by Elise Kova
With a sigh, Cvareh went inside. He had only begun to receive his latest tailor orders. No clothing seemed quite appropriate for the situation. So he donned a loose fitting robe, a sort of belled sleeve and wide-sashed ensemble that put the masculine lines of his chest and abdomen on display in a way he was rather fond of. It was most certainly a color from last season, but it brought out the dark umber notes of his blood-orange hair in a way he’d always liked.
He only had to look presentable enough for Petra.
His door clicked closed quietly behind him, and Cvareh descended the window-lined hall that would lead across the manor to Petra’s chambers. Footsteps drew his attention; Cvareh’s eyes locked with another set of golden irises.
Cain—his childhood friend, his confidant, aspiring mate to his sister—looked at Cvareh with an unfamiliar expression. Cain opened his mouth to speak, then promptly closed it before opening it again.
“What will we do?”
Cvareh couldn’t help but grimace. No doubt, Petra had correctly anticipated or deciphered his actions of letting Ari go. “Arianna will continue to support us,” he assured. “Even on Loom, she’s returning to reunite with the rebellion and—”
Cvareh lost the final word. Cain crossed to him in a tempest. He grabbed Cvareh’s robe by the lining of the collar, the man’s claws punching holes through the silken fabric.
“Cain—”
“You think I care about your Fen pet right now?” he growled. Cvareh was instantly reminded of one of their last fateful encounters in the stables at the Crimson Court. He’d hoped the tension of that meeting had been washed away by the events of the past day.
“You’d do well not to refer to her in that way.”
“Petra is dead and all you can think about is Loom?”
Cvareh froze. He didn’t care for the ribbons that Cain was slowly cutting into his fine clothing. He didn’t even pay attention to the full depth of rage and pain in the other man’s eyes.
Petra is dead. These three words echoed so loudly in Cvareh’s mind that he went deaf. He saw Cain’s mouth moving but no sound accompanied it.
Petra is dead. Petra is dead. Petra is dead.
“What?” Cvareh blundered his way back into Cain’s speech. “What about Petra?”
“You . . . you don’t know.” Cain’s grip relaxed. His golden eyes changed from a fiery hue, alight with magic, to a smoldering ache. They glistened in a way Cvareh had never seen before. “She was with you, Cvareh. Your Oji was with you. How do you not know?”
Before Cvareh had a chance to explain his and Petra’s plan—how they had split up for effectiveness—and before he had time to ask again what Cain meant, he was interrupted again.
“Cain’Da, Cvareh’Ryu.” There was a note of genuine surprise on the quiet words of a servant who had appeared in the hall below them. “Your presence is requested back in the main hall.”
Throne room. It had been the throne room before. Cvareh wanted to correct the boy. He wanted to be like Petra and inspire fear over something as simple as the use of a proper name. But he couldn’t speak.
If he opened his mouth, he would scream. Or vomit. Or beg for answers. Or some combination thereof.
There must be some mistake, his mind protested as they descended through the fresh opulence of the Xin Manor. It stood in contrast to the Rok Estate’s antiquity, a fact underscored even more by having just sneaked through the latter’s halls. But Cvareh saw none of it. His mind barely registered that his robe was reduced to tatters. He moved on instinct and somehow found himself at his sister’s most beloved room.
The stained-glass floor was illuminated with the first light of dawn. It splashed colors on the ceiling and walls of the long hall in happy contrast to the heavy melancholy that dominated the air. Most of the staff and servants were lined in rows, looking toward the raised platform where Petra’s meticulously fashioned throne stood.
In front of that throne was a ruby-skinned man. Cvareh didn’t know him but he recognized the beads of a King’s Rider when he saw them.
“Good of you to join us, both of you,” the Rider praised brightly. “We heard you had returned, Cvareh’Ryu, from your late-night adventures.”
Cvareh didn’t believe for a moment that the Rider didn’t know exactly where he’d been. Cvareh barred his fangs in a wide grin. He was not to be tested right now. The past day was beginning to tug on his shoulders to the point of pain, contorting his muscles under the weight of something he couldn’t yet fathom.
“Don’t you mean Cvareh’Oji?” Cain corrected darkly from his side. For all their differences, and even when he dripped with anger, Cain still stood for Xin. If that fact ever changed, Cvareh’s world would truly have ended.
“Not quite.” The Rider turned back to Cvareh, smiling, fangs gleaming. “Cain Bek was gone for a while. I trust he informed you of the death of your sister.”
Petra is dead.
“I require some clarity.” It was all Cvareh could muster. Something had to begin making sense. The sad eyes of his House surrounded him, wary gazes begging for an answer he didn’t have. He didn’t even know the questions to ask.
“Ah, well, then allow me to inform you that your sister, Petra Xin’Oji To, has perished on this day.”
Cvareh could see the ghost of his sister behind the man, sitting proudly on her throne. Her golden curls cascaded over her shoulders and down to the curve of her hip. A woman among women, and warrior who could best them all.
“She was challenged to a duel in the Rok Estate,” the Rider continued.
There were whispers now, but all Cvareh could focus on was the ghost of his sister. It was a figure that already threatened to haunt him until the end of his days.
“A duel between whom?” Cain asked. “A Rok, no doubt. For if she was slain by a Rok, the title of Oji falls to Cvareh.”
“I know well how titles work,” the Rider chided with a condescending smile. “We use the same ones in House Rok. And you would do well, Cain Bek, to remember where House Rok sits.” At the top, the Rider allowed everyone to mentally fill in the words. “No, she was challenged by a Xin.”
They all knew who it was. There was only one man it could’ve been. For the only other Xin present at the time of Petra’s death was Cvareh, and every last man and women assembled knew that Cvareh would have never challenged his sister.
“On the fifteenth day of the month of Soh, eleven years after the annexation of Loom, Petra’Oji was slain by Finnyr’Kin in a duel of her challenging.”
Cvareh stared through the Rider. He looked back to the ghost of his sister in all her power and glory. She had a might that should only be thwarted by the Gods themselves, and Finnyr was no God. There was foul play here. Deceit and lies abounded everywhere Rok stood.
“Coletta Rok’Ryu and Yeaan Rok’Soh bore witness to this honorable challenge and kill. It determines before the Divine Twenty and the mortals below that Finnyr Xin’Kin To will henceforth be known as Finnyr Xin’Oji To.”
In this moment, the Rider’s words were muffled, garbled. The visage of his sister moved her lips, and all he heard was Cain’s voice again, ripe with pain and colored in grief—Petra is dead—before the ghostly presence vanished, and left the halls of the Xin Manor forever.
ARIANNA
She was relieved to be free of her bonds. The feeling of entrapment in that dank little room was too similar to what she had endured on Nova at Yveun’s hand. Even though the man before her was the antithesis to the hulking Dragon King, and her surroundings looked nothing like the architecture found in the sky world, there was something disturbingly similar to both situations.
“So, where are we?” Movement helped, but thinking helped more.
“Suburb of Ter.5.2.” Louie moved at a snail’s pace, and Arianna was reduced to a shuffle to avoid striding past him. “It was a warehouse I was using to transfer goods from Dortam to the port of Ter.5.2, and vice versa.”
“How far does your reach actually extend?�
�� Arianna didn’t know why he was suddenly sharing all this information with her, but if his tongue was well oiled, she’d encourage the words to flow.
“Far enough.” Louie paused at one of the switchbacks, giving her a smug smile.
“I suppose you weren’t known for your transparency.”
“The opposite, actually.”
He pushed open a door that was quite light when Arianna caught it, despite the heavy-looking wood-and-bronze framing. They arrived in a homely upstairs room far more domestic than Arianna expected. A long wooden table was lined with pewter stools, one of which was occupied by a red-eared Chimera.
“Adam, go fetch our little crows from their tinkering.”
The man named Adam stood and Arianna regarded him warily. She knew Chimeras got the luck of the draw when it came to organs, but seeing red Dragon flesh evoked a completely new response in her. He was oblivious to her apprehension, however, and left the notes he’d been looking over to disappear through a galley door.
“I’m going to need your help.” Louie drew her attention from the table as he rounded it in his deliberate manner.
“With what?” Arianna was surprised when he slid the papers toward her. It seemed her needlessly complex planning for how to sneak looks at them was no longer necessary.
He fanned out the papers, an assortment of technological specifications, schematics, unit numbers, and more. “We need to outfit this airship for magic, using this much gold.” His finger settled on a quantity.
Arianna scoffed. “Impossible.”
“You seem to be someone who makes the impossible, possible.”
“I’m an engineer, not a wizard.”
“Well—” Louie was cut short by the galley door opening again. Two children strode through. “Ah, thank you for joining us.”
“A delight to be here, m’Lord!” Helen gave a dramatic bow in Louie’s direction.
Arianna tapped her fingers against the table. Magic rippled through the muscle and bone of her forearm, pooling in her fingertips. It was a conscious effort not to unsheathe her claws and throttle the two Ravens.
“If it isn’t Helen and Will . . .” Why was she surprised? She really shouldn’t be. Arianna had last seen the girl barreling through the underground at breakneck speeds. Anyone who possessed such equal parts stupidity and suicidal tendency would certainly find her way into Louie’s employ.
“Been a while, huh?” Helen raised her hand in greeting, nonchalantly strolling over to the table. “What a small world. You work for Louie, I work for Louie…”
“I do not work for Louie,” Arianna corrected. “He works for me.”
Helen seemed taken aback by this, and her eyes swept to Louie.
“We have an arrangement.” It wasn’t much in the way of concession on Louie’s part. But Arianna was operating under the idea of choosing her battles at present, and this one wasn’t worth fighting.
“I knew you stooped low, but working with children, Louie?” Arianna keenly remembered Louie’s statement regarding Florence being “observed” by one of his lackeys. Was he keeping Helen and Will here by force, to get back at the girl? “What threats did you have to make?”
“Flor introduced us,” Helen announced, as if it was something to be proud of. Well, Ravens were notorious for rushing in headfirst with reckless abandon. “She’s been busy while you’ve been having a vacation on Nova.”
“I was not on vacation,” Arianna snapped.
“Whatever you’ll call it then.”
“Enough of that, both of you.” Louie leaned against the wall, looking as though he could hardly stand for another moment. “We’re all on the same side. No need to be at each other’s throats.”
Arianna could think of quite a few reasons to be at the throats of everyone in the room. But, begrudging as she was to admit it, for now it did suit them all to get along.
“I’ve already begun to fill in the Wraith on our airship,” Louie said to Helen and Will.
“I had some ideas for that.” Will approached with caution, and Arianna regarded him in kind. At her side, he leaned over and pointed at a hollow point in the wing of the glider. “I think, right here, we can use it as a main sort of magic artery for lift in both wings.”
“Save on gold by piping in the wings instead of on the outside . . .” Arianna’s mind folded and unfolded the idea onto the blueprints before her, seeing how they laid atop the glider. “It could be possible.” She pointed to the back of the wing. “Discharge through here?”
“Not unless you don’t want us to be able to turn.” Will shook his head. “Need movements in the flaps.”
“How about the end of the wing then?” It was like her mind betrayed her; helping them along was the last thing she wanted to be doing. But it would get her to Florence. And perhaps even more important, it stretched her brain in ways it hadn’t been for months on Nova.
It was good to be home.
“That might work. I’ll need to check.”
Arianna nodded, glancing over the quantity of gold. “I’ll need a proper drafting table.” She looked up to Louie. “Somewhere I can work.”
“Does this count as a wish?” The coy bastard grinned his thin, little smile.
“Hardly.” Arianna kept her voice level, scooping the papers and tapping them on the table. “It’s a demand, and it’s necessary to give you what you asked for.”
“Yes, yes, there’s somewhere by the hangar that should suffice.”
Arianna wondered what constituted a “hangar” in Louie’s makeshift world. She wondered what counted as “suitable” too, and was more afraid of the latter than the former.
“Then let’s get to work, children.”
“I am not a child!” Helen said.
“Let’s go.” Will grabbed his friend by the elbow, tugging her from the room. Ari was short behind.
“One more thing, Arianna.”
“Yes?” She stood with the door half-open, but let it close when he gave it a pointed look. “We will stop in Holx for refueling.”
It made sense; Holx was the capital of Ter.4, and even when the world was in disarray it’d still be well stocked. “Helen and Will know you’re taking them back to the guild they escaped from?”
“They have faith I’ll look after them.” Louie waved away the concern. Arianna’s only faith in Louie was that he’d look after no one but himself. “While we’re there, I need you to acquire something for me.”
“Acquire? You mean steal.”
Louie hummed his affirmation. “You must think so poorly of me.”
“Louie, I have to care about you to think poorly of you. Die in a ditch for all it concerns me.”
“You should be more concerned, as I give you great power in this world.” Sure, he was well connected, but Arianna had every faith she could be self-sufficient without him if she needed to be. It merely suited her to go along with him, for now, as the path of least resistance.
“So, what is it that you need the White Wraith for?”
“I’ll give you the details when we arrive. In the meantime, focus on the airship and fixing your tools. They were badly damaged in your little fall.”
Arianna snorted at the word “little.” There was a time where not having her daggers would have been cause enough for panic. But now that she could produce claws from her fingertips, they seemed slightly less critical.
Arianna moved for the door but stopped. “One more thing.” She looked at the little man. “If you go back on our deal, if you give me one reason to suspect you’re out of line—”
“I’m always out of line.”
Arianna resisted the urge to roll her eyes, and chose, instead, to hold her gaze level. “I will kill you and everyone you ever loved, horribly.”
“Of course.” His mouth cracked into a smile, a wild, little grin of pure mirth. Arianna knew where his mind was before he opened his mouth to speak. “That will be easy for you, as I’ve never loved anyone but myself.”
Aria
nna let him have the last word. She needed time to think over how to threaten someone who fought for nothing but himself.
COLETTA
The first sip was always the hardest.
Coletta poured liquid fire into her mouth. She swallowed it down, a blessing that tasted of damnation. Her fingers cupped the stone mortar, one hooking the pestle to keep it from her face. Her elbows trembled from the weight of the vessel, and the pain.
The poison reached her stomach like a throbbing punch that made her abdomen clench so tightly it pushed the air from her chest and collapsed her lungs. It unfurled agony like the wings of death and took flight through her veins, ravaging her insides. Her magic pushed against the poison on instinct, fighting to keep her knees locked, striving for consciousness.
Still, she drank from the mortar like a babe to a tit. There was delight in the hurt that came from allowing her body to be brutalized by a concoction of her own creation. She charged toward the threshold where pain became pleasure, and nimbly leapt over the edge. Death transformed to triumph.
She killed herself time and again to feel her body reborn, to emerge stronger with each draught.
Coletta lowered the bowl, the sticky residue of the poison weeping down its sides in faintly umber-colored rivulets. Another day, another draught, and death yet avoided. There would soon be no poison, no concoction or illness that could fell her.
She pulled a sheer, silken shawl back over her shoulders from where it had slipped down her back. The last of the poison was finishing coursing through her system, and Coletta decided a walk would keep her joints moving through the final shivering aftershocks. She stepped away from her sheltered outdoor laboratory, and into the gardens proper.
