Inker and Crown

1

ENA

There is a moment when the first spark of a fire appears and it is still possible to ignore the coming blaze.

There is no smoke tainting the air. No damage has been done.

Just a little flash that seems harmless and beautiful.

You can’t see the raging power of the fire, but it is there, hiding its danger and waiting for its moment to ignite.

That one spark will consume the world.

It does not care if you are too blind to see the destruction racing toward you.

We will all burn in the coming blaze.

I perched in the rafters above the crowd, wondering if any of the people below could see the spark or sense how near our doom we stood.

“The paun will starve us.” Cade stood on a crate, looking out over his followers. His eyes gleamed as he took in the silent horde. “They will watch our children die and not raise a hand to save them. For too long, we have let the Guilds build their glory on the corpses of our fallen brothers. Their time is coming to an end. How many of you will be brave enough to stand with me when the battle begins?”

A rustle of murmurs fluttered through the crowd.

“Watch and see what decrees the King sends down for Winter’s End,” Cade said. “He won’t order the healers to stop letting those who can’t pay die. He won’t order the soldiers to put down their swords and help the common farmer in the field. The King cares only for glory and riches. We are worthless rodents to the Guilds.”

He stood still for a moment, basking in the crowd’s rapt attention. With his curly, blond hair, handsome face, and broad shoulders, he looked like the hero the common folk had been waiting for. The savior of the tilk standing on a crate as he made grand plans to change Ilbrea.

Cade looked up at me.

My heart stuttered, but I didn’t shrink back into the shadows. I held Cade’s gaze as he spoke.

“A new day is dawning. The blood of the Guilded paun will slick the streets. Fire will consume anyone who stands in our way. There is only death or freedom. There can be no other path. Who will answer when I give the call to fight?”

“I will!” a voice shouted from the back of the crowd. The same voice that had shouted first the last time Cade held court.

“I will fight with you!” A man stepped up to the front of the horde.

“I’ll fight!”

“I will!”

I stood up on the rafters and made my way back to the open window at the front of the stable. The shouts of the horde were still growing as I grabbed the thick rope hanging off the side of the building and swung myself down to the street.

The people passing by paid no attention to the roaring shouts in the stable. It was Winter’s End, after all. A day of celebration for everyone in Ilara.

Cheering, dancing, drinking, a raucous mess would swallow the streets by nightfall. Why should anyone care if some started their celebrating before midday?

I forced my shoulders to relax as I followed the crowds toward the cathedral square. But even as I pressed a careful smile onto my face, I couldn’t drive the horrible images of blood and fire from my mind.

Cade wanted a rebellion. He wanted blood to slick the streets of Ilara.

It would be easy to cause chaos and death in Ilbrea’s capital city.

It would be impossible to protect the innocents of Ilara if Cade got the battle he craved.

“Mama, mama, look!”

I nearly tripped over the little girl who had stopped in the middle of the street to point at me.

The child gazed up at me, her eyes wide with wonder. “Are you a fairy?”

“There is no such thing as fairies.” The girl’s mother frowned as she eyed me.

I bent down to be level with the girl and pulled my hair over my shoulder, letting her touch the technicolor strands. “But it is Winter’s End, so I suppose anything’s possible.”

The girl giggled as I winked and strode away.

I could feel others staring at me, but it didn’t bring me any fear or make me blush.

I wanted them all to stare.

A dozen colors streaked my hair. More decorated my skirt. I offered them all a grand display as I fluttered through the streets of Ilara.

Armor comes in many forms. Mine is forged of pigments and beauty. Better to know why I drew the gaze of those around me than to wonder if they’d discovered the secrets I’d hidden in the shadows.

The pace of the crowd slowed as we neared the cathedral square and the people packed more tightly together.

I weaved through the throng, offering smiles to the men who let me pass, winking at the women who glared disapprovingly.

“Keep moving forward.” A soldier stood on the steps of a shop, waving the horde onward. I caught his gaze, and he smiled down at me. “Happy Winter’s End, miss.”

He was young and handsome. He had a glimmer of hope in his eyes as he smiled at me, as though speaking to a pretty girl might bring evening enjoyment.

A laugh escaped me before I could stop it. I tucked my chin and hid behind the curtain of my hair, hoping the soldier would think I was shy rather than disgusted at the thought of ever letting a filthy paun touch me.

The line of people stopped as we reached the cathedral square.

“We should have stayed home,” an older man grumbled.

A woman smacked him on the arm. “We should have left home when I wanted to.”

I ducked around them and dove deeper into the crowd, aiming for the statue of the seven-pointed star that rose up in the center of it all.

A hand grazed my waist as I climbed up onto the statue’s pedestal. I didn’t bother looking for whoever had been so brazen. The crowd nearest the cathedral had already begun cheering, and I hadn’t the time to spare.

The bottom two arms of the star were set into the white marble of the pedestal. The next pair up had already been claimed by men.

“Give a girl a hand?” I reached for the man sitting above me.

“I don’t mind the company.” He grinned, wrapping his callused hand around mine as he helped me up.

As soon as I got a toe onto his arm of the star, I let go and climbed onto the level above him.

“I thought we were going to be friends,” the man called up to me.

“I only asked for a hand.” I gripped the center arm of the star and looked toward the towering, white cathedral.

A line of soldiers in black uniforms stood in front of the cathedral steps.

Fear flickered through me. Only a chivving fool would be brazen enough to climb above the crowd in front of so many paun soldiers. But it was Winter’s End. I would no more be whipped for climbing the statue than a fiddler would be for taking coins for their songs.

And, even if the soldiers wanted to get to me, they would have to slog through hundreds of others to reach me.

I forced myself to breathe.

The crowd at the front gave a fresh round of cheers as the Lord Soldier climbed the cathedral steps. Two lines of men in black uniforms marched behind him.

The golden doors of the cathedral opened before the soldiers reached them and closed as soon as they’d passed through, keeping the common folk from peering into the Guilds’ precious sanctuary for too long.

The sailors in their blue came next. They didn’t march in neat columns as they entered the cathedral. A young man with black hair moved at the center of their unruly pack, and even the Lord Sailor laughed at whatever joke the young man had made.

I tried to find a bit of sympathy in my chest for the sailors. They looked almost like common men, like they’d rather drink ale with you than see you dead.

But the healers started up the steps, and any flicker of pity I might have felt vanished.

The Lady Healer turned and waved to the crowd as though she actually thought herself to be a savior of the common folk.

I gripped the star, biting back my urge to scream that the healers were no better than murderers. How could anyone be grateful for a healer who left the poor to die?

The Lady led her red-clad killers through the golden doors.

The map makers in their green entered next. At least the Lord Map Maker didn’t stop to wave at the people. He led his flock straight to the doors. A girl with red hair wore the same map maker’s uniform as the men. She walked taller than the rest, though she was the shortest among them. She kept her shoulders thrown back and her chin held high.

At least there was one paun I could feel true pity for. Poor thing had lost herself to the world of men and didn’t even have the sense to revel in the power it gave her.

The doors shut again. I squinted through the sunlight glinting off the metal but couldn’t see the fancy carvings in the gold from my place on the star.

I’d only been near enough to see the carvings once, when I’d come by late at night and offered a smile to the soldiers guarding the cathedral in exchange for a chance at a closer look.

A soldier had tried to tell me about the scenes and saints the images honored, but all I’d been able to think of was the number of children that could have been fed off the gold the paun had molded into a door.

I’d run away from the soldier and been sick in an alley.

The crowd cheered again as a flock of white-robed scribes climbed slowly up the steps. At the front of the group, two men clasped each other’s arms. The older had a shining bald patch. The younger, dark blond hair so neatly groomed I wished the wind would give a great gust just to muss it up. I thought the younger man had been helping the older up the stairs until they reached the top and the hint of a limp marred the younger man’s stride.

I had heard of that scribe before. Born on the bastards’ island of Ian Ayres and now the heir to the Scribes Guild. Too young for the position, too talented to be unseated―even the common folk liked to chatter about the Ian Ayres-born scribe. The whispers in the shadows called him the Guilded Cripple. I wondered how many in the crowd were disappointed to see a young man with a limp rather than a mangled beast.

Before the door had closed behind the scribes, a golden carriage stopped in front of the steps.

High up on the cathedral walls, horns blared, welcoming the King.

He stepped out of his gilded carriage and smiled for the crowd, waving at his people like the benevolent ruler he pretended to be. His clothing glinted gold in the light, and sour rolled up into my throat.

The Queen stepped out of the carriage next, her gown sparkling like her husband’s coat, though she did not smile as the King had. Her face was pale, and the King gripped her hand as though keeping her on her feet.

The King helped the Queen up the steps, leaving the young Princess to face the crowd on her own. The girl was beautiful, and her silver gown made her look like something out of a fairy story. But her smile flickered away as she watched her brother abandon her to the crowd. She nodded to the horde and followed her brother up the steps.

Last to arrive were the purple-robed sorcerers.

The Lady Sorcerer led her pack. She didn’t look to the common crowd or to the soldiers as she climbed the steps and sauntered to the door, completely secure in her position. Completely certain that no danger could touch her.

The purple lady was above us all, her power made untouchable by the strength of her magic. She held the throat of the Guilds in her hand as the paun crushed the common folk beneath their fancy boots.

The golden doors closed behind the sorcerers, and the soldiers tightened their ranks around the cathedral.

All the most powerful people in Ibrea packed into one place. They’d spend hours locked inside, plotting new ways to grow Ilbrea’s might.

If a fire could start, flare to life right in the middle of the cathedral, then the paun would burn and Ilbrea would be free.

But only the gods could set a fire like that, and none of them have ever seen fit to be so kind to the common folk.

A fiddle started playing on the far end of the square. A pipe and a drum joined in.

Men rolled out barrels of ale and frie, and the whole square turned to chaos as the celebration of Winter’s End truly began. The common folk would dance, and drink, and sing, and laugh while the Guilds decided what new torments to unleash upon the people of Ilbrea.

I could see the spark of the fire that would devour Ilara hiding beneath the celebration. It was in the leering of the soldiers and the red faces of the men who drank to forget their troubles.

The inferno would not come quickly, but it was beyond my power to stop.

I was not strong enough to save the people dancing below from the coming flames.