by Adam Holt
He looked at me over his shoulder, his purple eyes flecked with red and gold.
“Go ahead,” I nodded.
“Tully?” he said.
“Yes?” I said, waiting for his question. He didn’t say anything more though, just looked out the window at the square. His wings stretched down to his fingertips, then bristled as before. What was he waiting for? Was he stalling?
The time for waiting was over. The guys could be waiting at the submarine. My powers had returned. I could rescue Tabitha and be on my way...and hopefully get Janice on the way back. Still, Icarus might be able to stop me. I did not know all of his powers. He was Encountered like me, and he was staring out the window at the light from the distant stars.
“Icarus, what is your question?”
He turned toward me.
“I was going to ask you who you really are,” he said, “but I do not need to ask that anymore.”
The red and purple light of his eyes shined in the darkness.
“You didn’t ask me anything,” I said.
“I asked you nothing…and everything,” he replied.
“But all you did was say my...” but I could not finish my sentence. He finished it for me.
“Your name,” he said. “Tully. Tully Harper. On Europa known as the Red Thief.” Icarus took a step forward, reaching for my shoulder. “I’ve known for longer than you think.”
“No,” I said, backing away. It wasn’t “no” to him, more to the idiot bomb that I had detonated in my own face. I blew my cover with one word. All that sneaking around—just like last time and all for nothing. Sawyer knew it was me in that orangutan suit, and he toyed with me. Icarus did the exact same thing. Might as well just wear a nametag next time.
Icarus waited patiently, my mind in tornado mode.
I should have left earlier. He would never have known. He would go on with his peace march. Tabitha and I would be on our way back to the submarine. Maybe I could assassinate the Lord Ascendant somewhere in there.
My heart leaped into my throat. A cold lump formed inside my stomach, and my lightning scars felt hot, ready to burn something.
“Let me go,” I said. “I’m on a mission, Icarus.”
“I know. So am I—to make my people good again.”
“I don’t care about that,” I said. My hands sent a warm red glow onto our faces.
“Yes, you do,” he said.
“You don’t know me.”
“Better than you think,” he said.
“I am here to save a friend. I owe her.”
“I know that, too.”
“You know nothing,” I said.
“Nothing, and everything,” he said. “Think about it, Tully. Who are the Ascendant? Where did we originate? What is the Sacred? You came for Tabitha, but you also came for answers.” It wasn’t a challenge, just a simple statement of fact. Before I could respond, he stepped in front of me. Both my hands glowed red in front of my body. River of fire, I thought, river of fire.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Can you?” he asked. “Can your hands burn right through me?”
“Of course they can,” I said. “At least I think they can.”
“I did not understand this when we first met.”
“You mean a few hours ago.”
“No,” he said. Icarus dropped his arms to his sides. “Tully, look at me.”
His feathered tattoos bristled. Red and gold flecks danced in his blue eyes, which he closed. He breathed deeply, and his lips began to move. He whispered something in Greek. His tattoos glowed dimly in the dark room. He’s about to use sacred powers. I thought about creating a portal and launching myself out of the apartment, but I held my ground, ready for anything.
Then his tattoos shifted. His feathers stretched and wriggled on his arms and shoulders. In place of feathers there were scales. In place of wings there were rattler and fangs. A thousand serpents danced on his skin. The tunic turned blue like a Fourther’s. Suddenly, Icarus did not look like Icarus. He looked like someone I had known.
“You can’t be,” I stammered.
Icarus opened his eyes again. They were his eyes, but combined with these tattoos they transformed him into someone else. Ekphrasis the tattoo artist, our guide on Rathmore, stood before me, but now I knew him by his proper name. Icarus.
“You—”
“You know me,” he said. “And I know you. I feel like I have known you my whole life, Tully. I dreamed that we would cross paths. You are a vision in the flesh.”
“How did you find me?”
“The Sacred brought you to me. When you appeared in my shop, it was the fulfillment of my very first vision: that I would meet a boy with wounded hands, and I would guide him through a steep mountain pass. The visions hinted at the truth, but I did not expect the boy would be an Earther. I still do not know how you arrived here, but you could be none other than Tully Harper. So I am done guiding you. Now what do I do? I have a choice. I can wake up Adèle. Tell her about you. She will realize you are a valuable asset. She will have many ideas for what to do next.”
The snakes writhed upon his skin. They coiled, hissed, rattled. They sent chills down my spine. Great, Adéle. She wasn’’t my biggest fan. He’s right. He could trap me here. He could turn me in. I would have to help him. Now he knows my hands are weapons. He might change his mind about the peace march. He might attempt an assassination. That wouldn’t be so bad, I guess, but what if he doesn’t care about Tabitha’s safety as much as I do?
“Is that a threat?” I asked, my pulse rising. “I thought you were good.”
His tattoos transformed from scales to feathers again. He seemed himself.
“Alas,” he said. “I am, and I am still your guide. I cannot block your path. But before you venture off alone, why don’t we take a brief trip together?”
“Where?” I asked.
“Tabitha is safe in her tower,” he said, “but I fear that another is not so fortunate.”
“Who?”
“Sunjay.”
TWO TALES AND A WALL
I abandoned my plan and went with Icarus. What else could I do? He was right about Tabitha, and he might be right about Sunjay. So under a starry night sky, we slipped out of the apartment together. The wet night air clung to my tunic and slowed me down. I struggled to keep up with Icarus. We weaved our way down the side streets and alleyways of the Fourth Step. We hopped fences, watched for guard cats and guard foxes (Who knew they could do that?), and finally traversed a beautiful garden. On one end was a dreadfully high wall. There were tall stone spires in the distance above it.
“Can you portal us through the wall?” he asked.
“Not if I haven’t seen the other side.”
Icarus didn’t look concerned. He kept walking and I stayed beside him until we reached its base.
“It is quite a wall,” he said, his eyes flickering in the starlight. He turned toward me and put a hand on my injured shoulder. I flinched, but didn’t feel pain. We were now face to face. What the heck is this? Alien dance lessons? It was awkward for a split second. Then I felt a rush of power, a kick of energy and enthusiasm. Not only that but my shoulder felt better. My lightning flowers didn’t ache. Looking up at the wall, it didn’t look so high anymore. The top looked closer than I expected, and the shapes beyond the wall came into focus. This wall’s nothing, I wanted to say. And there’s a river on the other side. We can jump the wall and the river. Stars, let’s jump to the Seventh Step and save Tabitha while we’re at it.
“Okay, we got this,” I said, feeling like a million bitcoins. “It’s not that high after all.”
“Maybe not,” he said. “Or maybe the ground has just become that low.”
It was a weird comment. Alien dance party weird. Still, I felt great. Then I looked up. To my surprise, there was no longer a wall above me. Instead, I saw wings.
I checked below my feet and what I saw took my breath away. The ground was a hundred feet below
us. Somehow we were now perched on the top of the wall.
Big Ben, the Tower Bridge, and a bunch of other familiar landmarks rose in the distance. Icarus took his hand off my shoulder, and the glorious feeling faded. The height of the wall left me dizzy and tingling. I rubbed my injured shoulder.
“How did you—”
“This never gets old,” he said. “The first time someone flies, the mind cannot make sense of what’s happening.”
“You mean we just—”
“Flew,” he said, looking down at the street below. “Either that, or you’re dreaming. Now let’s keep moving. Guard cats on a high wall are common. We, however, will draw some attention.”
Good point. I created an entry portal on the top of the wall and an exit on the street below. We dove headfirst into the portal and popped up on the street.
“You’re quick, Tully. I can’t portal like that.”
We crossed the street and stopped in the middle of the cobblestone bridge. Above us the stone arches cast shadows on the rippling water, which reflected two of London’s greatest landmarks.
“Big Ben,” I said, pointing to the water, “and the Eye. This isn’t what I expected to find on Europa.”
“Yes, the Eye is new. Only the rich can afford it. I’ve heard that it’s exactly one meter taller than the real one in London.”
“Well, why did we stop here? To talk about buildings? We need to save Sunjay.”
“I agree,” he said, “but I need answers first. We need to trade stories, Tully.”
“Maybe later,” I said, “because Sunjay—”
“—needs our help, but I need to know some things, too.” His eyes gleamed with understanding, curiosity, and most of all, power. “I promise you, Tully, this is the only demand I will ever make of you.”
A demand and a promise. I’m not a fan of either, but what choice did I have? I nodded.
“Okay,” I said. “You probably know that my dad discovered the Sacred on Mars. It actually almost killed him. It landed in front of him, blew a hole in his helmet, and knocked him out. When he woke up, he found that it was producing some kind of atmosphere and keeping him alive.”
“He had no idea what the Sacred was though,” said Icarus. “That must have been such a shock. To him, to the whole world. And a shock to you, too.”
“Yeah, I full on freaked out. So he returned, got super famous, and no sooner did he get home than the Sacred started messing with our atmosphere. So the Space Alliance decided that they needed to take it back into space.”
Icarus’s feathers trembled. “Ah, that was no accident,” he said. “Someone must have been manipulating it. The Sacred can do great harm in the wrong hands. We both knew whose hands...”
Well, only one hand now. Trackman, of course. Icarus didn’t have to explain that any further. Trackman had access to it and used something to make the Sacred go crazy. He put the entire world at risk. He set up the whole thing. Not like I needed more reason to hate the guy.
“Continue,” he said.
“Well, my dad agreed to take the Sacred back into space, and I was sick of Alaska so I got on board his ship – with Sunjay and Tabitha’s help. I wore the orangutan spacesuit. We hung out with Queen Envy…” Icarus looked a little lost, and I didn’t blame him. “Anyway, long story short, I touched the Sacred. It sort of drew me to itself, then it gave me dreams, powers, and then I talked to it at the end of the trip before I put it to sleep.”
Icarus feathers pulsed with a brilliant red glow that made me shield my eyes. A few other people walked the bridge, but fortunately nobody saw it happen.
“Talked?” he gasped.
“Yeah, we chatted. You know, the Misty Man in the garden?”
“No, I do not know the Misty Man. The Sacred gives dreams, but it does not speak.”
“Oh, well, he spoke to me.” The idea almost knocked Icarus off his feet, and it suddenly dawned on me. The Sacred only spoke to me. What did that mean? I had glimpsed something special, like a shooting star that trailed out of sight before anyone else saw it. Or those people that come back from the dead and say that they visited Heaven. Icarus gripped the rail and shook his head.
“The universe is so full of mystery,” he said. “I know so little of its designs.”
“Yeah, I feel you there,” I said. “But you think you know nothing? Icarus, I’m an idiot about all of this compared to you.”
He shook his head. “No, you are not. You’ve met the Sacred. That is special. You may know little, but you acted upon it. There is greater truth in one honest act than in a thousand proverbs. Have you never heard this?”
“No, that’s a new one,” I said. “I just wanted to help my dad.”
“You sought the truth, Tully. Maybe that is why the Sacred chose you.” Icarus grinned. He tousled my hair like my dad does, and that feeling of excitement returned.
“So tell me who you are,” I said.
“That, too, is a long story. I grew up on the Sixth Step. My father was Encountered, like me – like us. He was offered as a sacrifice to the Sacred, and he offered me in the same way. You’ve never heard of this, have you?”
“No.”
“In Rathmore, it was a great honor, but also a danger. Both parents must agree. You see, only the first child of a household can be presented to the Sacred.”
“Presented?”
“Yes, the child would be placed alone in the room of the Sacred. The parents would then leave. This is when the child would choose. If courageous, he or she could touch the Sacred. Then the child would become Encountered, if the child survived.”
His words sank in. “You mean, not everyone survives.”
Icarus shook his head. “Very few, but it was the price that we had to pay. The only way we could control the Sacred was through the Encountered. If we could not control the Sacred, Europa would fall into ruin. So, you see, the Encountered risked everything to help their people. My father survived, and so did I. We helped our people for many years, but the Lord Ascendant ended all of that.”
I looked up at the broken Sixth Step. The jagged edges were all that remained. I imagined the scene. The step cracked. The Encountered fell. A terrible moment. The Lord Ascendant wielded more power than I imagined. Now he wanted the Earth. I wanted to ask Icarus more about this, but I remembered my dad’s saying. What really matters? Not the past. Stick to the present. Right now.
“How many lived?” I said.
“Seven of us did,” he said, “but now only Bernard, Adèle, and I are left. Ah, and you, my young friend. We are the last of the Encountered.”
“The Lord Ascendant did all this horrible stuff,” I said, “so why haven’t you tried to assassinate him?”
“Oh, I have tried. And I have failed. I have discovered that death—”
BWAAAAAMP.
The sharp sound of a horn rattled my nerves. Marching feet shook the bridge, and from the far end I saw hundreds of black staffs marching toward us.
“Relax.” Icarus put his hand on my shoulder. Then he grabbed some rocks from his pocket and handed me one. The black staff marched past us as we tossed rocks into the flowing water. Their eyes bored into the back of my head. Their staff buzzed and made all the hair on my arms stand up. I prepared to make a portal, but the warriors passed us and their sounds receded. We were just a father and son chucking rocks off a bridge.
“Right on time,” he said. “You see, there were many reasons to slow down. The Ascendant guard is light at this time of night. The coast is now clear, as your people like to say.”
He’s so smart, and he has this all planned out, I thought. But he’s not going to get me off topic though.
“Why not try again? This time you’ll have me. We can stop him before he hurts anyone else. Before he takes down my world like he took down your Step.”
“I have discovered that death leads to death,” he told me. “How could we have peace if it starts with a death? Even one is too many. No, only peace can bring peace.”
“Even if that means your death?” I asked him.
“Then that is how it shall be,” he said. “It is a risk, but only peace flows from peace. This is a hard lesson. So I will ask you to march with me, but I cannot demand it. That is not the way to peace either. It is like touching the Sacred. You must choose it for yourself.”
We watched the water flow under the bridge for a moment. It behaved differently on Europa, making tall peaks instead of flat ripples. He expected an either, but I had none for him.
“I suppose it’s time we do something about Sunjay,” he said finally. “Follow me.”
THE WEEPING DOOR
More alleys. More sneaking. Another flight up a tall wall. I wished that Icarus would just keep flying up and up, until we could see all Seven Steps far below us, but that wasn’t our mission. The last wall put us right where I would have ended up the day before if he had not interfered. The Ascendant Training Grounds.
A dark mansion sat in the middle of the empty training grounds. They would have been dangerous to cross, but we didn’t have to. Icarus pointed to a cellar door on one side of the mansion, and I portaled us to it. We entered through a deserted kitchen and crept through a few hallways until we reached a long corridor. At the end was a large purple door.
“That is the Weeping Door,” he said. That did not sound promising.
“How do you know this place so well?” I asked.
“I trained here,” he whispered.
“You were a black staff?”
“Yes, it was a useful disguise once. I learned this much. They hold captives beyond the Weeping Door. Mostly Outlanders. From there, they take them to the Undercity. They become slaves. They must have brought Sunjay here. Now can you portal us in?”
“No,” I told him. “It’s not like I’ve been here. I can’t see through that door. Can you?”
“No, but I have an idea. How far away can you portal?”
I closed my eyes. I could picture the entire city of Rathmore in my mind. When I tried to focus on creating a portal, I couldn’t see very far. My field of vision grew smaller and smaller until I could see just outside the training grounds. I told Icarus.
