The fitful wind went still. Off in the woods, far in the distance, a man’s voice called out. Another answered. Jey turned to look but could see nothing in the dim moonlight. The wind picked up again.
“Jey,” Lokim hissed. “Come on.” He reached forward and took Elle’s other hand. Jey’s friend moved without protest when guided, heading for the hillside.
As Elle stepped ahead, she gave Jey’s hand a little tug. Jey experienced a sudden, intense desire to rip her hand from Elle’s grasp and run. She was abruptly certain this was all an elaborate setup. Lokim had been grooming them, orchestrating his every move to bring about this moment – the moment he led her straight into a trap. He already had Phril, after all.
There was a curse in the darkness. Jey felt the rush of Phril’s emotions as her tessila burst through the stitchring and came into near proximity again. His presence washed over her like an invigorating wave, pouring new energy into her body, heightening her senses.
There was a brief moment of confusion as the agitated tessila tangled in Lokim’s shirt on his way out of the stitchring. But he fought his way free of the fabric and shot through the air to Jey. He burrowed himself into the scant space between her cloak and her neck, pressing his cool scales against her skin.
Lokim had not tried to stop Phril going to Jey. Her vision sharper, Jey could see him standing there by the hillside, his face creased with strain. He was still holding the passive barrier spell but there was a sheen of sweat on his forehead and his chest rose and fell with heavy respiration.
Elle, held between them, seemed to dawn into full awareness for the first time since they’d begun their flight. She looked at Lokim, blinking. “What’s happening?” she said.
“We need to get inside,” Lokim said in a flat, exhausted tone. “And your friend has once again decided I’m the enemy.”
Elle gently pulled her hand free of Lokim’s grip, then Jey’s. She caught the flapping edges of her cloak and wrapped the garment around herself. She turned to look at Jey. She said, “I trust him.”
Then she moved forward and disappeared into the hillside.
Jey felt a strange sting over her heart – as if an invisible dagger had pierced the skin there. Lokim still stood, waiting.
I can’t leave Elle, Jey thought. But even as she thought it, she knew it wasn’t true. If Elle had just walked into a trap, her only chance of ever getting out again was for Jey to remain free.
The wind died again and the forest went still. Into the quiet, Lokim said, “I can’t wait any longer.”
From the tunnel, Elle’s voice came back, full of exasperation. “Jey, get in here.”
With a low cry of terror and defeat, Jey hurried into the hillside.
◈
“She had it worse than I did, you know.”
Jey heard the words as she drifted up out of sleep. It was Elle speaking, her voice low, something in it a little bit apologetic.
“You were in the same place, were you not?” Lokim’s answer was also low. There was an intimacy to their tone, a snugness – as if they believed they were the only two people in the world.
Their voices came from nearby. Jey’s training, kicking in to control her as usual, told her not to move, not to betray the fact she was awake.
Phril was also there. He’d refused Lokim’s offer to go back through the stitchring after they’d settled in the hideout. The tiny animal was awake now, sitting on her shoulder like a sentinel.
Elle’s voice had gone a little sadder when she replied. “I was trained primarily for diplomatic use. My strength is in the passive spellworks. I’m good at mental manipulations. I was used lightly – usually sent to parties or court functions. I had a whole fictional identity, did you know? There was a double who lived in town and pretended to be me. I was briefed each day on her activities so I could step in and be her whenever necessary. I don’t think Jey even knows that.”
Jey hadn’t known. She felt an unpleasant shock of surprise. She had to repress a small surge of jealousy that Elle would tell Lokim something she hadn’t confided in Jey. With the emotion came a desire to move and stretch, to banish the stiffness of sleep from her limbs. Jey repressed that as well.
It was quiet in the shelter, which had proven to be a long, low room buried deep in the hillside. Lokim said it was one of several such places near Deramor. They had been used to conceal and house refugees during the Betrayal. He’d known this place was here, but it had taken him weeks of searching to find a way in. There was a small spring in back that provided fresh water, and four different hidden entrances.
It was not a trap. It was a dusty, unused space that had been created to help desperate people – people who had once been in the exact same perilous position as Jey and Elle were now.
“So what did Jey do?” Lokim’s voice was a teeny bit more clear, as if he’d turned to look at Jey as he spoke. Jey felt Phril stiffen on her shoulder, arching his neck and releasing a little hiss. Phril was convinced Lokim had done something to make Jey so afraid, which had inflamed all the tessila’s protective instincts. Now the tiny creature was making his revised opinion of the young man clear.
“She was an assassin, mostly,” Elle said. “And she used passive persuasion in places that were hard to get into. She can sneak into anywhere undetected, if she’s alone. She was by far the most valuable of the three of us. She went on two or three times as many opportunities as me and Kae. Which means more drugs, more shots, more confusion. You can’t blame her for not trusting you, Lokim. We’ve never been able to trust anyone.”
There was a pause. Jey thought the conversation might turn. But Lokim spoke again, his voice was tight with contained anger. “They’re letters,” he said, putting it together. “J. K. L. They aren’t even proper names.” He seemed outraged at the thought. “Why do you still use them?”
Elle, unruffled, gave a little sigh. “L134,” she agreed. “That’s me.” She laughed, but the sound contained no mirth. “What else should I call myself, Lokim? I don’t remember my parents, much less the name they gave me.”
If it was still windy outside, there was no way to know. They were surrounded on every side by several feet of solid earth. Lokim had lit a fire when they arrived. He’d built it on a hearth made of glittering red stones and heat had radiated throughout the room with surprising speed. Now the air was pleasant – not hot, not cold.
“What about Jey?”
Elle’s tone carried a quiet sadness. “I don’t think she knows any more than I do. But it’s not something we talk about, you know?”
Lokim was quiet for a time as he considered this. “And your other friend? Kae? Did she decide to strike out on her own?” Lokim’s voice had returned to its normal tone. There was a rustling sound as he shifted within his cloak.
Elle was still for a moment before answering. “She died. The night we escaped. I don’t know what they used Kae for, but she was always so angry. Her tessila got too near one of our handlers. He killed it.”
Another beat of silence, then Lokim said, “Your handlers were trained warriors as well, then?”
Elle laughed. There was another rustle of fabric in the still room. “Hardy. Nylan was a scholar, I guess. A sort of scientist diplomat who sent us on our opportunities. He knocked Kae’s tessila out of the air and stomped on it.”
This statement was followed by the longest silence yet. There was more rustling and movement and the scrape of a log set on the fire. Jey felt an immediate bloom of warmth beneath her. The stones she’d slept on had a softness to them. They were heated as well. She was growing a little too warm. She resisted another urge to move, to push aside her cloak and sit up to stretch her limbs.
“Stomped on it?” Lokim said. His tone was sad and wondering, and also there was a sort of understanding in it. “So your tessili,” he said. “They don’t know how to fight?”
◈
Lokim’s shelter was larger than Elle had expected. When he’d mentioned it before, she’d pictured a
cave or a hollow behind a tree – some small space he’d carved out for himself in the wilds. Or perhaps the attic of an abandoned building, or a barn way out in some farmer’s field.
She’d never imagined anything like the reality.
The place Lokim called his shelter was the most amazing space Elle had ever seen. While its shape was unassuming—a long, domed room hidden under a hill—the details of its construction took her breath away.
They’d made it here late the previous night. Jey had insisted on sitting up to keep watch. Lokim had tried to persuade her doing so was unnecessary as he’d gotten the fire started, but the light-haired girl had become so bristly and Lokim had been so exhausted, Elle had seen him give up and throw himself down into his cloak to sleep. Elle had done the same, falling into a deep slumber without taking much stock of her surroundings.
So when natural morning light had woken her, she’d come out of her sleep quickly, full of confusion. She’d opened her eyes and sat up, blinking in awe. The room around her had been full of sunlight. It streamed down from above as if through massive windows. But the ceiling in this place, Elle knew, was solid. It had to be. They were deep underground. If there had been windows, their fire the night before would have given them away.
“Sunstone.” Lokim had spoken the word from his bedroll, his voice rough with recent sleep. “Have you never seen it before?”
Elle had shaken her head, sitting up and sifting through her pack until she found her hairbrush. As she combed and re-braided her hair, Lokim told her about the remarkable chamber. It had been made by the Tessilari, before their strength had been broken by war. There was magic woven into the floor, the ceiling, the walls, the store rooms. It was a feat of magical engineering and ingenuity alike.
“The sunlight was crucial, of course, for the brillbane.” Lokim had nodded towards the far wall. Elle had noticed the floor there transitioned from stone to earth. The twisted remains of brillbane bushes stood along the far wall. They were nothing more than withered trunks – long dead.
And that was the reality of the place. It was remarkable, but old. The floors were covered in grit and dust. No one had lived here for lifetimes.
They had talked for a while, then. It had been nice. Elle adored Jey more than anyone else in the world, of course, but she couldn’t help but think her friend was being a little unfair to this young man. Jey’s suspicion and innate distrust had always been a kind of silent barrier between Lokim and Elle. Now, in the morning light that filtered into this strange, abandoned chamber, they were able to talk a little more freely.
All that ended when Phril went berserk. Jey was still asleep, but her tessila was on her shoulder, watching Lokim and Elle with his glittering eyes.
Lokim and Elle were talking about the academy. Lokim said the tessili at the academy did not know how to fight. Apparently in an effort to prove Lokim wrong, Phril launched himself into the air, flinging himself across the room in a blind rage.
Lokim, surprised, raised a hand to protect his face from the tiny, attacking creature. Phril slammed into it, clawing and hissing as he tried to tear out Lokim’s eyes.
“Phril,” Jey cried, sitting up all at once, squinting as she blinked at the broad light in the surrounding room. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Shai, who’d been off flying lazy loops around the large room, came darting back to Elle, suddenly full of confusion and anxiety.
But it was Bliz that was the real surprise. The orange tessila had been dozing on Lokim’s knee, tired from all the casting the young man had done the night before. She woke up now and leapt into the air, ready to fly to her human’s defense.
What happened next took Elle by surprise. Lokim opened his eyes. With a quiet curse he reversed his hand, turning it deftly to catch Phril between his fingers. Phril screamed in outrage, squirming and hissing as Lokim flowed to his feet.
Bliz, in the meantime, transformed. One second, she was like Phril and Shai – a tiny speck of color in the bright air. The next she was a hulking presence, as tall at the shoulders as the sighthounds the academy used, and much thicker. Her scaled hide was glorious and vivid, her build one of compact, efficient power.
Elle gasped in pure shock, climbing to her feet to stare. Jey had taken a few steps forward, expression outraged, when Lokim had taken hold of Phril. But now she was frozen, staring at the massive Bliz in complete shock.
Bliz was furious. When she’d expanded, she’d settled onto the floor. Now she scuttled towards Lokim. She moved with flowing, sinuous grace. Her shapely head was almost as large as Lokim’s and her eyes were focused with pure hatred on the hand that held Phril.
Lokim placed his hand against his own heart, ignoring its squirming occupant. He spoke in a voice that rang through the large chamber. “Bliz, that’s enough. He’s half mad, can’t you? He doesn’t know what he’s about, and he can’t hurt me. You need to settle down.”
Elle recognized the tone of mild exasperation in Lokim’s voice. How often had she sounded nearly the same when addressing Shai?
But instead of ignoring Lokim’s reprimand, as Shai always seem to ignore Elle, the orange tessila stopped her advance. Bliz released a disgruntled huff, but turned around with not further resistance. Elle continued to stare as the now massive animal wandered away towards the dead brillbane.
◈
“They can all do it, as far as I know.” Lokim spoke thoughtfully, sitting on one of the stone stools near the fire pit. He was holding a steaming mug of soup, which Elle had handed to him after warming it on the fire. Jey held a similar mug between her own hands. Its warmth was comforting against her palms. Its earthy scent made her realize how hungry she was. “How big they get varies a lot, as well as how long they can stay in larger form. Bliz is on the small size of average.” He’d lowered his voice for the last sentence, as if he didn’t want his tessila to hear.
Bliz, however, appeared to be asleep. She’d returned to her smaller size as soon as Phril had settled down. She’d fallen back into slumber as if nothing had happened at all.
Phril, on the other hand, was still agitated. He clung to the inside of Jey’s sleeve, seething with resentment and a strange, fiery desire Jey had never felt in him before. The words Lokim had spoken troubled her. He’s half mad.
Jey knew Phril wasn’t the most rational of creatures. But there was no such thing as a rational tessila. Was there?
“They used to get bigger,” Lokim was saying. “Much bigger. There are stories of the most powerful of the Tessilari who could make their tessili as large as houses and ride on their backs in flight.” He laughed, sounding self-conscious. “Those must be exaggerations.”
Jey tried to imagine what Phril would look like if he was as large as a house. The thought filled her with a little shudder of trepidation. At that size, his tantrums would be a lot more dangerous.
She glanced at Elle. Her friend’s face had taken on a similar look of surprised dismay.
Lokim paused to sip his soup, then continued. “No one knows why they’re getting smaller, but most agree it is probably due to a lack of variety in the bloodlines. We were able to rescue so few tessili when we fled, all the ones in the valley go back to the same ancestors. That’s one of the reasons everyone was so excited when I told them about you and the existence of even more tessili at the academy.”
Lokim went quiet, his words trailing off in a way that suggested he’d said something he hadn’t mean to let slip. Jey looked up instantly, staring across the low fire at him with sudden sharp attention. “Wait,” she said. “People know about us? People other than you?”
Lokim’s face had flushed underneath his smooth tan. He ran a hand through his hair and said in a low tone, “Jey, they’re your people, too. Even if you don’t realize that.”
Jey felt that fear constrict her heart again – the fear of the trap, the fear of losing the freedom she’d so recently gained. It was joined, now, by the new fear – fear that there was something wrong with P
hril, that his years around the flashnodes and holdstones had permanently damaged him in some way.
Jey stood up, staring around the chamber with frantic eyes. She realized she didn’t know how to get out. Whatever passage Lokim had opened last night was closed. “Elle,” she said in a tight whisper, “we need to go.”
Lokim stood too, his face flushing deeper with some new emotion. “Go where?” he said. “Back out into the woods, so you can get hunted and chased and attacked? Back to the cheesery, so you can endanger more innocent lives? Jey, I’m here to help you.”
His voice rang with frustrated sincerity, but Jey hardly heard him. She went to her pack, collecting the few items she’d taken out the night before.
“Jey.” It was Elle who spoke now. “I’m not going.”
The words hit Jey like a blow across the back of the neck. She seemed to see stars. She straightened and turned.
Her friend was standing next to the fire, Shai hanging onto the end of her dark braid. Her eyes were large and sad. “I want to stop running,” she said. “I’m tired. I’m afraid. We can’t do this alone. We need help. I’m going with Lokim, back to meet the Tessilari. Maybe in the Valley of Mist, I can have a normal life.”
The words sank in slowly. Jey closed her eyes. The terror still sang in her veins, frantic as a caged tessila. Her thought seemed to bunch and strain. A normal life. She almost laughed. Was that even possible for someone like her? Maybe Phril’s not the only one who’s crazy.
Jey spoke then, her words heavy and slow. “What do you remember, Elle? From the time before Professor Liam told me to cast that spell on Phril?”
Elle’s face got that distant look it tended to assume when she was trying to draw on the past. Her narrow shoulders moved in a small shrug. “Opportunities, mostly. Dances and balls, state dinners.”
“Exactly,” Jey hissed. “Opportunities. That was the one time our brains were free of drugs, able to access what they knew and store thoughts and ideas for later.”
Elle’s face had gone a shade paler. She seemed to understand what Jey was getting at. “So all you can recall …” she said.