by Amy Ewing
“Azalea’s were blue her first time,” Sil says, staring at the spot where my flowers used to be. “Mine were the darkest red I’d ever seen. Like blood.”
“Does that . . . what was that?” My voice is so quiet. I don’t want to disrupt whatever just happened.
She claps a hand on my shoulder. The gesture is jarring in this moment, even though her grasp isn’t that hard.
“That’s life,” she says.
Then she walks back to the house, leaving me alone. I sit down and press my hand against the grass. Each individual blade feels different to me. Another little white flower sprouts between my fingers, curling and twisting, reaching up toward me, before it inevitably wilts.
Beautiful, I think. It feels like a sigh, a half-formed, yearning thought. Suddenly, hundreds of white flowers blossom around my hand, wrapping their stems around my knuckles and wrist, their cheery white faces fluttering in the light breeze.
I sit there for a long time, listening to the stars and the pond and the grass and the wind. I have never felt so connected to the world around me. Like I am a very small part of something so large it can’t be comprehended. It makes me feel insignificant and unique at the same time.
It’s odd, but I somehow feel safer out here than I did in the house. In the wide-open space, with water and air and earth free and uncontained, I am calm.
I think of the dirty streets of the Marsh and the filthy air in the Smoke. I remember what Sil said, how the royalty cut up this island and stitched it back together. I see the royalty as a giant spider, ensnaring everything in its web, engorging itself until its body becomes swollen, and still it’s not enough. They will never have enough and it’s time for them to be stopped.
For the first time since this whole thing began, I start to feel like it is possible. Like I might be able to help the way Lucien wants. I feel so connected to it all, so filled with the power of the elements—maybe I can make a hole in their walls, break down the barriers, help unite the circles. I stretch my hand out across the grass and it swells up, growing to reach my fingers. I feel like I am growing, too. The blades tickle my skin.
“Violet?”
I whip around. Ash is walking toward me. The wind picks up.
“I wanted to make sure you’re all right,” he says. He stops and looks down. “Whoa.”
A trail of white flowers lights up the ground. They swarm around his feet, growing over his shoes.
“Is that you?”
I nod.
“What is it?”
“It’s life,” I murmur. The flowers wither around him. “How is Raven?”
“Still sleeping.” Ash sits beside me. “What you did back there . . . it was incredible. A little terrifying, but incredible.”
“I think I might be able to help,” I say. “I might be able to do what Lucien wants. I think . . . I think I could break down rock and stone. I think I could make this whole pond turn into a tidal wave if I wanted, or coax the wind into a tornado. So maybe I can carve out holes in the walls that separate this city.”
Ash smiles my favorite smile and slips his hand in mine. “Well, if whatever went on in that room is any indication, I’d say you can. I think you can do anything you put your mind to.”
“What happened?” I ask. “What did it look like, to you?”
“You went very still,” Ash says. “I called your name, and Lucien did, too, but your face . . . it was like you weren’t there anymore. And then this wind started, slow at first, but soon it was throwing things around the room. I thought it was going to break the windows. Sil shouted at us not to touch you. You weren’t affected by it at all, like you couldn’t feel it or hear us. But your expression . . . you were so calm and yet . . . strong. That’s the only way I can describe it.” He hesitates. “What was it like for you?”
I’m frightened by the idea that I caused something so violent without being aware of it. And I don’t want to share the cliff with Ash, not yet. It feels too private. But I want to give him some kind of answer.
“I saw the ocean,” I whisper.
There is a heavy pause. I can sense his disbelief. I keep my eyes trained on the pond.
“What was it like?” he finally asks.
“Endless,” I say.
We sit in silence for a minute. Though it isn’t really silence. I can hear the grass growing and the water rippling and the air breathing.
“Do you think,” Ash says hesitantly, “that what you did for Raven . . . could you do that for someone else?”
We both know who he’s talking about.
“I don’t think it works like that,” I say.
I don’t mention the fact that we couldn’t get to Cinder now, even if we wanted to.
“No,” Ash says. “I suppose not.”
The wind blows a lock of hair into his eyes. He shakes it away.
“I wish there was more I could do,” he says. “I wish I was more useful. Four years in a companion house and all I’ve learned is how to seduce women. There isn’t much value in that.”
“You have plenty of value,” I say.
“Do I? All my life I’ve only been worth what someone was willing to pay for me.”
“I never paid for you,” I say. “And you are beyond priceless to me.”
Ash cups my neck with his hand and pulls me in for a kiss. His lips feel magnificent—soft and warm and full of life. I could devour him. I want to feel his skin on my skin again. I want to feel all of him in this new body, with these new senses. He pulls back as another wave of white flowers swells up around us and dies.
“You’re not bleeding,” he says, running his finger down the length of my nose. “Not like you did at the incinerator.”
I rub the base of my skull. “No,” I say. “And the headaches are gone, too. This is what I’m supposed to do. It’s the four elements, Sil says—I’m connected to them, somehow. I’m not controlling them, or forcing them, or twisting them to something else.” I think about the fiery kettle. “They scare me, though. There’s so much power in them. And we never knew. I don’t even think the royalty knows.” I sigh. “I should probably go back inside. I want to be with Raven.”
Ash tightens his grip on my hand. “Sil is cooking,” he says. “She suggested that you stay out here for that. Actually, she suggested that you stay out here all night. Apparently, you can do a fair bit of damage in your sleep. Or, I guess Azalea did.”
“Oh.”
“Raven will be fine,” he says. “Garnet and Lucien are with her.”
“Right.”
“Violet,” he says, his fingers brushing my cheek. “I’m staying out here with you.”
“Oh no, Ash, you don’t have to . . . I mean . . . you probably shouldn’t. I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I know you’re alone in this thing, that I can’t possibly understand what you’re going through. But I can be here with you. For you. That, at least, I am capable of. So here I am.” He shoots me a sidelong glance. “Please don’t set me on fire in the middle of the night.”
“That’s not funny,” I say.
Ash rolls his eyes. “Sil told me you can’t create anything, only affect what’s already there. So unless you’re planning on sleeping with some matches and a can of kerosene, I think I’m safe.” He kisses my temple. “I’ll go get some blankets and pillows.”
I grab his arm and hold him back. “No,” I say. “Stay here with me for a while longer.”
Ash inclines his head and settles back by my side. He wraps his arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his chest. I breathe him in and feel his heartbeat, strong and steady under my cheek, his life and my life and the life of everything around us intertwined in this moment.
We sit like that in the quiet of the night, as white flowers bloom and fade around us.
Nineteen
I WAKE AT DAWN TO FIND SIL STANDING OVER ME.
She’s wearing her signature overalls and a thick woolen scarf. Clutched in her hands is a thin leather portf
olio, sheets of yellowing paper sticking out around its edges.
She puts her finger to her lips and jerks her head toward the trees.
Ash is sleeping peacefully beside me. I untangle myself from his arms and the blankets as gently as I can—he sighs and rolls onto his back, but doesn’t wake. We slept in the shadow of the barn, so the trees are close by. Sil wanders through the edge of the forest, always keeping the White Rose in sight, until we are a good distance from Ash. On the far side of the clearing, gray light is kissing the treetops, hints of orange and gold peeking out through their branches.
“I didn’t want to burden you with this last night,” Sil says, holding up the portfolio. “I know you had a lot to take in.”
I nod. The air is chilly and I miss the warmth of Ash’s body. But at the same time, I can feel the whole world waking up.
Sil stops at a huge sycamore. She groans as she lowers herself onto the ground, resting her back against its wide trunk.
“Sit,” she says, patting the grass beside her.
As I do, I become very aware of the earth beneath me, its rich, heavy texture, the roots that live and grow inside it. Somewhere deep below, I think I sense the rush of water. An underground river, maybe?
“You feel it all, don’t you?” Sil says.
“There’s so much,” I say. “How are you not . . . how can you . . . live normally?”
She barks out a laugh. “I don’t.”
The sun begins to rise, painting the sky with streaks of pink. Sil puts the portfolio between us.
“You need to learn your history,” she says. “When this power came to me, I had no understanding of it. I was terrified. And I was alone. For years I wondered where it all came from, this magic that got twisted into the Auguries. Was it some failed royal experiment? Then Azalea came, and Lucien, and he had access to the oldest library in the entire city.”
“The Duchess’s library,” I say. I remember the Duchess bragging at dinner one night about how her ancestors built the Great Wall, how it was her duty to preserve the literature of their time.
Sil nods. “Lucien has been smuggling anything he could find out of that library for me. Piece by piece, I’ve put this puzzle together. Or at least, I’ve done the best I could. The only ones who could truly explain it are long dead.”
She opens the portfolio. I pick it up with trembling hands—the pages are very old and I’m afraid that if I touch them they’ll crumble to dust. The first page looks to be a map. It’s the island, but without the city—there are markers on it that I’ve never seen. Several red Xs line the coastline. Other areas within the island are circled, with scribbled notes that I can barely make out. “Topaz deposit,” one says. “Rich soil,” another circle is marked.
I flip to another page. This one is filled with thin, slanted writing. It looks like a list of names, but they are strange and unfamiliar.
Pantha Seagrass
Jucinde Soare
There are twenty names in all. I would guess they are all women—the names feel distinctly female to me. And at the bottom of the page is a note that sets a chill creeping through my chest.
Execution date, March 5, in the year of the Founding.
The year of the Founding. The year the Lone City was formed.
I turn to the next page. It’s filled with very crude illustrations—one shows a woman holding what appears to be a handful of flames. Another shows a young girl, her arms outstretched, a massive blue wave cresting over her head.
Other pages are too smudged to read, with only a few words and phrases written clearly.
. . . to stomp out the source at its heart . . .
. . . ours to command . . .
. . . mercy . . . of death . . .
. . . riches . . .
. . . promised . . .
But it’s a page near the end that holds my attention. Probably because it is the oldest and yet the best preserved. I have a feeling that when Lucien recovered it for Sil, she took great pains to take care of it. It is almost entirely legible. There is a date at the top that I don’t recognize . . . was this document written before the Founding?
I start to read, and the first sentence makes my stomach swoop, like I’ve missed a step going down the stairs.
The island was called Excelsior, the Jewel of the Earth.
I look up. Sil is watching me with a steady gaze, her silver eyes sparkling in the early-morning light.
“Yes,” she says. “This island had a name once. And it was not the Lone City.” She nods at the page. “Keep reading.”
Legend spoke of its riches—thick black dirt where any crop could grow, lush green trees that sang when the ocean breezes tickled their leaves, wild animals of all kinds, striped cats and brilliantly plumed birds and scaly lizards. But most of all, caverns upon caverns of precious gems. Diamond, topaz, garnet, ruby, emerald, sapphire. All these and more.
The next few sentences are hard to read. I see a reference to the House of the Lake, another to the House of the Stone. Something about alliances, and another mention of riches. The next paragraph is much clearer.
But the island was merely myth. The people of Bellstar—ruled by Lake and Scales—and the people of Ellaria—ruled by Stone and Rose—knew this to be true. Many had tried to find the island. None had succeeded. Those who returned spoke of evil winds that blew their ships asunder, or giant waves that swept their crew overboard to a watery grave, never catching even a glimpse of their destination.
But the royal families were not to be dissuaded. Hundreds of ships were built and the great race began. Which country would find the Jewel of the Earth and claim it for their own?
I was hired by the House of the Scales, to work as a scribe. My father did not wish for me to take this journey. But I had to see the island for myself.
Dark days . . .
The rest of that paragraph is faded and smudged. I turn to the next page.
In the end, it took all four families working together to conquer the island, its magic so deep, its boundaries so well protected. But the natives were no match for the power of the cannon, the brute force of royal weaponry. I have made a further account of the attack on the western shore, though, as it does not portray the royalty in a favorable light, I imagine it will not live to see beyond this day.
The executions took place at dawn. Not a single woman in the village was spared, for who knew which of them possessed the strange and wondrous ability to speak to the sea and the wind and the earth? They call themselves the Paladin, guardians of Excelsior. They claim it is their duty to protect the island.
The royalty is convinced they will track them all down, but I am not as certain.
The rest of the page is blurred. My hands are shaking so violently, I have to close the portfolio to make sure that I don’t harm its contents. My brain whirs as I make sense of everything. The royalty always claimed this island was uninhabited. That was the story. That they found it, settled it, built the Lone City.
They never said there were people here.
“Yes,” Sil muses, gazing out at the trees across the field. “They really are a bunch of bastards, aren’t they.”
“Who were they?” I ask. “Those women?”
“They are our ancestors,” she says. “We are descendants of the Paladin. The guardians of this island.” Her voice is warm and rich, reverent. She places her palms down on the earth beside her. “This island gives us power, I believe. In return, we were trusted with its protection. But we were lost for so long. They thought they killed us, but our good friend the scribe knew differently.”
It is strange to think of myself as descended from an ancient race of magical women.
“Maybe that’s what that place was,” I murmur.
“What place?” Sil asks. I tell her about the cliff and the monument, where I found Raven and brought her back.
“You saw the ocean?” she gasps.
I nod. Sil covers her mouth with her hand, and for a moment, I think she might cry.<
br />
“I knew we were connected to it,” she mutters to herself, “but I never . . .”
“What are you talking about?”
“When I was dying in the morgue,” she says, “I heard a strange sound, like waves, and I smelled something sharp and salty. I’d never smelled seawater before but I was certain that was it. It called to me. It comforted me.” She blinks and looks away. “I wish I could see it. These walls . . . these damned walls have been standing for too long.” She turns back to me with a sudden ferocity. “Don’t you see? This is our island. They took it from us, they murdered our ancestors and claimed it as their own. This is about so much more than the Auction. This is about a race of people enslaved and made extinct. But we are not gone. They couldn’t kill all of us, and it’s time for them to pay for what they’ve done.”
“And you believe that I can break down parts of their walls?”
“I think that’s what you were born to do,” Sil says.
We sit in silence for a long while. It’s so much to take in. I hold out a hand over the grass and feel the roots in the earth groan and stretch. I welcome their strength. I feel as if I could ask them to shoot up from the ground or dig deeper into the earth and they would. I feel as if these trees had been thirsty for someone like me. The air is crisp and cold and infused with desire. To protect. To be protected. To help.
“You understand so quickly,” Sil says. “This place is special. They called me here, I think—the Paladin. Their spirits, if you believe in such things. There is an energy here. I think this place might have once been important to them.”
“How did you get here?” I ask.
“That’s a long story.” She rubs the back of her scarred hand.
I wait. With an exaggerated sigh, she leans back against the sycamore.
“You know how I got out of the Jewel.”
“The incinerator.”
She nods. “I wandered around those sewers for who knows how long. I was starving. I was terrified. When I finally made it out, I found myself in the Bank. I’d never been to the Bank before. I had no idea where I was. I hid in an alley behind a shop.” Her gaze softens. “That was when I saw my flowers. But I didn’t find them beautiful. I was frightened of them, of what was happening to me. I didn’t feel in control—how you felt last night but a hundred times worse because I was alone. I thought I was going insane. It began to rain. It rained for days, huge biting sheets of water that wouldn’t stop. It was me, I suppose, though I didn’t know it at the time. I scavenged for food in trash cans. I stole clothes and bandages for my arm. But I could only go out at night. The wind followed me everywhere. Trees would turn into twisted, gnarled versions of their former selves.” She lovingly pats a root poking out from the ground. “I finally had the courage to venture out farther into the Bank. I found a train station and hid on the train. I didn’t know where I was going but I couldn’t stay in the Bank. The train took me to the very same station it took you.”
