Will Wight - Of Dawn and Darkness

She examined him more closely. His skin was dark enough, he was the right build, and he spoke in oblique riddles. Perhaps he was a royal; one of the direct descendants of the Emperor. That would certainly explain his attitude.

The room shook again, and this time the air between Jerri and the hidden silver cage rippled. It was almost invisible, as though someone had thrown a rock and managed to disturb space, and for a moment an image of another place flickered in front of her eyes. It was so vivid that it swallowed all of her senses—she smelled burnt wood, tasted the salt of the ocean, saw sunlight on waves—and so quick that she couldn’t make out details.

It was the vision of a Reader, shared with her for a split second. She’d seen such things before.

“Did you see that?” she demanded.

“I’m not permitted to, I’m afraid. Safeguards.”

She pointed to the flesh-covered steel again. The gesture didn’t help anything, since he couldn’t see it, but she felt like pointing. “What is that? Why do they want it?”

“It’s the key that controls the world,” he said softly. “Almost obsolete now, but it has its uses.”

Jerri was going to wring answers out of this man if she had to sift them from his ashes. “ What uses?”

“At this moment? In this place?” He smiled again, his gold teeth gleaming. “It’s bait.”

The room continued to shake as the enemies outside—the Imperial Guard, she supposed—kept launching their attacks. No matter how she pleaded, or demanded, or threatened, her guide gave her no more answers.

Which was fine, she eventually decided. If no one would tell her what she was supposed to do in this overgrown room, she would decide for herself. And she’d already decided where she would start: by burning her way out.

Two Imperial Guards dragged Calder Marten out of the Emperor’s palace. He had been kept in a room, not a prison cell, but he was still a prisoner. His eyes burned from a night spent weeping over his father instead of sleeping.

His father, who had been killed on the Emperor’s orders. Right in front of his eyes.

One of the Guards was a slender woman with vertically slitted eyes, whose head jerked at the slightest sign of movement. A pair of feline tails twitched behind her, and the hand that wasn’t holding onto Calder’s shoulder sprouted short claws. Her partner loomed over her, a muscular giant with bony spikes growing out of his skin like ominous armor. He supported most of Calder’s weight, propping Calder up with a forearm when the young man looked likely to fall. His spines jabbed into Calder’s chest every time.

They both wore the red-and-black uniforms of the Imperial Guard, marked with the Aurelian Shield crest: a shield emblazoned with the moon-in-sun emblem of the Aurelian Empire. Like everyone else in their Guild, they had been alchemically imbued with the power of Kameira, forever changing their appearance and giving them a host of strange powers. None of them more frightening than their Guild Head, who could kill with little more than a touch.

Calder tried to drum up some anger at the Head of the Imperial Guard, but the image of the woman killing his father brought him nothing but grief. Jarelys Teach wasn’t responsible for Rojric Marten’s death.

The Emperor was.

And so was Calder.

May his soul fly free, Calder thought, and almost wept.

The pair of Guards dumped him out on the street as soon as they passed through the gate of the Imperial Palace, and he didn’t bother to stand up.

The woman pointed with one claw. “An Imperial officer has been assigned to supervise you for the foreseeable future. He awaits aboard your ship, in the harbor. Do not attempt to leave the city by land, or you will be hunted down. At dawn tomorrow, if you have not departed on your ship, you will be hunted down. If for any reason your officer fails to make his regular report, you will be hunted down.” She spoke as though she read from an especially boring shopping list.

Calder just nodded, still collapsed on the paving stones. He hadn’t expected to be assigned an officer, but it made sense. He owed the crown for a ten-thousand-goldmark ship. They weren’t simply going to turn him over to the Navigators without any supervision.

“Report to your ship by sundown at the latest,” she continued. “If you do not, you will be hunted down. Do you know your way to Candle Bay?”

“I wish I didn’t,” he said.

Calder waited until the Guards were gone before pushing himself to his feet. There was no point in going anywhere except straight to the ship. His mother lived in the city, but she couldn’t help him, and he dreaded telling her what he had done. His best chance at freedom lay in The Testament, his new ship, and in his job for the Navigator’s Guild.

Maybe, once he cleared his debt, he could make the Emperor regret ever letting him live.

Jerri appeared at his shoulder, placing a feather-light hand on his arm. “Calder?” Her eyes were dark, warm, concerned. “Can you walk on your own?”

He demonstrated by marching a few steps down the road, scarcely paying attention to where he was going. “We have to get to the harbor.”

“I heard,” she said, hovering like she expected him to collapse.

He remembered the Emperor’s face, cold and focused, with the crown gleaming gold on his dark, hairless head. It focused his willpower and his anger, propelling him through the crowd and down the crowded streets. “No one ever stops him,” Calder said. “No one can.” Jerri nodded as thought she understood perfectly.

“Someone should,” she responded.

He had expected more of an argument. She drifted along beside him, apparently unconcerned, her eyes forward and her braid hanging down her back. Her eyes were red and half-lidded, as though she too had gone without sleep.

The sight sent a note of guilt thrumming through his gut. He had been focused on his own pain, his own tragedy. He’d forgotten about Jerri. She had been taken along on his plan, caught up in the summoning of an Elder and the destruction of Imperial property. While he was being tried by the Emperor, she must have been sick with worry, left with no idea what would happen to him.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “This is my problem, not yours. You should go back to your family.”

Jerri looked at him, eyes wide in evident surprise. “And miss the Aion Sea? ”

That reminded him: she had been eager to attempt a jailbreak, delighted at the appearance of the Lyathatan, and just as angry at the Emperor as he was.

She, at least, didn’t blame him for the disaster that had ruined their lives.

He couldn’t have faked the smile that split his face in that moment. “I should have known better.”

Waiting for them on the deck of The Testament was a dark-skinned Heartlander man in a pristine white suit. His white pants were freshly pressed, his white shoes polished, and his white hat round and wide-brimmed. A silver pendant gleamed around his neck: the White Sun, symbol of the Luminian Order.

Calder paused halfway up the ramp to his ship, staring. A Luminian? The Empire had sent a Luminian Pilgrim as his babysitter? He had already assumed that the Imperial officer would make all his decisions for him, but he had never imagined that they would come with a sermon on the side.

“Andel Petronus, pleased to meet you,” the man said, unfolding a sheet of paper. “And you would be Calder Marten.”

“What gave it away?” Calder asked, running his hand over his head. “Was it the hair?”

Andel ignored him, reading off the top of the page. “Calder Marten, in the name of the Aurelian Empire and with all the authority of the Emperor himself, you are hereby placed under my custody until your obligation to the crown is paid. Until such time, you are required to…”