Chattering.
The sound circled around me, like bells twinkling the rise and fall of music.
I opened my eyes to see a silver brocade pattern through streams of light. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust enough to realize that I was looking at a patterned wall.
Gods, my neck hurt.
I was lying, mercifully, on my stomach. My body was cradled by white blankets that were thicker and softer than anything I had ever felt in Threll — though then again, in Threll, it was so hot that we would have no need for such things.
I blinked. A groan creaked from my lips.
The sound stopped. It was only when a plump woman’s torso, clad in a simple blue blouse and a long, billowing skirt, entered my vision that I realized it had been a voice.
I lifted my chin, ignoring the stiff pain in my neck, just as the woman bent down to look at me. She was perhaps in her mid-thirties, with white skin and silver hair that was piled messily on top of her head, leaving some curly tendrils hanging around her round cheeks.
A Valtain.
All at once, I realized that I must be in Ara.
At the Order of Midnight.
The woman said something to me in Aran, but she spoke so quickly and my mind was so fuzzy that I let her words slip through my fingers without translating them.
The woman smiled at me, her eyes crinkling with concern.
“Tisaanah?” She said. Her voice was high and light. No wonder it sounded like bells. “Your name?”
She spoke slowly, emphasizing every word in a manner that might have been patronizing if she hadn’t seemed so aggressively kind.
I nodded. “Yes.”
Her smile broadened. She placed her palm on her own chest. “Willa.”
“Hello,” I whispered. “Hello, de-ehr.”
De-ehr. De-ehr. I prodded my brain, searching every Aran word I’d ever read. It was so much easier in writing.
Slowly, it clicked. De-ehr. Dear. Term of affection.
I could do this. The corners of my mouth turned up.
This small sign of comprehension, was, apparently, all the encouragement that Willa needed to launch herself back into a chirpy onslaught of words. I had to force myself to follow her sentences.
“—been out for quite some time. I needed to come in here to heal you three times a day at first. You had a bad infection.” She shook her head. “Very bad.”
In-fect-shun.
New word. But I could gather what it meant.
I moved my arms, bracing my hands to push myself upright. I expected the movement to be met with a wall of pain, but it wasn’t. Soreness, yes — but nothing compared to what I had endured for the last few weeks.
Incredible.
“I’m sure that still hurts.” I looked up to see Willa staring at me with a wrinkle between her eyebrows.
“Not bad,” I replied. “Thank you.”
She made a small, sucking sound with her teeth, something caught between sadness and disapproval. “You poor thing. Your back was awful.”
A slight, cold breeze drew my gaze to the right side of the room, which was essentially a wall of glass windows, floor to ceiling, selectively covered with layers of dusty-blue chiffon curtains. One window was cracked open slightly, allowing the sea air to slip in.
The room was small, but impeccably clean. The only furniture was my bed, a large mirror, and an armoire. All of them were simple in construction but clearly expensive, crafted of deep mahoghany with silver hardware. That hardware, in fact, was the only decoration. Each piece — every knob or pull — was a little silver moon.
Another breeze. I shivered, clamping my arms around myself. It was only then that I realized, to my embarrassment, that I was shirtless.
My sheepishness must have shown on my face. “Don’t worry. Naked bodies are nothing new to me,” Willa said. “But I do have some clothes for you. I assume that you don’t want that anymore.”
She gestured to the armoire, where my jacket hung from a hook on one side. My tattered, dirty, bloody jacket. A jacket that could have only been worn by someone who was close to death. Someone who had seen and experienced terrible things, who had closed her eyes every night wondering if they would open again in the morning.
I shuddered.
No. I did not want it. I did not want to even look at it ever again.
But now, the sight of it reminded me with a tight pit at the base of my stomach why I had come here to begin with
— made me wonder what Serel was going through right now. If I could speak to Zeryth, maybe he could help me rally the support of the Orders and go help him. I can’t
imagine they would stand for this, and with their firepower
—
“I need speaking to Zeryth Aldris,” I told Willa, who had opened the armoire and was rummaging around inside. She peeked out, holding a blue cotton dress. Her lips thinned.
“Oh yes,” she said, almost as if to herself. “They did say that, didn’t they…”
She hung the dress on the side of the armoire, covering my dirty jacket. “Here. Not the most stylish but, let’s keep it loose for now so we don’t irritate your wounds.”
I only understood roughly half of that sentence, but I was too impatient to care. “Is Zeryth—”
“Yes, yes. While you get dressed, I’ll go get someone who would like to speak to you.”
Willa went to the door, her skirt floating around her feet. Even though she was short and relatively squat, she moved with a grace that I watched with faint envy. My dancing had been crafted out of practice and sheer force of will. Willa’s movements were all natural poise.
“Willa,” I said, as her hand touched the door handle. She paused to look at me. “Thank you.”
She gave me a little, warm smile. “You are very welcome, my dear. I’m sure I will see you again soon.”
And then she floated out the door, leaving me alone in the tower of the Order of Midnight — a place I had dreamed about for years.
I still didn’t quite know how. But I had made it.
 |
I SLIPPED OUT of bed and wandered a circle around the room, taking a moment to peer out the window between those light, flowing curtains. When I looked down, the floor seemed to tilt beneath me, and my throat released an involuntary gasp. I was probably hundreds and hundreds of
dizzying feet above the ground. Only glass separated me from the sky.
My window overlooked the famous Aran cliffs, and the thrashing sea beyond them. If I tilted my head and pressed my cheek against the glass, I could barely see the Tower of Daybreak — headquarters to the Order of Daybreak — standing beside this one. It was identical to this tower, except its glass was lined with burnished gold instead of silver. Fitting.
Beyond it, perhaps a mile away, the Palace loomed against the cliffs. It wasn’t nearly as tall as the Towers, but it sprawled against the curvature of the earth. The gold that lined its every angle glittered beneath stormy, sea-tinted clouds. Peaks accented with violent spires stabbed the sky.
A lump formed in my throat.
The ink drawings in my books and Zeryth’s descriptions did not do any of it justice.
I turned around and went to the armoire, grabbing the dress that Willa had produced for me. Three layers of straight, loose cotton, dusty blue like the curtains, with billowing sleeves that hit to the elbow.
My nose wrinkled. Is this what Aran women wore? Did they like to pretend they didn’t have waists, or…?
Well. I wasn’t here to be beautiful.
I unhooked the dress and turned around, and in that movement, I caught a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror.
I had to stop myself from dropping the hanger.
Gods. Was that me?
My hair hung in dirty tangles over both shoulders, my cheeks sunken, ribs protruding. Two angry, pink scars sliced across my chest and abdomen. They cut across my forearms, too. If I held my arms the right way, I could see the unbroken lines that the whip had sliced in my flesh when I shielded myself. But when I turned, my back —
My back was completely covered in deep, ferocious gouges. Some still bled, some had scabbed, and some were stitched together like a hideous patchwork quilt. No wonder I had been in such agony. I practically had no skin left. And it was already clear that magic healing or no, these scars would mark me forever.
Crack!
Twenty-seven.
The image of Esmaris’s dying face flashed through my mind. And for the first time, the thought of it didn’t inspire even a hint of guilt. I was glad. Glad he was dead, and glad I had gotten to kill him.
For one fractured moment.
Then I thought of that sadness that had stripped his features, that whisper of betrayal. The guilt followed like a wave crashing on the shore.
I shuddered, turning away from the mirror and slipping into that ghastly shapeless dress. I felt another ache at my wrist, and when I looked down, my brow furrowed.
Strange. There, on the inside of my wrist, was a crimson-splotched bandage. It was clearly fresher than my other wounds, small and neat and very deliberate looking. How had that—
The thought was interrupted as I heard the door open behind me.
I turned to see another Valtain woman standing in the doorway.
She was a little younger than Willa, and much slimmer and taller. Her clothes were entirely white, blending with her skin and hair and flattening her to a colorless silhouette. She wore tight pants and a stiff coat that buttoned up to the neck, following her lithe body until it nearly touched the floor.
I looked down at my dress, relieved that this was not, apparently, what all Aran women wore.
“I’m glad to see that you’re awake.” The woman closed the door behind her. The movement revealed a large, dark-grey moon emblem across her back. “We were all worried about you.”
“I am much better.”
“Good, good.” She stepped into the room, hands clasped, and flicked her hair behind her shoulder. It was long, nearly reaching her waist, and braided into countless tiny strands.
She regarded me with an icy, stripping stare. Gods, those white eyes were so disconcerting. I felt like she was staring straight through me.
I met that stare, matching her intensity.
“I need speaking—” To speak, I reminded myself. “I need to speak of Zeryth Aldris.”
“Can I ask what about?”
I hesitated. “If you get him, I will tell you both.”
An echo of a smile quirked the edge of her mouth, as if something about this statement was amusing. I didn’t know what. And I could feel nothing from her, not a hint of thoughts or emotions, or even the nebulous shape of her aura. When I reached out with my mind to find hers — try to sense something that might help me adjust my strategy
— I was met with nothing. Just a blank wall.
“Zeryth isn’t here right now,” she said. “Actually, he’s in Threll. Maybe you two passed each other in your travels.”
Threll? My mouth went dry. I wondered if Zeryth would have stopped at Esmaris’s estate, like he always did during his visits to the area.
“I received this letter from him last week, actually.” The woman lifted her hand, and suddenly, a piece of parchment appeared between her fingers. She held it up, reading. “‘As planned, I stopped at the home of Esmaris Mikov only to find out that he was, in fact, dead. He had been murdered mere weeks before I arrived. His city, needless to say, had fallen into turmoil.”
She looked at me and raised her eyebrows. “Do you need me to translate that for you?”
Translate — as if to imply that she knew Thereni and chose not to speak it. I knew a power play when I saw one. Besides, I understood enough — enough for my mouth to turn to ash at the word “turmoil.” I knew that word. I had read it in the books Zeryth had given me, in descriptions of war and brutality.
“I understand.”
“Do you also understand why it might seem slightly suspicious that a Threllian girl with a whipped back collapsed at our doorstep just after Esmaris Mikov was killed?”
I bristled. “I left because I purchased my freedom,” I said. “Fair.”
The truth, if an extremely partial one.
“It’s not my place to care whether you killed him or not. I saw what your back looked like. I wouldn’t blame you if you did. However.” She dropped the letter, which disappeared into a lazy spiral of smoke, then crossed her arms over her chest. Strangely enough, she reminded me of Esmaris — those same commanding, uncompromising movements. “The Orders are politically neutral. If the Threllians find out that we have knowingly harbored a wanted woman, we might ruin our relationship with them. Or worse, start a war.”
Noo-trul. Har-boor-ing.
I filed the words away, along with my murky understanding of their meaning.
“We need to send you back to Threll,” the woman said, slowly, as if she saw me struggling.
My fingers curled at my sides.
I went through all this, dragged myself here, and she was trying to tell me that they were going to send me back there? She saw what that place did to me, and she wanted to send me back?
No. That was not how this worked. “I am not Threllian,” I said.
The Valtain woman opened her mouth to respond, but I cut her off.
“I am not Threllian. I am Nyzrenese. My nation was destroyed by Threllian Lords when I was very small, my people killed and enslaved. And eight years ago, they caught me, too. They murdered my family and took me. I was beaten. Whipped. Raped. Others had worse. I nearly died to come to here.”
I had prepared for this moment. I had specifically learned the Aran terms for all of those awful things — condensed my life into little, terrible words — because I knew I would need them.
I opened my palms and sent a stream of silver butterflies rising to the ceiling.
“If you send me back,” I said, “you send me to death. Zeryth said me that I could join the Orders, even though I am Fragmented.”
I turned the butterflies to glass. They fell, shattering against the marble floor. The woman didn’t flinch. “Nice,” she said, flatly, eying the shards on the ground.
“This is why I come. Because my people need me. And for helping them, I need the Orders.”
The woman and I stared at each other, her expression shuttered.
“I mentioned your arrival in my last letter to Zeryth,” she said, at last. Then she opened her palm and produced another letter, reading aloud. “‘I have met the Fragmented girl many times. She is intelligent and driven. She may be ill-trained and inexperienced, but she has undeniable potential, and it would be a deep shame to see that wasted.’”
She glanced at me. “I assure you that Zeryth doesn’t always provide such praise to young women who collapse at our door mumbling his name.”
A warm satisfaction unfurled in my chest. I may not have needed Zeryth’s help to cross the sea, but I had needed it in this room. Silently, I thanked him for it.
“I will give everything I have to the Orders,” I said. “I would be best Wielder it has seen.”
I opened my fingers and whispered to the shards of glass, calling them to me. They slid across the floor and rose to my hands, where I closed them in my fists. When I opened them again, the glass had become a frosted, mottled circle.
The moon.
For the first time since our conversation began, a real expression crossed the woman’s face — a bemused smirk clinging to the corners of her mouth. “That’s a tall commitment from someone Fragmented, but I can appreciate the sentiment.”
She opened the door. “Walk with me. And, I didn’t introduce myself. My name is Nura.”
|
Nura moved quickly, not bothering to check if I could keep up. Still, I matched her stride, ignoring the sharp pains tugging at my back. Whatever Willa had done to help me, it was working.
“Zeryth was correct. There’s no rule barring Fragmented Valtain from joining the Order of Midnight. It’s rare, but…” Nura shrugged, her palms lazily lifted. “I don’t have a problem with it.”
This was really happening.
As we glided through the halls, I tilted my head to take in the tall ceilings, white floors, and silver accents bathed in the soft glow of sunset through the huge windows. A few other Valtain passed by, some giving me curious glances. I tried not to stare back. While most had some form of moon insignia on their jackets, none were as prominent as the one on Nura’s back, and no one else wore pure white like her. I wondered if she held a higher rank.
“But there is one issue.” We made a sharp turn, arriving at a circle of cerulean blue etched into the floor, bordered by a delicate silver gate. Nura stood in the center and motioned for me to join her. When I did, she placed her hands on the rail, and the platform began to tremble.
I gasped quietly as the floor started to descend, resisting the urge to back away from the edge. Nura caught my reaction and gave me an amused glance. “There are many uses for our magic. Imagine climbing all those stairs.”
So *she* was doing this? Lowering us, and the floor?
I watched as the floors of the Tower blurred past us, catching glimpses of the activity within. “However, you do have a problem,” Nura said. “Apprenticeships were assigned six months ago. There aren’t as many Valtain as there are Solarie. I don’t think we have anyone available to train you.”
Uh-pren-tish-ips.
I didn’t recognize that word. But I did understand her last sentence.
“I do not need training.”
Nura snorted, as if my statement was absurd. “Yes, you do. Every Wielder, Valtain or Solarie, must complete an apprenticeship to join the Orders. No exceptions.”
“Apprenti—?”
“Apprenticeship. Young Wielders train under a mentor for six years.”
Six years?!
“I don’t have that time,” I blurted out. “People in Threll can’t wait six years for help.”
Nura glanced at me, her eyes narrowing thoughtfully. I desperately wished I could read her thoughts.
“And what kind of help, exactly, do you want us to provide?”
“Send a small group of Wielders to Threll, with me.” I didn’t hesitate. I had thought this through many times. “Give me twenty men and Order protection to go to Esmaris Mikov’s city and—” I struggled for the right word, searching for the Aran equivalent of “negotiate” but came up empty. “—and discuss the freedom of the slaves there. Provide me with money or authority to make deals for their release. If this succeeds, we can expand further in Threll. But for now, I only ask for twenty.”
The platform halted, touching down, but neither of us moved or spoke. The silence was unbearable.
“You’re ambitious,” Nura said. “I’m not sure that’s a realistic plan. But we’ll see what we can do, maybe after you complete some training. There’s no way around that requirement.”
She stepped off the platform, continuing down the hall, waving me along, “Come on.”
—
The ground floor of the tower was more open than the spiraling hallways above, and so blindingly bright that I had to squint. The lobby buzzed with activity, filled with people who seemed to be on important business—Valtain with their white hair and pale skin, and Solarie, who looked like ordinary humans but wore sun emblems, marking them as members of the Order of Daybreak.
My eyes were drawn to the opposite side of the room, where they froze.
The mural on the back wall was deeply familiar, yet different from the version I knew. The massive painting of Araich and Rosira Shelaene mirrored the ink drawing in my well-worn book—the two of them framed by the sun and moon, their palms touching. At the point where their hands met, the building itself shifted, the accents turning from Rosira’s silver to Araich’s gold. The Tower of Midnight and the Tower of Daybreak shared the same ground floor, converging right there.
I didn’t realize I had stopped walking until Nura paused beside me.
“You know the story of our founding?” she asked. “Yes. Very well.”
I traced their faces with my eyes. Araich’s tilted down, his gaze meeting mine, while Rosira’s looked out over the sea through the large windows. I wondered if she had dreamed of my world the way I dreamed of hers. If she had, she might never have seen it. Five hundred years ago, the world had been without magic, and its return was so chaotic and unpredictable that it threatened to destroy everything. According to the stories, she and Araich had given parts of their souls to shape magic into something sustainable. Then, they founded the Orders as a beacon of stability in a new world of dangerous power and great possibility.
I swallowed a sudden swell of emotion.
That’s what the Orders had always been to me—a beacon of hope.
I was so captivated that I almost didn’t notice when Nura began walking away again. “Come,” she said, motioning for me to follow.
I trailed her into a smaller room lined with desks and bookshelves that smelled comfortingly of paper. Willa sat behind one of the desks in the corner. Across the room, a man and woman shuffled through papers, their lapels adorned with the gold sun insignias of Solarie.
“You’re moving well!” Willa said, smiling warmly at me. I couldn’t help but smile back.
“Willa. We need to find a teacher for Tisaanah.” As soon as Nura spoke, Willa’s attention shifted entirely to her.
Yes, Nura had to be important. Probably not the Arch Commandant—the leader of the Orders—but certainly someone of high rank.
Willa frowned, sifting through a few papers on her desk. “I’m afraid no one who is open to taking an apprentice is available now, as the assignments were given out months ago—” She squinted at me. “How old are you, dear?”
“Twenty-one.”
“Twenty-one?” Willa arched an eyebrow, looking at Nura. “She’s three years older than most apprentices are when they finish their—”
“Age doesn’t matter. If she wants to join the Orders, she must complete at least some training. The laws are clear about that.” Nura crossed her arms, tapping her finger impatiently. “We’ll have to be unconventional.”
A wrinkle formed on Willa’s forehead. She pulled out a scribbled stack of bound parchment and began flipping through it.
“Check where Maxantarius Farlione is living now,” Nura said.
Willa stopped mid-motion. “Really?”
“I said we’d have to be unconventional.” “But are you sure he’s the right—”
“Just look it up, please.”
A pause. Willa looked like she might argue but instead flipped through her books, pulled out a small piece of paper, and handed it to Nura.
“Thank you.” Nura glanced at the paper. “And how much longer do you think Tisaanah needs to recover before she can begin?”
Recover? I didn’t need to recover any more. I wouldn’t let them force me into six years of training. I knew that for sure. Which meant I had no time to waste. If I could drag myself thousands of miles on the brink of death, I could certainly handle whatever this Maxa-whoever could throw at me. “I want to start now.”
Willa looked surprised. “Tisaanah, dear, you’re still—”
“I’ve waited eight years to get here. I’m recovered.
And I want to start.” “But—”
“We can’t fault her impatience.” A small smile tugged at the corners of Nura’s mouth. “She likes to get things done. I can respect that.”
Respect wasn’t quite what I saw in the amused glint of Nura’s pale eyes. But that was fine. I had been given my chance to earn it, and that was all I needed.
“Let’s go, then.” Nura looked at the paper Willa had given her, flipped it over, and took a pen from the desk. “Hold onto my arm.” I obeyed, watching as she drew a circle, adding lines and shapes that wound through its center—
And suddenly, I was no longer standing in the Tower of Midnight but blinking into a blinding midday sun.
“Nura.” A strained male voice. “What exactly do you want?”
