The Firebrand Legacy (13 page)

“Your Majesties, sirs, the servants’ stables
still have horses.”

Carine dug her fists into Giles’ chest and
her head into his back as two servants’ horses galloped north, over
the first bridge along with throngs of running crowds. Carine held
onto Giles, and David onto Limly, a full bag strapped over his
shoulder.

Carine turned. The Heartless One watched from
the Bastion’s turrets.

“He sees us!” she cried, just as the bridge
crumbled beneath them. “Jump!”

The horse leapt from the crumbling stone onto
the hard dirt pathway. Not everyone had been as lucky. The unlucky
ones screamed or lay in the churning river that carried them out to
sea.

Carine squeezed her eyes shut as the horses
headed to the Grunge, but as they traced the streets where her old
neighbors fled into their homes and doors slammed shut, hatred
swelled within her. She missed her parents and the safe city she’d
always known. She would destroy the Heartless Ones. She had to.

As they whipped around a corner, Carine
straightened. A weeping woman with long graying hair stood at the
corner of the street. Her nut-brown eyes flicked up to the horses.
Carine’s heart flipped. After days without her parents, her mom was
alive.

“Giles, stop!” Carine’s body twisted to watch
the figure of her mother zoom by.

“We can’t. He’s on our tail,” Giles said.

Mom was moving now, running, her long hair in
waves behind her, arms and legs flying as she chased the horse.
“Carine!”

“Stop!” Carine yanked Giles’ shirt. “It’s my
mom!”

Giles whipped his head around, taking in just
a glimpse of the woman that meant nothing to him and everything to
Carine.

Mom’s eyes were wide and frazzled as she
gained distance. Her face fluctuated between panic and joy. Carine
felt the same: joy that Mom was here, panic that they were leaving.
Carine reached out for her mother’s fingers, though Mom was still
ten feet away, stretching out her hand as well, as though a
physical touch would make this real.

Limly’s horse slowed as David said, “I don’t
see the Heartless One. Let her stop.”

Giles glanced back down the alley and slowed
but didn’t stop. Carine, eyes filling with tears, met his eyes in
quick thanks, but his stony glare and paranoid glance back told her
that she didn’t have long.

Without a word, Mom found Carine’s fingers.
Her warm touch was a thousand hugs to Carine. She jogged, her
Didda-made shoes bounding over the cobblestone as she kept pace
with Carine and Giles on the horse. They swayed back and front, but
Carine kept her eyes locked on Mom’s worn face. In this moment,
neither the subtle breeze nor the threat of the Heartless One could
chill her. Mom was here, holding her hand.

Mom rested her other hand on the horse’s
coat, jogging sideways so she could look up at Carine. Carine bent
over the saddle. “I’m so sorry, Mom. I should never have left you
with that baker. I shouldn’t have left for Padliot.”

“It’s okay, my sweet girl,” Mom said. “I’m
okay. Didda’s okay.”

“He is? Where is he?”

Mom shook her head. “I don’t know. I saw him
an hour ago.”

Giles turned. “It’s time, Carine. We have to
go.”

Mom looked over Carine’s companions: two
princes and a servant. Her eyes trailed over Carine’s cut hair. A
question lingered in her eyes. Carine knew the expression on her
face. It was the same one she wore when Carine came home after
others had picked on her. Mom wanted to know what had happened to
her daughter, because something had changed.

Carine wanted to tell her everything. She
wanted to see Didda.

“Where you going?” Mom said.

“We’re going to get Kavariel’s flame.”

“What?” Mom’s face contorted as though in
physical pain.

“As soon as we get back, Esten will be safe.
In the meantime, be safe. Promise me you will.”

Mom just squeezed her wrist tight with both
hands. The horse was going faster, and if Mom didn’t get out of the
way, it would trample her. She ran as fast as she could to keep up,
her shoulder bumping into the horse’s side.

“Promise me!” Carine said.

But Mom’s eyes, brimming with tears, were
squeezed nearly shut as her mouth formed a kiss. She leaned
forward, reaching for Carine’s cheek, but at an inch away, the
horse bolted. Mom fell away against a brick wall. Carine’s hair
flapped around her forehead as she watched her mother grow more and
more distant.

“I love you!” Carine called back, but as they
turned the corner, Carine doubted Mom heard her.

She held tight onto Giles as they left Esten.
As much as she knew this was necessary, as much as she and her
family needed that flame, every voice in her head asked what—by
dragon’s bane—she could possibly be thinking.

The city gave way to nature’s stir as Giles
and Carine caught up with David and Limly. They looked as though
they’d just stopped, right at the edge of the street, where the
city broke away to the long grasses and marshes that lay to the
west.

Their horses crossed narrow wooden bridges
over the marshes leaving Esten. Little black insects glided over
the water, and splashes marked where fish broke the surface. When
the bridges gave way to compact dirt paths, the horses brushed
through cordgrass.

Carine couldn’t help but turn as they
traveled westward, toward a landscape filled with unknown dangers,
toward an area just as vulnerable to the Heartless Ones as Esten.
Dry green moss grazed Carine’s shoulders, hanging like laundry on
the tree branches. Distant Esten seemed quiet and small. Only the
top of the unlit torch was visible now, though the dragon’s
features were indistinct.

“You can stop looking back,” Giles said as
the sun sank. Limly rode abreast with the youngest prince, so David
sat next to Carine.

She asked, “What do you think the Heartless
One will do to them now that they’re all trapped inside?”

Limly answered, “Not a thing, madam. Not a
thing! We will capture the flame and extinguish him before he has a
chance to strike.”

David made a face. “Grandfather almost died
today. The Heartless One had better not kill him.”

“Or Mom and Didda.”

The dusk was colder than they’d planned.
Carine wrapped herself in her cloak as the horses clicked on.

“Carine,” David said after a while. “You
saved Grandfather’s life. You should get a medal or something. Be
knighted or something.”

Carine smiled. “Can you knight me?”

Giles laughed. “It doesn’t work that way.
There are no honorary knights in Navafort. All knights must pass
rigorous training of the body, intellect, and will. Honorary
knighthood is a thing of Padliot. It has no place in a kingdom such
as ours.”

“That’s right, Your Majesty,” Limly said.
“Quite right.”

Carine sat up straight, something in Limly’s
voice stirring her to speak. “You saved all of us, Limly.”

A sad smile crept into his lips. “I just
followed my duty, just followed my duty.” He raised a finger.
“Incidentally, Your Majesties, I grabbed some money from the
treasury on my dash downstairs, just in case. I hope you’re not
displeased, Your Majesties.”

“How much?” Giles asked.

The red velvet bag clinked as Limly raised it
from where it was tied to his waist. “Enough, sirs—quite enough, I
should think—to cover food and lodging for the journey.” He went
silent for a moment, and then added, “Despite the circumstances, I
feel honored to be part of this mission. Your Majesties, my older
brothers both were knighted early in their lives, very early.”

“Renald who swordfights with me, he is your
brother, isn’t he?” Giles said.

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“He’s not too bad.”

Limly smiled. “Not at all, Your Majesty,
though his talent far surpasses mine. Far surpasses.” The tree
frogs croaked and sang. “I always wanted to be like him, but I
couldn’t pass the exams. After too many years of training and
failing, my instructor finally recommended I choose another
occupation.”

“I didn’t know that,” David said.

“All I have ever wanted, Your Majesties, is
to serve this kingdom’s leaders. Your Majesties, to have been your
servant all these years, and to serve you now on this expedition
that could very well be the last chance for Navafort…” Moonlit
tears sparkled in his eyes. “It is a privilege, Your
Majesties.”

Limly’s joy in this journey sharply
contrasted with Carine’s unease. It would take more than two weeks
just to reach the dragon, and if they survived, two weeks back. She
hoped that Mom would find Didda safe, and that by some miracle,
Esten would be left untouched before they returned.

“But what do you mean, the flame went out?”
The centaur had aging brown hair on her head and body. Her dark
green shirt fell nearly to her hooves, so from the front she looked
almost like menfolk.

Her husband had opened the door as soon as
Limly knocked. He shooed her away from the door, his tail just as
white and frizzled as his short hair. “Do not hound them, Marie;
they are weary.” He waved in Carine and the princes. “Come in, come
in. Take off your shoes.”

Though they’d managed to find safe havens
each night since leaving Esten, Carine always felt uneasy entering
a stranger’s home. She was sweating, since the countryside grew
warmer as they traveled westward, and was glad to take off her
cloak and shoes and enter the cool kitchen.

Carine surveyed the room. A large hearth
burned embers with cast iron cooking equipment, and two divans were
pushed up against a corner surrounded in colorful blankets that
must serve as a sitting area for them.

“Ask them if they’re hungry, Marie,” the
husband said, making sure the princes were satisfied as they
stepped out of their shoes.

“Of course, what can I feed you, Your
Majesties?” Marie rattled off a list of options before skirting
back to the hearth with an armful of ingredients to prepare. “Give
me a half hour.”

By the time Carine bit into the satisfying
polenta served on plates and eaten on the colorful floor mats, she
decided she could sleep soundly in this home. Marie and her
husband, George, spoke of the spring harvest and their small farm
for most of the meal, but when George ate the last of his meal, he
put his hands on his white hairy knees and said, “So?”

Marie’s panic when Limly briefly explained
their quest revealed that they would have to give some information
at some point or another.

She met David’s eyes. He set his plate on the
floor and sat back. “I guess you didn’t hear all the way out here.”
David scratched his head, looking for words. “Luzhiv has attacked
Kavariel, and our dragon didn’t deliver the protective flames.”

“A Heartless One has entered Esten,” Giles
said, his posture perfect despite sitting cross-legged.

Marie blinked, not moving, horror shining in
her eyes. “You mean to say that we have no protection?” She turned
to George. He picked up a blanket from the floor and covered his
flank, as though his shiver were from the cold.

“You’re doing a great help to Navafort by
hosting us for the night,” David said, as though their help alone
could restore peace to the nation.

Marie didn’t seem to hear him. “It is hard to
believe that the same situation that forced us to leave Wyre now
afflicts us here in our old age.”

George wrapped the blanket around his wrinkly
arms now, his eyebrows squiggled up. “Is the Heartless One in Esten
the only one in Navafort?”

“We do not know,” said Giles. “Communication
has been scarce with other parts of the country.”

“But he wasn’t the only one to enter,” Carine
said. She traced her finger along the red wool stripe in the
blanket on the floor. Her voice hushed as she said, “The one that
has taken Esten killed Selius, the first Heartless One. We can’t
figure out his exact plan, but it’s like he’s closing all the
borders to the city.”

George’s plate clattered to the ground, its
noise dulled by the thin fabric. In his eyes was both confusion and
horror. “That can’t be true.” Marie looked at him, shadows crossing
her eyes from the candle that lit the room in the dimming
night.

“Like I said, we don’t know why he wants to
cut the city off...” Carine’s voice faltered as David met her
eyes.

Limly bit his nail, his knees curled up under
him. Giles sat straight, listening but physically unaffected.

“Not that,” George said. “You said the second
Heartless One killed the first.”

“Yes, I saw his body.”

“That’s impossible!” George said, standing
suddenly, his half-horse body appearing massive with the blanket
hanging over him and his shadow cast along the wall.

“Be calm, George, be calm,” said Marie with a
high-pitched voice that did nothing to model tranquility.

Carine stood, not ready to let this
conversation switch to anything else. “What do you mean it’s
impossible? You think his death was faked?”

“I can’t say,” said the old centaur.

“My George and I grew up in a town taken over
by a Heartless One.” Shaking, Marie stood and took his hand. “He
was fierce and needy, and our town appeased him. But it wasn’t half
as bad as when the neighbor town’s Heartless One began to war with
ours.”

“They couldn’t kill each other, see, since
they aren’t really alive to begin with.”

“They’ve got no hearts, no blood, no
soul.”

“None of that,” George agreed. “It’s only the
dragon Luzhiv’s power that sustains them. No cut or scrape or loss
of limb can break that link between those pitiful creatures and
their dragon.”

Marie’s wide eyes scanned Carine and the
princes as they stood. “Neither of those two Heartless Ones knew
what they wanted. They destroyed our town and many others, not just
buildings but livelihoods and lives. It wasn’t just death but
despair that plagued us as our sisters lost vision and our brothers
lost houses. We all lost our freedom.”