Fireborne (THE AURELIAN CYCLE Book 1)
Fireborne: Chapter 17

ANNIE

Back at the Palace, we unsaddle Aela and Pallor in their nests, and walk together up the aurelian corridor of the caves. The entrance of the Firemouth glows distantly, several bending corridors out of sight, and torches light the way along the route. Though I remain empty of words, I replace myself reaching for Lee’s arm, wrapping my own inside it, and he returns the pressure.

And then we round a corner, and replace Power and Darius waiting for us in the cave corridor’s torchlight.

“Hello, my lord,” Power says to Lee.

He’s grinning from ear to ear, his eyes full of a cruel, frenetic energy that I associate with his spillovers.

For an instant the four of us stand frozen. And then we move. Lee and I raise our wrists to our mouths to summon; Darius launches himself at Lee, knocking his wrist aside before it can reach his mouth. Power has me on the ground in seconds; larger and stronger than me by half, it’s easy for him to fold me over and twist my arms behind my back. I hear a soft click as he removes my wristband.

Three feet away, Lee struggles against Darius with an animal ferocity I haven’t seen in him since Albans; Darius’s grip on his summoning arm is loosening inch by inch as Lee pummels him with his free fist. Then Power speaks.

“Give him your wristband or I’ll break her arm.”

I’m not prepared for the sudden pain that shoots up my arm as he twists it, and I don’t hold back the cry. Lee’s eyes fly to my face. Though he’s momentarily gotten the better of Darius, he freezes.

“Nothing personal, Annie,” Power breathes in my ear. “For the sake of Callipolis, you understand.” He raises his voice. “It’ll be easy, Lee.”

He twists harder; I inhale in spite of myself.

Lee releases Darius, unclasps his wristband, and holds it out. Darius snatches it.

“Hands behind your back.”

Darius produces a length of rope, which he uses to tie Lee’s hands together. When he’s hauled Lee to kneeling on the cave floor, Darius takes a step back. Lee’s jaw is clenched, his eyes staring so hard, they’re white-rimmed.

“That’s better. Trade, Darius.”

I’m passed from one boy to the other like a sack of grain, then Power steps away when Darius has confirmed his grip on my arms. Power’s eyes rake over Lee, kneeling before him with his hands bound.

“So. All these years. When I thought you were a self-satisfied, superior piece of shit—turns out I was onto something. Golden Boy is just a little too golden.”

Lee’s teeth are gritted. “Where is the letter?”

“Oh, I’ve got it. Ready to hand over along with you,” Power says, smiling. “But we’re in no rush to do that, Lee.”

Darius shifts, though his grip on my arms remains firm. “Power, I don’t know if—”

“Scared to hit a dragonborn, Darius?”

I can feel Darius’s swallow against the back of my head.

Lee’s eyes flit from the faces of the two boys to me. His voice comes out a growl. “You want to stay down here hashing out schoolyard grudges, fine. But you have no grievances with Antigone; let her go.”

Power lets out a delighted bark of laughter.

“So she can spill the beans to Atreus and cut our party short? I don’t think so. And who says it’s schoolyard grudges? Maybe I’m just feeling patriotic. Giving one last dragonborn what they should have got on Palace Day—”

Lee twitches. Power sees it and laughs again, softly. Then he demands, like the thought is of passing interest to him now that it occurs:

“Who are you, anyway?”

Lee’s chest rises and falls with the sound of his breathing.

“Stormscourge, I’d say,” Power goes on, his eyes narrowing as he studies Lee more carefully. “Must be, those eyes.”

His gaze slides on to me, like a dragon tracking new prey. As if he senses my every nerve going on end at the sound of the truth exposed.

“And you’ve known it all along, you lying, traitorous bitch.”

Lee flinches on the last word; Darius’s arms tighten against mine to the point of pain, as if he’s worried I’ll be galvanized to make a renewed attempt for freedom.

“So who is he?” Power demands of me.

At my silence, Power nods to Darius, and Darius tightens still further. And then the ratcheting pain in my arms trips into something else.

I can feel Aela.

She’s almost out of reach; the aurelian nests are far down the corridor, and the cave walls are thick. But faintly, she is there. And her awareness is wakening to my pain.

Aela, please. Hear me. Come to us.

“Who is he?” Power says.

Lee’s face has screwed up as he waits for the first blow.

I raise my chin, and though it sends renewed pain through my twisted arms, I plant my feet to straighten. Because these words will be not for Power but for Lee, and right now, it’s all I have to give him.

“He is Lee sur Pallor, Firstrider of Callipolis.”

Lee’s eyes close, his breathing quiets, and his clenched jaw spasms as he swallows.

But it is my face, not Lee’s, that Power watches. His smile becomes soft and cruel.

“Remind me of your dragonlord’s name, Annie?” he whispers.

At my silence, the corridor stills. Darius’s grip on me has gone slack.

“Leon, wasn’t it.”

Lee’s eyes are still closed, like he’s willing himself to shut everything happening out, but the ripple that goes through him is enough. Power’s eyes glitter with a malicious mirth.

“Well, that’s an interesting twist.”

Aela, please—

Power turns from me, seizes Lee by his hair, then forces his head back.

“Tell me, Lee. Were they punished for it? The ones who were there at the end?”

Lee’s eyes have snapped open. They fix, with hatred, on Power’s face.

Power’s smile grows. He leans forward, his mouth next to Lee’s ear. “I thought not.”

And then he slams his fist into Lee’s gut.

Lee grunts. The force of the impact makes him lurch sideways. But before he can fall, Power seizes his shoulders, steadying him. Then he hits Lee again.

And again, and again. Lee begins to wheeze and splutter, not given enough time to breathe between blows—Power is laughing as he begins to pant from exertion—Lee dry-heaves—

Then, from above us, comes a blaze of light.

Aela.

Dragonfire fills the cavernous corridor, illuminating its soaring ceiling. The source of that fire is Aela, her wings outspread as she descends. She lands to my right.

Power freezes; I wrench myself free of Darius’s slackened grip and he doesn’t attempt to regain it.

My voice is shaking but strong.

“As Alterna of the Callipolan Fleet,” I tell Power, “I command you to unhand Lee. Make a move to summon and Aela will fire on you where you stand.”

As Power releases his grip on Lee’s shoulders and Lee slumps, disoriented from pain, I catch him with one hand.

“The letter,” I demand, from Power.

Power produces it and I pocket it, not taking my eyes off him.

“Wristbands.”

They hand us back our own, and then I say: “And yours.”

Power balks. “You can’t be serious.”

“For assaulting a fellow rider and a superior officer? For obstructing justice? I’ll have both of you court-martialed.”

“They’re not going to court-martial us for mistreating a dragonborn,” Power spits.

Aela bares her teeth and inhales, and Power decides not to argue further.

The bands click softly as they’re unclasped; one by one, Power and Darius hand them over to me. I reach down, replace the knot in the ropes binding Lee’s hands, and yank it loose. I fit my own wristband back on my wrist, then Lee’s on his. But he’s still too winded to stand and remains on the ground, gasping as he leans against me. It’s unnerving to feel the weight of his head, his shoulder, against my thigh.

I look down at this boy, vulnerable, at my mercy, and think, To the ends of the earth I will protect you.

“Lee,” I murmur. “Tell me what you want me to do.”

Tell me if you want to run.

My fingers are in his hair, feeling his shaking.

But his voice, when he speaks, is sure. The tone of someone issuing a final command.

“Take me to Atreus.”

***

Aela escorts the four of us to the Palace entrance to the caves. I support Lee, my arm hooked tightly against his, Darius and Power in front of us. After we’ve left Aela and the caves behind, we make our way through the near-empty Cloister to the Inner Palace. In the anteroom of the Protector’s office I turn to the two members of the crimson-clad Protector’s Guard, stationed on either side of the door.

“Please ensure that Power and Darius do not leave this room.”

Then I remove my arm from Lee’s side, steady him as he sways, and hand him Julia’s letter.

I follow him into Atreus’s office.

Atreus is waiting, seated, at his desk. He takes in Lee’s disheveled appearance and our harrowed faces. Even though Power and Darius landed no blows on exposed skin, the indications of a recent beating are apparent enough. Atreus straightens at once.

Lee crosses the office to the desk, his movements still a little stiff. He hands over the letter and stands silently while Atreus reads it. When Atreus looks up, his face rippling with confusion, Lee speaks. For the first time in my memory, he uses fluent, colloquial Dragontongue.

“I am Leon’s youngest son. Ten years ago, you spared my life.”

Atreus’s eyes widen ever so slightly, then his expression smooths again. But the emotion that is left on his face is, unmistakably, pain.

Lee sees it, swallows, and plows forward.

“For the past few months, I’ve been in contact with my cousin, Julia Stormscourge, Firstrider of the Pythian Fleet, who has repeatedly sought my support for the Pythian cause. I have repeatedly refused her. You have in your hands our most recent correspondence.”

Atreus’s eyes flicker down to the note in his hands, then back to Lee.

“Why do you confess this?”

“To ask for mercy, and to plead my case.”

***

I wait outside, in the anteroom with Power and Darius, while Lee tells Atreus the rest. Lee doesn’t emerge until late morning. When he does, he speaks to me without acknowledging the presence of Darius or Power at all.

“I told him everything. He wants to question you now. I’ll replace you after—”

And then Lee looks down: One of the Protector’s Guard has placed a hand on his arm. The arm with the summoning whistle on its wristband. Though the guard doesn’t exert pressure, the gesture conveys a clear meaning.

Lee begins to shake again, this time violently. Looking at him, I replace the memory of an old lesson from Callipolan history class returning to me, unbidden: that when, toward the end of the Red Month, the revolutionaries made their dragonlords hand over their summoning whistles, it was the beginning of the end.

We were always taught to think of that moment as a glorious turning point, but now I realize how differently Lee must remember it.

Lee unclasps his wristband and offers it to the guard. Power and Darius, seated across the room, look on avidly. The guard takes it, and his hand remains on Lee’s arm.

“If you’ll come with us, now,” the guard says. And then he adds, more softly, as if some paternal urge overtakes him as he regards Lee’s trembling: “It’ll be all right, son. Just protocol.”

Lee stands frozen for a moment. Then he raises his head to look at me.

What hollow comforts were they given, I wonder, when this happened ten years ago, that I will unwittingly echo if I give comfort now?

So instead, all I tell him is: “I’ll replace you as soon as I can.”

Lee allows himself to be led away.

Power, sitting on the opposite side of the anteroom, catches my eye. “See?”

Instead of answering him, I raise my fist to knock on Atreus’s door.

***

Atreus sits across from me, still and silent, while I speak. I start at the beginning, with the fact that Lee’s father killed my family and that I’ve known about it for years. I tell him about Albans, everything I can remember, including the things Lee said that day we fought. He shows brief surprise, then, the faintest raised eyebrows, and they rise again when I describe our reconciliation.

I describe the months afterward, before the Choosing ceremony, when Lee took care of me—protecting me, feeding me, even holding me. The words come clumsily: I’m describing memories I’ve never discussed with anyone.

I tell him about our years in training, every detail I can think of to vouch for Lee’s character. I speak of Lee’s untiring efforts to coach the others, to keep Power in line, to prevent patrician kids from bullying lowborn riders, back when that was something anyone tried. I tell him about the care Lee has taken with his studies, the attention he pays to ideas of justice and virtue and all the things Atreus speaks about in class. The lines deepen around Atreus’s mouth and he nods, as if he, too, has seen this.

I tell him that for the past few months, Lee has been solicited by his family repeatedly and has, at each turn, refused them.

And then I tell them about going to see Holbin Hill with Lee this morning, how he asked to go, how he told me about Julia’s final offer, how in the caves we were confronted and assaulted by Power, and Lee asked not to be allowed the chance to run but rather to be brought to Atreus to make a confession.

Finally, I pull my mother’s necklace out of the neck of my uniform, show it to Atreus, and explain how I got it. It feels like I’m undressing before him. Surprise shows on his face again. It is unclear if he is surprised more by what I am telling him, or by the fact that I’m telling it.

“Your account is as remarkable as Lee’s,” Atreus says. “He described something incredible, and you have confirmed it.”

“He’s loyal to you,” I say. “He believes in you.”

“I’m not sure it’s me he believes in,” Atreus says. “In any case, thank you.”

As we rise, his tone becomes businesslike. “For the time being, please tell those who ask that Lee has been apprehended following charges of misconduct. Whatever more you choose to disclose to your fellow Guardians should remain within Cloister walls. Effective immediately, you are promoted to acting Firstrider and fleet commander.”

A month ago, it would be a promotion I dreamed of, and a month before that, one I didn’t dare to dream of. Today, it comes as a blow.

Acting, I reassure myself. He said “acting.”

“What about Power and Darius?”

“I will speak with them next.”

***

I set a meeting in the oration room for the evening, before dinner, where I’ll debrief the corps. In the meantime, I cross-reference schedules, and at the hour I know everyone I need will be free, I round up the ones I’m most sure I can rely on: Crissa, Rock, Cor, Lotus, and Duck. In the classroom that’s become the fleet commander’s office—which I refuse to think of as mine—I tell them the full version of what happened, rather than the one I’ll present to the corps later today. That Lee’s been apprehended, that Power and Darius made an attempt at vigilante justice and are currently being questioned by Atreus, that Lee is in the stockade, because—

“Because Lee is the son of Leon Stormscourge,” Rock repeats.

“Yes.”

Here’s where they’ve grown incredulous. But I’m determined to talk it through with the riders I rely on most. Not just for their loyalty to Lee: for their standing in the corps. And I want to give as much time as I can for them to grow accustomed to this truth.

“The dragonlord Leon Stormscourge?” Rock presses.

“Yes.”

The office feels crowded with so many people inside it, the low ceiling beams even lower. I’m standing behind the desk, Lee’s chair vacant beside me; the five of them are gathered in a loose ring around it, some leaning against the walls, some sitting. Rock sinks down into a chair, curses loudly and then, to my surprise, says, “This explains so much.”

“What are you talking about?”

Rock’s calloused hands open in a shrug. “He was always just so—”

“Good at everything?” Lotus suggests, from where he leans against the locked door, his arms folded.

“Yeah . . .”

Cor is hunched in the other chair, bent over his lap. He speaks for the first time since I’ve told them. “And now we know why.”

I feel the beginnings of frustration prickle.

“Don’t do this,” I tell them. “Lee earned his place, just like the rest of us.”

“Yeah,” says Rock dubiously, “but it must have been—easier for him.”

Although it’s a thought I’ve been grappling with for years, I’ve no patience for it now. “It wasn’t easier for him.”

“Yeah, really? Name one thing that wasn’t.”

Crissa has been standing with her back partly turned to the group as she stares out the narrow window at the Cloister courtyard. “Palace Day,” she murmurs.

Panes of glass cast small squares of light across her face. It takes the rest of them a moment to understand her meaning. Cor lifts his head. “He wasn’t . . . ?”

I nod. “He was.”

“Oh, dragons,” says Cor quietly, placing his thumb and index finger against his forehead. “So all those nightmares—they were of—”

Cor’s bed has been next to Lee’s since we got here. It’s the first time I’ve considered what that would mean. Cor’s never spoken about it; none of the boys have. “Yes.”

It’s a moment before anyone speaks again. And then Lotus murmurs, “I always thought his Dragontongue was a little too good . . .”

It seems Lotus couldn’t resist remarking this aloud. Crissa, still looking out the window, allows a watery smile, like she appreciates the moment of levity. Rock just snorts.

“That’s what you’re thinking about, of all things?” Rock puts his head in his hands and lets out a groan. “I just realized . . . I taught a Stormscourge how to do collections. Lee’s uncle killed people I know.”

A noise of impatience escapes me, and I realize immediately afterward I shouldn’t have let it. It’s enough to catch Rock’s attention. He lifts his head from his hands and looks at me.

“No,” he says. “Leon—that wasn’t the one who—”

I nod.

“What’s going on?” Lotus says, looking between Rock and me.

Crissa exhales slowly but sharply, so that it makes a small sound: like the realization she’s made has caused her pain. Cor’s eyes narrow, like he too understands. I look past them all to Duck. He has eased himself onto the floor, his back against the wall, his knees drawn to his chest. He alone of them all doesn’t look surprised. I remember his expression, on Palace Day, as we listened to Lee vomiting and he asked nothing.

“Did you know?”

Duck stirs.

“I didn’t . . . know, exactly. But you and him, you’ve always been a little strange around each other.”

Crissa lets out an appreciative, shaky snort.

“That,” she mutters, “is an understatement.”

Her and Duck’s eyes meet. For an unsettling moment, they exchange a flash of understanding. Then Crissa turns from the window to face me. The silhouette of her golden hair glows against the light.

“How long have you known?”

There is a certain relief in coming clean with her at last.

“Almost as long as I’ve known him,” I tell her. “Stuff came up, at the orphanage . . .”

“He . . . told you?”

“No. It wasn’t like that. There were just—things.” I try to think of something other than the fight, or the fact that he used to ask for my help planning escapes to what I know, now, was New Pythos. “Like . . . he couldn’t really speak Callish when I met him.”

Rock lets fall an expletive. Cor’s fingers reach up to clutch his hair.

“It didn’t occur to you,” says Lotus, “to report him?”

“I didn’t think about it like that, I was just a kid . . .”

Rock says, “Let me get this straight. Lee is the son of Leon Stormscourge. That Leon Stormscourge. And you realized this. And it wasn’t a problem for you?”

I shake my head. “It . . . couldn’t be, not at the time.” And then, knowing they need more, I take a breath and explain. “He took care of me. The other kids . . . He made sure they didn’t take my food.”

It’s humiliating to admit this sort of thing to people I routinely beat in the air, and I can feel my shoulders draw together to confess it. I force them straight. If this keeps them on Lee’s side, I’ll say it.

Crissa’s mouth is working like she wants to cry. Lotus clears his throat, uncomfortable. Rock scrutinizes me, his eyes narrowed. Cor’s fingers continue to seize at his hair, his head still bowed. And Duck supplies, quietly, from the ground where he sits hugging his knees: “So you didn’t think about it.”

I nod. “I needed him.”

Cor tears his hands from his hair and bursts out, “Dammit, Lee.”

“And later?” Rock demands. “It didn’t occur to you, later, that him being a dragonrider wasn’t a good idea for Callipolis?”

Cor has raised his head to look at me, too. As if he, like Rock, is demanding an answer. And I realize that after years of friendship, of trusting and following Lee, even Cor is on the verge of dismissing him now that he knows the truth about Lee’s parentage. The realization fills me with fury.

“No,” I say, “it didn’t. Because there was never any reason to think it. And in the meantime, in case you’ve forgotten, he earned your trust, too. He was tutoring you after hours, Rock, so you wouldn’t get punished for lagging behind. And he was helping you keep the patrician riders in line, Cor, in case you don’t remember the stuff Goran was always turning a blind eye to. By the time Atreus made him squadron leader, he’d already started looking out for every single one of us.”

I glare around at them. Even in the dim light of the single narrow window, I can see them struggling to replace an objection.

“Look,” says Cor finally. “You don’t have to tell me Lee’s a good person. But this . . . isn’t about that.”

“It seems like it’s all it should be about,” I say.

“It’s not, Annie,” Rock says quietly.

I round on him.

“Even good people don’t get over things like Palace Day,” he says. “That’s just how it is.”

“Right,” Cor says, like Rock spoke for him.

“If people . . . if people did that sort of thing to my family . . .” Rock breathes in slowly, stares up at the wood-beamed ceiling, and clenches his fists. “I wouldn’t forget it, ever.”

Cor is nodding, grim-faced.

I think of this morning, of Lee’s face when I showed him the picture of his family, the shutters closing behind his eyes. “He hasn’t forgotten,” I say. “But that doesn’t mean he’s plotting revenge, either.”

I can tell from Cor’s and Rock’s expressions that they don’t think this is even possible.

“Look, Annie,” says Rock, and now he just sounds apologetic. “If that’s not why he’s here . . . then why is he?”

He means it as a rhetorical question.

But even as I understand this, and know that as far as Rock is concerned, Lee is already finished—I realize there’s an answer. I don’t think it’s one Lee himself would make, and it isn’t one I could ever put into words until this moment. But now that it comes to me, I am unshakably certain it is true.

“Atonement.”

Cor and Rock look at each other, then back at me.

“Lee knows what his father was. What he did. He’s known for as long as I have.”

But Cor has only returned his head to his hands, and Rock’s face has softened with what might be pity.

“Annie,” he says, “even if that were the case . . . how could it ever be proved?”

***

The stockade is in the lowest level of the military wing of the Inner Palace, lining the arena, where prisoners used to be kept awaiting execution by dragon. I’ve only been down here once before, when Duck and I were young and exploring. It seemed like a dark place, forsaken for good reason, and we never returned.

“Lee?”

“Here.”

I hold the lantern against the bars and peer in. The cell is tiny, its unpaned window letting in the cold air from the arena. Lee is lying on a cot in the corner. He pushes himself up onto one arm and looks at me with a hand shielding his eyes.

“What did Atreus say?” he asks.

“Nothing conclusive. I think he’s still . . . deliberating.”

He has, since I’ve left him, been stripped of his uniform and provided with a tunic and trousers. It’s the first time I’ve seen him in plain clothes since Albans, and my first thought is that they don’t suit him.

“I’ve brought you some stuff.”

“Oh . . . thanks.”

He rises and approaches.

“Ice,” I say, handing that over first. “And there’s a medical examiner coming to look at you in a bit.”

“It’s really not that bad—”

“I want him to be able to testify later.”

“They won’t care,” Lee says.

I hear it as an echo of Power’s goads, which have been resounding in my head during the few quiet moments I’ve had over the last hours. Were they punished? I tell him what I’ve been telling myself. “That’s not true. The Palace Day perpetrators were locked up, they were executed, I checked ages ago—”

Lee’s face is startled at first and then, at once, guarded.

He clarifies: “I meant they won’t care because of the concerns for national defense. They can’t afford to confine sparked riders, especially not one in the Fourth Order. Power’s too valuable.”

Then Lee clears his throat and adds, softly:

“He didn’t say anything I haven’t already had to think about for years, Annie. Don’t worry about that.”

He turns from me, slightly, pulls his shirt up, and holds the bag of ice against his abdomen. I stare at the web of burn scars across his back that don’t entirely mask a different, older web of scars beneath. The ones he has never, not even in Albans, talked about.

The day, its disaster, lies shattered around us. All at once the only thing I want is to rewind: to yesterday, to hours ago, before everything went wrong. Before I had to see Lee like this.

“I . . . told some of the others. Figured I’d better, in case Power . . . anyway. Duck, Cor, Rock, Lotus. And Crissa. No one else.”

Even with him turned, I’m able to see the knot of his throat move as he swallows.

“And they . . . ?”

“Some of them might need time.”

Lee nods rigidly.

“I’m acting fleet commander,” I go on. And add: “For the interim.”

The interim before—what?

But Lee doesn’t comment on this phrasing. Just says, “Good.”

“I’m . . . going to need to talk to you about that. At some point.”

I hear my voice do the thing I’ve been praying it won’t do, then: jump an octave, go shrill. Lee hears it too and stills. And then he lowers the ice from his stomach and turns back to me.

“Hey,” he says.

Only from Lee would such a simple phrase be enough to calm me like a caress.

“We can go over it now, if you want,” he says.

I nod, mortified by my swollen throat, by the fact that in such a moment Lee would be comforting me. Mortified by how much I need it.

“Do you have something to write with?”

I nod again.

We sit together on the stone floor of the stockade, separated by the bars, as Lee holds the ice to his stomach and talks while I take notes. He tells me about the duties he’s assumed as Firstrider—and then about more than that. Additional responsibilities he’s taken on over the years, while doing his rounds with the ministry and the military. He describes the contacts he likes to check in with, the quirks of each task, the extra measures he likes to take to ensure the jobs are done well.

Lee’s voice is contained, calm, steady throughout, even as my own breathing grows ragged.

When he’s finally told me everything he can think of, he hands me back the mostly melted bag of ice. He’s shivering, his leg damp from the ice bag’s dripping water. I pull the blanket I brought him out of my bag and pass it through the bars. He wraps it around himself, murmuring a thank-you. I hand him, one by one, the remaining contents: a pillow; matches; a lamp; today’s editions of the People’s Paper and the Gold Gazette; and his copy of the Aurelian Cycle, in the original Dragontongue.

His eyes close as he takes this last from me, like he’s receiving a benediction, and for a moment his fingers and mine touch over the book. Then the contact is broken, and we both get to our feet.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can—”

“You’ve done enough. You need to prioritize other things right now.”

I don’t argue with that.

“Is there anything else I can bring—?”

Lee starts to shake his head and then stops.

“I don’t know if he’d want to come. But . . . Cor?”

“He’s not ready yet, Lee.”

Lee’s swallows, his face rippling with the effort to remain calm.

“And . . . Crissa?”

As soon as he says her name, he catches himself, shrinking as if he fears my anger. But it’s not anger so much as sadness that settles over me, and not the kind he’s anticipating. Because there’s nothing so heartbreaking as the thought that, even in this way, he’s at my mercy.

I look at him, standing alone in a cold, dark cell to await whatever fate he’s offered himself up for, and I imagine how it would change, to have Crissa here, her laughter, her smile, her gentle humor a light in the darkness, her beauty something to blot out the barren ugliness of this place. Who am I to begrudge him the ways he’s found to escape his darkness? I’ve been escaping mine with Duck for years.

My heart swelled with love for him, I say:

“I’ll make sure she gets visitation rights.”

Lee, for the first time in our interview, looks close to losing control.

“Thank you.”

***

Crissa replaces me outside the oration room where I’m about to hold my first meeting as fleet commander. I’m surprised when her greeting has nothing to do with Lee.

“You ready?” she asks.

I nod, my stomach leaping, and Crissa touches my arm. She stands so erect, her golden hair cascading down her shoulders, that I have to lift my head to meet her eyes.

“When Atreus made me squadron leader,” she says, “the most important thing for me was confidence. Even if I didn’t feel it, I faked it. I faked it all the time. And eventually, I’d faked it so long, I convinced myself. That’s what you’re going to have to do, Annie.”

It’s as if she knew exactly the doubts that have been wriggling in my stomach. Before I can even think how to thank her for sharing such a thing, she’s stepped over the threshold of the oration room and left me to replace her seat.

Power is waiting for me inside the doorway. He makes a flourishing salute.

“Congratulations on your promotion, Commander.”

I stop dead.

“He let you off?”

Power shrugs. “Atreus gave us a slap on the wrist and suggested we keep our mouths shut for the time being. I’ll do my best.” He grins at me in a way that puts me on edge at once. Then he nods inside. “Better hurry. Looks like Goran’s already staging a coup.”

Goran has taken the rostrum, calling the room to order. At the sight of him, a weight like a stone thuds in my gut. I approach, watched by thirty of my classmates.

“I’ll take it from here.”

Goran looks at me.

“That’s all right, Annie, there’s no need.”

We stare each other down. I think of how he must see me, a sixteen-year-old peasant girl who doesn’t know her place.

Even when you don’t feel confident, you fake it.

I raise my chin, square my shoulders, and think of Aela.

And to my amazement, Goran steps aside. The corner of his lip raises and he makes a little shrug, as if to say, Suit yourself, if you want to make such a fuss about it.

I take his place at the rostrum. Then I turn to him.

“Thank you,” I tell him, “you are dismissed.”

Goran’s half smile flickers. But even he recognizes the reality of rank when it’s laid bare: He may be our drillmaster, but drillmasters do not outrank fleet commanders.

Without another word, he turns and leaves the room.

My classmates, watching us, have fallen silent.

Into that silence, I tell them that Lee has been apprehended on allegations of misconduct and is relieved of his duties until an investigation can be completed. I tell them that they will, in the meantime, take orders from me. Deirdre becomes acting aurelian squadron leader in my place.

I hold my shoulders back, speak from the diaphragm, and pace it slow. Like Crissa and I once practiced. And then, when I conclude with a call for questions, I intone it the way Lee does, down, like I’m not really asking at all.

Power raises his hand.

“I’ve got one,” he says. “If it looks like a Stormscourge, talks like a Stormscourge, and walks like a Stormscourge—is it a Cheapside slum orphan?”

***

The damage control after that takes hours. It’s only after Cor raises his voice at the Guardians interrogating me that I’m finally given a few moments’ peace; throughout the Cloister, groups are gathered in discussion. Cor and I lock ourselves in Lee’s office to confer.

“I’m backing you hard, as is Crissa, but you’re going to have to be ready for gossip,” Cor says. “Power’s telling everyone that you’ve been covering for Lee all along. And—he’s saying more than that.”

After being on the receiving end of Power’s birth-based slurs for the past seven years, I can readily imagine what more he’s saying than that.

“I don’t care what he says about me.”

“You’ve got to. You’re the fleet commander. And if you want them to hear your case for Lee, you’ll need their respect.”

Over the next few days, I hear whispers around the Cloister—theories about why I’ve stood by Lee, ranging from those that question my allegiance to those that say I’m a lovesick schoolgirl, to those that insinuate serving dragonlords is in my blood. The one time I overhear this last suggested, it’s Crissa’s voice that opposes it with fury.

“If I ever hear that you utter that old-regime blood-determinative bullshit again, I will report you.”

To my face, no one opposes me at all. In the meantime, I figure out how to do Lee’s job. Managing the details and the paperwork comes easily; for the rest, I use every trick I’ve learned from watching Lee and training with Crissa to project confidence. Aware of the murmured reservations of the corps—for me as a leader generally and now, specifically, as the supporter of a dragonborn—I’m conscious of the importance of showing them that I can do this job right. Not just for my sake, but also for Lee’s. Those who doubt me and those who trust me alike follow my orders without question, but I sense that the calm is temporary: It’s as though we all hang suspended as we wait for Atreus’s decision. And in the meantime, we hear nothing more.

Lee reads about two books a day, brought to him by Crissa, and less frequently by Lotus and Duck. Cor and Rock haven’t yet visited him. And I haven’t gone back. Lee’s right: I have other priorities, and I need to stay focused. I can’t when I’m thinking about Lee.

In the meantime, my time is consumed by organizing ration distributions, which are to take place on a rotating basis throughout the winter from depots at major population centers across the island. Schedules for distribution are based on class metals, with each class metal collecting their ration cards on different days. The Inner Palace hopes to minimize discontent by minimizing comparisons, though it’s acknowledged that people won’t remain blind to what’s happening forever. That’s where dragons will come in, General Holmes tells us, in his briefing to the corps. He doesn’t explain his meaning.

On the first day ration cards are distributed in the city, they’re given to class-irons in the center of Cheapside. Cor and I accompany it. The location and class metal were chosen by the Ministry of Propaganda, to be heavily featured in the People’s Paper the next day. The ration cards’ equivalents in bread and potatoes will be meager, even by Cheapside standards, but no one in this crowd complains. For them, the miracle is that the food will be free. Discontent will come later. When they begin to realize just how little they’ve been given, when they come to see what others have.

“How is he?” Cor asks.

We’re standing beside the ration distribution line off the center of the square, based out of the Cheapside guardhouse. The line winds around the square; guards are shouting at the crowd to have their left sleeve rolled up, ready to show their wristband. Aela and Maurana circle overhead.

“You could visit him,” I tell Cor.

Cor squints away from me, up at the old Cheapside dragon perch silhouetted in the autumn light, and says: “I can’t. I’m still too angry.”

“He’s still him, Cor—”

“I don’t know what that is anymore.”

When Atreus calls me into his office a week later, I’m relieved to replace he’s ready to discuss Lee’s situation at last. But then, with little to no preamble, he introduces the solution he’s considering. After he has described it to me, he says:

“I was not unmoved by your story, Antigone. And I believe—I am eager to believe—that you have certain insight into Lee’s character. I would like you to use this insight to help me now. This is a risk I would not undertake lightly, without substantial reason to believe it would go in our favor. So I am asking you what you think the outcome would be. Answer carefully, for you take the fortune of Callipolis into your hands.”

Though his solution does not, now that it faces me, feel surprising—in fact it feels as though it has been long coming, something I should have seen from the start—still, I am short of breath.

“Antigone?” he prompts.

“Do it,” I say.

I’m sorry, Lee.

LEE

On Crissa’s visits, we talk mostly about the newspapers, or books I’ve been reading, or the flying conditions, which I am able to discern through the window. But sometimes I ask her about the corps. About the others. About Cor.

“Does he believe Power?”

Crissa sits, cross-legged, on the opposite side of the bars, her hair glowing softly in the torchlight. Our hands are wound together in her lap. “No. Of course not. He’s stood by Annie from the start. Rock, too.”

Then why won’t they come?

“It’s hard for them, Lee.”

“It isn’t hard for you?”

Crissa pushes stray curls back from her face and shakes her head. “This? No. This isn’t hard for me.”

But as to what is hard, she doesn’t say. When the Protector’s Guard interrupts our visit to give me my summons to Atreus’s office, she kisses me on the mouth, in front of them.

“Go be good and brave, as you’ve always been.”

The guard escorts me to Atreus’s office on either side. I’m acutely conscious of the differences between now and the last time I was here: I’m no longer in uniform and my wrist is bare. Still, it’s good to stretch your legs after so many days in one room.

“Lee,” says Atreus gravely, gesturing at one of the ornate chairs facing his desk, “please sit.”

He nods to the guards to leave us, and then we’re alone. The glass wall overlooking the Firemouth spills afternoon light across his desk.

“Are you aware of what day it is?” Atreus asks.

I’ve been keeping track, so I give the date. Atreus nods.

“Do you know what will happen in a day’s time?” he asks.

I shake my head.

In answer, Atreus passes a piece of paper across the desk to me: the letter from Julia. In a day’s time, I realize, she’ll go to the Riversource and wait for me.

“You may already know that I have spoken to Antigone, as you requested. She confirms your story. You do seem to have led a life of . . . unusual allegiances.”

I wait. This seems to be a reprieve, of sorts, but it can’t be the end of it, or else we would have had this conversation a week ago, after she first spoke with him.

“Nevertheless,” Atreus goes on, “one cannot help having reservations. I believe you have attachments to Antigone, and she to you. Considering your background, it is remarkable; though considering the exigencies that threw you together, it is also understandable. I also believe—and am impressed by—the fact that you have sustained contact with, but continued to refuse, the family that reached out to you from New Pythos.

“But I’m also afraid that mere refusal of your family is not enough. I cannot risk Callipolis’s safety on the fact that you surrender me a letter and tell me you care about a girl whose family your father butchered. There is a war coming, Lee. Your family and their dragons will come again, by the end of this winter at the latest. When they come, every one of our sparked dragons will be integral to our defense. I need soldiers loyal to their City, I need Guardians loyal to an idea, and I need them ready to kill for it. In short, I need to know, not just that you can refuse those on the other side, but that you are ready to fight them. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” I say.

Here it is at last, I think. Tyndale’s question, on the table, to be pushed aside no longer. Julia’s ultimatum, about to be laid bare.

“Good,” says Atreus.

“What do you want me to do?”

I’m pretty sure I already know the answer, and when Atreus nods at the letter, I’m not surprised. Even so, the way he phrases it makes me flinch.

“I want you to take your dragon, meet their Firstrider, and return with two heads in a bag. If you can’t do that, don’t come back at all.”