The Sky Weaver Page 2

  Unless, thought Safire, he’s trying to taunt me.

  And then, suddenly, that young soldat’s lilting voice rang through her mind.

  How do you know it’s a he?

  Safire’s stomach twisted.

  She’d been in such a hurry, she’d thought nothing of the girl’s morion—which, now that she was thinking about it, was far too big for her and shielded half her face.

  But there were other things, too.

  The soldat carried no weapon, and she spoke with an unfamiliar accent. Safire had never heard a lilting voice quite like hers. It was almost . . . lyrical.

  Not to mention that rolled-up bundle tucked beneath her arm.

  Safire froze, thinking back to that bundle. The old, fraying threads. The considerable size.

  It was a tapestry.

  Her tapestry.

  The one Asha had given her.

  Safire sank down in her chair. “That thieving bastard.”

  Safire tripled the guards. She stopped leaving the palace and remained on patrol through the night. The next day, despite her vigilance, the king’s seal went missing from Safire’s drawer. The day after that, Safire left her rooms only to return and find every single one of her uniforms gone. And in their place? Scarp thistles.

  It was enough to make a person lose her mind.

  Safire now had a collection of the gray thistles sitting in a glass jar on the windowsill of her bedroom. When she was feeling particularly broody, she would lock herself in and glare at them for hours, trying to think of a solution to this infuriating problem.

  “I don’t think she’s a threat,” said Asha as she picked out a rock lodged in Kozu’s claw. The First Dragon stood over her like a shadow while Safire lay in the warm grass beside them, staring up at the indigo sky.

  Where they sat, the former hunting paths ended in a scrubby field surrounded by forest. To the north, a huge round tent was pitched, and between them and the tent several dragons prowled, all of them being trained by hopeful riders. Safire could hear the clicked commands from where she stood.

  These were the dragon fields. Asha hoped to build a school here—one that would simultaneously preserve the old stories while repairing the damaged relationship between draksors and dragons.

  “A thief who can walk through the palace halls completely undetected doesn’t sound like a threat to you?” Safire asked, her hands cradling her head.

  Asha set Kozu’s foot down, thought about it, then shook her head. “This one doesn’t.”

  Safire sat up and crossed her legs. “Please explain.”

  Kozu—an enormous black dragon with a scar through one eye—nudged Asha’s hip with his snout, as if to tell her something. But whatever passed between them was a mystery to Safire.

  “She sounds . . . bored,” said Asha, rubbing the First Dragon’s scaly neck. “Like she’s tired of being the cleverest person in the room. What if she’s provoking you because she needs a challenge?”

  Safire frowned at this. “Do you think I should give her one?”

  Asha left Kozu and came to sit in the grass. Her black gaze held Safire’s. “Can you? Right now she seems three steps ahead of you.”

  Safire bristled at this.

  Seeing it, Asha leaned forward. “All you need is to get one step ahead.”

  Propping her elbow on her knee, Safire rested her chin on her fist. “And how do you propose I do that?”

  In the rising heat, Asha began undoing the brass buttons of her scarlet flight jacket. Dax had it sewn especially for Asha, to mark her as his Namsara. As Asha shrugged it off, the buttons flashed in the sun and Safire leaned in, squinting, to find that each brass orb was impressed with the image of a flame-like seven-petaled flower—the namsara, Asha’s namesake.

  “These are the things you know about her,” Asha said, laying her new jacket down beside her, then ticking fingers off her burned hand as she spoke. “She’s brash—there’s no room in the palace she won’t break into. She steals things that have monetary value—the ruby, Dax’s seal. And she steals things that are valuable only to you—like the tapestry I gave you and your uniforms.”

  Asha leaned back, planting her palms on the red-brown earth beneath her. “So,” she said thoughtfully, looking out over the dragon fields, “what is the brashest, most valuable thing she could possibly steal from the king’s commandant?”

  They both fell silent, thinking.

  Safire didn’t have any valuables—other than maybe her throwing knives, which were a gift from Asha. She might have royal blood running through her veins, but there had been nothing royal about her upbringing. Safire didn’t like to think about the time before the revolt, when she was kept out of sight, forbidden to touch or even stand near her cousins, taunted and abused while the palace staff looked the other way.

  Just as she was shaking off the memories, a sound issued from across the field.

  It was a series of quiet, nervous clicks familiar to both Safire and Asha, who looked up. Across the grassy plain, away from the commotion of the dragons and their riders, a tall, thin boy with coppery hair and freckled skin made his way toward them.

  Torwin.

  Several paces behind Torwin walked an ivory-scaled dragon with one broken horn. He stepped warily, casting his gaze ahead and behind, looking like he would bolt at the slightest irregular movement. Safire knew this dragon. His name was Sorrow.

  Several weeks ago, while Asha and Torwin were collecting old stories in Firefall—a city west of Darmoor—they’d found this half-starved creature chained in the courtyard of a wealthy home, with an iron muzzle locked around his jaws. He’d been severely abused by the children of the house, who were keeping him as a pet.

  As a result, Sorrow let very few people get close. He stayed deep in the Rift mountains and never came near the city. Asha didn’t think he’d ever pair with a rider, because he was so mistrustful of humans. A few had tried, but the bond that normally formed in first flight never took.

  As Torwin stepped toward the two cousins, then sat down in the dirt next to them, Sorrow crept toward Kozu, whose hulking black form was curled in the sun, soaking up the warmth. Sorrow’s ivory scales were a sharp contrast to Kozu’s obsidian.

  “Everything’s packed,” said Torwin. He held a large knife in his hands, its silver sheath embossed with intricate star patterns. “If we leave at dawn, we should arrive before sundown.”

  Despite having just returned from Firefall, Asha and Torwin were flying to the Star Isles tomorrow. The reason for their trip was currently gripped in Torwin’s hands: the Skyweaver’s knife.

  The weapon had saved Roa’s sister a few weeks previous, and Roa now wanted it returned to where it came from. She believed it was too dangerous an artifact to keep here in Firgaard. So Asha and Torwin had gone through the accounts of the last man who’d bought it—one of Firgaard’s wealthiest barons—and tracked down its history to a place called the scrin.

  “If Roa wasn’t so insistent, I’d drop this thing to the bottom of the sea and be done with it,” said Torwin, sliding the blade out of the sheath just enough to reveal the silver-blue blade concealed within. He shivered. Looking up, he squinted through the sunlight. “Are you sure you don’t want to come with us, Safire?”

  “Come? To an archipelago known for its monsters, tempests, and ship wreckers?” Safire wrinkled her nose, thinking of the treacherous waters of the Silver Sea. “I think I’ll pass. Besides, Roa and Dax will be joining you in a few days.”

  The empress of the Isles—a fearsome woman named Leandra who was rumored to be deathless—wanted to present the new dragon king and queen with a gift. One that Leandra hoped would help the dire situation in the scrublands. As Dax’s Namsara, Asha had been invited to the empress’s citadel, too, but she’d turned down the invitation.

  I don’t have the time or the interest in rubbing shoulders with foreign monarchs, Asha told Safire when the invite came. That’s Dax’s role.

  “Someone has to be the responsi
ble one,” Safire said. “Someone has to stay behind to ensure this city doesn’t fall apart.”

  Those were her official reasons for remaining in the capital. But as she spoke them, she thought of the criminal prowling through the palace like it was her own personal playground.

  Safire would never leave Firgaard at the Death Dancer’s mercy.

  Torwin, as if sensing her thoughts, said, “Caught that thief of yours yet?”

  Sighing, Safire fell back into the grass. “No.”

  That was why she was here on the dragon fields. The king’s commandant was running from her own failure. She’d hoped to have the Death Dancer locked in a cell by now. Instead, the criminal continued to elude her.

  Sometimes she felt a . . . presence. In the middle of the day or the night. In the palace or in the street. Watching her. Trailing her. But when she turned, knife in hand, all she found was shadows. Sometimes, when she entered a room, she couldn’t shake the sense that her thief had been there just a heartbeat before. It felt as though they were playing a game of cat and mouse.

  Only Safire wasn’t sure who was the cat and who was the mouse.

  She needed to catch this Death Dancer. She wanted to see the look in the thief’s eyes when she locked her up for good.

  Once she did, she could go back to sleeping through the night.

  “Saf’s beginning to believe the rumors are true,” said Asha.

  Torwin shot her a look. “Rumors?”

  “They say the Death Dancer is uncatchable,” Asha explained. “That she’s half god, half shadow.”

  Safire closed her eyes, letting the sun warm her face as she thought of Asha’s idea. One step ahead . . . a trap was what she needed. But with what could she bait it?

  “Well,” Torwin said, “if anyone can catch her . . .”

  His voice trailed off. Safire waited for him to finish, but the silence continued. And then, even with her eyes closed, Safire felt it: a cold darkness sliding across her face. It smelled like musk and smoke.

  She opened her eyes.

  The dragon called Sorrow stood over her. Ivory scales. Broken horn. Black eyes staring down into hers.

  It amazed Safire how much sadness she always found in the depths of those eyes.

  Normally, her first instinct would be to reach for her knife. But Safire knew what it was like to be at the mercy of brutes. She knew the horrible things that had been done to this creature and how little it took to frighten Sorrow.

  So she lay still, forcing herself to relax.

  Beside her, Torwin and Asha were tense and silent.

  What they didn’t know was that when Safire couldn’t sleep, she liked to walk the hunting paths up into the Rift. Most often, they took her here—to the dragon fields. The fields were always bare beneath the stars, the riders gone, the dragons sleeping somewhere in the hilly terrain. All except one: Sorrow.

  With no one else around, Safire told the dragon stories. Not old stories, though. Not the myths of gods and heroes Asha was so good at, the ones the dragons liked best. Safire didn’t know many of those. Instead, she told Sorrow the stories that kept her up at night.

  She told him about being the daughter of an unlawful union and, as such, growing up forbidden to be touched. She told him about the revolt she helped lead—a revolt that put her cousin Dax on the throne. She told him about the day that same cousin made her his commandant.

  And then, whenever she finished telling a story, they played a game. It involved Safire stepping as close as possible, and Sorrow standing as still as he dared.

  Sorrow always bolted before Safire came close enough to touch.

  That was why, when Safire reached her hand slowly toward the dragon’s ivory snout now, she expected Sorrow to flinch and run.

  Except Safire hadn’t flinched when she’d opened her eyes. Hadn’t reached for her knife. And Sorrow sensed it—Safire’s instinct, as well as the suppression of it. Sorrow was doing the same now.

  The dragon trembled with the fear of being touched, but he didn’t run.

  When Safire’s fingertips touched the warm scales of Sorrow’s snout, her skin prickled. She felt the effort it took the dragon to keep himself still. Safire held her breath as more and more of her skin came in contact with the dragon’s scales. Soon, Safire cupped Sorrow’s snout and the dragon’s warm breath was moist on her palm.

  Sweet boy, she thought. How could anyone want to hurt you?

  And then, like the wind changing, Sorrow jerked away. Safire froze, but the dragon only lifted his head, turning into the wind. Sensing or smelling or hearing something Safire herself couldn’t. She sat up, looking where Sorrow did.

  Safire felt it then—that same feeling that haunted her footsteps through the palace: that tingling sense of being watched.

  Sunlight flickered through the dark green boughs of the forest’s edge, the trees bending in the wind.

  “What is it?” Asha whispered.

  Safire rose, striding toward the cedars, thinking of the Death Dancer. She was about to plunge into the pines when the strange pitch of her cousin’s voice stopped her.

  “Saf . . .”

  Safire turned to find both Torwin and Asha watching her with worried eyes. Only Sorrow still scanned the trees.

  “What?”

  “Some time away from Firgaard might be good,” Asha suggested. “It would only be for a few weeks. Surely your soldats are too well trained to let Firgaard fall to pieces in so little time.”

  Safire was about to point out that they themselves had led a revolt in less time, breaching Firgaard’s walls and dethroning the former king. But Torwin interrupted.

  “Come on, Saf,” he said, stepping toward her. “You haven’t been able to rest since Dax promoted you.”

  Safire hadn’t rested since long before that. She couldn’t afford to rest.

  “Come with us,” urged Torwin, throwing an arm over her shoulder as he smiled that half smile of his. “Have a little faith in your soldats. Let them catch this Death Dancer while we’re in the Star Isles. I’m sure when we return, she’ll be waiting for you in a cell.”

  Not likely, thought Safire as her fingertips tapped each hilt of her throwing knives. The feel of them, there at her hip, calmed her a little. And as she did, Asha’s question echoed through her mind.

  What is the cockiest, most valuable thing she could possibly steal from you?

  Suddenly, Safire knew the perfect thing to bait a trap for the Death Dancer.

  “I should get back,” said Safire, already thinking of a plan. Sighing loudly, Torwin dropped his arm. Safire looked from him to her cousin. “Be safe, all right? No flying in bad weather.”

  Asha nodded, then pulled her into a hug. Safire squeezed her back.

  When Asha let go, Safire turned to Sorrow.

  “And you be good,” she told the dragon.

  Sorrow only tilted his head, watching Safire back away through sad, silent eyes.

  “Good luck with that thief of yours!” Torwin called after her.

  Safire nodded, waving. The dried pine needles crunched beneath her feet as she headed for the hunting path. But as she made her way down through the Rift and toward Firgaard’s gates, she couldn’t shake the sense that someone was dogging her, keeping just out of sight.

  Whenever Safire turned to look, as ever, she found nothing but shadows.

  Three

  Go to Firgaard. Steal the king’s jewel. Report to Kor in three days.

  Those were Eris’s orders. The job was long since done now. And yet she hadn’t reported to Jemsin’s protégé: a pirate named Kor who who was in charge of Eris while Jemsin met with the empress.

  It was foolish. Way too risky. But after four days of playing games with the commandant, Eris wasn’t quite ready to give up. A raven had followed her through Firgaard’s streets earlier. Eris panicked at the sight of it until she realized its eyes were black, not red. That it wasn’t Jemsin’s summoner; it was just a boring old bird.

  Still, its
presence was enough to scare Eris. And her fear was a reminder: it was time to go.

  She had one last thing to do before she left. Because the commandant was right: Eris was a cocky bastard. And more than the triumph of eluding Safire was the pleasure that came with knowing just how furious Eris made her.

  The anger showed every time Safire spoke about her.

  Every time she thought about her.

  The knowledge of that brought Eris a rush of irrational pleasure.

  Eris smiled to herself now as she stood behind the terrace curtains of the commandant’s bedroom, keeping herself hidden. She knew the commandant’s routine by now. You didn’t creep through the palace without memorizing the movements of the person in charge of its security first. Eris knew when Safire retired for the evening. So she waited.

  But as she fingered the stem of the scarp thistle in her hand, tracing the thorns, she started to have second thoughts. Why was she still here? She should have headed straight for the sea after stealing that ruby. She should be heading for it now.

  She was four days late reporting to Kor’s ship, the Sea Mistress. She couldn’t stay here much longer. To do so was to tempt the captain’s wrath.

  Forget the knife, said a voice inside her. Step across now and head for the Sea Mistress.

  But something else—something stronger than her fear of Jemsin—rooted Eris to that spot behind the commandant’s curtain. Maybe it was nothing more than recklessness, but Eris wasn’t leaving until she got what she’d come for.

  There was a time when, tired of his abuse, she had tried to escape her captain. That was before she knew better. The first time Eris ran, she got as far as Firefall—a city on the south shore of the Silver Sea—before Jemsin’s summoner found her and dragged her back to his ship, the Hyacinth—where several lashes and a week without food or sunlight awaited her.

  She tried twice more. Both times, she was caught. Both times, her punishment was more severe than the last. She carried the scars still—on her wrists and ankles, and across her back.