Rae Carson: The Crown of Embers

Chains rattle.

A pale face with eyes the color of a hazy sky peeks out from behind the tower. White hair streams from a middle part on his sunburned scalp, all the way to the ground. It’s the gatekeeper.

HE has the flawless face of an animagus, but his stooped shoulders and rheumy eyes make him seem as old as the mountains themselves.

“Two!” he squeals. “Two apprentices!” His Lengua Classica is thick and muddled, like he has a mouthful of pebbles. “I must be one of God’s favorites,” he says, “to be so blessed.” He steps from behind the tower to reveal tattered clothes of indeterminate color and filthy bare feet in rusty manacles. The skin of his ankles bulges up around the manacles so that it is impossible to see where iron ends and flesh begins. I have to look away.

“Who are you?” he asks. “I’ve felt you coming for hours now. Or years?”

I try to speak, but I can’t. I am nothing but pain and that awful tugging.

“Oh, yes, that,” he says. He flicks his fingers, and the pain disappears.

Relief floods me, and desperate gratitude starts to bubble on my lips, but I bite it back. I straighten cautiously.

“Are you the gatekeeper?” I ask.

“You first!” he says, clapping. “Tell me who you are. And come here, come here. Let me get a better look at you.”

I edge forward. He lunges toward me, and I recoil, but his manacles have caught him. He is chained, I see now, to the tower. He cries out in frustration, stomping on the ground like a child throwing a tantrum. Then he collects himself, and the frustration melts from his face as quickly as it came. “I believe you were about to tell me who you are?” he says with preternatural calm.

I’m careful to stay just beyond the reach of his chains when I say, “I am the bearer.” And after a moment of silence: “And a queen.”

He taps his lip with a crooked, dirty finger. “Not very good at either, are you? Your heart screams your inadequacy.” He turns to Storm. “And you?”

Storm draws himself up to full height. “A prince of the realm,” he says.

I gape at him.

He shrugs. “You never asked.”

The strange man leans toward us conspiratorially. “But not much of a prince anymore, yes? A shadow of what you were.” He grins, like it is all a great game, and I shudder to see his teeth, pointed like canines and brown with rot. “Would you like to see the zafira ? I can show it to you, yes, I can. It will have a bit of your blood, and then it will decide whether you live or die.”

Storm and I exchange an alarmed look.

I say, “So you are the gatekeeper? What’s your name?”

His teeth snap in the air. “I’ve told you a thousand times and you never listen! I am Heed the Fallen Leaf That Grows Dank with Rot, for It Shall Feed Spring Tulips.”

“Of course. Apologies.” He is insane. Totally and completely insane. “I think I’ll just call you . . .” Rot. “Er, Leaf.”

“Leaf! Yes, I’ll be Leaf. Let me see your stones.” When I hesitate, he barks, “Now! I must see them to let you inside.”

Reluctantly I lift the edge of my blouse to reveal my stomach and its resident jewel.

And then Storm reaches beneath his shirt and pulls out a leather cord that dangles a Godstone of his very own, in a tiny iron cage.

I gape at him. “How did you . . . When did you . . . ?”

“I’ve always had it. Since birth.”

Too many possibilities compete for attention in my head. Was it given to him? Was he born with it? “My Godstone never warmed to it,” I protest. “Never reacted. It always senses another Godstone nearby. Always .”

Storm wilts a little. “It’s quite dead. It fell out at the age of four. I trained to be an animagus, to learn to eke some power out of it. But I never could. I failed.”

Understanding hits like a rock in the gut. “The Inviernos are born with Godstones.”

Storm shakes his head. “Only a few of us. They fall out very early. And we’ve been separated from the source of their power for so long that they are mostly useless.”

“The animagi burned my city, burned my husband. That’s hardly useless.”

Storm shrugs. “That’s destruction magic. Easy, for an animagus. It’s creation magic, like barrier shields or growing plants or healing, that’s difficult.”

“ I can heal.” The words are out of my mouth before I think to censor them.

“What? You can?” His green eyes narrow. “You never said.”

I stick a finger in his chest. “You. Never. Asked.”

His brief moment of startlement dissolves into desperate laughter. “And yet you can’t even call your stone’s fire, which is the easiest, most basic power. You might be a worse failure than even me.”

Leaf has been looking back and forth between us, grinning all the while. “You are enemies!” he says, clapping with delight. “So much fun. Look, here’s mine.” He parts the rags hanging from his shoulders to reveal petal-white skin and protruding ribs.

A Godstone is sewn into his navel. Threads of hemp or dried grass crisscross over the top, holding it in place. The skin around the edges is puckered and scarred from so many piercings. One thread dangles, wisping back and forth in the breeze. I avert my gaze, sickened.

“Will you take us now?” Storm asks. He leans forward and his face twitches, as if he’s about to crawl out of his own skin in anticipation.

“This way,” Leaf says, and disappears behind the tower, his chains clattering with each step. After exchanging a troubled look, Storm and I follow.

An archway on the opposite side leads into darkness. Leaf reaches down and grabs his chain, which seems to have a little slack now, and hoists it over his shoulder. “Ready?” And he steps inside.

I remember the way he lunged at me. I debate the wisdom of following. I put my fingertips to my Godstone and whisper a quick prayer for safety. It nearly scalds my fingers with its sudden heat, and I gasp with the sensation of power flowing into me.

So much! It’s what brought me here, after all. I take a deep breath and step inside the ruined tower.

My eyes adjust quickly to the gloom. A spiral stairway bores into the earth. It smells of wet earth and mold. A few twists down, and our path begins to glow faintly, bluely, as if from night bloomers. The glow brightens as we descend, until the colorless walls have taken on its tint, until my skin is bathed in it. My Godstone thrums softly, as if crooning to a lover.

When the stair opens into a vast cavern, I fall to my knees, gasping in amazement.

The walls are lined with Godstones. Thousands. Tens of thousands. A river flows against the far wall, but not of water. It’s a slow-moving course of light and fog and power, glowing blue, as nebulous as a cloud. Its light reflects off the Godstone walls so that the cavern seems under a barrage of sapphire sparks.

My own Godstone sings in greeting. A finger of glowing fog creeps from the river, slithers across the damp ground like a searching tentacle, glides over my knee and up to the Godstone, where it presses gently.

There is an audible click, like pieces of a puzzle coming together. The energy inside me flares joyously, and suddenly I feel connected to the whole world as the zafira feeds me life and energy through the siphon of my Godstone. My head swims, my limbs tingle, and I’m a little bit delighted, a little bit horrified.

“Oh, it loves you, yes, it does,” murmurs Leaf. “Have you fed the earth a bit of your blood already, then?”

“I . . . yes. On the way down. I found a sacrament rose bush, and prayed for . . .” Power. I prayed for power. And here I am, connected to the source of all magic, but I feel no closer to my goal than before. My body buzzes with energy, certainly, like I could do anything. I could heal a thousand people. Bring down a hurricane. But can I take that power with me to help me rule a kingdom? Or does it only work here, in this cavern?