Jodi Meadows - Incarnate

As I left the road, my boots crunched on the ground, an odd mix of ash and pebbles. Sulfur-reeking steam tickled my nose, but it blew toward the forest, leaving white deposits of rime on branches. I started toward the geyser — I wanted to look inside — but Sam touched my shoulder, silently reminding me of his cautions as we’d entered the immense caldera: The ground was thin in some places, and would crack and drop you in scalding hot mud before you could leap away.

Since he tended to keep silent when I did potentially stupid things like scramble up old rock walls to get a better view of our surroundings, I’d taken the warning about the ground seriously.

“So did you feel betrayed? About Janan, I mean.” I drifted toward the wall, like I’d been heading that way all along.

“A little. I wanted to believe we were here for a purpose.”

“I know that feeling.” The wall bore no cracks or dapples of color, and was as hard as marble when I removed a bandage to feel if it was as smooth as it looked. The sun-warmed stone was frictionless on my tender palm.

“Wait,” Sam said as I was about to withdraw. He stood unnervingly close. “Just a moment.” Then his hand rested on the back of mine, fingers threaded between mine, carefully. “Do you feel it?” More a breath than a whisper.

Feel what? His touch? Heat radiating off his body? I felt it all over.

The stone wall pulsed, like blood rushing through an artery.

I jerked back, away from Sam, away from the wall. Sunlight hadn’t warmed the stone; heat emanated from inside. “How did it do that?” I itched to scrub my hand on my trousers, but the new skin was too delicate to risk. Instead, I wrapped the bandage around it again, sloppily and likely to cut off circulation to my fingers.

His gaze followed my hands. “It’s always done that. Why?”

“I don’t like the way it feels.” I edged away, not that I knew where I’d go. Just away .

He followed my not-so-subtle retreat, glancing between me and the geyser at my back. “Why?”

I stopped and ordered myself to breathe when the ground thumped hollowly under my steps; it was too thin to stand on safely. After weeks, I was finally at Heart, and now I wanted to run? No. I’d come here to find out why I’d been born, and I wouldn’t let a stupid wall scare me away.

Sam offered his hands, still shooting worried glances at the ground. “Come on. We’re nearly home.”

His home. Right. Where I’d stay until the Council decided what to do with me. “Okay.” I didn’t take his offered hands.

Sam studied me a moment more, but nodded. “This won’t take long. I can open the gate, but I suspect they’ll want to log your entrance.” He gave an apologetic smile, so I didn’t complain about the unfairness. This time.

“Why do you keep them closed?”

He walked between the wall and me as we returned to Shaggy, who swished his tail and gazed longingly at the archway. “Mostly tradition. We haven’t had a problem with giants or trolls in the last few centuries, but there were years we had to barricade ourselves in. Centaurs, dragons — all sorts of things used to attack, not to mention the sylph. Now the edge of Range is better protected, but just because they haven’t tried in a while doesn’t mean they won’t again. We don’t want to be unprepared.”

There’d been drawings of battles in some of the cottage books, most involving liberal use of red ink. If I’d died in countless wars against the other inhabitants of the planet, I’d keep my doors shut, too.

The arch was tall and wide, and deep enough for ten people to stand abreast. Still creeped out by the pulse of the wall, I hugged myself and stayed in the center.

Beyond the iron bars, the archway opened into a wide chamber. “Guard station,” Sam explained. “And this is a soul-scanner, so the Council knows who is coming and going. There are a few around armories and places they don’t think everyone should have access to. Normally you’d have to touch it, too, but I assume you’re not in the database, so it wouldn’t do anything.” He pressed his palm on a small panel by the gate. It beeped, and a section of the gate swung open just as yellow light spilled across the floor and footsteps echoed.

A slender man, perhaps in his thirties, appeared. “Hey, Sam. Would have been here sooner, but Darce just gave birth to Minn — who’s a girl this time — and a bunch of us had to keep Merton from getting revenge on him while he’s still so young. Her. That might take some getting used to. Minn hasn’t been a girl in ten generations.”

Sam went first with Shaggy. I followed when the hooves were out of the way, and didn’t even have time to take in the sparse furnishings before all eyes fell on me.

“Speaking of getting used to.” The stranger glanced at Sam, then back to me. He wore loose-fitting pants and a heavy, button-up brown shirt. The afternoon was warm enough to make coats unnecessary. “Ana, right?”

As if there were a question. He’d known because I hadn’t touched the soul-scanner, then started gossiping to make me feel excluded. I lifted my chin like I was about to come up with a brilliant retort, or like Sam might say something, but neither happened, and the stranger and I just watched each other, stares slowly turning into glares.

Shaggy broke the silence with a long sigh.

The guard turned back to Sam. “Still doesn’t talk, hmm? Sad.” He retreated to a wooden desk shoved against the city wall. A slim, flickering screen rested in the center — it was blank — and a few neat stacks of paper sat around that. He flicked on the lamp and leaned against the desk, casting shadows.

Sam hauled his bags off Shaggy, grunting between words; otherwise, his tone was congenial. “Actually,” I said, “I think she was waiting for you to give her your name.”

“Actually, I don’t care.” I took a bag from Sam, transferring it to my shoulder with minimal use of my hands. The one bandage was coming undone from where I’d been sloppy about rebinding it. “But I do talk, and have for quite some time.”

Sam turned his head as though to hide his smirk.

“Well then, glad to hear. I’m Corin.” The guard offered a palm, which I didn’t take, just held up my bandages. “What happened to your hands?”

“Burned them.”

“She rescued me from a sylph.” Sam didn’t mention how he’d rescued me from the sylph, too, and the lake before that, or how he’d been taking care of me for almost three weeks. It was nice of him to make me sound brave.

Corin whistled. “Impressive, but you know he’d come back, right?”

Eventually, sure, but not in time to save me from everyone treating me like Corin was. I hefted the new bag on my shoulder and addressed Sam. “It’ll be time for supper soon.”

He had little reason to play as my ally, considering he’d known Corin for five thousand years and my “saving” of him was only one small thing, but for whatever reason, he did, and I could have hugged him for it. “You’re right. It’s been a long walk from the edge. Can we catch up another day, Corin? Ana and I still have to unpack.”

The guard shook his head. “I’m afraid not. I mean, you can go, Sam”—he jerked his chin toward the open door at the end of the long room—“but Ana hasn’t been cleared.”

“What?” Sam’s tone was suddenly less pleasant.

The extra bag dug painfully into my shoulder. “I thought you just had to write my name in a ledger or something. What do you mean cleared?”

“For entrance into the city. You aren’t a citizen.”

“I was born here.” Surely everyone knew that. Li had told me how they’d all come by to ogle the nosoul, and that was one of the reasons she’d taken me away. Not just to hide her shame, but, she insisted, to protect me.