For, what if this is the start? The start of my descent into Shadow…
Rounding a corner, I find myself in front of the Bindery. Its great doors, carved to resemble the open pages of a book, stand to my right. I pause as a cart carrying starfruit rattles past, trailing the crop’s honeyed scent in its wake. More precious supplies for my binding feast.
The library is my favourite place in Meissa. Its books have offered me solace and companionship, opened gateways, allowed me to soar far beyond the city wall, though I’ve never once set foot outside it.
Yes, books have saved me before. Stars willing, they’ll save me again.
‘Leilani, are you sure you want to do this? There will be no turning back once you do.’
I stiffen as Orthriel’s thoughts resonate inside my head, settling like lead weights down the bridge between our minds. I bristle at their reprimand. But, for all they’re a thorn in my side, my Guardian is only thinking of my best interests. However much they disagree with my plans to flee the city in search of the Book of Mysteries – the lost grimoire that once belonged to the Sisters themselves – ultimately, they’ll always support me. Orthriel is loyal to the bone that way – if cielsylphs had any bones, that is.
I shift the weight of my pack, turn again for the city wall.
Skittering past the great dome of the Observatory, this is now the furthest I’ve ever travelled from the palace. My breaths come faster, pluming the air as I glance left and right. Still no sign of the Watchers, though they must be looking for me by now. My nerves are stretched moonbeam-thin, but the fist clenched tight around my heart loosens.
Maybe, just maybe, this will actually work.
I slip my hand inside my cloak pocket. My fingers curl around the Kingswrit – a forgery, but my best effort to date. It’s not been for nothing, those hours of painstaking copy work. If I make it past the wall, a horse should be waiting, assuming the stable-boy hasn’t betrayed me, forfeiting the bag of silver sickles my mother promised him. From there, it’s only a short ride north to the Asteum. A few moonsrisings at most. The false letter should earn me admittance to Estelia’s house of learning.
I won’t be able to stay long; the Watchers will be crawling the realm as soon as I’m missed, and the Asteum is still officially under my father’s dominion, for all the Highlanders maintain a precarious semi-independence from the Crystal Throne and claim control over the hills. My mother assures me the scholars adhere to the old ways, that historically the Highlanders were more sympathetic to the Branded, that they’ll shelter me for as long as they can, that they might know the whereabouts of the Book of Mysteries, that they’ll help me like they once promised to help her, before… before…
I can’t think about that now. Can’t risk spiralling into panic.
The narrow streets widen. I must be approaching the market square. I’ve never seen it, but Elvi, my liegemaid, has described it dozens of times. Before fresh rumours of Flamefever beyond the wall put an end to non-essential trade, she loved any excuse to walk here. She has a sweet tooth, and the market’s mooncakes were legendary. She always brought some back for me, along with tales of all she’d seen.
I draw my hood lower, but only a few citizens dot my path, and they keep their distance. Still, I catch up my pomander, lift it to my face. The vinegar makes my nose burn and eyes water, but one can’t be too careful.
As I hoped, the good citizens of Meissa don’t look twice at the girl made invisible by a drab, grey cloak.
The square is quiet, the crunch of feet on frost the only sound. No market traders cry out, no musicians play. Even its central fountain is frozen into silence – a monument my father only permits to stand as a deterrent. My gaze roams over the water-worn carvings. A heaving mass of prostrate bodies, both male and female, an undulating pattern of serpentine curves, faces contorted in expressions of despair. It depicts the Scouring.
Izarius, my tutor and the realm’s foremost starscribe, showed me illustrations of this fountain almost nine sunrings ago, soon after I started my lessons with him. Told me about the many who’d sought Noelani Stellarion’s lost talismans, in the hope my ancestor’s necklet and sceptre, the property of a once-revered Elemagus – one of four formidable members of the Branded who changed Arcelia’s fate forever – might reverse the Sickening. A fool’s errand. My father outlawed the practice when he took the Throne. He decreed that the relics would never be found, dismissed any hopes of using them to mitigate the effects of the Sickening as the stuff of legend.
But oh, how the tale sparked my imagination. How I dreamt of succeeding where all others had failed. Night after lonely night, I clung to Izarius’ story, whispering my foolish hopes to the darkness. I would find them, save my people, win back my father’s love, make amends. Prove myself a worthy heir to the Crystal Throne.
I turn from the fountain. Those dreams were the dreams of an ignorant child, before I accepted that, for all his flaws, on this one issue, my father is right. Arcelia has been cursed to a slow, protracted death, inexorable as the three-mooned tide, and there’s not a thing anyone can do to change it.
I may be Sistertouched, but I’m nothing like the Dawn Sister.
She created Arcelia; splintered her magic; siphoned the might of the Aethers to fashion the four cores that power its realms.
I have no such control over my magic. I create nothing; I only destroy.
We can only pray the Elemagi’s wards hold, seek to protect Meissa from the onslaught as long as we can, and defend our city against the stubborn folly of the Highlanders, the greed and jealousy of the Outrealmers.
In place of the yeast and syrup of freshly fried mooncakes Elvi described, the only scent swirling the air as I scurry past the silenced fountain is the lingering char of ash. My stomach clenches. I fight the tide of painful memories that smell awakens. A persistent, unwelcome reminder that, try as my father might to pretend all is well in Meissa, the Sickening rages beyond the city wall.
Flamefever is spreading. Bodies are mounting up.
I glance back at the palace turrets, my mother’s withered face rising before me again. She’s getting worse, whatever the healers say. The idea of leaving her pains my chest and slows my feet. It’s the reason I’ve never tried to escape in search of the Book of Mysteries before. My resolve wavers even now. But then I picture Astrophel’s gloating expression, the gleam in his cold, grey eyes when the date for our binding ceremony was finally set.
I’ve done my best to avoid him, but what little I’ve seen of my betrothed since his return from the Asteum two moonscycles past has only confirmed my worst suspicions. The time away at school did nothing to improve him. He’s as duplicitous as ever, still intent on licking my father’s boots. I imagine him touching me in our nuptial bed and my stomach hollows. As I cross into the wider streets of the Northern Quarter, my feet itch to run again, despite the pinching snow-silk slippers I’m forced to wear.
A towering bank of starcrystal glimmers at the far end of the road. The city wall.
A few more minutes and I’ll be free.
My shoulders sag in relief. I’m so tired. Tired of being shadowed every hour in case I make a mistake again, tired of being hidden away like some shameful secret, tired of being punished for past crimes I can’t take back.
