like he was burning up from the inside. He wondered if this was how Seraphina felt about her fire, if it was the kind of burn she craved, the kind of hurt she actually wanted to feel.
“Hey!” A guard was shouting at him. “Hey!”
“Is he mad?” Another asked.
“Maybe, but not from starvation. He’s got too much muscle on him for that, yet.”
“Hey! Calm down!” the second one shouted. “Are you lost?”
They were talking to him, Vadden realized. That storm was coming now, rolling up from the south like a lover needing a kind of satisfaction only he could give it. Soon, it would blot out the stars, wipe away the sunset, and drown the world and wouldn’t that be great? Maybe he couldn’t wash the stain of guilt off his hands, but he could certainly give it a try. For now, he was just a man with storms in his eyes and guards poking batons into his side. He realized he’d been yelling, his throat was raw, painful, hands clenched, but no lightning. He hadn’t lost himself that much. Not yet.
Soon.
He was so close to snapping. He could feel the moment approaching, all that coiled tension, that storm baring down on them, and Vadden in the middle of it all like the eye of a tornado.
“I’m not mad,” he said. His voice—was that his voice?—sounded different than he’d ever heard it before. It was lower. Deeper. Rougher. He sounded like a stranger to himself. Like his words were gravel, and he chewed them up before spitting them out.
“What’s wrong with you then?” One of them asked. He had yellow skin, yellow eyes, looked sick. Soon, he’d be like everyone else, just waiting to die, one more withered body on the side of the road.
“I love storms,” he murmured into a quiet that felt louder than any scream. “I find great comfort in the fact that sometimes even the heavens must rage.”
“He’s crackers,” the second guard said. “Completely nuts.” Vadden blinked and studied the men, their faces contorted into twin expressions of unconcealed wariness. They must see a lot of people like him, insane through tragedy, or for want of food and water.
“Don’t matter. Not really.” Another baton in his side, bruising up his ribs. He could hardly feel it. He was untethered, floating free. That storm was coming. Soon it would be here, and then everything would change. The sky would weep for the world it watched over. “Hey, you need to get to the square. It’s the Premier’s orders that every able-bodied man and woman go there. Now.”
A bell tolled somewhere in the city, bringing Vadden back to himself. His gaze snapped onto the guards. “The square,” he said. His voice was normal now. He still felt the storm, but it wasn’t as intense as it had been before. It wasn’t as all-consuming, rather soft background music than the clarion call it had been just moments before.
“The square. Now,” the guard reiterated. “Anyone left on the street is to be arrested and sent off to the camps. Those that fight will be put to death. It’s another city purging. You might be mad, but unless you fancy an early trip into that eternal night, I’d get moving.” In the distance, he heard shouting, the sounds of fighting, the music of people refusing to be herded.
The guards moved on, leaving him alone. He heard that bell tolling, each sonorous note sounded like thunder.
He moved toward the square, curious, despite himself. He should walk away, should go back to that rathole he’d hidden Neryan and Seraphina in, and use this opportunity to sneak into the palace while everyone was distracted. If he’d had any sense, that’s exactly what he’d be doing, but he was beyond that. Thought, logic, or reason were lost to him. He had become a creature, a beast formed of instinct and reaction, and an anger so sharp it cut his soul.
He leaned against the side of a building, closed his eyes, and drew in a deep breath. He was hovering on the edge of something, and he couldn’t afford that right now. He’d almost lost control, and now he needed to be contained. He needed to be clear headed. He heard the sounds of fighting, of people getting beaten by guards, someone down the street let out a cry that was abruptly cut off. It felt like the entire city was on the cusp of rioting.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
When he was calm he’d go, see what was going on, and then he’d dash out and get Neryan and Seraphina. He could find people he’d once known, people he could probably trust, but events had moved just the right way and now, he felt like they could end this tonight. With this huge distraction, the three of them could march right into the palace. This would be perfect, like an opportunity, a window for action delivered right to them. Fate was smiling on him, for once in his life.
But first, he had to know what was going on.
The square was at the center of the city, the hub of the wheel. A large stage filled one end, used for the public announcements and, in happier times, summer concerts, though no music had graced the space since Eyad’s revolution. Even the bustling market was gone for now, cleared away leaving nothing but the four hulking walls and a flow of nervous people, packed together like cattle as they waited and wondered what was coming next. The sky above and walls surrounding the space gave it an ominous feel, like a cage.
Whatever was happening, it was a big deal. The Premier was pulling no punches.
The square was almost completely full when Vadden got to the doors. He entered as a man with a cart piled high with bodies was exiting. He heard moaning from his cart and grabbed the guy’s arm. “You have someone in there who isn’t dead yet,” he said. They looked horrible, those bodies, nothing but bones covered in thin flesh, listless eyes, mouths gaping in silent screams. They looked the way he felt.
“Don’t matter,” the man said with a shr
ug. “They’ll be dead soon enough.”
“Where are you taking them?” he asked.
“We dig pits outside the city every night, and shove in all the street kids, the dead, and the almost dead.” Another shrug.
“Why—” Vadden began.
Lifting up the handles of his cart again, he said, “You learn to live with your sins, and I’ll learn to live with mine.”
Then he was off, pushing his cart with that moaning person out of the square, four others trailing after him. They’d tip the bodies into the pits, cover them in dirt, and do it all over again tomorrow. There was an unending tide of the dying here. They’d be doing this for the rest of their lives, hauling out the dead, just to turn around and get more.
The square was filling up, people shuffling around, fear permeating the air like a disease. No one seemed to know what was happening, and there was anxiety about that, anxiety in the not knowing, and anxiety in wondering what would come next. The square kept filling up until it was just one huge press of half-dead bodies and sickness. So much coughing, so many rattling lungs. How many would die of plague due to this? Was plague any better than starvation?
He heard the doors slam closed, locking everyone in, and the world out. Above them, the sky was full of starlight, a thin sliver of moon rising in the east like a smile.
He was anxious and wary, like he was standing on the edge of a cliff at night just waiting for the wind to blow hard enough so he’d fall. He was ready to slide through the darkness, cut though the unknown like a knife. A dark part of him was coiled low, waiting for the perfect moment to rise up through the cracks in his armor. It was moving, stretching and yawning. He felt that storm in the south, closer now. Close enough that he could feel the humidity in the air, and the static hum of lightning. He wanted to be that storm. He wanted to be the sound the heavens made when they erupted. He wanted to be nothing but feeling.
A man took to the tall wooden stage at the front of the square. It was someone he recognized from the time before. Samson, goddamn him. He was older now, and grayer, but no less Samson. He’d thrived under Eyad’s leadership. The man always did have some sick sense of knowing which belly to attach himself to, and whose blood to suck. He’d been instrumental in their revolution, the head of the military, and he threw all his strength behind them. He’d been rewarded mightily, it seemed.
“We are here,” Samson shouted, a soldier with a wind talent mark on his cheek had his attention focused on him, propelling his voice into the crowd on a gust of air, “to witness the death of a subversive element, a counter-revolutionary who has been actively working against the state. This is a great victory to the Premier, and for all loyal citizens of the Sunset Lands.”
The crowd broke into the sort of cheering and shouting that could wake the dead. Vadden could have sworn the earth shook under his feet. To not cheer loudly would be seen as protest, or subversive action, an unavoidable death sentence; so the crowd bellowed and bayed, wrapped in revolutionary zeal, proving their worthiness by shouting louder than their neighbors. Hungry, all of them, for blood, and as long as it wasn’t their own, they didn’t care. They could buy one more day in the world just by shouting loud enough and being seen doing it.
A small door opened at the side of the stage, and a cart pulled by a pathetic-looking mule entered the square. Two guards made their way to the back of it, while Samson shuffled off the stage and vanished into the shadows. Whispers filled the gathered throng of people. Someone shouted, “Long live the Premier!” Others picked up the chant for good measure. Eyad would have hated it, if he’d been there to hear it. That chant had monarchist roots, and he had always despised it, despised the idea of one person ruling over the Sunset Lands for their entire life, and being born into the role. Or, perhaps ten years of power had changed him and he’d learned to love it, and the lifelong reign it was in support of.
Tension rippled through him. Thinking of Eyad while he was penned in with all these dying strangers wasn’t doing him any good. His sanity was fraying. That storm from the south was bearing down on them now like a hurricane. It was close enough that soon it would blot out the stars. His hair was standing on end. Everything in him was tense. Waiting.
He saw Amiti when everyone else did, but he couldn’t hear what was said through the ringing in his ears.
He felt cold. He felt hot.
No.
He felt like lightning.
Not the showy kind that wore storm clouds like a cloak over an ensemble made of rain, the crack of thunder its entourage.
No, nothing so grand as that.
He felt more like the silent lightning that stalked across the western sky during the hot season, looking for a sacrifice. The kind that fed on heat and bred fire.
Guards started lighting torches, filling the square with smoke. So many torches, lining all the walls, the stage, everywhere. If he wasn’t closer, he wouldn’t be able to see what was happening through all that smoke. He didn’t want to see what was happening.
He had to see what was happening.
He cut a path through the square, moving here, shifting there, pushing forward in an effort to get closer to the stage. Closer to Amiti, closer to the man who had spent so many years of his life offering shelter and security to him despite how unworthy he’d always felt. Amiti, with his heart of gold and his diamond soul. He would die here, on this stage, surrounded by strangers, smoke, and torches. He would die a spectacle and his body would end up in some anonymous grave. It was not fitting for someone as grand as he.
The guards dragged Amiti onto the stage, his broken, beaten, haggard body looking nothing like the proud innkeeper who had always been ready with a hot meal and some even hotter gossip. He wondered where Kabir was, and then decided he probably already knew. Clouds started to fill the sky. Humidity rose, and the temperature dropped. The earth inhaled.
A gust of wind made the empty noose swing.
Vadden curled his hands into fists, and watched. He would witness this crime. He would watch his brother die, and he would carry it with him.
The storm was coming, singing to him.
This is what love did.
It tore the world apart.
Amiti
They had stolen everything he loved. They had robbed him of everything he had known.
They beat him and burnt him. They killed the man he loved and left him on the bare ground to rot. They reduced his husband to parts—grotesque, ragged bits that barely made up the whole. But when they had killed Kabir, they killed Amiti. They snuffed out the flame that burnt in his soul. They murdered him as assuredly as if they had carved out his heart with a knife and pulled it from his breast, for without Kabir, he stopped living. He just existed.
What was the point of having a heart if it was broken?
They whipped him with barbed ropes and tore off chunks of skin with each slash. He screamed until he could scream no more. When he passed out, the blood pouring down his back like spring rain, his bones showing like polished white stones where his flesh had once been, they doused him with buckets of cold salted water to revive him. He wept then, while salt poked his tender wounds with fingers made of rusted daggers.
He didn’t know how long they kept him. Time was a thief. You never realized what she took until it was already gone.
They didn’t speak to him, didn’t ask him questions. He was consumed by pain and blood, by rending flesh and breaking bones. Kabir was the linchpin that held him together. Didn’t they realize that? What remained of the man who had been Amiti was just a sack of flesh; his soul was already gone.
They attacked him with their barbed whips, and the iron rods they used to break his bones, and he said nothing. He had nothing left to give. Only so much blood could be squeezed out of a rock. They’d rung him out like a wet rag.
They kept him in the dark, in a room devoid of light and sound, and they dripped water until he was nearly insane with it. Just water, dropping, cocooned by a darkness so deep he couldn’t
see the end of his nose.
Drip. Drip. Drip.
It became his world. That endless, eternal sound. Maybe this was Hell, this darkness and dripping water.
Then they took him out of the darkness and tied him down to stakes in the sun, naked, and covered him in honey, food for the bees and rodents. They came. They stung and gnawed with their tiny needles and sharp teeth. They ate bits of his flesh. They took the last of his soul with them. That was when his captors murmured sweet promises. He could end this, they said, if only he renounced Vadden and his counter-revolutionary intents. If only he pledged his loyalty to the Premier.
He wasn’t a fool. They didn’t care about his loyalty. They just cared about their end result. The grand performance. They were readying their prop. Their promises were just an excuse, something that they used to justify their behavior. All of this was okay, as long as they were doing it for a reason.
None of it mattered. They had stripped him of time, devoured his soul, and murdered his pride. They killed his love.
This meant nothing. He was nothing. He had nothing.
He found solace in nothing.
Nothing, but one last tiny seed of defiance, which he held close and nurtured. It was a drying, decayed plant hidden in the darkest recesses of what was left of him. It kept him going, kept him enduring. He would need this small seed of power for what was to come.
From one seed sprouts a garden.
Fuck them.
And then everything changed. He was put in a cart and moved; taken to the palace first, down into the dungeons that were now almost completely empty. He was kept in a small, locked cell that was damp and dark, with one hole in the ground for his waste. He was occasionally fed watery gruel. He was kept just alive enough. He knew what was coming, and the day it did he almost laughed. They had to drag him out of the palace. He was too weak and battered to walk.
They loaded him onto a cart like a sack of grain and took him to the center of the city, a place he’d been a thousand times before on market days, and always with Kabir. But this was not the bustling, thriving marketplace he remembered. The traders and merchants were gone, replaced by a milling crowd of strangers who muttered, and cried, and shouted, probing him with their eyes, and cutting him with accusations. Their fear fogged up the air. They were like sheep, eyes rolling, tongues lolling, words coming out, but none of them making sense.
