Beneath Stained Glass Wings Read online

  A group of eight people wrapped in rough, burlap clothing scurry by, flooding about me until I’m pinned against a wall, curling my wings painfully tight against me. “I-is this smart, Carita?”

  She pauses, looking back. “Is what smart?”

  “They might…” How do you say something like this around so many people? “They might, you know, touch my other parts.”

  She raises her eyebrows.

  “You know what I mean!”

  “Then think quickly. Adapt. And if you get caught, I don’t know you.”

  Protests stutter from my lips, but she’s already headed down the street again, walking as if there isn’t anyone there, leaving me to be drowned in the crowd. Easy for her to say and do; she’s been living down here for who knows how long, and I just had to leave home.

  Not that I didn’t do that to myself.

  I shrink in on myself, trying not to draw attention to the way I stick to the walls, creeping along after her, trying to keep my eyes on her head of hair amongst all the blacks and browns. It’s a bigger crowd than there ever was in Caelum. It makes me so small, insignificant, easy to be crushed in.

  As she almost bobs out of sight, my wings cramping and my heart pounding, we turn a corner and it opens up, the sky widening. It’s like I can breathe again, and I hadn’t known I was suffocating.

  The people disperse and wander through the huge area and…there’s color. This dead place is suddenly alive with more shades and splashes of color than a rainbow can produce. Stalls of all shapes and sizes are scattered over the wide space as far as the eye can see, and a few people are walking around with goods to sell, too. Fabrics, meats, animals, and fruit! I didn’t know this many varieties even existed. The smells rush through me, the warm scent of wool, the spike of sharp spices, the musk of a multitude of people sweating in the desert sun.

  Carita returns and grabs my hand, towing me into the place.

  “You remind me a bit of myself, when I fell.” She says it so quietly, I almost wonder if I was meant to hear.

  I try to focus on her, not the people and stands flying by us. “What do you mean?”

  “Hopelessly clueless, jaded by the dragons.”

  I can’t imagine her as anything not harsh and vicious, anything like me. “If you were so jaded, why did you fall? What did you do to betray them?”

  She stops, turns toward me, and twists my arm just enough to make it painful. “I’ll answer that if you answer me: what did you do that made you fall?”

  I try to tug away, but her grip is iron. Sweat beads on my forehead, and I can’t look away from her eyes staring deep into mine. She can’t know. No one can know. I won’t let them hand me over to the dragons. I will not leave Vito.

  “You’re close to him, closer than any dragon and illusionist should be. But if it were just that, you wouldn’t look like a rabbit about to bolt. The alarms in Caelum wouldn’t have gone off for something so simple.” She leans in a little closer. “I’ll figure out the secrets you try to hide, birdie, whether it’s now or later.”

  Despite my legs quivering below me and the shakiness to my lungs, I grab her arm with my free hand, digging my fingers in and glaring at her. There’s a threat in that statement, bigger than she could ever know, and I won’t let her treat me like I am nothing when I have something left to fight for. “You can ask and threaten all you want, but you will not and cannot make me talk.”

  For a moment, she stares. Then she laughs, making me jump, and lets go of me. “You really are something, birdie.”

  She shakes her head, starting to walk away.

  I scramble to catch up, my legs still a little flimsy underneath me. I don’t know how I could ever be anything like her. It makes me all too curious about her past, but not enough to pay her price.

  She glances over her shoulder, making sure I’m following, then starts speaking like that conversation never happened. “Mercatus is the largest market of the kingdom under the city in the sky. We’re near the border here, so we get travelers from around the world and a little more freedom than other territories under Caelum—though they more than make up for that with taxes. The locals make most of their trade from the creatures that somehow thrive here, so you’ll see quite a few ground-dweller hunters and farmers among our people. But nearly everyone else is from somewhere foreign.”

  There’s no doubt about that; a woman passes by me with red—red!—hair. A few people have skin that’s nearly white. Not many have skin darker than mine, save for one woman, her skin dark as night. Despite Carita’s brisk pace, I pause at her stand. Maces and morning stars and swords and knives and daggers and bows line the walls, gleaming against the dark fabric of her booth. Some types I’ve never seen, combinations of blades and spikes and shafts I could never have thought of.

  One blade catches my attention. It’s a simple sabre, none of the excess decoration the rest have. Not like the one I left back home, specially crafted for me and left buried in the chest of a dragon. The ornate decorations on the handle were so slippery when covered with blood. I didn’t know it flowed so fast out of a body. I wanted it to stop; I hadn’t meant to kill her even if she’d meant to kill me. She’d charged at me so fast I couldn’t think. I lashed out. And it was done.

  Maybe I should have let her kill me.

  “Fond of blades, young one?” The woman with night-dark skin looks behind her, following my gaze.

  I blink. “Ah, yes. Fencing is one of the few things I’m good at, but I’m afraid I don’t have any money to buy anything. I’m sorry to waste your time.”

  The woman shrugs and I turn, going to find Carita, but I actually run into her this time.

  “How much for the sword?” she asks, putting a hand on my shoulder to steady me.

  She wants it? Why? They barter, talking so quickly and so heavy in their different accents that I can barely make out a word between the two of them. Before I know it, Carita’s handing over a handful of coins to the woman and a sabre is being pressed against my chest. She strides forward again, not a word about it.

  “But…why?” I clutch it tightly to me, like she might decide to take it back any second. I could kill her with this in a single moment. My stomach churns. That shouldn’t be my first thought. I shouldn’t know how easily I could do it.

  “You’ll need it.”

  That’s it? “What if I want to stab you in the back, literally?”

  Her chest rises and falls in a deep sigh. “You remember how when you first saw me, you thought I was a hunter?”

  I furrow my eyebrows, the words she said yesterday echoing around my head. “‘You all assume the same thing.’ Who is ‘You all?’”

  “Irrelevant.”

  “But—”

  “I may be one of the Fallen now, but once upon a time, I was a hunter. And a damn good one. How do you think I survived so long down here?” She stops, turning back and looking me in the eye. “So don’t push me for information. I have every means to help you or harm you—it’s your choice which I use.”

  Her eyes bore into mine, and I’m not sure if she wants an answer right now or not. There isn’t really a choice. If Vito hadn’t followed, I might have refused her. Taken my chances with Caelum, with Carita.

  But Vito. Even if I left him behind, especially if I had, they may have still hunted him. And for what? Because we’ve held hands? Because I let our arms or thighs rest together while sitting? Because he may have brushed my hair out of my face or I may have touched his cheek?

  I don’t know what Carita wants from me, but after what Caelum’s put me through, after learning slaves exist, maybe, maybe, I want to listen.

  I clear my throat, push down my thoughts, and open my mouth. “Why are you taking me in like this? What do you want me to do?”

  She smiles, just a little bit. She opens her mouth, words about to fall from her tongue—

  A crash rings out, a child screams. The people around us quiet in an instant, heads turning toward the noise. Of course som
ething happens right now.

  Carita slips through the crowd and I stumble after her, my wings pushing people aside. But they all barely notice, so absorbed in the world around them that they don’t truly see us passing by.

  Pressing into the edge of the throng, murmured protests trail behind us. A little boy huddles against the ground, blood streaming from his hairline.

  “P-please,” he whimpers, curling around himself. “I-it was wr-wrong to take the bread. I won’t try again, p-p-please!”

  Food? Caelum distributes food to the towns and its people, and I know I’ve never gone hungry. But his bones nearly poke out beneath his skin, and the hollowness beneath his eyes is deep. He doesn’t look that much different than the slave from last night, except he wears no chains. And slaves shouldn’t exist in the first place. None of this society should be like this. Are all ground-dwelling towns like this?

  Sweat starts to bead on my forehead, skin prickling with the uncomfortable thoughts running through my head. What if…no. No, not everything I know is a lie, something has to be wrong here.

  Two guards, a man and a woman in worn leather armor, look at the boy with no emotion crossing their faces. They’re the same sort of mutant illusionists who were at the gates last night, though one has a half-grown wing, the other a claw instead of a hand. Why don’t they hide their ugly growths with a mirage?

  Or…can they not use the same illusions I can? Do they not have enough dragon blood to be true illusionists? If they can’t manipulate water, I don’t know what that makes them.

  One of the guards kicks the boy. Blood spurts from his nose, he sprawls backward, and a small piece of burnt flatbread flies from his grip. With how his skin clings to his ribs, I’m sure that’s a king’s feast to him.

  They keep kicking. No satisfaction crosses their face, just simple duty. Like they’re teaching this kid a lesson instead of beating him to death.

  Carita doesn’t make a move to do anything. No one does.

  I grab her elbow. “We need to do something.”

  She gives me that look. “I see. You only want to help people when they’re being beaten in front of you, but if you can’t see it, it’s fine.”

  How was I supposed to help before? I didn’t know the ground dwellers had been suffering. “No, that isn’t—”

  The boy cries out. The ground underneath him is soaked with blood and snot and tears.

  I can’t take it. I push out of the crowd, stepping into the circle of open dirt no one dared encroach into.

  The guards pause to look at me.

  “He said it was wrong and he wouldn’t do it again.” The words don’t sound nearly as impressive now that they’re out of my mouth.

  They turn to me, an emotion finally crossing their faces. Anger.

  “So?” says one.

  “You think you know how to do our job better than us, worm?”

  I bristle at the slang, holding back a snarl. “You know what I think? I think that you two are nothing compared to what I—”

  There’s the sound of wood moaning, loudly. Creaking follows as I turn. The crowd starts to shuffle away, a woman screaming. The people in front of me finally move, leaving no time to avoid the wagon full of gourds barreling at me.

  I try to flap backward, but my wings get tangled with my mirage and I stumble. The wagon slams against my stomach and chest, knocking the wind from my lungs. It keeps rolling with me in tow, between the boy and the guards, and rattles through the rest of the crowd. I try scrambling onto the cart, but all I can grab are the gourds, failing to yank myself up the avalanching fruit with one hand, desperately gripping my sabre with the other.

  The wagon slams into a wall, the handles nearly snapping as I fly back against the clay. My head smacks against the wall, my legs buried in the wagon’s contents.

  Before I can get my breath back, Carita’s next to me, pulling me up. “Of course you’d manage to get hit by a wheelbarrow, you idiot.”

  I try to get my head straight enough to correct her, that it’s a wagon, not a wheelbarrow, when a new voice rings out.

  “What’s all this commotion about, now?”

  “No,” Carita whispers. Her eyes widen, darting around as her grip on me gets too tight. The expression looks wrong on her face, too much like fear. “We have to get out of here. Get up!”

  Carita half drags me as my mind tries to wrap around the concept of keeping a mirage and walking at the same time.

  She pulls me toward an alley, leading me from the market. But through my still-swimming thoughts, I can remember that I want to stay there. I keep looking around. I turn, happy that the little boy isn’t there anymore, when I catch a glimpse of the person who had spoken.

  Horns that curve higher than any I’d ever seen, wings that have to be at least as large as mine, and long spikes running down his head, his back.

  I’ve never seen an illusionist like that.

  Before I get a better look, Carita yanks me down the alley.

  “Was that—”

  “I told you that there's an ambassador in each town from Caelum. That’s him. That’s Duryea.”

  He’s a what? No, that can’t be. We aren’t supposed to have contact with the lower world, those of different blood. We take care of them because they can’t survive without us. But we don’t walk among them.

  Right?

  She pulls me down a set of stairs, stopping at a door. She knocks, and it opens.

  An older man peers out from the opening, blinking in the sunlight that glares off a pair of wiry glasses and the large bald spot between tufts of white hair. “Carita? I thought you were going to be gone for at least a fortnight! Those goods aren’t—”

  She motions toward me. “Change of plans. Mind if I come in? Duryea’s on the move.”

  He nods gravely, then moves aside. Carita finally releases me, ducking through the short doorway. Following at a pace more cautious of my wings and horns, I emerge into a wide, open room, lit softly by a collection of candles and lamps that my eyes have trouble adjusting to.

  Three other people are in the room, widely varying in age and race. There’s a lanky young man with that pale skin, his accent heavy and a little brutish. A woman, even older than the man who opened the door has eyes, skin, and round lips and face like most other ground dwellers, her hair in delicate plaits that reach to her feet. The third girl has an ageless face, her eyes wide and her features sharp, her movements lithe but every motion purposeful, elegant and strong.

  Carita perches on the edge of a table, all the rest of the room’s occupants turning to her.

  “Where is that slave of yours? How is he?” the old woman asks, leaning forward.

  “He isn’t a slave.”

  The old man’s mouth quirks down. “You did buy him, Carita.”

  She glowers at the lot of them.

  “I paid to set him free. Bricius belongs to no man or dragon or anyone between, just himself.”

  Carita, of all people, bought a slave? Why? Questions bubble up, but I have more important things to ask.

  The old man raises his hands in surrender. “If you insist.”

  I creep through the room toward Carita, feeling out of place in this intimate environment. When I reach her, I lean in and murmur, “What is this place?”

  “Somewhere safe, as far as it concerns you.”

  “Oh, don’t be like that,” says the man as he adjusts his glasses. Then he turns to me, motioning toward the room behind him, a strange, nutty incense wafting into my face with the movement as the room finally comes into focus, draped in strange fabrics with strange furniture and colorful, metallic knickknacks placed everywhere. “My dear, all of us here are Story Collectors.”

  5

  The Story Collectors

  Story Collectors. He says it like it’s a treasure, something precious.

  Carita stands. “Estes, stop.”

  He pauses, arms spread and eyes still wide from the excitement of starting his speech. “Why can I not
spread our own story? You of all people—”

  “No. She is not one of us. She won’t understand; don’t try to make her.” Carita looks to the door. “He’s left the market by now. I need to go check on Bricius. Birdie, stay here and don’t…don’t do anything stupid.”

  I raise my eyebrows, adjusting the sabre in my hand. Carita fidgets, her eyes constantly moving among all the people in the room. What’s she afraid of? That I’ll run? That I’ll hurt these people? That I’ll ask the right questions? Honestly, I don’t know what I could do.

  “If you leave,” she warns, making for the door, “the ambassador will be able to sense you.”

  The door slams behind her, leaving the room in silence.

  For a moment, the four of them exchange glances. Then all their eyes turn to me.

  “So,” starts the man with the pale skin, waving his thin arm. “It’s, uh, nice to meet a friend of Carita’s.” The word “friend” comes out of his mouth more like a question than an assumption. “Obviously, the old bloke here is Estes. This lovely woman,” he gestures to the oldest of the group, “is Dantea. She,” the woman with the sharp face, “is Nalani, and I’m Fitz. Not that I expect you to remember that, of course.” He rises from his seat, walking over and extending a hand. “May I ask your name?”

  I eye the hand, wondering what on earth he wants me to do with it. “I-it’s Ava.”

  Slowly, he draws back his arm. “You…aren’t from around here, are you?”

  The girl, Nalani, looks up. She’s working on some sort of craft with a small loom, but I can’t make out what it is from here. “Of course she isn’t.” Her voice is light, almost chirping like a bird. Her accent is the least of the bunch, or maybe more like mine. “Look at her gloves.”

  Fitz looks at my hands, confused. But Dantea gasps. “Those…those are dragon scales.”

  Fitz takes a step back, eyes widening. Dantea grips the arms of her chair like they’re her lifeline. I curl my hands into fists, not sure what to do with them. Even with the staring and gaping, even if I’m kicked out of this place and Carita gets angry, I won’t take them off. Never.