Beneath Ceaseless Skies #13 Read online

  “Not all the people would hate you for it.” Prue’s voice is soft and wistful. “Do you not remember the dance we saw, when we were children? The whirl of light across the green?”

  My breath stops in my throat. I peer down through the darkness, but I cannot make out my sister’s lovely face.

  My voice trembles as I speak. “It is heresy to think on it, Prue.”

  “Then more than half the country must be burned.”

  “Our father—”

  “Our father is dead, and his joy-starved vision of Albion with him.”

  “You cannot mean that.”

  Prue sighs. “Good night, Justice.”

  “Prue....”

  But she does not speak again. Eventually, I lie back down and close my eyes beside her. Her even breathing fills my ears.

  She is lost and melancholy, nothing more. I tell myself so, nearly sobbing it. She only says those things to shock me. She cannot mean them.

  I remember the women on the green. I remember the blaze of holy fire on their gowns. I remember their screams in my ears.

  After hours of turmoil, sleep wraps around me like a shroud.

  Silvery laughter echoes in my ears. Dead, dead, dead....

  “No!” I jerk awake, panting. I reach for Prue’s reassuring warmth.

  But the mattress beside me is empty, and Prue has disappeared.

  * * *

  IV. The Third Day

  Is this what it felt like inside the heretic king’s grand palace in the last days of the Civil War? This muffled panic, this terror that lurks in corners, shows in the whites of the soldiers’ eyes, and sounds in every voice, every whisper? This knowledge, written plain in the air between us: we cannot win.

  My sister is gone. My brothers are gone. And they are not the only ones.

  “Two hundred soldiers left during the night,” John Parkinson tells me.

  Purple shadows bruise the wrinkled skin beneath his eyes. We stand together in the central guardroom, crowded with soldiers and stinking with rancid sweat. I note, as I look around their pale faces, that only three councilors stand behind John Parkinson now. The others must have fled as well. To Oliver? Or....

  My voice is steady. I know not why. This past night’s weeping should have shredded and torn it apart forever. “Do we know which way the soldiers have gone?”

  “Half to your brother’s cause, I think. The others, to the coast.”

  The coast. Which coast, I need not ask. The half-breed prince has lived across the water these past fifteen years, his fey mother charming the dotard neighbor king.

  I turn and start to pace, if only to avoid John Parkinson’s steady gaze.

  “The Hibernians? Could we muster any help there?”

  “Oliver’s troops block our path to the North.”

  “Any foreign powers—”

  “Would take too long to answer any call.” He snorts. “To say nothing of how long they might then take to leave, if once they were successful on these shores.”

  “There must be some way,” I say. “There must! We are the only keepers of the holy fire, here in this fortress. Surely—surely!—that must count for something.”

  He sighs. “What would you have us do with it? It could have no effect on your brother’s army, unless….” His thick, white eyebrows rise. “If you have reason to suspect your brothers’ own parentage—if you think they, themselves, might secretly be—?”

  “No! No, of course not.” I almost laugh, despite the gravity of our situation. How Oliver and Daniel would roar at that suggestion! “But still—”

  “Then the holy fire can only aid us against one of the two armies that confronts us. And if we turn it upon the Others, Oliver’s men will have no obstacle. They will sweep over us like a flood.”

  I turn and face him. “What can we yet do?”

  “Do?” John Parkinson shakes his head slowly. Behind him, the other three councilors look down. None of them will meet my eyes. “Forgive me, my Lord Protectress,” John Parkinson says, and he sinks to his knees on the cold stone floor. “I have failed in my duty to you. I have dishonored my oaths to your father, indeed.”

  “No.” Tears clog my throat. Useless tears, here in this room. I move forward and place my hand on his white hair. This man directed some of my first steps when I was small. Now I help him to his feet. “It is not you who has failed.”

  His eyes glisten, too, as he stands. “If you turn yourself over to your brother’s army, you will surely be executed. Oliver will not withstand a rival to his power. Perhaps, if you surrender to the half-breed prince and beg for mercy, a bloodless exile—”

  “No,” I say. “That, I cannot do.”

  “Then....” He heaves a sigh. “We can hold this fortress for at least a week. There are those in Londinium loyal to your father’s memory, who will supply us with food in these next few hours to store against a siege.”

  I cannot hold back the bitter twist of my lips. “And what good would any of that do?”

  “What good?” He meets my eyes. “Lady, your father chose you as his successor for a reason. He believed you were the ruler that Albion needed in this troubled time. Surely we can give him the benefit of our trust, for a few more days at least. Much may happen in the space of a week. Will you give up your own life without a struggle?”

  I look at him, blinking through my haze of pain and despair.

  If—when—Oliver takes us, John Parkinson and the other loyal councilors will be executed along with myself. I know that as well as he, although he has been too kind to say it.

  I will not let my despair end their lives any sooner than it must.

  My voice sounds thin and choked when I speak. “Let the soldiers choose for themselves,” I say. “Let those who wish to flee leave now, in good faith. I will not have them stay to be murdered for a cause they cannot support. But let food and bandages be stockpiled through the day, and close the gates”—I almost say, at nightfall, but it is always night now—”before midnight. We will hold my father’s fortress until the last.”

  “My Lord Protectress,” John Parkinson murmurs.

  The other councilors bow their heads behind him.

  I wonder whether their hidden expressions show more relief or terror.

  * * *

  V. The Fourth Day

  I have lived in this fortress for fifteen years, but it never felt like a prison until now.

  Last night I wandered the stone passages, unable to sleep. Seventy-five soldiers remained in the end, from the six hundred who had been quartered here until a few days ago. Guards stood at the end of each corridor, stiff and pale. When I passed, they bowed before me with a look in their eyes that I found more terrifying than any advancing army.

  It was a look of faith. Of trust. Of loyalty.

  I am their Lord Protectress. And there is nothing I can do for them.

  “Your father chose you for a reason.”

  I sit huddled on my cot now, in the middle of another sunless day. There are no noises below my room today. There are too few soldiers left for that. No one shouts or argues. There is no use.

  We sit, and we wait. And that is all we can do.

  My father chose me for a reason.

  I wrap my arms around my knees and rock back and forth. I want Prue by me, with her flowery, wild scent and her soft embrace. I want my father, more than anything else. I want my father, Hallam Merriwell, here to be the Lord Protector, unquestioning and certain and strong.

  But my father was never truly certain. And I was the symbol of all his secret fears and doubts.

  “Justice,” I whisper to the empty room. “I was supposed to bring Albion justice.”

  What justice is there to be brought to a land torn in two jagged parts? Half of it marches to Oliver’s standard, and half looks to the coast, dreaming of unearthly beauty. Harsh retribution could rule the day, or else gilded corruption and lost faith. My fortress is only one tiny sliver nestled between the two camps—shining with mea
ning, indeed, to every man who loved my father, but still far too small to be a meaningful force. Unless it could somehow tip the balance...

  “Justice,” my father whispered, before he unleashed the holy fire. But two nights later, I felt his sobs.

  When the fit comes upon me, for once, I welcome the release. As my limbs lash out around me, my mind floats high above my writhing body and foaming mouth. There are no maids here to help or hold me; they have all fled, with my blessings. One of them left a ring of golden flowers on my pillow—as apology? As prayer?

  When I come back to myself, my arms and legs are sprawled at odd angles across the stone floor. Tears dampen my cheeks; a speck of blood marks the floor by my mouth. Every muscle aches. Through the window, I see only darkness.

  I pull myself up, though my body is heavy and unwilling. Broken. Broken, since my youth. Broken, like my father’s country.

  I know what would be easiest to do, if I had not sworn an oath.

  I walk up the long, wide steps to the tallest watchtower. Two soldiers stand atop it, looking out into the darkness. They start when they see my wild, disordered appearance.

  “My Lord Protectress—”

  “My Lady—”

  “All is well,” I tell them, through numb lips. “Go now. I wish to be alone.”

  They clatter down the steps, reluctant but obedient. From their agitated whispers, I know I haven’t much time. They are sure to alert my chief councilor.

  But there is still time enough.

  I look out over the darkened land. Shadows of hedgerows and trees mark the fields. The tall buildings of Londinium rise in the distance. To the west lies the coast. To the north, my brother’s army.

  Everything would be made so much easier if just one piece of the puzzle was removed. Two equal parties, left to fight each other for power and revenge.

  But Albion has had enough of civil war and its aftermath. My father knew that, even if my brothers still do not.

  There are times when the act of healing can be the most dangerous choice of all.

  John Parkinson must have run all the way. He bursts up onto the tower, his hair disordered, panting for breath.

  “My Lady Justice, I beg you, do not—”

  “John,” I say. I move forward, through the darkness, and I take his hand. “I have made my decision.”

  “My Lady—”

  “No.” The sudden power in my voice stops his protest. I draw my shoulders back. I hold my head high. “I am your Lord Protectress, am I not?”

  “Yes....” He watches me. In the faint and sickly moonlight, I see both the fear and the sudden spark of desperate hope in his weary face.

  “I need you to send a trusted messenger for me, skilled in negotiation,” I say. “I know what it is my father needed me to do.”

  * * *

  V. The Fifth Day

  I wait with my soldiers in the front hall of the fortress. They press around me, fearful but brave. No betrayal of faith will harm me today. Only my own choices rule us now.

  I understand, today, as we wait, how terrifying it must have been for my father when he took power for himself. How soul-quaking to take on all responsibility, and bear every ounce of guilt and failure.

  The thunder of horses’ hooves sounds through the closed and heavy gate. An army is approaching.

  “My Lord Protectress,” John Parkinson says, beside me. He touches my arm and looks at me with respect and fear. “Are you ready?”

  “Yes,” I say, and I raise my voice so that all can hear. “Raise the gates.”

  This is not a decision my father could have made. This is not a risk he could have borne to take, after the losses of the war.

  But it is the only choice I can make for myself, in memory of him.

  Ten soldiers work together to pull back the first set of iron-bound wooden doors. Metal squeals with effort as the heavy portcullis rises beyond them, one labored inch at a time. No speck of iron must be allowed to brush even a single hair on the newcomers’ heads, or all our effort, and days of fraught negotiation, will have been for nothing.

  My fortress of soldiers, bulwarked by the power of the title my father left me, forms only a sliver of moral and physical force in comparison to either of the two equal armies that gather around us. But by allying my father’s legacy to one of those armies, I can tip the scales of power in all Albion.

  If I have chosen wrongly, I may yet destroy us all.

  The portcullis rises, revealing a second set of doors beyond. Soldiers step forward. They push open the doors to let in the fresh air.

  Gold and silver flash on the horses of the waiting army. Sunshine floods upon us, and the men around me gasp and step back, blinking. I do not. I cannot let myself react to the light. It has no greater power than the solidity of this fortress, the weight of the land, the stone that supported my father and his people all these years.

  One man rides at the head of the army, clad in velvet and jewels. He swings himself down from his prancing horse and steps forward, one hand at his waist, long, dark curls hanging down his back. His eyes meet mine: long-lashed and deep brown, as lovely as a woman’s. But I see the glint of yellow hidden in the corner of his left eye, and I know it for the truth: he is anything but human.

  In the moment that my eyes meet his, I think: I was mad to ever conceive this plan. My feet start backward, of their own volition.

  In the alien yellow of his eye, I see all the stories of the war and the misery that caused it.

  If I scream, my own soldiers will leap into action. I may be killed, but so will he—and Oliver’s soldiers, sweeping through the wreckage, will turn this country into the harshly purified land promised to the faithful by the war’s commanders, my father foremost among them all.

  But a land ripped in half can never be healed or whole again.

  I step forward, hands trembling in my plain black skirts. I reach out, and John Parkinson presses a heavy box into my hand.

  I am no longer five years old. But this box seems to press just as heavily in my hand now as it did on that night long ago, when I first came to understand my name, and my purpose.

  “I bring a gift to you and your people,” I say to the half-breed prince, and I pass him the holy fire that won the Civil War. “That you may never again be forced into hiding, oppression and unjust exile.”

  The yellow-brown eyes widen. The long, pale hands reach toward me to accept the box. I feel every soldier behind me tense as one, all eyes upon our greatest weapon, our most lethal defense, suitable only for an enemy unworthy of mercy or even justice itself.

  The half-breed prince looks up from the box. His lips curve into a smile I find hard to read. If he were mortal, I would name it relief, mixed with amusement. If he were mortal....

  “My Lord Protectress,” he murmurs. “You’ve kept your bargain. I bear a gift for you, as well.”

  He passes the box back to his second-in-command, and a sigh of relief ripples through the men behind me. I hold myself still, waiting. The prince snaps his fingers, and one of his soldiers hurries to his side, holding a silken bag. The prince reaches inside, and withdraws a golden circlet.

  “Equal measure,” the prince says. “You have my oath upon it. That neither may be allowed to rule alone, and neither be disregarded or afraid.”

  “Amen,” I say, as I take the crown.

  Albion has never seen believers and Others take hands in faithful partnership. Albion has never seen a queen with the power of a king. But my father taught me to have faith in a force stronger than worldly probabilities, and to believe in more than can ever be seen by the merely material eye.

  My name is Justice Revelation Merriwell, and this is the last day of my reign as Lord High Protectress of all Albion.

  Tonight, I will become Albion’s queen and Albion’s full and equal co-ruler, ready and able to protect one half of the country against the other, and to ensure justice for all. Together, in partnership, we will build a new Jerusalem.

 
; I am as frightened now as I have ever been. But I take a deep breath, and I step out of my father’s fortress.

  Copyright © 2009 Stephanie Burgis

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  Stephanie Burgis is an American writer who lives in Yorkshire, England with her husband, fellow writer Patrick Samphire, and their crazy-sweet border collie mix, Maya. Her short fiction has appeared in magazines and anthologies, including Strange Horizons and Aeon, and her YA historical fantasy trilogy will be published by Atheneum Books in 2010, 2011, and 2012. To find out more, please visit http://www.stephanieburgis.com.

  Read more Beneath Ceaseless Skies

  HAXAN

  by Kenneth Mark Hoover

  I found the old man nailed to a hackberry tree five miles out of Haxan, New Mexico. They had hammered railroad spikes through his wrists and ankles. He was stripped so the westering sun could peel the flesh from his bones.

  He was alive when I found him.

  I got down from my horse and went up to him. His twitching features were covered with swarming bluebottles. I swiped them away and pressed the mouth of my canteen to his parched lips. He took a little water and coughed.

  “I can cut you down,” I said. “You might have a chance if a doctor—”

  He raised his head. His face was the color of burned leather kicked out of a prairie fire. His eyelids were cut away, his eyes seared blind by the sun.

  “Won’t do any good, mister. Been two days. The croaker in Haxan is a knife-happy bastard roped on laudanum half the time. And the tooth-puller ain’t much better.” He spoke slow, measuring his remaining strength. He had a thick Swedish accent. “It was the people of Haxan who did this.”

  I tried to give him more water but he shook it off. He was dying and didn’t want to prolong it. “Why?”

  “They’re scared. Like children.”

  “Of what?”

  “Me, and what I know about this place. The voices frozen in the rocks and grass.” His head drooped onto his naked chest. He was losing strength fast. “What’s your name, mister?” he whispered.