She exhaled, a last breath of air that marked the end of an old life—one that was small in scope and purpose. When Veronyka drew air again, it was the start of something new—a life that promised wind-tossed hair and endless blue skies and fire that burned hotter than the sun. Her fingers tingled, her senses sharpened, and the world was alive in a way that it had never been before. Her magic buzzed inside her, drumming like a second heartbeat—or maybe that was this creature’s pulse beating in time with her own.
In that instant Veronyka knew Val had been right about the bond between animage and phoenix. It wasn’t love—such a small word couldn’t begin to encompass the feelings of respect and devotion, of trust and codependence that existed between human and beast. The bond was a unity that was written in the stars, older than the empire and the valley and the mountains, older than the gods, a connection that not even death could shake. Endless, limitless, and somehow timeless, Veronyka’s fate was tied to this creature, and they would always be together.
They were bondmates.
A cool breeze slipped across her skin, and Veronyka broke eye contact. The cabin was glowing with pale dawn light, the front door wide open.
Val was nowhere in sight.
She returned some time later. Wearing a mask of indifference, she carried a new sack of rice, some cornmeal, salt fish and dried deer meat, a small ceramic jar of honey, and a bag of dates. The dates were a rare treat—expensive and grown only in the province of Stel. Even corn was hard to come by in the mountains, though some farmers worked the crop on the lower rim.
Veronyka got to her feet, leaving her phoenix on the ground and wiping sweaty palms against her trousers. Val often stormed off when she was upset, disappearing for hours—or days—with little by way of explanation. If Veronyka was lucky, the time would allow Val to cool off and forget her anger. If Veronyka was unlucky, Val’s rage would ripen and rot, becoming all the more potent in their time apart.
Sometimes Veronyka would have no idea what had set Val off—but this time she thought she knew. The first phoenix should have been Val’s—she was the eldest, and she’d been the one to find the eggs. Guilt nagged at Veronyka, but she fought hard not to let it spoil this sweet, shining moment. Val would be fine. They simply had to wait for the second egg to hatch.
The phoenix chirruped softly as it pecked around the edge of the fire. The warmth had turned its fiery red down into a soft puff, and its beak and feet were as golden as the phoenix statues Veronyka had seen as a child in the gods’ plaza in Aura Nova—before they’d been taken down. Once guardians and defenders of the empire, the Phoenix Riders had abandoned their posts and sworn their loyalty to Avalkyra Ashfire instead. This made them traitors, and phoenixes along with them. While Avalkyra was the true heir to the throne, she’d committed treason and been labeled a criminal before she was old enough to be crowned, and had been chased from the empire. The governors threw their support behind the nonmagical sister, Pheronia, instead, while Avalkyra set herself up in Pyra. She and her supporters had soon been deemed “rebels,” refusing to abide by empire law or answer for their supposed crimes. In the years following her death, the empire had destroyed anything that could be construed as supportive of her and her legacy—phoenix imagery most of all.
It was no easy task, as phoenixes had been a part of empire history from the very beginning. They were symbols of the royal line and sacred to the empire’s highest god, Axura—translated to “Azurec” in the Trader’s Tongue, the common language of the empire. One by one temple statues were removed and sacred prayers altered. Axura—who had always been depicted as a phoenix—was anthropomorphized, and even songs, poems, and plays that featured phoenixes were forbidden.
Though they had begun this process during the Blood War, it had taken the Council of Governors years to finish the job. Veronyka had caught small glimpses of the phoenixes’ continued presence up until her last days in the empire several months ago: faded frescoes peeking out from under a peeling coat of paint or crumbling concrete revealing glass mosaics underneath.
Veronyka would often daydream about returning to those places on phoenix-back, scraping the paint clean or cracking the sidewalk in half to reveal the truth beneath.
With a jolt, she realized that this daydream now had the potential to become reality.
Veronyka watched her sister warily; first Val put away the food stores, then she tore open the bag of cornmeal with her teeth, pouring some into a small bowl and stirring in dollops of honey, producing a fine, grainy paste.
“For the bird,” she said at last, nodding her head in the direction of the phoenix. “Later it will be ready for dates and fresh fruit, if we can get them.”
Val knew everything there was to know about phoenixes, thanks to their maiora, who had been a Phoenix Rider back in her day—one of the few who had escaped the empire’s notice, at least for a time. Their grandmother loved to tell stories, and while Veronyka had been interested in epic battles and romances, Val had wanted to know more practical things.
Veronyka took the bowl from Val, who refused to meet her gaze, and placed it on the ground next to the phoenix. The bird inspected the mixture for a moment before dipping its beak into the sticky-sweet concoction. “The other one’s gonna hatch soon, right, Val?”
Val looked at the rocklike egg, sitting among the burning coals.
“Going to,” she said, avoiding the question and closing the shutters with a loud clack.
The phoenix’s head popped up at the sound, but it quickly returned to its meal. The broken shutters blocked out most of the late-morning sunlight, leaving the cabin in near darkness, save for the warm glow of the fire.
Strange that there were three of them now, when it had just been Veronyka and Val for most of their lives. Their parents had died in the Blood War, and their grandmother, who had raised them for a time, had been beaten to death by an angry mob almost ten years later.
While the immediate aftermath of the war was apparently the worst, there had been many incidents throughout the years—trials of famous Riders discovered in hiding, small groups of rebels and dissidents rounded up and executed—that had caused new fervor to ripple through the empire. The council—the ruling body of the empire, made up of the four provincial governors as well as lawmakers, bankers, landowners, and other important political leaders—made an example of anyone who didn’t fall in line, doling out punishments that were swift and severe. Animages grew more fearful and went deeper into hiding, while those who’d grown to hate them thanks to the war became eager to hunt them down and ferret them out again.
It was one such riot that had taken their grandmother. It began outside the courthouses after a trial and spread toward the Narrows, where many animages lived in secret.
When their maiora heard the mob coming, she’d told Veronyka and Val to flee and leave her behind. The girls were small and fast and could slip out windows and slink through alleys that she could not.