The Crown of Embers

“Your people came, bearing magic we’d never seen,” he continues. “They changed us, made us less than we were. Changed themselves too, the legend goes, though I don’t know how or why. They scattered across the land now called Joya d’Arena, and we fled before them into the mountains. After that, they changed the whole world. Your country wasn’t always a desert, you know.”

I’m shaking my head, with uneasiness rather than denial. If what he says is true, then my ancestors were interlopers. No, thieves. But surely one cannot be considered a thief when one is taking only what God gives? God offered us this world. All the scriptures say so.

My old tutor did tell me our great desert was an inland sea before a mysterious cataclysm forced the water deep below ground. So maybe what Storm says is partly true. Maybe we created the desert somehow. But how? “That makes no sense,” I say aloud. “God wouldn’t—”

My Godstone leaps, and the tugging on my navel becomes a dagger in my gut.

Storms gasps. “I don’t like pain.”

I bend over, clutching at my stomach with one hand, even as I grab Storm’s shoulder with the other and push him forward down our path. “Just . . . keep . . . moving.” I can hardly put one foot in front of the other. All I want to do is drop to the ground and curl up, knees to chest. Maybe this is what Father Nicandro meant when he said my determination would be tested.

I have a lot of determination.

But a few steps farther and the vise on my abdomen twists suddenly, and I tumble to my knees, panting. I will crawl if I have to. I will—

“It’s worse for you, isn’t it?” Storm says, looking down at me with irritation.

I nod, unable to speak.

He stares at me a moment. Then he sighs, squats down, grabs one of my arms, and loops it over his shoulder. He stands, pulling me to my feet. “Just a bit farther, Your Majesty.”

I swallow my surprise and concentrate on moving my feet as he drags me down the path.

Just when I think the pain can’t get any worse, when my body wavers between vomiting and passing out, we break into a small clearing. In the center is another ruined building, as perfectly round as a tower. But its summit has long since crumbled, leaving it merely the height of a man.

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.

Chapter 28

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?

Storm is gazing at the walls, his mouth agape. “It’s a grave,” he says. “A catacomb of animagi.”

“Oh, yes,” Leaf says. “They used to come here to die. Or if they died too soon, they would have their bodies brought here. But only their stones remain. No one has come here to die in a very long time. Until now!” He claps, showing his rotting teeth.

Fear shoots through me. I jump to my feet, eyeing the opening to the stairway, wondering if Storm and I could outrun him if he turned on us. But no, I won’t run. I can’t. “We came to learn about the zafira,” I say firmly. “Not to die.”

“Oh, no one minds being dead!” he assures us. “But some people mind being alive. Like me. I’ve lived far too long.” He rattles his chains, which now lie coiled like a snake at his feet. The opposite end drops over the lip of the riverbank, into the vast blueness. “One of you will take my place as the zafira’s gatekeeper, its living sacrifice. God is so kind; he gave me two to choose from!”

The wonder on Storm’s face cedes to misgiving.

“One of you, if you survive, will leave here a true sorcerer,” Leaf explains, “having made the pilgrimage and tasted of the zafira. And oh, she is fickle. It’s fun to guess if someone will live or die. I only get it right some of the time. But the other . . .” He dances a joyful jig, blood oozing around his swollen ankles. “The other must stay so that I can sleep. Oh, I am so tired. Let’s begin, shall we?” He lifts his arms above his head and mutters something unintelligible. A stream of light rises from the river of fog and rushes to the space between his hands, where it grows, coalesces, begins to spin.

I gasp with recognition. I know what this is, for I’ve done it myself, when I destroyed the animagi with my Godstone amulet. He is drawing the power to himself, storing it up, readying it to explode into a wave of energy.

Panic builds in my throat. I have to do something. But what? The force he gathers brightens. It illuminates the whole cavern, showing a roof gnarled with the roots of trees from the valley above.

Storm sprints for the doorway.

“Trying to get away, little mouse?” says Leaf. A tendril of blue fire whips from the river, shoots toward Storm, wraps his torso like a snake, and yanks him to the ground. He lands hard on his back, where he gasps like a beached fish, the wind knocked out of him.

Think, Elisa! I have channeled this power before. I’ve won a war with it. I’ve healed people. I pushed the Aracely, somehow, through a massive hurricane. I can do this.

I close my eyes, place my fingertips to the Godstone, and imagine the zafira’s power pouring into me.

It does, like a flood, like a hurricane, until I’m spinning with it, mad with it. My hair lifts from the nape of my neck, and my fingers tingle with power that feels so natural, so easy. The earth beneath me disappears.

I open my eyes to discover that I float several inches above the ground and the zafira’s soothing flame has wrapped around me like a lover’s arms. But what to do with all this power?

“Interesting,” Leaf says as his ball of blue fire begins to shoot white sparks. “You may be a worthy opponent, with your living stone.” And from his spinning sun, he sends a bolt of blue fire spearing toward me.

I imagine Hector’s forearm shield, the way it sheltered me when arrows flew down the hallway of my palace. A shimmering barrier materializes out of thin air before me, and the bolt of fire bounces harmlessly against it. So easy! The power, drawn directly from its source. Exactly what I’ve been looking for. Exactly what I need.