23. An Arsonist’s Lullaby
DESDEMONA
The Flame always follows its igniter. Fire Folk, run fast.
– RECOVERED WRITINGS FROM THE WELDERS VILLAGE (TRANSLATED BY ELPHENSTEIN AJ, 536AA)
Ithrow another rock into the river, then I scream into the mastick. Birds chirp back to me, filling the space with their cacophony, and I decide that my next rock will peg one of them.
It’s just failed attempt after failed attempt. Every single day.
This isn’t the way to open a portal to the void, and the next rock I pick up goes into the skull of a flying bird. And another. And another.
One rock to distract and the next to kill.
I bring my catch to Eudora, and I have to say I’ve missed the hunt.
“Where’d you get those?” she asks while I hold the birds by their legs.
“Anger and accuracy. A little bit of annoyance too.”
Eudora sets a plank of wood on the counter in front of me. “Put ‘em here. I’ll whip something up.” I set the birds down and sit in my usual seat across from her. “How are you doing?”
Now, that is a weighted question. I’ve spent almost the entirety of these last two days at the river, trying and failing to open a portal and screaming at birds. Aralia’s been in bed for those two days. Apparently Lucian’s sister was attacked.
I take Aralia’s behavior as grief, though she won’t divulge anything to me. I thought I’d earned her trust more than that, but I think she’s smarter for keeping it to herself.
At least I know I certainly made the right decision when I lied to Lucian about the moonaro and the whispering, or the wind, or whatever it is. I won’t let anyone clump me up into a mess that involves the princess. I’ve already gotten too tangled with the prince.
Avoid and deflect is plan A. Lie and gaslight is plan B. I’m trying not to think of plan C.
As for Eudora’s question, I’d tell her I was fair if I didn’t already admit to being angry and annoyed.
“Angry and annoyed,” I say, bringing my elbows to the counter.
“Here,” Eudora says, leaning down until I can’t see her. She pops back up, sliding a dish over to me. “Have a pie.”
I smile a little, fiddling with my fingers over the newly presented pie. “I’m all better now.”
Hours later, long after the sun has set and the stars have taken over, I put Hogan’s glamour on the stab wound, and even though it burns I keep putting it on.
Every time I see the thing, I think of the dead Lucent.
I put it on my hand too, because obviously there’s no way to explain why my palm is so badly burnt. My shirt covers my forearm. The skin is charred to a color that looks like ash. But it doesn’t hurt anymore. More often than not, it’s numb.
And I’m probably gonna need more glamour soon.
When the wound disappears I slide the spatha sword into the sheath strapped to my back. Not that I want to train or learn to swing a sword to wound my opponent or do anything but find out how to get to the not-so-mythical universe we call the void. But I don’t know how to talk to Lucian anymore, who is my only lead. I’m just waiting for him to come to me; after my mom and his sister, it doesn’t feel like I can ask him for anything.
“I’ll be back soon,” I say to Aralia, but she doesn’t respond.
The school is quiet tonight. While I walk the empty halls, I close my eyes, trying to pretend it’s the early morning, before sunrise, and that I’m in the woods with Damien. Mom’s in the dwelling, getting ready to head to the factory, and I’m waiting for an austec to fall so I can throw a dagger in its throat.
The weight of the sword on my back feels nothing like the little dagger in my hand. The stagnant indoor air replaces the crisp morning breeze. And I’m all alone. Pretending to have company only serves to remind me that I have nothing here.
Leiholan is waiting in the training room. I don’t greet him, and he doesn’t greet me. I only unsheathe my sword and he raises his. I’m not in the mood for banter or blame, or for much of anything, actually. Every swing of mine is filled with anger.
After I’ve lost our fight, he says, “Good!” He points his sword at me, flicking it up and down in assessment. “You’re improving.”
“Yeah, I tend to be at peak performance when I’m pissed.”
We go back and forth before he inevitably presses his blade to my throat. I’ve gotten used to the steel on my skin.
I’ve gotten used to defeat.
The next time, it only takes two measly swings and a nick across my shoulder and collarbone for the sword to fall from my hands.
I drop to the floor to pick it up and pull my shirt up higher to cover the wound. The same thing happens one, two, three more times.
It isn’t until we’ve finished that he says, “I think I like you better this way.”
“Pissed?” I sneer.
“Quiet.” He smiles.
I swing at his sword with all my force while he isn’t paying attention, finally knocking it from his hand.
I go back to the suite and slip into the room, lying in bed and pulling the covers over my head just as Aralia’s been doing. I do nothing but try to breathe, keeping my eyes open, because every time I close them I see my mom covered in bruises and blood and dirt.
This is how I spend my night. Taking shallow breaths when I want to be taking deep ones and forbidding myself from closing my eyes for too long.
The next morning goes the same as yesterday. Aralia won’t get out of bed, and I’m realizing how much more dreary this place is when my roommate is acting dreary. I pull on my clothes and try to go through the motions normally.
I start going to the library every day, looking for any book that can tell me something, anything, without searching alarm words like “Arcanes” or “the void.” Arcanian War is the first thing I look up, even though that’s risky too. For as much text as they have on the subject, there’s really not much information.
The population of orphia on Iris went extinct—they never say what the orphic population was. So anyone with half a brain knows it’s the Arcanes. Which I do have, I just never had access to any of these books.
Their entire world burned and so did the Irisan Archives, turning all of the universe’s hundreds of thousands of years of history to ash. Over seventy percent of Elysia’s population was wiped out, with Soma keeping over ninety percent of their population—the only world that managed to do that.
Blah, blah, blah. The universe needed repair. Soma opened Visnatus on the free land so they could bring up the next round of leaders and keep the universe from dying.
Not a thing about the Arcanes, other than their homeland burning. Nothing about the void; what it is, how it was created, why they were sent there or how to get there.
Defeat has never tasted this bitter. Like the dirt and blood on my mom.
I decide I have to find the illegal tomes. I remember when the Arcanes became forbidden to speak of—I was six. It was just before the war, when the keepers were getting more and more violent. They killed everyone who even said the word, and the ghost stories became less and less popular.
Lucian is the only person who would have any access to what I need. But I haven’t seen him since I saw my mom. How that one got so screwed up, I don’t know.
A week passes before Ms. Abrams pulls me out of class halfway through a lesson on weaponizing our powers for defense. Air Folk work on taking the air out of a location, effectively killing any living, breathing thing in what could be a thirty-mile radius once they’re able to fully harness their powers. For now, they only suffocate a table’s worth of students and any plants in the area. Light Folk create barriers—like the one that electrocuted me on the first day here—effectively trapping anything in its vicinity. When they’re able to fully harness their powers, they can up the voltage so that any creature that touches their barrier dies on impact.
I didn’t even know the Folk could do any of these things. I keep my confusion, concern, and astonishment from my face at all costs.
There’s nothing for the Fire Folk, I guess because our magic is already so easily weaponized. It’s why my “dad” was such a force in the second brief war against the Nepenthe. He could kill anything for miles just by setting off a fire with his finger. He was just never able to stop it.
“I wanted to give you a heads up that you will not be passing my class,” Ms. Abrams says, and I swear she’s trying not to grin. She enjoys this, and I’m not cut out for this. I wasn’t made to be poised and proper and powerful. I’m the opposite of it all—I’m manipulative, I’m vulgar, I’m… powerless.
And I won’t apologize for it. I’m strong where they’re stubborn. Clever where they’re clueless. Cunning where they’re cautious. It’s why I’m alive and it’s the way to get my mom, which is all I have to do before I can get out of here.
I just have to get out of here.
I just have to get something.
“Okay,” I say. “Is that all?”
“Yes, you may be excused.”
I want to punch her in the face. I want to set her hair on fire. Instead, I smile and walk back to the table where I get to be briefly suffocated or electrocuted or whatever else they want to do to me that I can’t do to them.
“Don’t worry,” I hear Kai’s voice, but I don’t see him. Another trick I recently found out the Air Folk could do—amplify and isolate sounds they make. But Kai is a Light Folk. “I won’t let her ruinate your future in the kingdom.”
My future in the kingdom. I don’t let my face fall, but I can’t stop my stomach from churning.
“Thank you,” I whisper, but I don’t think I mean it. I also don’t know how this magic works. Did he hear me? He didn’t answer, but there’s not much more to say.
When class is over and I feel thoroughly beaten up by my fellow Folk, I find myself running into Kai.
“Walk with me,” he says in a hushed tone and doesn’t stop. I step in stride with him and am momentarily reminded of doing the same with Damien every morning. “I’m going to tell my father about Ms. Abrams.” He looks over at me and smiles sideways. “Discrimination isn’t admissible.”
I think I understand what he’s saying; he wants to get Ms. Abrams fired. For me. If he knew I was septic, he wouldn’t do this. I don’t even think there is any kind of rule against discrimination in the septic.
“Why would you do that?” I say.
“Life has been more than poor for me as of late. You’re kind of the only person whose taken my feelings into consideration. I owe you.”
The prince of Lorucille owes me? I could use that, but to what length? I’m glad the bullshit I’ve been spewing has led him to believe I take his feelings into consideration.
At least I’m doing something right.
“Oh no, you don’t owe me anything,” I say with a short—fake—laugh. “I was just doing what any good Folk would do.”
“Well then, Desdemona, you are the only good Folk here,” he says quietly, a little breathy, and I think he is actually saddened by the sentiment. In turn, it makes me kind of sad too.
“Can I ask you a question?” I ask. It’s a slow descent into what I want to know.
“Shoot,” Kai says.
“Was it you who amplified your voice when you spoke to me in class?” What can I say? I’m curious about what else we don’t know at home.
“Yes,” he answers.
“You used air magic?” I ask, just for the clarification.
Kai lets out a short chuckle and says, “Yes, why?”
So it is possible. “I didn’t know you were so powerful,” I say. I turn my head to his side and look up at him for a split second, just until I see him acknowledge it.
Kai looks around the hall quickly, then takes my hand and takes a sharp turn. “I can teach you, if you want.” He looks over my shoulder. “It has to be our secret.”
“I don’t think I’d be able to,” I say quietly. I just wanted to know if my suspicions were true. Besides, I’ve hardly been able to use the power I do have.
His eyes lock on mine intensely. I’m actually a little scared about what he’s going to say next, because if his eye contact says anything, it’s that it’s going to be important. “It’s a lot easier than they want you to know,” he whispers.
“Who?” I match the intensity of his gaze.
“Let me show you.” He tilts his head toward the garden.
“Okay.”
Then I’m following him out of the school, through the garden and into the mastick, but not beyond the barrier. There’s been no official announcement, but I’ve heard some students talking about a possible ban on the mastick since there’s been an influx of students getting attacked. Of course, a prince would probably be the first to know of a rule, especially after a princess was attacked.
The leaves of the trees are already falling off here. Back home they wouldn’t until… now. We’re past three hundred days of the Collianth cycle. The year is almost over, and I’ve been here for months doing… what?
Kai steps into a pile of fallen leaves and holds his hands out open to his sides. With his eyes closed, he mumbles something under his breath.
Then the wind picks up around him. I can hear it howling when the leaves he’s standing over get picked up into the current and swirl around him. A Light Folk performing air magic. I can’t believe my own eyes. The leaves fall down abruptly, and Kai looks like he is catching his breath.
“Are you okay?” I ask, then curse myself for not saying all right like Lieholan is always instructing me to—especially in front of the prince.
“Yes.” After a minute of heavy breathing, he says, “Channeling a component you don’t inherently possess takes more energy. I wanted you to know what to expect.”
“Oh,” I say. “Thanks.”
Kai sits on the ground, then gestures for me to do the same and says, “Please.” I sit. “All you have to do is open yourself to a new element, the same way you had to open yourself to the one you have,” he says. “The truth is, you have them all, there’s just normally one that’s stronger than the others.”
Okay, so almost everything I know about Folk magic is turning out to be a lie? Light Folk can do more than shoot things with electric currents, and anyone can use any form of magic. But what about the Water Folk? The creatures that have to live in water, can we use their powers, and can they use ours?
I have so many questions, but I start with, “What happens to a Folk who isn’t born with just one element stronger than the rest?”
His eyes go wide for a second. “What?”
“You say that normally one is stronger than the other. What happens when that isn’t the case?”
“Well, it normally doesn’t happen to the Fire Folk, since only they can carry that element,” he says, deflecting the question.
“Okay,” I say. “That’s fair, I do already have a lot on my plate with the Flame.” I smile. I don’t show any sign that I know he doesn’t want to answer the question. I pretend like he already has.
He doesn’t say anything more about the subject, instead saying, “Close your eyes.”
I begrudgingly do.
“Air, light, water,” he whispers, stops, then adds, “fire… I have everything inside of me.” So, we can use water magic. He repeats it again, like a mantra, and I do the same. I feel the wind pick up, brushing through my hair and against my ears, and I know that it isn’t me doing this. “Reach for it,” he whispers. “The first time letting the foreign energy course through you is the strangest.”
I feel it, rising in my stomach and bubbling in my chest. It’s like rena coursing through my blood, moving through me, into my arms and palms, taking me over until all I can feel is that rush of power.
“And release it,” Kai says, and I do. It leaves me feeling pleasantly dizzy. My mind hums with a sort of silence I’ve never experienced before. My whole body vibrates with it.
It’s the peace of sleeping without the horrors of my dreams, and I could sit in it forever.
But someone is calling me, saying my name, and I’m trying to ignore them as best I can, but they’re only getting louder.
Kai is in front of me when I open my eyes. Fire is behind him and I see that he’s screaming but I still can’t really hear him. He pulls me up, and we run.
I begin to make out the noise of our feet against the crunching leaves. The opposite of Damien when he moves through the woods. Lucian too.
Kai’s cursing, and I don’t know what to do. When the sun shines on my face, I can suddenly feel the heat that’s surrounding him and me. It’s from the fire that’s chasing behind us.
I didn’t tap into another element, I tapped into my own. The Flame.
“What are we gonna do?” I yell, losing my breath and trying to catch it. We’re making it closer to the school, but the fire follows closely behind. This is how we die back on the septic, and I’m about to kill countless others.
“I’m going to get Headmistress Constance,” Kai says. “She can stop this.”
There’s only one person I know who can fix this.
“No,” I say, “get Lucian.”
“Lucian?” Kai says. “The headmistress is much more powerful than him.” The way he speaks doesn’t leave much room for debate.
“I’ll run toward the lake, you go in,” I say, and I see him looking at me from the corner of my eye.
I don’t wait for a response before I turn from him and run for the water. I know the fire is following me, because they always follow their igniter. Once the fire starts, it has a mind of its own with one goal: preservation. It will go on until it can’t anymore, and I’m hoping that the power of the moon in the lake will be enough to keep me alive to see the end of this.
I do my best to ignore the fire catching in my lungs, and I don’t look behind me until I’m three quarters of the way to the lake. I see Kai and Headmistress Constance behind me. Maybe I’ll survive this, be one of the lucky ones.
When I turn around again, the fire is still raging on.
“Get Lucian!” I try to scream, but even that feels hopeless. I mean, Kai said it himself, the headmistress is more powerful than Lucian. The rest of the fires I started were never this big. Maybe it’s just impossible to put it out now.
To save my life.
I’m not one to plead, but I find myself doing just that while I dive into the lake, begging Zola to let me live.