The Fire Children (9 page)

But she was cold, and if she was stuck up here when night fell, she’d only get colder.
Forgive me, Mother Sun. I’m only borrowing it for a little while.

Yulla wrapped the quilt around herself like a cloak. It smelled like Aunt Mouse: talc and desert flower and sage. It gave her comfort and courage. She stepped out into the not-quite dawn like the Brigand Queen leaving her hideaway. The wind trailed after her, now a breeze. It curled through a set of chimes the neighbors had left hanging.

The tinkling pipes sounded like laughter.

M
OVING AROUND
K
ALADIM
like the Brigand Queen meant being brave, but cautious. Yulla pressed herself close to the buildings as she crept along the street. Even though the sky lightened the higher Mother Sun rose, the shadows remained in abundance. Yulla kept to them, darting from one dark alcove to the next only when she was certain she was still alone. Sometimes, she closed her eyes and pretended she was in the tunnels again, listening hard for any sounds other than her own soft breathing and the wind’s gentle
sshhhh.

The world was washed in eerie grey light. The sky had brightened a little more, the morning grown a touch warmer, but both only incrementally. It was almost boring to look at, all the once-bright colors of her city turned drab. But when she looked up where the rooftops gave way to the sky, Yulla’s breath caught.

So many stars.
Plenty of times, on nights when Sister Moon had gone visiting the other side of the sky, Abba had taken Yulla and Kell up to the roof to go stargazing. He’d drawn the constellations for them, taught them their names, and showed them how to find their way home if they ever got lost.

Yulla had thought there were a lot of stars on those moonless nights. Now, the familiar constellations seemed almost crowded. Hundreds—no,
thousands
—of new ones shone. So many that, for a moment, she was afraid it wasn’t her sky at all. That she’d come up out of the tunnels to a world that
looked
like her own, but wasn’t.

Her eyes sought out Delir, still the brightest, riding high in the north. Like Abba did, Yulla reached up and traced her finger down, down, through pale blue Ranem, to where Chetia made up the point of the Brigand Queen’s sword. Delir was the diamond in its pommel. It brought her comfort, finding them, and soon she could pick out other familiar shapes. The feeling she was in a different world faded, but didn’t leave her entirely.

Dark shapes blotted out a smattering of stars, and it took some squinting before Yulla realized they were kestrels, circling.
They must be confused by all this, too.

Now that she listened for it, Yulla realized the sound of birdsong was missing from the morning. The silverbills should have been
tsip-tsip-tsipping
to each other, or the terns calling with their scratchy-throated voices. But there were only the kestrels’ cries.

She didn’t want to go back to the market just yet, in case the Fire Child was there. That brief glimpse of it had set her curiosity jangling, though, and more and more she found herself disappointed when she
didn’t
spot it flickering in the distance.

How can I get a look at it without being seen?
She searched the sky again and watched the wheeling birds a little longer, wishing she could sprout wings and fly.
I bet they can see the whole city in a glance, and out across the desert, as far as Darat.

Yulla froze.
The lookout towers.

She’d been heading toward the middle of the city, for no other reason than that’s where most of the interesting things would be. But the lookout towers ringed Kaladim, ten of them circling the outskirts of the city. They rose eight stories into the sky, nearly as tall as the Worship Hall’s spire. Most nights, lanterns burned in their highest windows, guiding caravans through the desert.

When the sandstorms came and the wind whipped dust and grit at the town in her rage, those beacons stayed lit through the days as well as the nights. The sentries spent their shifts in the towers looking outward, so they could spot caravans in distress. When she was little, Yulla used to think the towers had been raised to keep watch for the Brigand Queen, but Abba said there hadn’t been bandits roaming the sands for a hundred years or more.

If she climbed up, she’d be able to see the whole town. From that height, she could watch the Fire Child’s comings and goings from a safe distance, and maybe spot its brothers and sisters. Surely there had to be more than just one.

The closest tower was at the end of her own street. Grinning, Yulla darted back the way she’d come.

S
HE HADN’T REALIZED
how dark it would be inside the tower. The narrow, uneven stairs wound their way up the outside walls, giving way to a platform every couple of turns where supplies were stored. Only a little light came in through the narrow window slits on the eastern side, but the grey gloom didn’t carry very far at all. The wooden railing seemed far less sturdy than it ought to, and soon enough, Yulla found herself crawling up the steps on her hands and knees, her side pressed against the wall as though she could meld with the stone. As much as she’d grown used to the absolute darkness in the tunnels, down there she hadn’t had to fear falling more than a few feet if she tripped.

Even her tumble from the top of the cave-in debris hadn’t been terribly steep. Her injuries from that could have been worse, she knew, but down there, someone would have found her eventually. If she fell up here and hurt herself, no one would come until Mother Sun’s face was shining down on them again. Yulla had no idea how long that might be—Kell said the Darktimes rarely lasted less than a week; Old Moll claimed that once, when he was very young, they’d stretched on for nearly three.

Mother Sun and Sister Moon hadn’t visited one another for fifteen years. If Amma and Aunt Mouse spent more than a handful of
days
apart, their reunions stretched long into the night.

The thought of the two of them pulled Yulla up short. Even if they hadn’t heard her pounding at the cellar door, they must be awake by now. They must have noticed her missing. Had they started searching? Were they roaming the caverns even now, calling her name, waking up the other families and getting them to join in?

It was almost enough to get her to inch back down to the bottom and flee home again, the wind be damned.

Almost.

I can be brave
and
careful. I have to be.
She was nearly halfway up. Safer to keep going. Yulla patted her pockets, feeling the jerky and figs she’d eat for breakfast at the top. On her way to the tower, she’d ducked back into her house and snatched Abba’s old canteen from the kitchen. One of the horse troughs near the tower was still full of water, and she’d topped it off there. It sloshed at her waist when she moved.

Neither the food nor water would last her very long, but they’d do for a while. She’d have to descend to find more eventually, but decided to worry about that later, when she’d gained the top.

When she rounded the last corner and saw the scattering of stars overhead, Yulla let out a sob of laughter. She scrabbled up the last few steps, the grit digging into her palms. She didn’t bother climbing the last half dozen—when the platform that made up the tower’s top floor was waist-high, she hauled herself up onto it and flopped onto her back. She lay there, sprawled out and panting with relief, for a good quarter of an hour. The cool air tickled as it dried away the sheen of fear-sweat that had broken out on her skin.

Soon enough, the cold crept back in. She’d unwrapped Aunt Mouse’s quilt from around her shoulders for the climb—it wouldn’t do to trip over the ends and go tumbling down the stairs—but the exercise and the close quarters had kept her warm enough. Now she sat up, groping for the quilt and bundling up in it again. It was breezy up here, though it didn’t feel like the same wind that had haunted her down below. This seemed... regular, in a way she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Just plain old wind, doing what wind was supposed to do regardless of what Yulla was up to.

She didn’t quite trust herself to stand up all the way yet. Though the parapets ringing the top of the tower were too high and thick for her to go tumbling past, and though she’d put distance between herself and the edge of the stairs, she felt too wobbly to risk much more than a crawl.

I’m tired,
she thought. Her belly gave out a pitiful yowl.
And hungry.

She’d planned on being home by now, either tucked back into her bed and sleeping off the adventure, or gobbling down a plate of honey-drenched figs while pretending she couldn’t feel Amma’s glare weighing down on her in the dark. Yulla leaned her side against the parapet and fished the last of the figs from her pocket.

Compared to the honeyed figs she’d been imagining, these ones were a poor substitute. They barely filled her palm—why hadn’t she taken more? She wolfed them down anyway, one by one. The first few, she bit in half to make them last longer, then she went to thirds. Quarters. Nibbles.

It only served to wake her stomach the rest of the way. She swallowed a few mouthfuls of stale water from Abba’s canteen, hoping it would trick her into feeling full. Tempted as she was to finish off the jerky, it was better to save it for later. Another swallow of water, and she set the canteen aside.

Let’s see what’s out there.

Yulla hoisted herself up to her knees and peered out across Kaladim. The city stretched out before her, unfolding like a desert flower. It was different than she’d imagined; from their own roof three stories up, she’d thought she could see everything. Up here she was nearly three times that high, and she might as well have been looking down on distant Darat, for all that what she saw resembled the city she knew.

After a few minutes, though, as she searched for landmarks—the market, Old Moll’s, the Worship Hall—familiarity returned. There was the stable, where the hay-tenders pitched spring grasses on top of the roof to dry out in the sun. Next to it was the farrier’s. On the street behind the stables, Yulla could see the row of houses where Old Moll lived surrounded by three generations of his family. She picked out her own rooftop, and traced the streets with her fingers, trying to find her friends’ homes from up high.

It felt, she realized, a little like looking down at Old Moll’s miniature, and that helped her get her bearings even more. She made a game of it, thinking of a landmark and seeking it out. Nowhere in her searching, though, did she see even a hint of light that might be one of the Fire Children.

Where
are
they?

Soon enough her knees began to ache. The breeze that had been so refreshing when she first came up grew cold again, and despite Mother Sun and Sister Moon rising higher in the sky, Yulla didn’t think the day would get much warmer. She sank back down, sheltered from most of the breeze by the parapet. Drawing her knees up to her chest, Yulla pulled the quilt around her tight as a caterpillar in its cocoon.

Maybe the Fire Children are asleep.
She imagined them in one of the houses, curled up in the family’s abandoned beds. Though, she realized that was absurd—they’d burn them in a flash. Right now, she missed her own bed. She missed the lumpy pillows down below, and Kell’s snores tearing the air. She missed knowing her parents were nearby, hearing Abba humming along off-key in their bedroom as Amma plucked at her setar, thinking everyone else was asleep.

Yulla hummed one of those songs, her voice sounding small and thin up here atop the tower. Lonely. The wind didn’t even try to carry her song away.

Her head drooped until it rested on her knees. The humming grew slower, and slower, until Yulla fell asleep.

T
HE KESTRELS WERE
screeching overhead. Yulla woke from a dream filled with honeyed figs and warm, chewy bread to an empty belly and a still-dark sky. She sat up, rubbing sleep-sand from her eyes, and reached for Abba’s canteen. Maybe a drink of water would quell her hunger a little longer.
I can have the jerky when I figure out where to get more food.

Mother Sun and Aunt Moon were nearly straight overhead now. She couldn’t look at them directly, the same way you couldn’t look right at Mother Sun when her face was uncovered. She could squint, though, and catch them out of the corner of her eyes.
How long did I sleep?
Four hours? Five?

She felt as creaky as Old Moll as she stood to stretch out the aches that had settled into her muscles as she slept. She bent to touch her toes, then reached up as if she could touch the sky. Better. She took a slow turn around the platform’s edge, too, pausing on the desert side to look out over the sands.

It was strange not to see caravans wending their way along the road to Darat or Ednesine, or lone travellers leading horses and camels laden with goods to trade in Kaladim. Out on the horizon a thin band of sky was noticeably brighter. Not for the first time, she wondered if everyone in the world had gone beneath the ground to wait out the Scorching Days, or if her city was special.