by Rabia Gale
“I saw Max. He said to tell you good-bye.”
Another pause. He felt Isabella shrug. “Well. Inside my body is no place for a krin.” In spite of the dismissive gesture and light tone, he knew her emotions ran deep.
“You may see him again,” he said. “Now that the krin can metamorphose the way they’re supposed to.”
“I’m sorry,” said Isabella, “about Bryony. Not for her sake, but yours.”
“And the girl kayan. Gloriana.” He thought he should feel sadder, but instead he just felt hollow. Perhaps his mind hadn’t quite registered what had happened. “In the end, I couldn’t reach them.”
“It may not be over for them,” said Isabella. “The girl is a prodigy. She may have gotten the aether ship working again. They may return.”
“I don’t think Bryony ever would.” Somehow, it was easier to think of them alive out there, flying from world to world. Perhaps they would both find a better life elsewhere.
“So our work here is done?” Isabella asked.
“Not quite.” Rafe gestured with his free hand in the direction of Salerus. Hot aether surged in through the massive gaps in the chamber. The sun’s ferocity was warm on his face. “We have to give the world back its light.”
“From here? Did the controls survive Karzov’s rampage?”
“It doesn’t matter. The ka-systems did.” He released Isabella’s hand and walked forward. Rubble crunched under his feet. Steps rose in front of him, outlined in ka. He climbed up them and paused at the top.
He stood in the center of the spellwork that controlled the sun. And he began to knot and weave, taming their wild luminary and releasing the blocks that had arrested its motion for so long.
Chapter Thirty
Isabella
ISABELLA AND RAFE WANDERED the ruins of New Hope while its tense inhabitants hid inside the hollow mountain that had sheltered the now-shattered Tors Lumena. They were the only two out at this stage. It was moonset, the time called Scatter, when day gave way to night.
No, not Scatter, Isabella corrected herself, but Seed. Rafe said that they must get used to calling day night, and night day.
They awaited the rising of Salerus, the luminary that ruled the day. Silver Selene must return to her place as queen of the night.
Down in the control chamber, Rafe had put right what had been done to Salerus. She’d sat cross-legged on the floor, alert, pushing back tiredness for one more moment, one more stage, one more day as she had ever done.
And when he was finished, long-still gears groaned and ground into motion. Through the open window, Isabella saw, ever so slightly, Salerus begin to move.
“I made it so that it will take its place in our daytime once again,” Rafe had said. Tiredness etched his face, but with it also was peace and confidence. Somehow, somewhere in the age they had spent under the disc, he had finally grown comfortable in his skin.
Isabella, glancing up at the scarred thin face with its stark features, thought that no one would ever be able to look at him again and see a fop. He had lost the ability to disguise himself as average.
She hadn’t looked forward to the journey home, but Rafe had summoned another capsule and they’d ridden in swift ease all the way back up to the Tors, where Coop and Furin and Wil and the rest of New Haven’s leadership waited. She could tell from Rafe’s face that even while he teased out the nuances of this new-old form of ka, the magic came to him easier.
Or else it was his new-found confidence in himself that did it.
Neither she nor Rafe had expected the gathered Ironhearters to greet the news of Salerus’ reappearance with enthusiasm. To the discouraged people of New Haven, it came as a blow. Many had sobbed, other had looked dazed. Some wailed and a very few cursed—if not Rafe out loud, but in thought.
Isabella fingered Eya’s hilt and stared back at them.
Coop, voice hoarse, had held back that nasty tide. “For God’s sake, we have trusted the kayan thus far. Trust a few stages longer.”
Wil had said to Rafe, low-voiced, “This is as it was meant to be. From the moment you took up your path as kayan, this was how it must end. Leonius Grenfeld was afraid of this.”
And Rafe answered, “And what of you, Wil? Are you also afraid?”
“I think that, like Coop, I will wait and see.”
But, in the end, neither had decided to come out into the open and witness for themselves.
“What of the other countries?” Isabella wondered as they went around a damaged street sign. “Of Oakhaven and Clearwater and Blackstone, and the Talar-e-Shoshan? What will happen when they see Salerus appear in the sky? They’ve had no warning.”
“There will be fear and panic. I hope it will be short-lived. This was the only way.” Rafe turned onto a path that led up the slope, leading the way with surety despite not sharing her sight.
Their kyra bond was truly gone.
Isabella let out an exhalation, a small sigh. The ka below had washed away her pain, but it couldn’t take away the fact she’d been pushing her body to its limits. There’d be a reckoning even she could not put off.
“Tired?” he asked, half-turning back towards her.
She smiled wryly up at him, though he could not see it. “Not at all. I race through the disc and back before breakfast most days.”
He chuckled. “Sorry. I’ve gotten in the habit of relying on you, you know.”
It was silly to feel so warm and fluttery inside. Silly to let the long-buried daydreams of her distant girlhood bubble out. She said, more severely than she’d expected, “Kayan or not, you don’t need to do everything yourself.”
“I could say the same to you,” he teased slyly. “Krin slayer or not…”
She waved a hand, interrupting. “Not anymore. Not with the krin back to normal. To think they were muses and not demons, after all.” She paused, thinking. “The Matria must’ve known. Why did she never say?”
“This is just the beginning, though.” Rafe led her to an iron bench on the summit that had, incongruously, survived the destruction of New Hope. “The beginning of discovering the answers and rebuilding our lives. The start of a world that exists on a firmer foundation.”
He sat down, both arms stretched out across the back and closed his eyes. “Don’t sell yourself short, Isabella. The world still needs you.”
As she looked down at him, hands on her hips, he said, so softly she barely heard it. “I still need you.”
There was no change in his expression. He didn’t open his eyes.
Isabella waited, but he said nothing more.
With a sudden rush of fond exasperation, she saw he had fallen asleep.
Isabella sat down next to him, her back straight, their bodies just touching. She smoothed the folds of her borrowed skirts and clasped her hands in her lap.
She waited.
The sky lightened so slowly that she missed it at first. Then, suddenly, the blue bleached out of it, leaving it pale and streaked with blush-pink.
Next to her, Rafe breathed evenly, deeply. His head had dropped to her shoulder.
“You’re missing this,” Isabella murmured, scarcely louder than a breath.
He didn’t respond. He was sound asleep.
A golden glow appeared at the rim of the world, outlining the horizon in blazing yellow. It was warm and friendly, nothing like the angry blaze she’d seen below the disc and half-expected.
Rafe slept on.
It was the tenth day of the sixth month, named Magus. A fitting day for a kayan to return the sun to its place.
“I’ll watch,” Isabella whispered, “and tell you about it later.”
She tilted her head, so her cheek pressed against his hair, and watched as the sun rose for the first time in five hundred years.
Thank you for reading this book! If you enjoyed the story, please consider mentioning it on Twitter or Facebook, or reviewing it on your blog, Goodreads, or the site you got it from.
Subscribe to my mailing list f
or bonus content and news of upcoming releases.
Books by Rabia Gale
The Sunless World
Quartz
Flux
Flare
Fantasy Novellas
Rainbird
Mourning Cloak
Ironhand
About the Author
I create weird worlds full of magic and machines and write characters struggling to do what’s right. I’m fascinated by light and darkness, transformation, and things that fly. Giant squid and space dragons appear in my work—you have been warned!
A native of Pakistan, I now reside in Northern Virginia, where I read, write, doodle, avoid housework, and homeschool my children.
Visit me online at http://www.rabiagale.com or follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/rabiagale. I love hearing from readers!
