I awoke to a steady jostling, my face pressed against someone’s chest. For a breath or two, I couldn’t remember where I was or why someone was carrying me. Then it rushed back, and I opened my eyes and looked up to see Forest. His face was grim.
“I’m fine,” I managed.
He didn’t answer. When we got to our tent, he lowered me carefully to my feet and helped me inside. I waited while he shook out and respread my blanket, and then I lay gingerly on my back.
“Stay there,” Forest said. “I’ll make more tenepa tea.”
He left, and I lay in the dim tent and thought only of the shame of my defeat. The stings beneath my bindings were angry and hot, and a dull ache throbbed in my head. I didn’t try to stop the tears that burned their way down my cheeks. Might as well let them out now, so they’d be spent by the time Forest returned.
He appeared more quickly than I had hoped, steaming tea in his hand. I sat up—slowly—and reached for the tea.
“I should have given you more of this,” he said. “Your body is struggling with the venom of nineteen stings.”
I looked up from my sip of tea. “Nineteen?”
“I counted.” He averted his eyes, and I was once again reminded of how hard this must have been for him.
“Thank you for … rescuing me.”
“Jasper wanted to examine you, but I stopped him,” Forest said. “I told him I’d already started giving you the tea. It was hard to convince him.”
The enormity of what Forest was saying struck me. “If you hadn’t intervened, they…”
“Would have discovered the truth.”
I lowered my eyes. “Thank you.”
“You don’t have to keep thanking me.” There was no warmth in his expression, though. No hint of the friendship we’d forged, boy to boy. When he spoke, his words were carefully measured, the way one might speak to a stranger.
I didn’t know what else to say. I set the tea down and lowered myself to my side.
“I’ll be back later with more tea,” he said.
I nodded, and he left without another word. I drank my tea and rested my head, wishing I could unwind the bindings.
Later, when he brought supper and more tea, he merely set it down and lifted the flap to leave again.
“Wait,” I said.
He frowned. “I can’t stay. Jasper is planning on visiting you, so make sure you’re … presentable.”
I watched him leave, and then I stared at my food, wondering how I would ever swallow any of it, knowing that Jasper was coming. If I had fallen in his estimation, I wouldn’t be able to bear it.
Stormrise, they’d shouted. It seemed laughable now.
I had barely finished eating when Jasper lifted the corner of the tent flap. “Storm?”
“Yes, sir.” My voice cracked.
“May I come in?”
It felt strange for him to ask so politely, when normally I had to obey his commands without question. I gestured with my hand, and he entered and sat on Forest’s blanket.
“How are you feeling?”
“Better,” I said. “Thank you, sir.”
“You should have said something about the hornet attack.”
“I’m sorry.” I didn’t know where to look. “I thought I would be fine.”
“Nineteen stings,” Jasper said.
Heat rose to my cheeks. “Apparently.”
“I don’t think you realize what you’ve overcome here.”
“Forest took care of the stings and brewed me a tea.”
“I know,” Jasper said. “But nineteen stings! Nine or ten would put down even the strongest man.”
Unease wove its way through me. “I was foolish.”
“Perhaps,” Jasper said. “But I’m amazed at your constitution. You won your first match, and probably would have won the second if you hadn’t been stung.”
“Thank you.” But the sinking feeling in my stomach continued to grow. I shouldn’t have been able to withstand the stings. And the only reason I could think of for my added strength was the dragon powder.
Yet another layer of deception I’d have to hide behind.
“Don’t let your performance today make you feel any less,” Jasper said. “You’ve all worked hard, and your training shows. It speaks well of you.”
“It speaks well of your command, sir.”
His mouth tightened, as though my compliment tasted bitter. “It speaks well of my father, who trained me.”
“Is he a grandmaster?”
“Was.” The word sounded like dust. “He died with the special Neshu unit at Stonewall.”
“Oh.” I lowered my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“It is what it is.” He let out a long sigh. “I was going to suggest you see Captain Lisbet, who has healer training, but you seem well enough.”
My heart quickened. “I am. Forest knew just what to do.”
“I’ve already commended him.” He reached into his pocket. “This came for you at Grigsbane. Lisbet brought it.”
He handed me a sealed, folded parchment. Even in the dimness of the tent, I recognized Papa’s bold handwriting: Storm L’nahn. My heart tried to crawl up my throat as I closed my hand around the letter.
“Thank you.”
He was silent for a moment that stretched to near-awkward proportions. “You can join the men at the campfires tonight, if you’re feeling up to it. The others aren’t leaving until morning, and there’s extra ale.”
“I might do that. Thank you.” Papa’s letter burned hot in my hand.
“I’m glad you’re well,” Jasper said, rising. “And next time you’re attacked by a horde of stinging insects, let me know, s’da?”
His smile warmed me as he left, but all I could think of was the letter. I pressed it to my lips, imagining I could smell the soap on Papa’s hands. He’d addressed the letter to Storm—did this mean he accepted what I’d done? Or had he merely written my brother’s name because he had no choice? I stuck my thumb beneath the fold to break the seal, but then I stopped. If Papa’s words were laced with shame, lamenting my deception and asking me to return to Grigsbane so that he could take my place, I wouldn’t be able to bear it. Not now, with the throbbing hornet stings and lost Neshu match weighing on me.
I tucked the letter carefully beneath my folded blanket. It could wait.
I took care of my personal business in the latrine tent, where I was certain no hornets’ nests lay hidden. Then I grabbed an ale and joined Forest, Dalen, Rock, and River around a fire.
Everything felt strange. Not because of sympathy—everyone seemed to have his own tale to tell of stinging things and losing Neshu matches—but because Forest looked at me differently, if he looked at all.
Of course he would. I didn’t blame him. But I hated it. It felt like every word, every gesture I made, was suspect.
Not a boy. Not a boy. As though Forest’s knowledge of this made it obvious to everyone else.
Rock’s singing kept me by the fire, his smooth, deep voice rounding the sharp edges of my day. Even if others were laughing or speaking, he kept singing, as though it were as important as the air traveling in and out of his lungs. I hung on every note, grateful for the gift he didn’t realize he was giving.
But Papa’s letter pulled at my heart until I couldn’t bear it. I said good night well before the others were ready for sleep and headed to my tent. I thought of Nuaga, making her way toward the camp. My heart was heavy with the thought that if she arrived tonight, I would be unable to meet her. Though Forest’s tea had helped considerably, the hornet stings throbbed with each movement.
“Nuaga,” I breathed. “I’m hurt.”
Too many heartbeats passed. Then, steady and clear, her words came.
I know. The power of T’Gonnen will restore you.
Relief trickled through me, easing the tension from my muscles and even lessening the pain of the hornet stings. “When will you be here?”
Tomorrow night.
So. I had one day to prepare myself to meet her face-to-face.
I lit the lantern on the crossbeam and retrieved Papa’s letter from beneath the blanket. For a few moments, I held it, stroking his writing with my thumb. Then I broke the seal, unfolded the parchment, and read.
Dearest of My Heart,
After several days of not knowing what to do, I traveled to Grigsbane, only to learn that you had been sent off somewhere else. I am writing now in the hope that these words will reach you, for I fear they may be the last I will ever be able to share with you.
Once the shock of your departure wore off, I realized that your decision reflected your character and what I would expect of you. I am terrified for your safety, but I am proud of you.
In your letter, you mentioned receiving the medicine by mistake all those years ago. It pains me to think you have grown up with a misunderstanding of what happened that night. The healer arrived with enough medicine for only one of you, it’s true. At the time, you seemed much sicker than your brother. Your mother and I were reluctant to choose one child over another, so we told the healer to make the final judgment. He came out of the room and told us he had given the medicine to our son, since we already had another daughter. After he left, we discovered that Willow had placed the son’s cap on your head, a little game we had caught her at before. We have never told your sister about her role in this, as we didn’t wish to burden her.
In his decision to honor an only son, the healer gave the medicine to you instead of your brother, who was not wearing the son’s cap. Had he received the medicine, his fever would not have gone so terribly high, leading to the fits and eventually the damage.
Might the same have happened to you if you hadn’t received the medicine? We will never know. But I trust the Great God’s will, and I am thankful for your health and strength. I did not want you to march to war questioning your value. It is greater than you know.
All my love always,
Papa
I read the letter three times before the tears began to fall. I read it again as they streamed down my face, my breath coming in short, gasping sobs.
My parents hadn’t chosen Storm over me. They had given that choice to someone else.
It didn’t lessen the pain of knowing that my receiving the medicine had led to Storm’s condition, but it did make me feel, for the first time, that I wasn’t an afterthought—a mere third child who took the medicine that might’ve saved her brother’s mind.
When I had drunk my fill of the words, I tore the letter between the second and third paragraphs. The first part I folded up small and tucked deep into my pocket. The rest I tore into tiny bits, which I gathered and rubbed into the dirt beneath my blanket.
“Thank you, Papa,” I whispered. I blew out the lantern and lay in the darkness, my heart more satisfied than it had ever been.
It seemed a long time before Forest came to the tent. I was going to pretend to be asleep, to make things easier for him. But when I heard him gathering up his blankets, I rolled onto my back.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Sleeping in Jasper’s tent,” he said. “It’d be better if I didn’t disturb you while your stings are healing.”
I let him go without saying another word, feeling the death of our friendship like the point of a blade in my heart.
Before the sun had fully crept up, the visiting soldiers marched south, their cheerful farewells and huzzahs incongruous with the gravity of what was now our daily lives. They left behind a team of horses to draw our supply wagon to Chancory.
“If no news arrives today, we’ll march out first thing in the morning,” Jasper said as we ate a cold breakfast. “The silence makes me uneasy.”
I knotted my toes inside my boots, his words leaving an ominous echo in my breast. The faces of my fellow soldiers reflected the same uncertainty that danced in my own heart. Except for Sedge, whose expression was almost arrogant. As though he feared nothing.
Jasper turned his face toward me. “How are your stings?”
“Better.” They still throbbed and were starting to itch, but Forest’s tenepa tea had worked wonders. That, and the power of T’Gonnen coursing through me.
“We need you, Storm,” Jasper said. “If I could give you time to rest, I would.”
“I don’t need time to rest.”
Jasper’s slow nod expressed his approval. We finished our last few bites and rose to make our way one final time to the ropes. Sedge maneuvered himself so that he was walking beside me.
“Jasper doesn’t pick favorites, midget.”
“So?”
“So stop pretending the stings don’t hurt, just to make the rest of us look weak.”
“I didn’t say they didn’t hurt.”
“You said enough.”
I ran my tongue over my teeth in an effort to stem the hot words that wanted to shoot out. “I’m not going to fight with you.”
He stepped in front of me, forcing me to stop. “You’re not half the man you pretend you are.”
“If you’re the model of manhood around here, I’d rather be a girl.”
His fist flew at me a fraction of a second too late; I blocked him, throwing my weight against my knife arm to shove him away.
“What’s wrong with you?” My dragon-deepened voice gave power to my words. “Does it feel good to push around the only person who’s shorter than you?”
He pushed back, his eyes glaring into mine. “Maybe I don’t like your face.”
“Is there a problem?” Jasper hovered over Sedge’s shoulder.
“No problem here,” I said, my eyes still on Sedge.
“Nothing here at all.” Sedge turned and continued walking toward the ropes.
I gathered my courage and looked Jasper in the eye. “I’m sorry, sir. He won’t stop baiting me.”
“Stop taking the bait,” Jasper said.
He walked away without another word, and I headed toward the ropes, my face burning with a heated mixture of anger and shame.
Hours later, I stood at the edge of the field wearing my leather breastplate and carrying a short, back-sheathed dagger. We’d practiced throwing the daggers, building accuracy for both combat and hunting, and we’d sparred with wooden ones, learning to incorporate weapons with Neshu moves. Apparently today would be different.
The breastplate was uncomfortable on top of my bindings and the healing hornet stings, but it made me confident that I looked like everyone else, and I would fight like everyone else, too. If I lived for even a single day of this mission, that would be a victory.
Jasper lined us up fifty or so paces from a crudely constructed, life-sized doll mounted to a wooden frame. It had a face painted in rich, black ink, so that it seemed to be staring at us from across the field.
“It’s one thing to spar with each other,” Jasper said. “But it’s another to go face-to-face with an enemy who wants to kill you. Today, you will learn not to fear killing your enemy.”
I glanced at Forest, who stood beside me, but his new habit of not quite looking at me made it impossible to catch his eye. So I stared instead at the stuffed soldier.
“There is no room for hesitation in combat,” Jasper continued, “and no room for mercy. If the enemy is coming at you, you must attack. If the enemy falters, you must attack. If the enemy turns from you and runs away, you must attack. And if he falls, wounded, you must finish the job. He’ll have a face, like yours. He will be a son or a husband or a brother or a father, or all of those things. But to you, he must become nothing.”
The silence was heavy as Jasper paused to let his words sink in. I glanced at the others around me, their faces creased against the afternoon sun. They looked hardened.
Ready.
“When you’re not on a battlefield, but in a corridor of the palace or alone in a stand of trees, it becomes even harder to face an enemy without hesitating. It’s you or him. Live or die. Today, you will learn to live.”
I continued to stare at the ink-faced soldier as Jasper walked across the field and took his place behind the doll, explaining how he would push it forward as we engaged it, offering as much resistance as he could and making sure the false soldier didn’t topple backward. He then asked for a volunteer to go first.
I stepped forward.
Across the field, my eyes met Jasper’s, and I once again read approval there. I breathed it as though it were air.
The moment didn’t last long. “Listen well, soldier,” Jasper said. “The enemy before you has one goal—to kill you quickly. Draw your dagger on my mark. Then I want you to charge, and I want you to yell until your guts spew and you’re spitting blood. I want you to stab your enemy until you’re sure he’s dead. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, sir!” I said.
“I said, do you hear me?”
“Yes, sir!”
“You call that a yell? Tell me again!”
“Yes, sir!” My voice sounded octaves too high, even with its deepening.
“Again! Again!”
I yes-sirred until the words lost meaning. Then, heart pounding, I drew my dagger on Jasper’s mark and waited for his order.
“Charge!” he yelled.
I ran toward the stuffed soldier, fingers tight around the hilt of my dagger. The staring face drew nearer, expressionless, vapid—nothing like a real person’s face. I imagined hordes of nomads storming Stonewall and killing our men. I imagined them combing the countryside on their way to the capital, killing anyone in their path. I imagined that the not-real soldier I was closing in on meant to run his knife clean through my heart.
I gave a Great Cry and plunged my dagger into his chest.
Jasper leaned into the doll from behind, and the force of his resistance caused me to stagger a bit. I hesitated, then pulled out the dagger.
“If this were a real battle, you’d be dead!” Jasper yelled. “Don’t stand there, soldier!”
I gritted my teeth and stabbed my soldier again, a sort of grunt escaping my mouth.
“He’s murdered your family!” Jasper yelled. “It’s you or him! How badly do you want to live?”
I stabbed a few more times, without making a sound. Jasper put his hand on my shoulder, stopping me.
“Go back in line,” he said. “Find your anger.”
I fought the weight of shame as I ran lightly back to the others while Cedar stepped forward to take his turn. How was I supposed to summon anger from thin air? I watched as Cedar attacked the doll and felt somewhat better when he received a similar speech from Jasper.
A creeping sense of doubt curled through me as I watched each man before me attack the stuffed soldier with his knife and his hoarse yells. I tried to imagine it was a true melee, and that each man fought to his death. But as my turn grew closer, I didn’t feel much more capable of murderous rage than I had the first time. And I knew with sinking certainty that if I couldn’t accomplish this, I really would fall quickly at the hands of the enemy.
An honorless death, swift and brutal.
“Next!” Jasper’s voice was ragged from yelling. I stepped forward, my eyes on the now-battered target, and waited for Jasper’s command. Then I drew my dagger and ran.
Within those fifty paces, I conjured a sudden and jarring vision of my family dying at the hands of enemy soldiers, their anguished cries silenced forever, their blood soaking the ground by the fence around our home. My eyes burned into the stuffed soldier as I raised my dagger. I didn’t see a drawn-on face anymore; I saw Sedge’s face.
“Die!” I yelled, stabbing the face. I pulled my dagger free and stabbed again and again, neck, chest, stomach. I yelled until my throat burned hot and gave way, until I coughed dry heaves and fell against the shredded soldier, hand curling around the buried dagger, strength spent.
“Well done, soldier,” Jasper said when he reached me. “You found your anger.”
My hand shook as I pulled my dagger out and resheathed it. It wasn’t anger that had motivated my attack. It was hatred.
Was this what I had become?
“Thank you,” I said. But this time, I didn’t mean it.
I lay alone in my tent, ears straining for the slightest sound of Nuaga’s approach. But my eyes grew heavy, and I soon fell into dreamless sleep.
In the blackest of night, I awoke, knowing without hearing a sound that Nuaga was waiting for me. My boots were already on my feet, so all I had to do was grab my cloak and slip quietly outside and away from the other tents.
My heart pounded with such force I was certain it would awaken everyone.
“Where are you?” I mouthed.
Among the trees.
Rock stood on guard duty, too close for comfort. I waited until he turned his back and walked several paces in the other direction; then I crept lightly toward the trees, my eyes pulling at the darkness, searching for Nuaga.
She stepped forward—even in the dark, I could see that her fierce beauty was ten times what it had seemed. She opened her mouth and spoke real words—teeth and tongue, sound and syllable. “Rain L’nahn.”
“Nuaga.”
Her face shone when I said her name, as though she hadn’t heard it spoken aloud for a long time. She held her head just so, appraising me. “Thank you for releasing me.”
I met her gaze and did not feel afraid. “You are … breathtaking.”
Joy radiated from her eyes, so palpable I was certain I felt its throbbing warmth. “Are you ready to ride?”
For several seconds, I didn’t respond. Tentatively, I stepped forward and reached my hand toward the thick coat of fur just behind her ear. The moment my fingers brushed it, a warm peace settled within me, fear trickling from me like water. How much harder could it be to mount a dragon than it was to mount a barebacked donkey?
I took one deep breath. Then I grabbed fistfuls of her pelt and swung myself onto her broad neck.
