The Book of Heroes

  A realization pricked at the back of U-ri’s mind like a needle. She had been a hero, before she was stricken down. Almost like Hiroki. Mr. Hata, his teacher, had pointed out the boy’s “heroic” aspirations. “Hiroki has to learn his place,” he had said.

  But were what Elem did and what Hiroki did really the same? Were there similarities between their stories? Elem had raised the dead and made an army—what was an unthinkable act for the average person. Hiroki had saved Michiru from being picked on by her classmates, which was certainly brave, but not epic by any means.

  But that’s not all that happened, was it?

  Hiroki didn’t just turn against the bullies. He turned against their teachers as well—a rebellion, of sorts. Meanwhile, Elem had gone against the very cycle of life and death, breaking the boundary between the two. It was hard to think of two acts more different in scale. But you could say that both of them acted to overturn the orders governing their respective worlds.

  That was why they had both been hailed as heroes at first, only to be reviled later.

  There it was—the two sides of the same coin. The Hero and the King in Yellow.

  “U-ri? Something wrong?” Aju asked from atop her shoulder.

  U-ri shook her head. “It’s nothing. So—when are we heading for the capital? Will there be something there to help me find my brother?”

  “It’s a possibility,” Ash said, his eyes fixed on U-ri’s expression.

  Maybe he always looks sleepy so people won’t notice that keen gaze. His eyes looked like they could see through to the back of her skull.

  “And there may be clues at the place I plan to stop at along the way. That’s why I came to find you, allcaste. To take you with me.”

  Suddenly, their goal was coming into focus. U-ri straightened her back. “Really?”

  “Right here.” Ash pointed a long finger at a spot on the map. There was a mark like a wall on top of one of the mountains, next to which was written a word in tiny letters that looked more like someone’s scribble than a proper caption. U-ri found that she was able to read them.

  “The ‘Katarhar Abbey Ruins’? Is that what that says?”

  “That’s right.”

  The state religion of the Haetlands was monotheistic. They revered the royal bloodline as having descended from one creator god. However, there were several other religions scattered across the countryside. Some of them had roots that went back even before the founding of the kingdom. These were tribal religions, tied deeply to the land where they thrived.

  “When the current royal family unified the Haetlands under one rule, these minority regional beliefs were discouraged at the point of a sword. Orders were dissolved, sacred scriptures destroyed, churches and monasteries reduced to rubble. Now, the local beliefs exist only in the form of traditions kept alive within the communities.” Even still, Ash explained, the more meaningful holy sites were still properly respected by the locals. The royal family chose to ignore this practice. It was a waste of time to further destroy buildings already in ruins, and most of these were so remote that leaving them alone seemed the most harmless choice. “Katarhar Abbey is one such place,” Ash continued. “Though publicly it is considered deserted, in secret there are still monks there, protecting the ruins.”

  “What kind of clues are we going to find in a place like that?” Aju snorted, wrinkling his tiny pink nose. It had become a habit of his to openly dispute Ash’s statements whenever possible.

  “There are clues. There is a person—” Ash said, pausing slightly. “An individual with information.” He seemed to be having difficulty defining just who this contact of his was.

  “You mean a monk? Like Sky?”

  Next to Aju, Sky nodded, both of them staring at Ash. But the wolf did not seem to notice them.

  “Look at this map well, burn its features into your mind. There is a glyph in the central courtyard of this abbey. For us to go there, you must grasp both distance and direction, U-ri.”

  “What the heck’s a glyph doing in a place like that?”

  “Because I carved one there, you irritating little rat.” Ash picked up Aju with swift fingers, then dropped him onto the map. “Stop chittering away and try helping U-ri for a change.”

  That said, Aju wasn’t sure how he could help her, and U-ri had no idea where to begin. All she could do was stare at the map. The Katarhar Abbey ruins were much closer than the capital. All they had to do was cross the mountains to the southwest, and they’d get to what was either a lake or a very large swamp. A large river flowed there, but they weren’t to cross it. They would follow it southward, and once they hit the forest, they would turn east.

  “Hey, I can see the buildings—” Aju chirped suddenly. He sounded like a sparrow twittering with joy. “That’s what you meant by helping her.” Aju had one paw on the picture of the Katarhar Abbey ruins on the map. “It’s okay, U-ri, I can guide us there. I can see the buildings in my mind.”

  Behind them, Sky turned to Ash. “Master Ash,” he called out softly, “will we be leaving soon?”

  “Is there some reason we shouldn’t?”

  “I was wondering if we shouldn’t say farewell to the boy who visited here yesterday.”

  Udsu, the springfoot. U-ri looked up from the map. “That’s right. Didn’t you make medicine for his mother?”

  “That I delivered last night,” Ash told him, standing up from his chair. “He won’t care if we leave without telling him. Once he sees the smoke gone from the chimney, he’ll know I’ve left.”

  Sky bowed curtly. “Then I will see to putting out the fire in the stove down below. I daresay there’s no need for you to lock up?”

  Above their heads, the blades of the windmill turned with a slow creaking that sent shivers through the crude shack’s floor. U-ri was thinking about this as she stepped inside the magic circle, but soon she forgot everything as the room went black around them, and the wind whistled in her ears. Then U-ri flew up into the sky and away, and they were gone.

  U-ri tried pinching her nose. She could feel her fingers, but she could see nothing. It was pitch black, except that after a while, brief flourishes of color would flash in the darkness, sometimes beneath her feet, other times to one side or over her head—bits of landscape suddenly appeared and disappeared like a magician’s painted scarves. She caught a glimpse of mountains, forests, towns, and villages.

  “That’s right, U-ri, that’s it,” Aju navigated from atop her head. “Wait—you’re going a little far south. Come back, back!”

  Sky held her hand tightly. Ash apparently didn’t need to physically hold on to her to travel. From the moment they had departed, she hadn’t seen or sensed his presence at all.

  She felt her spirit ease as they rushed through the darkness. She was one with the darkness, and at the same time, she was a wind cutting across the void. She was free of gravity, free of time, free of all material bonds. Even Aju’s squeaking sounded like it came from impossibly far away. But it didn’t matter. Aju was at the helm, and U-ri was the ship. She left the navigation to him, and let herself soar.

  This feels great! None of her previous jumps had felt even remotely the same. Had they been too short? Or maybe it was the difference between traveling within a region and going from one region to another—or to the nameless land as she had on her first jump from Minochi’s cottage.

  U-ri closed her eyes and relaxed. She lost sense of everything, even the boundaries of her own body. She was the wind—

  Yet she could still feel the warmth of Sky’s hand in her own.

  Sky’s a gentle soul. A warm feeling grew inside her as her heart drifted out into the darkness. He had been so concerned about Udsu after only meeting the boy once. I never would have thought to say goodbye to him.

  It was strange. She wondered who Sky was—who he had been. Up until now, she never had the time, nor any particular need, to think about it. Not that she had a need now, but here in this darkness, in this wind, flying freely, the
only person she felt any connection to at all was the nameless devout. She felt it like she felt his warmth. At that moment, he was everything to her.

  Why?

  Maybe it’s this darkness. Maybe it’s because the darkness resembles him.

  Because Sky doesn’t exist. Because he is empty, hollow. Like Ash said—he is nothing.

  But that wasn’t right. Sky wasn’t nothing. He just hides who he is beneath those black robes—he hides his warmth, his kindness. I know. I can feel who he is when he’s near me.

  “Yet, like the darkness, you will never know his true form.”

  Who said that? Whose thoughts were those? U-ri tried to look around in the rushing darkness.

  “Stay away!”

  Someone was screaming, making the darkness around her shudder. Then U-ri found her way blocked. Like a bird flying into a window, U-ri hit a wall in the darkness, hard. Sparks flew behind her eyes.

  “Stay away! You must not come any closer!”

  The voice rose like the howl of a wounded beast, trembling with rage at first then fading, choked with fear. No, it wasn’t fading. The voice still repeated its warning to stay away—it was U-ri’s consciousness that was fading—she slipped and fell—

  “U-ri!”

  It was Ash. A long arm reached out, grabbed U-ri by the collar, stopped her fall. But U-ri’s arms flew up over her head and she slipped easily out of the vestments of protection.

  “Lady U-ri!” Sky’s anguished cry receded into the distance. U-ri was falling, falling, falling—down and down into the darkness.

  It seemed she would never hit the bottom. If this darkness even has a—

  Then she broke free, out of the bottom of the darkness into the light. Color returned to her eyes as the world took shape around her. And she was still falling.

  “Waaaugh!” U-ri screamed. No—that’s not me, it’s Aju. The little mouse was clinging desperately to her hair. Every hair on his body stood straight on end, and his tail whipped through the air above them. “Fly, U-ri, fly!”

  “Fly? How?”

  They were up in the air, at about the level of the clouds. They passed through the cotton candy swirl of one cloud, falling ever downward.

  “Wave your arms like you’re swimming!” Aju squealed. He began rapidly reciting a spell. It was a silly-sounding spell, with lots of da’s and pa’s—but he chanted it with an intensity she had never seen in him before.

  “—handanaranipa, ujrawitika, nadapamun-dpamurupa!”

  It sounded so comical, U-ri found herself laughing. How can I laugh at a time like this? I’m falling to my—

  But she wasn’t falling now. U-ri was floating through the air. She was soaring, flapping her arms like a bird. She passed through a ragged cloud. Yipes, that’s cold!

  “Whew, we made it.” Aju breathed a sigh of relief, still clinging with all four paws to U-ri’s hair. His own fur seemed to have settled down. “We’ll just fly like this for a bit, nice and slow. We’ll have to pick an inconspicuous place to make our landing.”

  Beneath them was a town, one of those beautiful, European-style places she had only seen on television and on postcards. The houses were white, with red triangular or slanted blue roofs. Glittering towers rose from stonework manses. There were wide parks with bubbling fountains. Cobblestone streets ran between the buildings, and here and there stood small copses of trees. A large river flowed nearby, quietly reflecting the blue sky. A bridge traced an elegant arc over the water, and she spied a horse and carriage crossing it.

  “We came out way too soon,” Aju was muttering. “Look over there. That’s the mountain with the Katarhar Abbey ruins.”

  He yanked at her bangs, directing her eyes off to the left. Sure enough, rising from the beautiful pastoral scenery below was a dark, clouded mountain. It was not much taller than the foothills surrounding it, but its sides were covered thickly with trees, so thick they seemed to jostle for the sunlight. They looked like pines, with pointed tops and dark foliage, lending the mountain a shadowy, jagged aspect. Here and there, bare cliff faces stood out from the forest, as though some giant beast had taken its claws to the mountainside to leave gaping scars where no trees grew.

  She spotted a narrow road that wound up the mountain toward the peak. At the end of the road, she thought she saw something like a gray wall. U-ri flailed her arms, trying to get closer, but it seemed her powers of flight were not on par with a bird’s after all. The more she thrashed, the more altitude they lost.

  She could make out details in the town below now. Flower boxes outside of windows in which red and yellow blossoms bloomed. There were people in the streets. And shops. Carts carrying goods rattled to and fro, and the sound of music rose up from somewhere. It resembled a church organ—and there were children singing in a chorus. Maybe there’s a school nearby?

  “This is a much bigger place than Kanal. Richer too by the looks of it.”

  “Yeah, I can smell a confectionery,” Aju said, his nose twitching at a sweet scent on the air.

  “What a different place. There are flowers everywhere.”

  “We have to take care who sees us. Let’s land over in the forest, U-ri.”

  With Aju’s guidance, U-ri shifted her body just so, avoiding the trees as they landed.

  She could tell immediately they weren’t out in the wilderness. Tiny paths crisscrossed through the trees, and there were guideposts at some of the intersections. U-ri went up to one, but she couldn’t read the writing at all.

  “U-ri!” Aju hissed, “don’t stand out in the open like that.”

  U-ri quickly ducked beneath some shrubs off to the side of the path.

  “Without your vestments of protection, you just look like a Japanese schoolgirl.”

  U-ri heard someone talking beyond a nearby tree. U-ri pressed herself down beneath the bushes. Footsteps approached. It was two women, each carrying a basket, walking slowly along. They wore aprons over long skirts and blouses with puffy sleeves. Their hair was bound on top of their heads and wrapped in white lace. The women smiled as they talked.

  Well, they look happy, but I can’t understand the slightest bit of what they’re saying.

  Without her vestments of protection, she couldn’t read or understand the local speech.

  “This is bad, Aju,” she whispered to the little mouse, feeling a panic come over her. This is no time for gazing at scenery and taking leisurely walks in the woods!

  “Just calm down. Leave it to me.”

  Aju hopped onto the ground by her feet and began to whisper a spell. The words of enchantment sounded like the rustling of leaves.

  U-ri felt a cold wind sweep around her, and when she looked down, she found that she was wearing the same clothes as the two women. Even her hair looked the same. The only differences were that instead of an apron, she wore a vest, and where the women had worn leather sandals, she wore boots.

  A small purse hung down over one shoulder. It was cute. “I’ll give you marks for fashion sense, Aju.”

  Aju grinned triumphantly, pink nose in the air. “Not bad if I dare say so myself.” He looked proud, U-ri decided, even though with him on the ground like that, I could very well step on him by accident.

  “You fit in now.”

  “But what about the language?”

  “Just talk normally. They’ll think you’re a foreigner or some such. You can use gestures—show them you were traveling with your parents, but you got separated. Wave your arms around a bit and they’ll see you’re lost.”

  U-ri frowned. “You sure that’s going to work?”

  “’Course it will. Some kind person will show you the way to Katarhar Abbey, no problem.”

  “I’m not sure I'd be able to follow directions even if they did tell me.”

  “But I’ll understand, and I can interpret for you. As long as you look the part, everything will be fine.”

  U-ri nodded, then quickly shook her head. “No, Aju, wait. I’ve got a better idea. Why don’t we just
fly again?”

  Aju chirped irritably, beating his little paws on the ground. “Come on, have you no idea why we’re in this fix to begin with? No? U-ri?”

  “I remember we were flying—and then we fell.”

  “Because we hit a magical barrier, U-ri. It canceled out the power of your glyph and knocked us out of the air. Someone at Katarhar Abbey doesn’t fancy you dropping in on them.”

  U-ri remembered the voice shouting for her to stay away. “You must not come any closer!” the voice had said.

  “Or maybe it wasn’t you but your glyph they didn’t want getting any closer. In any case, we won’t be able to use magic to get any nearer to Katarhar Abbey than we are now. If you don’t believe me, just try. We’ll be knocked out of the sky as sure as the sun rises in the morning.”

  U-ri decided she would give that one a pass. She didn’t fancy slamming into any more invisible walls anytime soon.

  “But what about Ash and Sky? Did they fall somewhere too?”

  “No idea,” Aju squeaked, his face looking as stern as a field mouse’s could. “We might’ve been wrong to trust him as much as we have.”

  “You mean Ash?”

  The mouse nodded, his beady red eyes glowing brightly.

  Maybe he’s mad.

  “I wonder what he’s after.”

  “What he’s after? Isn’t he a wolf?”

  “Just because he’s a wolf doesn’t mean we can trust him, U-ri. He might be working for the enemy. He could be a spy!”

  A spy! U-ri hadn’t even thought of that. She almost laughed, then stopped herself. Aju was dead serious.

  “But, you know, I think Ash tried to save me when we hit that barrier. Didn’t you notice, Aju?”

  Aju frowned, and it wasn’t hard for her to read his expression. He had noticed it.

  “Besides, if he was planning something, why mention Katarhar Abbey to us at all? I’m sure he’s right. There’s a clue there that will help me find my brother.”

  “How do you know? He could’ve been lying.”