Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Briony
The two stones are almost identical in shape, size, and color, although there’s more of a brownish tint to the black of the first one and more of a bluish tint to the second. The brownish stone is also a fraction lighter than the other two.
I tuck the lighter brown one inside my jacket, zipping it up, and Beaufort does the same with the heavier blue one.
Then we’re trudging back through the forest, reaching Tudor’s home as the sun is already low in the sky and the streets are filling with people again, either on their way home from their shifts or heading out to the next one.
We find Tudor’s parents in the kitchen, his father covered in black soot, his skin smeared with it so that his eyes seem almost ghostly in his dirty face. His mother stands beside him.
“There you are,” she says, sliding mugs our way. “I was beginning to worry. I thought maybe…” She trails off, shaking her head. Then she straightens her shoulders. “The word’s been spread. There’ll be a crowd gathered in the market square at six.”
My eyes flick automatically to Tudor, who looks down at his wristwatch.
“Half an hour,” he says. “You have half an hour.”
“Sure you want to do this, son?” his father asks, swiping a dirty cloth over his face in an attempt to remove some of the soot. “It exposes you. Puts you in danger.”
“One way or another,” the Professor says, “fate has brought us to Slate, and I think that’s for a reason.”
Of course, that reason may just be the stones hiding in our coats. But like Fox, I can’t help believing there’s more. We’ve been brought here for a reason.
His father tosses the dirty cloth onto the tabletop and lifts his mug, sipping the tea and saying no more.
We haven’t eaten any lunch, so we fill our bellies as best we can with the leftover stew that Mrs. Tudor serves us. Then I’m counting down the minutes. I chew on my cheek and on my thumbnail. I’m anxious and fidgety. I’m finding it hard to keep still.
I consider resting the firestones in the hearth by the fire, then dismiss the idea. The last thing we need is two baby dragons fluttering around us. Best to keep the stones as they are for now.
I debate going out to see Blaze again, then dismiss that too.
In the end, I find myself standing in front of the fire, rehearsing in my head what I’m going to say to the people out there. Everyone seems to appreciate that I need my space and they leave me to it until finally Fox rests his hand on my shoulder.
“It’s time to go, sweetheart.” He hesitates.
“I know why you want to do this. I understand that it’s the right thing to do.
But my dad is also correct. This exposes us.
Places us in danger. There’s no obligation, Briony.
Fate may want us to do certain things, but there’s still free will in this world, and we have a choice. ”
“Do we?” I ask, blinking up at him.
“Yes. We can walk away. We can run. We can hide.”
I turn back to the fire. “I don’t think we can.”
Maybe it’s been there since the day I learned of my sister’s death – a responsibility to find out the truth and expose it – and if I’m to do that, then I have to bear the consequences of that action as well.
But is it right? To do that and place the people I love in danger?
Maybe there is no right or wrong. Maybe there are just the decisions we make in the moment.
I guess I’m about to find out.
There’s a raised pavilion on one side of the town square that stands outside the courthouse, the only substantial building in the whole of Slate Quarter if you discount the factories and the mines.
The court building has a tiled roof and columns flanking its front, but it’s still as dirty as the rest of the buildings in Slate Quarter.
Some of the glass in the windows is cracked and the main doors need a serious lick of paint.
It’s funny, I never noticed those things before. The courthouse always seemed so grand and elegant to me back when I lived here. But now I’ve been to the academy, now I’ve seen Onyx Quarter and the palace, I see just how deteriorated everything out here is.
A crowd of people has already gathered in the town square. I wonder if they know who the Princes are. They must sense that the men with me are shadow weavers, just like I had known they were the first time I’d seen them. They must also recognize Fox, although I doubt anyone here remembers me.
I march to the platform, the others all following me, and turn to face the waiting crowd.
I open my mouth to address them and realize, despite spending all day thinking about this, I don’t know what the hell to say.
The others look equally confused when I turn to look at them.
I take a deep inhale and turn back around.
The words I’d practiced by the fire tumble through my head in a confused array and none of them seem adequate. They barely make sense. I peer back at the faces of the people staring back at me.
And it dawns on me, I don’t need words. Words will be dismissed. Words won’t be believed. Words can be twisted. I don’t have the booming voice of Fox, the sense of humor of Dray or Fly, or even the commanding air of Beaufort or Thorne. What I do have is my power and my ability.
So I say nothing, hold out my hand, and let a stream of light soar from my veins all the way up into the cloudy sky above us.
There’s an astonished gasp that ricochets through the crowd. A few people clap. A few people laugh. I let the beam of light flicker in front of me and then find my voice.
“The Empress has been lying to you – has been lying to all of us. All these years, all these decades, you’ve sent your children to the academy to face the trials in the hope they’ll be sent somewhere better than this place, than Slate.
Maybe you even hoped that they’d have the ability in their veins to weave magic.
But whoever has? Who from Slate has ever had magic? ”
There’s some murmuring. And then someone calls out:
“You’re from Slate, aren’t you? You’re one of the Storm daughters.”
“I am,” I say. “My name is Briony Storm, and I come from Slate Quarter. My sister came from this Quarter too, and she also had the ability to wield light in her veins. And do you know what happened to her?”
There’s a harsh silence. I think, to my surprise, many people do know. They do remember.
“She died at the academy, and they told us it was some accident, like every death that happens there. But it wasn’t,” I tell them. “She was murdered. Killed by the headmistress herself on the orders of the Empress.”
There’s a shocked hiss this time among the crowd. Several people move uneasily on their feet, or flick their gaze around. I hear whispers of treason, and treacherous words.
I let the light flow back into my veins and face the crowd.
“Yes,” I say. “I know these words are treasonous, but they’re also the truth.
And it isn’t only my sister who was murdered.
Other students have been too – from Slate, Iron, and Granite – all so the Empress and the shadow weavers can maintain control of this realm, can keep us in poverty and squalor while they live in luxury and wealth. ”
“The shadow weavers protect us from the demons!” a girl from the back of the crowd shouts out. I skate my gaze across the many faces peering my way, attempting to locate the source of that voice.
“The shadow weavers created the demons,” I say, talking over the voices of others who speak up in agreement with the girl.
“They killed my kind – the light wielders – to gain control of the realm, and in doing so they altered the balance of power forever.
They extinguished the light and left only shadow, and that act created the demons that have terrorized our realm ever since.
“But I’m here to change that,” I tell them. “I’m here to restore the light. And I believe that there are others like me among us who can help me.”
More chattering breaks out among the crowd. And then that same girl calls out from the back: “You’re a mad woman. Insane. Or maybe you’ve been drinking, just like your father.”
I search for the voice again and this time I find it.
Odessa.
It’s been a while since I last saw her, but it’s most definitely the girl who made my first few weeks at the academy miserable.
She’s not looking as glamorous as she once did; her chestnut hair ratty around her face, her complexion no longer clear, and her clothes old and worn. There’s the same old hatred burning in her eyes, though. No, even that is different now – it’s ten times more fierce.
Several in the crowd laugh at her words, and it spreads like wildfire until everyone in front of me is laughing. I feel Beaufort step forward, but I hold up my hand.
“If I’m mad, then how can I do this?” I say, letting my light shoot over their heads this time, like fireworks.
“A trick,” Odessa says. “An illusion. We all know that only those with shadow weaver blood in their veins can wield magic.”
I glare at her. “It’s no illusion.”
“This girl is a known liar. A compulsive and vindictive one. She is the reason I was sent here – all because she was jealous of me.”
“That’s not true!” I call out but my voice is drowned out by other voices. It seems somehow, despite the fact that she is a mega bitch, Odessa has gained some admirers out here in Slate, admirers who are willing to believe her word over mine despite what their eyes may show them.
“And you’re traitors, all of you!” she yells out. “You’re wanted by the Empress. You think we don’t know that? You think we’re stupid?”
“She’s labeled us traitors because we know the truth and she wants to silence us.”
“Or you’re trying to steal her throne – you and those shadow weavers,” some man shouts out.
“She always had ideas above her station,” Odessa says, “you should have seen her at the academy. Parading about the place like she was someone special.”
I almost burst out laughing. “You’re mistaking me for yourself, Odessa.”
“She can’t be trusted! She’s a liar.”
I scowl at her, then purse my lips together and whistle hard.
Now the crowd really is looking at me like I’m crazy and have lost my mind.
But that lasts only a few moments – a few moments until a giant dragon is soaring over their heads. Blaze.
Several people scream, covering their arms over their heads or crouching down low. Some just stand there, flabbergasted, with their mouths hanging open. Odessa doesn’t look at the sky at all, she’s still staring daggers at me.
Blaze circles the square, the sound of his flapping wings loud even above all the commotion below. He comes to rest on the roof of the old courthouse, the building creaking and groaning under his impressive weight.
There are more screams from the crowd.
I glare at Odessa. “I’m lying, am I? Is that an illusion too? Would you like me to have him breathe his fire in your direction, just to be sure he’s real?”
Odessa purses her lips together and shakes her head, there’s a flicker of terror in her eyes now too.
“I’m telling you the truth,” I say. “We’ve been fooled all this time.”
“And what if we have been?” an older woman, two children hanging onto her legs, calls from the center of the crowd this time. “We can’t change anything. The shadow weavers are powerful. What do you want us to do, Briony Storm? Rise up against them? They’d kill us all!”
“No,” I say. “They won’t. Because I’m going to change everything.”
And for a moment I truly believe that I can. That I will. That fate has chosen this path for me and fate will guide me.
And I’m guessing the people out there in the crowd feel it too, because that sour, cynical, skeptical atmosphere that hovered in the air only moments ago, evaporates and there’s a sudden feverishness, people whispering to each other in excitement, hope rippling through the crowd.
But then the screaming starts.