I can only think of sharing this news with the others.
We can begin our ascent up the Astral Mountain to seek the lost sceptre, now I know where it’s hidden and how to claim it.
I can’t shake the memory of that monument to the Branded either.
I’m heir to a magic I don’t understand, but perhaps I’m not cursed at all. Not a monster. Perhaps, I never have been. Like the starstone, despite my flaws, despite the strange powers that lodge inside me, and their capacity for destruction, perhaps even because of them, because of the very magic that flows in my veins, this legacy I’ve resented all my life, perhaps I too can prove myself valuable, a force for good. Not hopeless… Rather, my people’s hope. Their champion.
I’m glad the Book of Mysteries was nowhere to be found.
As I clamber through the window, careful to avoid any sharded glass, I glance up at the sky. An inky veil has been drawn while I made my search. The three moons are already risen, jewel-bright and finally full. Reminding me it’s a night for answers. I know where the lost sceptre is, and how to retrieve it. Now I need an explanation for the needling gaze at my back since the Council of Four. It feels like a good omen that I’ll finally use the mooncrystal tonight. Only the red comet scarring the night sky puts a dampener on things – an ominous, bloodshot eye to echo those that haunt my imagination. I won’t let it unsettle me, or deter me from my plans.
Somewhere above me, Serafine’s shrill cry lances the still of the evening. I reach inside my cloak pocket. If I’m going to do this, I’d better do it quickly. The others will send out a search party if I’m not back before full dark.
I’ve laid one ghost to rest here already, one I’ve carried far longer than the weight of these phantom eyes pinned to my back. But perhaps I can lay this newer ghost to rest as well, before we leave the Silver City.
I take a breath and draw the box into the open.
HALF-TRUTHS
LEILANI
PERCHEDONAlow wall between the portico columns, I feel those invisible eyes raking over me again. But though every instinct screams I’m being watched, there’s not a starlark or moonthrush to break the veil of silence shrouding the Starshrine, only Serafine stirring overhead. The mooncrystal must spill its secrets tonight, settle this. Absolve me of this creeping, seeping dread.
With shaking hands, I lift the orb into the moonslight. Spanning my fingers across the crystal’s sleek surface, I close my eyes and try to empty my mind, focus on the coolness of the orb, the faint tingle flushing through my hands, the tug as a connection is made.
After a minute or two, I open my eyes and search its depths. I don’t know what I’m looking for – something to explain my jangling nerves, the weight of those unseen eyes, the nightly visitations from the Faceless Woman that always end with my being burnt alive. Something follows us. I want to know what… who.
At first, there’s only the gleam of moonslight bouncing off the surface of the orb, but slowly, as my eyes relax and my mind attunes to its depths, images – shadows – start to appear. Flames. The same rabid, wavering flames that have haunted my dreams for so many nights now. A hand reaches through the wall of fire, stretching towards me, the fingers scarred and grasping. And, for a brief instant, there’s a face.
A woman’s face: burnished, beautiful, terrible.
Her snarling features are distorted by pain and fury, her red hair streams behind her like the tail of the comet overhead. Our eyes lock, and the rage in those piercing embers sears through me. I drop the crystal. It lands with a heavy thud on the snow, startling Serafine who swoops down from the spire, coming to rest at my side. When I pick it up, the image is gone: the orb, silent.
Cold grips my chest like the jaws of a starving frostfang. My heart pounds, the too-fast pulse throbbing in my throat and ears. I struggle to fight against the crashing wave of panic, to slow my breaths, so it doesn’t drown me.
Orthriel. Where’s Orthriel?
‘Are you there?’I scratch frantically at the door between our minds.
No response. Never a response, anymore.
I need them to confirm what I now fear to be true. They’re the only one who can.
My heart thumps harder still, as if trying to escape the cage of my ribs.
I recognised that face. Not exactly as it was drawn in the portrait, but close enough. The same colouring, the same sharp lines, the same searing eyes.
Arden Incenzo. She’s the one following us.
The realisation lands heavy as the blow of an executioner’s axe. Somewhere, deep down, I’ve suspected this, feared this, ever since that ghostly figure appeared on the other side of the windowpane.
I lift my chin to the night, to the bloody, burning comet glaring down at me – taunting me. At last, I understand its presence in the fire constellation. It’s a warning. One I’ve heeded too late.
This is why I couldn’t decipher my dreams of the Faceless Woman. My powers don’t work on the Flameborn.
But how’s it possible? Arden’s been missing, presumed dead, for centuries. True, the Blood Bond granted the Elemagi unnaturally long life, but if she’s survived all this time, why’s she never been sighted? And why, with her formidable powers, is she skulking in the shadows – why not simply confront us? She’d overpower us easily.
She can’t know where the sceptre’s hidden. Perhaps she hoped to remain invisible, undetected, till I led her to it.
