Dark Ember

by R. D. Vallier

  "Halt!"

  I wheeled around on my butt. A border sentry glared down at me from atop Earth's twenty-foot entrance. The detailed battles carved into the archway were vicious and cruel, but the stone's white emitted the calmness of vigil candlelight, leaked the slickness of bathwater oils. I could tell the rifle pointing at my face was Earth-made because its colors were merely colors. Flat, lesser things.

  "Show your cards and wings!"

  "I-I don't have cards."

  A hand grabbed my shoulder and lurched me to my feet, spinning me around. Two border sentries flanked me, a man and a woman, rifles in hand. Unlike human soldiers, their uniform shirts were skintight with a hard collar, and the gray feeling of unable to return to bed on a miserable morning. Pockets lined their legs. Pistols and batons hung off their belts. The R on their gold buckles looked like the crimson of strength and authority, but felt like the clink of a spoon on a sundae dish.

  I couldn't imagine Orin in their place, his warmth scowling, shoving a gun in my face.

  The mother wailed near the encompassing wall; the female sentry turned to look. A strip of fabric traced her spine, openly displaying her border sentry wings, which twisted along her back and shoulders like wrought iron.

  Wings like Orin's used to be.

  The woman returned her attention to me as the man yanked up my shirttail. "She's a miner."

  "Are you on an Earth excavation crew?" the sentry overhead demanded.

  The woman gasped. "Her ear-tips are folded."

  The man scrutinized my face, his eyes the feeling of tea sipped on leather chairs. "Impossible. A changeling would—" Disbelief stretched across his face. "Grian…"

  Grian. Orin's last name. My heart leapt. I glanced over my shoulder, thinking he'd somehow emerged.

  The sentry snarled: "She's the traitor's assignment!"

  "Traitor? No! He—"

  "Turn around! Get on your knees! Hands on your head!"

  Two rifles aimed at my chest, one down at my brains. My legs shook, my arms shook, even my heart shook, so strong I feared it might rock off its cords. I put my hands on my head and turned around, feeling naked without night and darkness. Compared to these faeries, my day magic was like a slingshot in a gunfight.

  A chickadee darted through the gateway, skimming my scalp. "Hold!" it squawked. The mother wailed from the pink stone walls. "Do not enter! Hold! Hold!"

  A dozen sentries encroached from the flanks. The man and woman jabbed their guns against my sides, demanding cooperation. The sniper overhead held his rifle on me, but kept glancing to the shrieking mother. Apparently, this situation wasn't covered in their procedures and training manuals.

  I knelt on Delano's heap of clothing, heart pounding. They won't shoot me facing the gateway, I reasoned. I heard the crick of opening handcuffs. They won't risk hitting faeries on Earth.

  I lunged for the gate. A gun fired overhead. The bullet grazed rubber off my heel; my toe caught on Delano's clothing, pulled it along. My bones buzzed and I felt a falling down sensation, then staggered upright into a marsh. The air reeked of wet feathers. I blinked, expecting the Realm's blaring light to have blinded me, but my magic's night vision activated instantly when I entered Earth. Delano appeared beside me, naked and murderous. He yanked his jeans through, slipped them on. Raina's water truck gurgled as it flooded the grounds. Several guards lay around the gateway; some face down in puddles. Bavol thumbed cartridges into a shotgun near the Humvee, shadows eddying around his feet. A spray of bullet holes pockmarked the vehicle. Scattered brass casings glinted in its headlights.

  "You're not safe! Hear me darkslimes?" Raina screamed, standing on the truck's hood in a shimmering aura.

  Wildlife shrieked from the woods as Raina swiped her hands and the ground's flooding rose in a boiling wave. My bowels loosened. Delano and I flew up diagonally two arm-length's apart, racing the crest, our jaw's hanging. Steam stung my skin. My lungs burned. Darkness blasted as cold gripped me, refreshing then painful. The world crinkled like an accordion in a nauseating rush and I used all my magic to retain consciousness.

  I soon collapsed in a grove, gasping. Distant frogs replaced the hissing steam. A waning moon replaced the Humvee's beams. I pressed my forehead against cool soil as gray waves fanned across my vision.

  Delano's frozen jeans crackled when he knelt. "I'm so sorry," he said, rubbing my shoulder. "Are you okay?"

  I sat up, nodding, the waves clearing. I hated traveling with him through darkness, but tonight I gratefully accepted its motion-sickness. I clenched my temples. "I didn't know faeries were capable of such magic."

  "Most aren't, but Raina gained her position of power for a reason." Delano checked me for numbness, reddening, discoloration. I had a white patch of frost-nip where he grabbed my forearm in a panic, but no frostbite. He relaxed. "Plus, fae men are stronger physically, but women often develop stronger magic."

  I coughed into my elbow, tasting acid. "Seriously?"

  "Not always. Probably eighty-twenty," he said. "If you ever take the darkshine, I suspect you'll be my superior."

  I couldn't imagine surpassing Delano's magical strength. If I ever surpassed Sam in, well, anything, he'd need reconstructive surgery due to his ego imploding. "Don't you find that off-putting?"

  "Not at all." Delano leaned back, bare-chested and barefooted, smirking. "In fact, I look forward to the wrestling."

  I snickered. "You're weird," I managed to say, a moment before Bavol appeared in a cloud of darkness and blasted Delano with magic.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Delano flew backward on a jet-black wave, toppled feet over head into the brush.

  Bavol wheeled on me, brandishing a shotgun. "You!"

  I backed away, hands up. "I understand you're angry, but ripping a newborn from their mother to—"

  Bavol's wrist twitched; shadows rammed me to the ground. I screeched and lashed out, my magic shredding like gossamer beneath a blade. Frost scaled my legs; magic pinned me in place. Bavol flew at me, snarling, and slammed into Delano's chest when he materialized between us.

  "Get off my territory!" A shadow-wave surged from the trees. Bavol vanished before it crushed him, appeared at the tree-line in a sable puff.

  Bavol launched a wave at Delano at the same time Delano launched another at him. Their magic shuddered and dissolved, useless. Delano screamed, his voice becoming the wind. Bavol copied and their voices collided. Leaf litter and dirt whipped into the screeching air. A twister formed and tore into the forest.

  Rage flared Delano's nostrils as the twister gobbled a young oak, plucking leaves in a whirling mass. Fir boughs flapped as if doing jumping-jacks. Delano screamed his tempest scream and slammed his fists, as if dropping an enormous weight. Shadows smashed. Bavol catapulted into a pine, yelping. Delano twirled his wrists—a gentle, feminine movement, like a conductor pulling music from an orchestra—and the tornado shifted courses, dissipating into a ravine.

  Bavol gasped at the base of the tree, blood dripping from his scalp. Delano stormed toward him, fists clenched.

  Bavol grinned upward, magic surging. Storm clouds rolled in. Delano stopped short, his wide eyes on the sky. "No!"

  Bavol shot magic at me. I shrieked, my magic breaking beneath his scourging shadows as lightning flashed. Frost pierced my lungs … then vanished. I gulped a huge breath as Delano's magic rammed Bavol, then shuddered and faded, caressing Bavol's body like feathers. Bavol cackled, spun to face me. Raindrops soaked into the soil, and the Earth's disapproval exploded.

  The world rippled, as if the night air was no longer a void but a thing, infiltrating reality's negative spaces. I gawked as the ripples sunk into Delano. He buckled like a serf beneath a lord's switch, his groans painful and guttural. I instinctively darted toward him, then wheeled on Bavol, afraid he'd exploit Delano's vulnerability. But Bavol hugged himself like a forest fetus, writhing in the dirt as the Earth's energies pummeled him. The world darkened. The darklings brightened as if the moon and stars spot
lighted only them. My heart pounded as I rushed to Delano's side.

  "Stay back!" Delano gasped. His teeth gnashed, then he threw back his head and screamed.

  "Del!" I cried. His body bucked. His veins bulged as if trying to burst. His skin dissolved into the night like blood gushing into water as the Earth syphoned his magic for its demands. Bavol writhed, wailing as shadows ravished him, blended his edges into the night. Coyotes howled from distant crags. An inky whirlpool gobbled the forest floor and absorbed the two darklings. A second of calm settled, as if driving beneath an overpass in a downpour. Then the energies erupted.

  Magic mushroomed like a silent, nuclear blast, flattening me supine. The Earth disintegrated the storm clouds like cotton candy sprayed with a firehose. An evening-grosbeak fell from the tree branches and twitched near my head, his yellow plumage dazzling in the gloom. Raindrops became mist, floated away. Darkness rolled. The air rippled. More birds tumbled from their nests, jerking. The grosbeak's legs stilled. Chipmunk bodies patted the forest floor. Then, like a wave over a shore, the energies stretched out, lessened, and returned to where it emanated.

  I sat up, gulping air. My entire body ached and tingled. Dead songbirds littered the ground in a hundred-foot ring. Feathers seesawed in the air. The sky was clear, star speckled, dry. Shadows recollected where Delano knelt gasping, his nose dripping blood.

  Delano had warned me the Earth forced its will if darklings disobeyed its decree, but I never expected this.

  Delano scooped a dead chipmunk into his hand. Bavol gaped at the tiny corpse, his mouth a loose O, bleeding gums staining his lips. Delano stood and stalked him, his thumb stroking the chipmunk's stripes.

  "I'm sorry, man!" Bavol scrambled backward on his rear. "I-I never thought you'd choose her over your territor—"

  Delano punched the ground. Darkness split and swallowed Bavol. Bavol screamed, screamed, screamed—a shadowman writhing in a shadow-mouth—and I wondered if he didn't defend himself because he believed he deserved punishment.

  Delano wiped his bloody nose on his arm while Bavol thrashed and wailed like a cat in a pillowcase. Delano dug into the earth, placed the chipmunk inside, and covered it with dirt. He snatched the shotgun then stomped to his writhing trespasser, shadows billowing.

  Delano ripped his magic free, aiming the shotgun at Bavol's head. Bavol rolled onto his back amid a flock of dead birds, gasping. His eyes widened on the gun.

  "Fine. Kill me," Bavol croaked. "What do I care?"

  "I don't want you dead," Delano said. "I want you to leave."

  "Then I'm dead anyway." Bavol sat up, coughing. "The Realm knew where Jenara'd be. They waited for her. They're probably waiting for me." He staggered to his feet, his chest heaving, the bathrobe's belt sagging from a missing loop. "Watch your back, man. The rebels have a mole."

  Delano's eyes widened, then narrowed. He lowered the shotgun. "Impossible. I've spied on those bumbling halfwits for years. You got lazy with spyders."

  "I have miles of frost traps and agents. I tell you, the Realm knew. And the only way they could've was if they conspired with a two-timing rebel."

  I thought of Cham, somehow knowing when Jenara died, and—

  Bavol glared at me, murderous and spiteful. "Now another darkling is dead. My darkling. And because of you our population will stay down. You think lunatic faeries are better for that infant than its birthright?"

  "You think it's okay to rip a baby from her mother to groom her into your sexual partner?" I snapped.

  Bavol blinked. "What?"

  Delano cringed. "Ooooh. Oh no, no."

  Bavol's face purpled, veins bulging in his neck. "Hundreds of darklings await partners! That infant wasn't mine! I was its guardian!"

  My stomach fell, squashing my ego, my smugness, my justifications. Delano was right. We shouldn't have intervened. I wanted to race to the mineshaft, crawl in deep and never emerge. Bavol clenched his scalp, would've probably ripped out hair if he had enough to grip. I whiffed the mother's blood on my clothes, copper and cloying, unsure if freeing the mother and baby was right. I didn't even know my own morals, so how could I judge others for theirs?

  "Another darkling will die alone, and that infant will grow up brainwashed to murder us, humans, Earth's life. And for what? Your conscience? You're an ignorant, self-absorbed halfling with blood on her hands!"

  No, no! I risked life and injury to keep a newborn with her mother, I justified, my heart racing.

  Delano snatched Bavol's bathrobe collar one-handed, rammed him against a tree. "Never speak to her like that! Especially on her territory!"

  Bavol sneered. "This is darkling territory, and I don't see darklings. I see two screw-ups. One too terrified to take the darkshine, yet self-righteously lectures about partnership." He glared at Delano. "And you! Permitting hybrid-magic! You're insane!"

  "She isn't ready," Delano growled.

  "This isn't a spelling-bee!" Bavol snapped. "The magic's rippling through my territory, scrambling my frequencies! You think it's any different on other territories?"

  Delano released Bavol, his hand splayed, disgusted. "Maybe instead of criticizing and finger-pointing, we should fight our true enemies."

  "I suffer enough managing Yosemite and its four-million ungrateful humans every year." Bavol pulled a crushed box of menthol cigarettes and a lighter from his bathrobe's pocket. He lit one and took a drag, blew a long stream of smoke. "And now I manage it alone." His face scrunched. "Murder might be a blessing. Why should I care? Humans treated me horribly, and all they do is whine about the weather cuz I can't handle the caseload."

  Delano rolled his eyes. "Quit bellyaching and go home, Bavol."

  "How'd you feel when they murdered Lydia, huh?" His words slapped Delano silent. A sob wracked Bavol's body; his palm scrubbed his face as if trying to shove the grief back inside. When his waning, ruddy eyes peered up, they were creased and moist. "They stole her body, man. You know what that means, but you're getting indignant on me?"

  Delano's shoulders slumped. He rubbed his forehead as a moth flittered onto his chest and hung like a brooch. He sighed, then ejected and pocketed the shotgun's shells, and handed the empty gun to his neighbor. "Go home. Get some rest."

  Bavol glared at the gun in his hands, his jaw tight and chin trembling. His lips parted, then his eyes locked onto Delano's. "The Realm knew," he repeated, then morphed into a shadowman and slipped away.

  Wind soughed through the pine needles as if a tornado never ripped through the land.

  "What does it mean?" I asked.

  Delano stared at Bavol's footprints, three inches and a million miles away from me.

  "Del?"

  His head jerked up. "Huh?"

  "What does stealing a darkling's body mean?"

  Wind rippled our hair. He wiped the rest of the blood off his nose. "Nothing good, I'm sure." Delano side-eyed me. "Still want to invite Bavol for dinner?"

  I shook my head, frowning.

  "I told you to not interfere. Maybe next time you'll listen," he said. "Now let's find a shovel. We have a lot of graves to dig." He stuffed his hands into his pockets and we headed to the mine in silence, as if to not wake the ferns from their dreams.

  The next evening a storm blew in from Bavol's territory. Palls of darkness spread over California. Pyres flashed in the clouds. A darkling's funeral, I thought, without a body to bury or burn. Delano faced the sky, tense and waiting … then let the lightning and dry thunder roll through his territory, the clouds roaring as if suffering from pain and grief.

  The humans and their media became ecstatic. Surely the drought would abate before summer's scorching heat. Surely water would fall from those dark and heavy clouds. Hope and excitement and anticipation crackled among the community, celebrating and reveling in a darkling's despair.

  But the temperature rose. Wells lowered. The dirt stayed cracked and dry. How unusual! everyone said. What strange weather! The humans blamed pollution and Earth patterns and sun spots and politic
ians, and they blamed loudly, as if their indignation would correct the world's problems if only they shouted loud enough, spoke with the most conviction, posted the most internet memes. Meanwhile, a darkling was dead and rotting, another grieved heartbroken and alone, and the rest lay awake in their daytime beds, dreading the countdown to their extinction.

  Days passed. The plants turned another shade of brown. Leaves wilted lower. Dirt devils blew across barren fields. Everything was dying and turning to dust, as if Jenara was determined to bring the world down with her.

  CHAPTER NINE

  "Miriam! Wake up!"

  I jolted upright, my chest heaving. The nightmare lingered, carving images into the darkness. I fumbled for the flashlight hanging on the wall like a fallen saber, but Delano clicked it on first, exposing the concerned darkling where moments before had been terror and gore.

  "You're safe." Delano sat beside me on the bed, hugged me to his cool chest.

  My face scrunched. I kicked off the blanket coiled around my ankle. "Did I wake you?"

  "No. I was awake," he said, stroking my head. "Nightmares."

  My lip twitched into a sad smile. He was the only person I knew who slept worse than I did. And, guiltily, I loved it. I never connected with a friend before, even over something as macabre as nightmares.

  "Which dream was it?" he asked.

  "Sam and the gun," I said. Delano's heart beat steady beneath my ear. Mine hammered. "The one with a bullet in the chamber. Sam's blood … his brains …" Delano squeezed me when I shivered. "I can't believe I almost killed him."

  "You didn't."

  "But I meant to. I feel like a terrible person."

  "Feelings are just feelings. They don't make anything true," Delano said. "You did what needed to be done. Even if the gun was loaded, you'd have been justified."

  The mine sighed, curling stale air around us. I knew Delano was correct. It was self-defense. Yet the logic seemed heavy and false, an excuse hidden as fact. Sure, Sam tried to murder me and Orin, but there must've been another way. I should've—