Port Sol was a powder keg. It would only take an ember for it to erupt.
Reeve had encouraged her before they’d parted, without even mentioning that she’d been clinging to him as if he were the last buoy in a turbulent sea. “This is your dream,” he’d said. “This isyours. Don’t let them take it from you.”
It was only his support that had kept Elara from quitting the Iryan Military Forces the second she failed to become a drake pilot, from returning to Deadegg with her tail between her legs to pack for Port Sol. Ending up here anyway, after the Queenshieldastral called for extra security in the city, was the kind of irony that only the gods could conjure. Apparently, security detail was a job for green cadets, not experienced soldiers or newly chosen drake pilots.
Everything looked different from horseback, and not just because Elara so rarely rode horses. She could see above the brown-skinned crowds in the streets to the buildings that blocked her view of the crystal ocean, buildings that had been razed to the ground the last time she had been here. Cement and scalestone, iron gates and shuttered windows, thatched roofs and verandas shaded by palm trees. Overlooking it all was Pearl Bay Palace, sitting atop a short rise generously described as a hill, built in the style of the great houses the Joyan nobility had left like fingerprints across the Iryan countryside: a stone base and plastered upper stories, balconies that wrapped around the second floor, a double flight of stone steps that led to the front doors, panoramic views of the sea.
Faron and Reeve were somewhere inside, preparing for the first night of the Summit. Elara wondered if they could sense her closeness.
“You could be in there.” Cherry, another drake pilot reject, pulled up her horse alongside Elara’s, her chestnut hair styled into side-pinned coils. “And instead, you’re out here with us. I’ll never understand you, Vincent.”
“That’s the real reason we’re no longer together,” Elara said, because enough time had passed that it was mostly funny. “I don’t want to benefit from my sister’s status for the rest of my life. I want—”
“To make your own mark on the world, I know.” Cherry rolled her eyes. “I just think that, with your talents, mind, and heart,there are so many other ways to make that mark. Why would you want to go back to war?”
Elara opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Cherry was an only child; she didn’t understand the twin pillars of love and resentment that made up a sibling bond. Elara didn’twantto go back to war, but when her sister’s reputation loomed so large that it spanned the world, she couldn’t match that with a quiet life as a teacher or a santi.
Unwilling to have this argument again, she turned in time to catch a glimpse of Port Sol Temple, a massive, one-story structure with an understated elegance compared to the ostentatious palace, glass sunrooms on either end reflecting the light in rainbow prisms. Commander Gavriel Warwick had burned it to cinders during the war, but it was another thing that had since been restored. If she got closer, however, she was sure she’d see nothing but blackened soil around it, lifeless earth like the patches all over San Irie, killed by dragonfire.
They rounded a corner onto a path that fed into the city center, an intersection of various streets and shop-lined sidewalks that met at a square packed with market stalls. A vendor with a machete chopped the top off a bright green coconut before handing it to a little girl. Bunches of yellow and green bananas spilled out of someone’s cart, next to a cart with cherries, next to another cart offering bags of fresh-caught shrimp. Port Sol Temple overlooked it all, an attentive lover of the colorful minutiae of Iryan life.
“Get out of here, you Langlish whelp!”
Commotion in front of one of the corner shops made Elara draw her horse up short. A scrawny man, tan skinned and gray haired, was shoving a boy to the ground in front of the store.The boy clutched something close to his chest, barely managing to hang onto it as he hit the pavement. His red-brown hair was haloed by sunlight as the Iryan man stood over him, but, even from only the back of his head, Elara would recognize this boy anywhere.
Reeve.
Elara’s heart climbed into her throat as other shoppers began to turn. She clambered down from her horse and elbowed her way through the throng, ignoring their curses, the surprised cries of her squad behind her—anything and everything but the boy she could no longer see. Unbidden, her mind flashed back to the last time she’d found Reeve in a circle of people, in the schoolyard, his dragon relic hanging useless beneath his shirt. The relics, crafted from the remains of dead dragons, allowed their wielders to do some form of magic, weaker than that of a dragon Rider and limited by how much power was left behind by the beast it was made from. But, instead of using the weapon he wore around his neck, Reeve had allowed himself to be shoved around by Iryan students who’d needed an outlet for their rage and grief.
She knew part of him thought he deserved things like this. She knew he didn’t regret his choices during the war, but he still saw the ghosts of his dead countrymen every time he closed his eyes. His nightmares, his guilt, his trauma were different, but she had connected with the sorrow in his eyes that matched her own.
But those were angry kids in a schoolyard. This was an angry adult, provoked by the Novans who slept mere miles away. She saw Reeve as he must appear through this man’s pained eyes: a Novan child walking these streets as if they were his home, seemingly indifferent to the damage his people had caused theirs. Andnot just any Novan, but aWarwick, whose family had destroyed parts of the very city he now strolled through.
A wrathful cloud hung over the island as the Summit began. Anything could happen.
And as she shoved at someone who shoved her back, nearly sending her off her feet, Elara realized that she would never reach Reeve in time. Not without magic.
She drew on her summoning, and the astrals of her aunts cut through the crowd like a hot knife through butter, ready to help. As always, when they appeared, she had two options: use the power, the raw energy, of their souls to craft whatever her mind could come up with, or send them to accomplish a task for her in exchange for a subsequent ride in her body. Most summoners used the latter for astral calls, but Elara reached for Vittoria and begged,Protect Reeve.
Her other two aunts disappeared, and Vittoria soared over the throng like a blinding bird of prey only Elara could see.
By the time Elara made it to the shop, her aunt had created a shield between Reeve and the man, one that had stopped him short. This close, she could see that the man’s eyes were lined with silver. A tear ran down his cheek and disappeared into his beard, which he wiped away impatiently. Like the man, Reeve could not see the astral who stood sentry above him, but, for once, it wasn’t just because of the nature of Iryan magic. Reeve was staring at the pavement, his legs drawn up to his chest as if to make himself as small as possible. This vulnerable display only made the man angrier.
“It’s too damn much,” the man grumbled, harsh voice thick with more tears unshed. “Wejustattained our independence, andnow they’re all back, swarming like mosquitoes hungry for blood. I don’t want his money. His veryexistenceis an insult. Look at him.” The man gestured down at Reeve. “Playing the victim after everything they did to us. My wife would turn in her grave if she knew I’d sold to this—thisspy.”
“Reeve Warwick is achildunder the protection of the crown,” Elara told him gently as Aunt Vittoria withdrew her shield and disappeared to let Elara handle this.
She understood; she really did. Elara knew from her friendship with Reeve that Iryans did not feel grief the same way as the rest of the world, but theydidfeel it. Astrals were impressions of the people who had died, incorporeal memories. Summoning her aunts for magic could not replace the feel of a hand ruffling Elara’s hair, the nudge of a hip to move her out of the way in the kitchen, the warmth of a midday hug. For all its benefits, summoning was also a reminder of all the things they’d never have again, thanks to the war, and so of course she understood the bitter edge of this man’s despair.
But Reeve had not caused these wounds. No one had to thank Reeve for doing the right thing five years ago, but they didn’t have to hurt him, either.
“I know you’re angry. I’m angry, too,” she continued. “I wouldn’t dare tell any of you how to process that pain when I’m still trying to myself. But this—attacking him just because he’s here—is something you would regret. That’s not who we are. That’s who they are.”
The man stared at her as another tear spilled down his face. Then he spat at Reeve and stormed back into the shop.
Slowly, the sounds of market life swooped back in, vendorscalling for people to come over, buyers arguing the price of fruits and vegetables, horse-drawn carts clopping along with packs of people inside. Despite the unrest, most seemed content to ignore the Langlish boy in their midst rather than pick a fight. One man broke away from the crowd and offered Reeve a cloth handkerchief to wipe his damp face. Reeve murmured his thanks, but the man just tipped his hat and moved along. A woman offered Reeve a cup of water, and she blended into the throng without a backward glance when he shyly refused. In her place, Cherry and the rest of the squad rode in.
But they were too late. Reeve was all right. For now, everything was okay.
