Page 35 of A Song of Ash and Moonlight

they can feel our hearts sing.

Oh yes, come down,

come down, come down,

come down, come down.”

Brilliant magic coursed through me as I sang, brighter and stronger with each word. When I stopped at last, the silence was deafening, almost physical.

I looked around, blinking back the glittering haze of magic, and saw that my father and Alaster had stopped fighting and now lay prone on the floor, not unconscious but near enough. They stared at the ceiling, their eyes open wide and their mouths moving in an echo of the words I’d sung. Everyone else in the room was either crying, tears streaming down their faces, or smiling insipidly at me—except for Gemma, who was helping Lady Enid back to her seat, and Ryder, who was corralling the servants. They’d gathered at the doors to gawk and weep. Even Gareth dashed a hand across his face, and he’d heard me sing more often than anyone else present.

The sight of their awe exhausted me, and the idea that my power had grown in might and beauty since our journey to the Old Country to save Talan made me feel sick. Now the sound of my music could leaveGarethundone? What would be expected of me in the days to come? If there were evils to be fought, would I be forced to sing again and again, even when I didn’t want to, reducing everyone I met to a blubbering heap on the floor? And what if, someday, my music rendered its hearers comatose, or even killed them?

I looked at my father and Lord Alaster, glared down at them as coldly as I could manage with so much burning, angry fear roaring through me. “You both disgust me,” I said to them, my voice coming out choked and hard. “Grown men acting in such a way, with no sense in your heads and certainly no shame.” I took a deep breath; I could feel Gemma watching me, and Ryder too, and suddenly felt so blisteringly sad for us that my throat ached around a sudden fist of tears.

“None of your children asked to be born into your war,” I said quietly, “and yet we’re the ones doing all the work to end it.”

I turned around to leave, afraid to look back at the men on thefloor lest I discover that my words had done nothing but fall inert at their feet. Let them clean up their mess on their own, I decided; my bed was calling me, and the smell of the firebird’s smoke lingered in my nose. I wanted nothing more than to sleep. But just as I started walking toward the doors, a sudden cry made me turn.

Gentar Barthel was rushing at me, his arms outstretched, a look of anger and desperate need on his face. I knew that look; my music had its hooks in him. I’d seen it before on dozens of faces, hundreds, as the audience swarmed the stage to claim me and my music as their own. I froze at the memory, my body gone cold and stiff, helpless.Run, my mind commanded me, but I couldn’t obey. I was fourteen years old again, and the world was tearing itself apart right before my eyes.

Then, before Gentar could reach me, Ryder darted between us and launched his fist right at Gentar’s face. The man fell back, caught by Gareth before his head could smack the floor.

Ryder stood over him, fists clenched, ready to strike again if need be. His whole body vibrated with anger, his eyes were bright with tears, and when he looked back at me, I saw the telltale signs of wonder on his face. He couldn’t quite disguise it quickly enough, though he’d certainly tried.

My song had gotten to him, just as my music did to everyone, everywhere. Ryder Bask was no different than all the rest. I shouldn’t have expected anything else; after all, my performance at the Bathyn tournament earlier that summer had propelled him toward the stage like a madman. It wasn’t his fault; it was unfair to be disappointed in him.

I swallowed a tired sigh and felt myself pulling inward, my shoulders tensing. Knots burned at every stiff joint.

“We should go to Rosewarren in the morning,” I said quietly, to Ryder and Gemma and Gareth. I ignored everyone else. They were the only ones who deserved my attention. “We’ll meet with the Warden,tell her what we saw. If anyone knows what a firebird is, it’ll be her. And we can meet with her in person about Alastrina, and Dornen, and…”And anyone else who’s been taken, I thought, not daring to say it. I swallowed hard. “And I think…”

I paused. I hated the words I was about to say, hated what heartache they might awaken in Gemma, but it seemed irresponsible to delay this moment any longer. Guilt flared up inside me; at least three of Ryder’s letters had mentioned this very thing, but I’d thrown them away without replying, too frightened by my own memories of that awful night in the Old Country to do what needed to be done.

“I think it’s time to examine the Three-Eyed Crown,” I said. “It’s been hidden at Rosewarren for weeks, but it should be at the university. It should be studied. It may hold the key to”—I waved my hand—“whatever all of this is.”

Another word I refused to say:Kilraith. But it hung between us nevertheless, giving a dread weight to the air. Were these machinations his doing? Anointed humans vanishing from their homes, the queen’s palace compromised…

I met each of their eyes—Ryder, Gemma, Gareth. Ryder nodded curtly at me, his profile largely in shadow. I ached with too many things to name. I hurried upstairs, my boots crunching on shattered plates and ruined supper. That night, I dreamed of fire, but I didn’t know if it was Ivyhill that burned, or a bird-woman dashing through a dark wood.

***

The Basks had at least one greenway on their property, which led not directly to Rosewarren but rather to Devenmere, one of the little villages dotting the Mist’s northern border. From there, we would travel to the nearby Order fortress of Thorngrove, and their greenway would take us to Rosewarren, and to the Warden, and—I hoped—to Mara.

But when we arrived in Devenmere the next morning, we emerged into utter chaos. Fires burned everywhere I looked; the air was thick with smoke, and the sky above us teemed with flocks of birds wheeling about in confusion. There were terrible noises, great piercing shrieks, coming from somewhere,everywhere—I couldn’t make sense of them.

Ryder took one quick look at it all and then raced toward the biggest fire, maybe one hundred yards away. We followed—Gemma, Gareth, Father, Lord Alaster, Gentar Barthel, Lady Leva, and I. Thank the gods our healer had come; Lady Leva found someone moaning on the ground in a bundle of singed clothes and immediately set to work on them, drawing stoppered vials from the belt she wore around her waist and murmuring spells of healing.

Ryder was talking to a fierce-eyed old woman, her wrinkled face covered in soot and sweat. I walked toward them in a daze, shivering, and loathing the roar and heat of the fire. I searched the inferno for a bird of blue flame. Past the fire loomed a silver wall, seething and shining.

The Middlemist.

“They came all at once, three of them bursting out of the Mist,” the old woman shouted. “They killed seven of us before we could even start to fight back. We lit a fire as quick as we could along the Mistline to keep any more from coming out. But our Anointed, our Lords Wynn and Moris, they’re gone, Lord Ryder. They disappeared right out of their garden. My own Hari saw them vanish right after a strange shadow swept through the village. And the Order, they haven’t come.”

Those last words turned me cold, even though the air shimmered with heat. I looked to Gemma just as wood and glass exploded behind us. We whirled to see a huge beast standing in the mess of a ruined cottage: the bulbous head of a lizard, huge muscular shoulders crested with black fur, deadly curling claws on its feet, a bear’s hulking furry body, a lion’s whipping tail.

A chimaera.

It glared at us with clever yellow eyes, then shook its head viciously from side to side, and I saw with a wrench of absolute horror in my gut that there was achildin the creature’s jaws, bloody and limp, quite obviously dead.

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