“Jhi, be careful!” Meilin shouted. “Suka’s not in her right mind!”
Suka slammed back down, her right front paw cracking the ice, her left pressed to her chest, again hiding the talisman. She opened her mouth, exposing teeth as long as Meilin’s leg.
Jhi didn’t stop, stepping around the larger chunks of ice comfortably, slowly and deliberately advancing. She was so large, her black markings were clear against the white background. Suka seemed mesmerized. She growled at the Great Panda. Jhi stood at Suka’s flank and stretched her neck toward Suka as if to touch noses.
Suka leaned back, raising a paw. Meilin held her breath. With one swat, that clawed paw could end Jhi. But Jhi didn’t duck, didn’t retreat. She just looked calmly into the black eyes of certain death.
Jhi is brave, Meilin realized. Fearless.
Jhi stood on her hind legs too. Suka hesitated, clearly entranced by the sight of that huge panda — the movement of her dark limbs against a world of white, her silver eyes catching the dawning sun. She stretched her neck out from her hunched shoulders. Suka was breathing hard, almost as if she were afraid. But she let Jhi’s nose touch hers.
Meilin could see the huffing of Suka’s chest slow. Her paw lowered without striking. Jhi put one black paw against Suka’s heart.
Suka dropped to all fours, Jhi beside her. They touched necks. Meilin wondered if through all that thick fur, their touch felt much like holding Rollan’s gloved hand. She realized she was still holding his hand and dropped it, suddenly embarrassed.
But she didn’t take her eyes from the bears. They were leaning into each other, Suka’s eyes closed. Meilin had felt that peace Jhi radiated, at times intensely. Often she had rejected it, preferring to be angry. She held her breath, waiting for Suka to reject it too and attack again.
But when Suka opened her huge eyes, they’d lost their wildness. She looked at Jhi, at the Crystal Polar Bear still strapped to her left paw, then around at the various people — crouched, tense, ready to flee — all watching her.
“Jhi,” Suka said. Her voice reminded Meilin of growls, of winds, of ice thousands of years old just starting to crack. It was a wild sound, deep enough to shake her bones, as lonely as an ice mountain in the middle of a tundra, as careful as a snowflake falling.
“Oh, Jhi,” said Suka, “what has happened to Erdas?”
Jhi sat back on her hind legs and blinked. Suka nuzzled her neck, inhaling, then she sat back as well.
“You have returned,” she said. “But you are not as you were.”
Jhi turned her large head to look at Meilin. Sensing a request, Meilin pulled the Slate Elephant from beneath her coat, showing Suka. Jhi flickered in place and returned to her normal size, almost as if her gigantic proportions had just been a trick of the light.
“Ah, Dinesh,” said Suka. “I see.” She rubbed her eyes with one paw, as if seeing caused her pain.
Rollan approached. Meilin refused to be less courageous than he was and hurried up, walking beside him. She stopped next to Jhi, putting her hand into the fur of the panda’s neck. She could feel her shivering, but sensed she wouldn’t want to go into passive state yet.
“How long was I asleep?” Suka asked.
“Long enough for the Ardu to find you and carve an ice palace around you,” Meilin said.
“And an entire ice city beyond that,” Rollan added.
Suka looked to where the Ardu from the Ice City stood, far on the other side of the great rift. “The Ardu have always been my people. I hope I didn’t hurt them. I . . . feel strange, after all that time asleep. My mind, it seems, took longer to wake up.” She looked at Jhi. “Perhaps it never would have. But you were always the healer. When a healer joins a war, all should take notice. I should have taken notice.”
Suka’s eyes grew distant, as if she could see something miles away, beyond the view of anyone else. She breathed deeply. “Erdas is not what it was. I do not believe even you can heal her.”
Jhi blinked.
Meilin looked for Tarik and Maya, but she couldn’t see them. Perhaps Tarik had carried Maya too far away to see that Suka had been subdued.
“Suka, as you can see, the Four Fallen have returned,” Meilin said.
Conor and Abeke had been edging closer, Briggan and Uraza beside them. Essix settled onto Rollan’s shoulder.
Suka growled, and Meilin flinched, expecting another attack. But after a moment, she realized it was a laugh.
“Their falling was partly what drove me into the ice all those years ago,” said Suka. “At my age, I should be wise, but I can only see my own folly.”
“You hid yourself because you were afraid?” Meilin asked.
Suka’s head turned to her, mouth slightly open, her long yellow teeth showing, and Meilin flinched. What in all Erdas could such a beast fear? Even calm, Suka was not safe.
Perhaps Rollan felt her shudder because he leaned closer to whisper, “Next time I’d like to meet a nice, cuddly Great Beast. Perhaps a giant bunny.”
“I was afraid, in a way,” Suka was saying. “The death of the Four reminded all of us that not even Great Beasts are completely immortal. I’d hoped by freezing myself, I might prolong my own life. But more, I hoped to keep —” She lifted her paw to look at the talisman and then pressed it back against her middle. “I’d hoped to keep my talisman out of evil hands.”
She adjusted herself, and Jhi went closer, sitting beside her huge leg. She looked up, and Meilin noticed Suka’s breath, white against the air, slowly exhaling. Jhi’s presence was comforting her, encouraging her to go on.
“I should have fought beside you, Jhi,” Suka said, her voice low and frightening. “And with you, Briggan, Uraza, Essix. What power I could have brought to you!” She slammed her paw on the ice, making cracks. “Regret drove me into the ice too. We Great Beasts have a stewardship over Erdas but a love of our own lives. The prideful belief that we’d always be greater than any man-driven rabble blinded us. Blinded me. You know, before I froze myself, Halawir the Eagle came to me, asking to borrow my talisman! I sent him on his way — minus a few tail feathers.”
Suka laughed, the sound like an avalanche. But quickly her eyes saddened.
“But I had to ask myself, what did Halawir want with my talisman? I imagined what would happen if another Devourer arose and renewed the war, but this time holding all the talismans of power. I grew warier and warier. Better to remove myself from the world, preserve my life, and keep my talisman away from the Devourer and his Conquerors. But it was a useless act, wasn’t it, Jhi?”
Jhi looked up at her and blinked. She nodded.
“You’re asking for my talisman too, aren’t you? You, like Halawir, want my power?”
Jhi looked at Meilin. She took a deep breath and spoke. “It isn’t power we want, Suka. It’s safety. For all of Erdas.”
There was a pause, and for a moment nothing could be heard but Suka’s slow breathing and the hushed groan of ice settling.
Rollan cleared his throat. “Dinesh gave us his Slate Elephant, as you saw. Arax would not give us the Granite Ram, but the Conquerors sought it too, and we managed to take it to keep it out of their hands. They have also claimed the Iron Boar.”
Suka snorted in anger. Her exhale was strong enough to push Meilin’s hood off her head.
“Please, Suka,” said Meilin. “I don’t think there’s any point in hiding. Zhong has already fallen. We’re all forced to take a side. I chose the Greencloaks and a fight for . . .” She looked at Jhi. “For peace.” The word felt comical to Meilin, dramatic, a child’s wish. Yet as she said it, she believed with a burning in her limbs that peace was the only thing worth fighting for.
“If the good guys don’t get your talisman, the bad guys will,” said Rollan.
Suka stared at him. Meilin noticed that Rollan flinched, but he straightened his shoulders and met the beast?
??s gaze.
Suka exhaled again, this time ruffling the fur around Rollan’s hood.
“Perhaps it’s time for Erdas to enter a new age,” said the polar bear. “Perhaps humans have become wise enough to be her stewards.”
Suka lifted her paw to her teeth. With a snap, the cord broke. She caught the Crystal Polar Bear with her other paw and handed it to Rollan.
He lifted his gloved hands and reached over Suka’s great claws to retrieve the talisman. Meilin noticed that his hands were shaking, but promised herself to never tease him about it.
“Thank you,” Rollan said, his voice husky with emotion.
Suka rose up. “I will go. It’s been ages since I ate.”
Meilin heard Conor barely whisper, “I have an extra seal-fat sweet cake in my pocket.”
“And I need to think,” Suka said. “Times are changing. War is here. There will be a last stand. Do not be foolish, young ones. As you say, there is no hiding.”
Suka bent over and gently touched noses again with Jhi. Now Jhi’s whole body was barely the size of the polar bear’s head. The comparison reminded Meilin of a soft panda doll she’d had as a child. That had been a different life, a different Meilin. The memory of her old, safe bed with the plush panda startled Meilin with sudden sorrow.
Then without further warning, Suka ran, her four paws sending thunder through the ice. She headed north so quickly that in moments she was out of sight.
“Three talismans now,” Rollan whispered, examining the Crystal Polar Bear.
“Well done,” said Tarik.
Meilin turned. She hadn’t realized Tarik had joined them. He stood behind, holding Maya in his arms. Her face was pained, her leg bound.
“Jhi?” Meilin asked.
Jhi lumbered over to Maya. Tarik laid her on the ground and carefully pulled up her pant leg. Maya flinched. The calf was already showing bruising, red and purple clouding her pale skin. And from the pain etched on Maya’s face, Meilin guessed it was broken.
Jhi sniffed again and then licked her calf as a mother cat might clean her kitten. Maya tensed and bit her lip, straightening her leg.
“You should probably still splint it,” said Meilin, “and be careful. I’m not sure Jhi’s power can heal a broken bone, but her touch might help it heal on its own a little faster.”
“What does it do?” Abeke asked, indicating the talisman in Rollan’s hands.
“Let’s find out,” said Rollan. He considered, then offered it up to Meilin. She blinked, surprised.
“Go ahead,” he said.
“But Suka gave it to you,” Meilin said. “That means something.”
“She gave it to us,” Rollan said. “And you are a part of us.”
Surely he meant all of them — the group. But when Rollan said “us,” she heard “you and me.” Rollan and Meilin. The thought startled her heart.
He tossed the talisman to her, and she caught it.
Sometimes back in Zhong, boys had offered Meilin flowers. In public, she’d been the general’s daughter — pretty, wealthy, harmless. She’d taken the flowers with a bow, but secretly scorned those scrub-faced boys who only paid her attention because their parents encouraged them to make nice with the daughter of a powerful man.
And here was Rollan, the street orphan, Essix on his shoulder, in the middle of icy Arctica, offering her not a flower but a talisman of great power. And she was no longer the daughter of a powerful man. She was just Meilin.
She bowed to him as she would have to those bouquet boys. And she slipped the talisman inside her coat, placing the cold crystal against her skin.
At once she felt larger, stronger somehow. Her arms seemed to move differently. She lifted her hand, and Abeke fell over as if pushed by wind.
“Whoa,” said Meilin. “Better stand back.”
They backed away from her. Meilin moved farther from Maya, and then she punched the air.
The strength was thrilling. Her arms seemed to be longer, stronger, enlarged with huge boxing gloves made of wind. Her reach was long, the power behind her strike tremendous. She laughed.
“This is a little dangerous for close quarters,” she said. “But with this talisman I think I could stand on the ground and knock a Conqueror right off his horse.”
“Or steal a pie off a second-story windowsill,” said Rollan. “I mean, not that I would do that sort of thing, now that I’m an upstanding hero and all.”
She smiled and reached out, gently tapping Rollan on the chest from twelve feet away.
ROLLAN HOPPED AWAY FROM THE RUINS OF THE ICE PALACE with a smile on his face. He and his team had just faced certain death and come out victorious. He was . . . happy, he thought. It wasn’t a feeling he was accustomed to, but it struck him more frequently since joining with Tarik on these insane Greencloak quests. Bright shafts of sunlight broke through morning clouds in the east. They shot through the holes and into the crevasse of the hidden city, making the walls of ice flash and sparkle like diamonds.
They’d found Suka. And not only had they survived, but so had the fragile Ice City.
“That’s right,” Rollan said to no one in particular, “I’m a verifiable hero.”
He felt his smile fade as the group of Ardu men and women approached. About fifty Ardu with their animals had emerged from the city, but they were examining the great crumbling hole that had once been the majestic palace dedicated to Suka. The Great Polar Bear was gone, and all that remained of the palace was a jumble of sinking ice.
Rollan’s eyes tracked the crowd, trying to find a friendly face, or even a younger face, amid the group of angry adults. His eyes settled on a girl who looked just a little older than him. He tried his most charming smile. She frowned even harder.
“Suka is gone,” she said, in a voice so sad you’d have thought he’d killed her spirit animal.
And suddenly an enormous dog shambled forward to her side and let out some kind of demon bark. Rollan stifled a scream. It was the most horrifying dog he had ever seen. Bloated and brown, its snout was blunted and pocked with whiskers, two overlong canine teeth poking out from beneath them. Its ears had been shorn off, and it had flat, flipperlike paws that slapped the ice unpleasantly as it moved. Rollan shuddered.
The group of stern-faced Ardu stood silently till Tarik came forward.
“You will go now,” said an Ardu woman with a seagull on her shoulder. She looked older than Pia — if Pia had never drunk the pond’s water.
“We just —” Rollan started, but Tarik put a hand on his shoulder.
“We will go,” Tarik said. “I am truly sorry for the damage. I’m relieved your city is still intact, but I understand you revered Suka and the magnificent palace that held her. If there had been any other way, if there’s anything we could do —”
“You can go,” the old woman said. “That is what you can do. Go. Now.”
Tarik seemed on the verge of speaking again, but he hesitated, nodded, and began to walk, the rising sun on his left.
“Rollan, Meilin, Conor, Abeke, Maya,” he called, sounding like a father gathering up his wayward children. “We go. Now.”
As the mass of angry Ardu grew distant behind them, Rollan finally felt able to speak.
“Did you guys see that dog?” He hissed. “I almost peed my pants.”
“He means the walrus,” Meilin said. “One of the Ardu bonded with a walrus.”
“Ah,” said Tarik. “There you go, Rollan. You have seen a walrus.”
“That was a walrus?” Rollan looked back. The walrus was in front of the Ardu, still watching. It howl-barked again. Rollan shivered.
“Creepy,” he said. “I think I might not like walruses.”
A few moments passed as they walked in silence, and Rollan felt the ever-increasing need to bring up a subject besides walruses and his fear of them.
“So what was with those guys, anyway?” he asked. “Those city Ardu? I thought they were going to cut loose with seal spears, the way they were looking at us.”
“We freed Suka,” Meilin said. “And destroyed the palace generations of their people had built.”
“We didn’t destroy it,” Rollan said. “Suka did.”
Meilin shrugged. “Part of who they are is gone, and it was our coming that made it happen.”
Rollan saw the remembrance of Zhong burning in Meilin’s eyes. He moved closer, till their shoulders touched.
“I guess,” he said. “But I mean, what were they thinking a giant monster polar bear would do if it ever got out of that ice block? I would have put good money on ‘smash, kill, and roar.’ ”
The wind shifted away from the brutally chilly west to the colder-than-imaginable north.
“Oh,” Abeke gasped, and Uraza disappeared, becoming a mark on her arm. “I want to get out of here and never, ever return again.”
“And how are we going to get supplies for our journey out of here?” Conor asked.
“I’m afraid the Ardu villagers will be less than welcoming,” Tarik said as his otter flashed back into its dormant state.
“Because of the Ice Palace thing?” Rollan asked. “How could they know? I haven’t seen any mail ponies, or mail walruses or whatever. I bet they don’t know that we’re the horrible palace destroyers of doom.”
“Nonetheless,” Tarik said, securing a rope around his waist. “We will be going directly west, to the coast. On our own.” He handed a length of rope to Maya. “Secure this around yourself. Then Abeke, Meilin, Rollan, and Conor. Rollan and Essix have done a remarkable job warning us of crevasses, but I don’t want to take any chances.”
“Do you think Tarik wanted me in the back for a reason?” Conor whispered to Rollan once they were all tied up and walking. “I didn’t do anything to offend him, did I?”
“It’s probably just because you smell,” Rollan said.