CHAPTER ONE
I should not be here. I’m foreign to this village of
broken rooftops and dull stone walls. I brush my fingers over a pillar. Its
coldness burns my skin, makes me pause.
Go home.
The words sing loud like a taunt
as moonlight slithers across my shoulders. The parchment digs like thorns in my
palm. I imagine its shape, every fiber and ink blot.
Something moves near my feet and I
jump. It’s just a rat, one of hordes from the city. They’ve grown bolder during
these past few seasons, always darting out of alleys and running by arches,
desperate—like us—to fill their bellies.
As it squeaks away, nails tapping
in rhythm, I inspect the darkened street before me. Lamplight glows from a
crooked post, but the shadows are still and the windows are empty. A
leaf-strewn house looms in the distance, enticing me over the cobblestone
ground. That house is the reason I’ve ventured so late into this weary part of
town. Beside me, buildings cringe with moss. Walkways glisten with dirty
puddles. Teetering balconies slouch from walls with garments strung between
casements like cobwebs.
But that smell.
I halt to sniff the air. It wafts
from the dwelling ahead of me. It winds from beneath its splintered panes—the
pungent scent of broth and ale.
I wish
it were stew.
Saliva brims on my tongue at the
thought of meat cooked with spices and oils. The last time venison passed my
lips, my mother was alive, my father smiled, and the future stretched before
us, unending. Those were the days of Emperor Komran, a king who lived and bled
for his people. I barely remember the white of his beard or how he limped
through the fields during harvest. And it’s the same with my mother. I’m losing
her, too. The curve of her cheek. The shade of her tresses. When she died, we
set her afloat in the Geynes, and I sat on the bank with my toes in the water,
not wanting to break that connection to her.
It’s a year tonight.
My chest starts to cave, but I
fight and I fight to be still, to not cry. At least the dead are not hungry,
not in turmoil. They do not see what Centriet has become.
I urge my feet toward the house.
Komran would never have driven me here. When he reigned, our streets were
routinely swept, and fountains dotted the well-kept pavements.
And medicine was—
A loose stone clacks. Forgetting
my thoughts, I dart to an alcove. Since Komran’s son became our emperor,
soldiers lurk where you’d least expect them.
In the dark, I steady my breaths,
in and out. Not that I’m breaking any laws—that I know of. I listen to the
night: crickets chirping, a soft breeze, and the whinny of a horse that’s so
indistinct, perhaps it’s from Sledloe, the next village over.
I wait longer, just to be safe.
Many of the soldiers are kind, though not all. Father says they’ve been granted
more powers, but that we won’t know what it means for a while.
I hate not knowing. Just like
tonight. I hate not knowing what awaits in the house. When the street remains
silent, I rejoin the road, but my ankles wobble when I try to walk.
So I jog.
It soothes my jangled nerves, and
I reach the house, breathless and flushed. Planks board the four square
windows; rust from the nails seeps into the woodgrain. The stones are all
different sizes and shapes, charred by the remnants of a long-ago fire. Ivy
clings to the rutted surface, its end pieces curling like ribbon from the door.
You should leave, Meadow.
But I raise my fist. All I need to
do is knock. I’ve already abandoned my stonebrick at dusk without letting
Father know where I have gone. The loss of my mother hits me anew—the pain a
reminder of why I have come here. That I’ve come to move on, to at last let her
go. Even though I’m not sure what that means anymore.
Or if I can.
“Are you here for the Gathering?”
The question shatters the bracing
air. Someone’s behind me and I spin to face him, shrouding myself with my long
dark hair. But I’m wrong. There are two. One’s tall and strapping. The other is
smaller in every way. As they chance another step, I notice that they’re
young—about my age, seventeen.
“Why I’m here is not your
concern,” I say.
“We do beg your pardon,” the
smaller boy says. He has a scar on his brow like a cutlass. And another on his
forearm, dark as molasses. He gestures to the vacant street behind him. “Have
you ever visited Yahres before?”
“Yes,” I say, though my words are false.
It’s safer to make them believe I’m a local.
“And
your name?” asks the boy, but I shake my head at the same time his companion
lets out a grunt.
“Don’t
bother,” he snaps. “We leave tomorrow.”
The
smaller boy nods, looking slightly embarrassed.
“We watched you for a bit,” he
tells me.
“And what did you see?” I ask.
He smiles. One of his teeth is
chipped. “We assumed you’d turn back many times.”
My pulse quickens at their
presumption, especially since it’s mostly true. The slums of Yahres are outside
the walls. My home lies inside in the village of Maytown. In Maytown we’re
warned to always tread wisely in places like Yahres, Florian, and Sledloe.
Perhaps that’s why I’d appeared so unsure. Yet neither of the pair looks
remarkably dangerous.
“You proved us wrong,” the boy
continues.
“No hard feelings,” I say.
He laughs. “Come inside with us.”
He holds out a hand, but I back
away.
“Forgive me,” he says, withdrawing
swiftly, color blotching his cheeks. “We lodge with the man who hosts these
gatherings . . . and I noticed you had a parchment to read.”
“You saw?” I jolt, clutching it
tightly, blood surging through my legs and arms. Since Mother’s passing, it
happens quite often. My heart beats fast, and I need to run.
“You don’t have to read it,” he
says.
I swallow.
“Although you can if you want to,
of course. Unless you didn’t come here for the Gathering?”
“I doubt she’s here for anything
else.”
It’s much too hard to read his
expression, but the taller boy speaks with a dash of disdain. He sidesteps his
friend with two no-nonsense strides.
“You don’t know my business,” I
say.
“Oh, please.” He comes in close,
reaching past me, and the scent of leather and steel is intense. It reminds me
of sitting in my father’s workroom when he’s mending quivers for the elder
archers. The boy raps on the door with his knuckles. Three times, then nothing.
The way we’re supposed to. “Of course you’re here for the Gathering,” he says,
as metal grinds and a peephole opens.
My need to bolt escalates.
“Get in. You’re the last,” says
the face inside. The cumbersome timber shifts outward before us. It breaks the
leaves and they flutter in spirals.
“After you,” the tall boy says.
The parchment feels like a stone
in my hand. It dawns on me how stifled this is—this narrow black corridor, deep
in the kingdom.
I brush the still-dangling leaves
to one side. The passageway stretches a good twenty paces. I could perish in
there and no one would find me.
“Are you waiting for something?”
“No,” I say.
Ignoring the boy, I stoop to
enter, trying to focus my thoughts on the brickwork. The blocks have eroded
from years of scuffing. They smell like lichen and tarnished copper. Light
spills through the distant doorframe, and our guide clears his throat to urge
us on. I double my pace, though the boys hang back. The weight of their
presence behind me is strong.
