Burn Bright

Naif crouched down and hugged her knees, feeling curiously deflated. What had she been hoping for in their conversation?

She wasn’t sure. Her emotions kept changing. Smiling came more easily, but so did dissatisfaction. All the checks and measures she’d learned as a child had crumbled away, leaving turmoil.

‘Ret?’

The whisper drifted up from one of the paths that led down the side of the mountain. She peered along it. She knew the voice but couldn’t see him. ‘Joel?’

‘Walk towards my voice but don’t look down.’

Her heart quickened and she did just as he said, feet crunching the light gravelly surface. Dry brush broke off and caught in the train of her skirt. She bunched it up and kept walking.

‘Stop now and fold your arms. Just stand looking down the mountain at the lights. Keep your voice low. Ripers might be watching.’

‘There are no Ripers out here,’ said Naif.

‘They are everywhere, little sister.’

Naif badly wanted to look at him. His voice came from a fall of rocks close by. He must be crouched behind there.

‘I heard you’d been taken by the Ripers. What did Lenoir do to you?’ he demanded in an angry whisper.

‘N-nothing. It was Brand. Lenoir saved my life, Joel.’

‘Tell me,’ he demanded.

Naif took a breath to explain again. ‘The wardens gave me an obedience strip when they put us on probation to stop me trying to leave the compound.’

‘What did it do?’

‘It gave electric shocks if I went near the gate to the compound.’

‘So how did you get away then?’

‘I practised hurting myself to get used to it, so I could escape.’

‘You practised hurting yourself?’

Naif licked dry lips. ‘The way you told me. It was all I could think of to do. I couldn’t stay there after you left. Mother was heartbroken. She barely spoke. And the warden, he used to …’ She stopped there, unwilling to share what happened, even with Joel.

‘Ret, I’m sorry.’

She gave a tight little nod. ‘Brand found the strip and cut it from me. I was bleeding, dying, when Lenoir … he stopped the bleeding.’

‘Brand used a knife on you?’

‘She’s cruel and dangerous, Joel.’

‘And she will pay for this,’ he said with whispered fury. ‘How did she know you?’

‘She tried to tear my clothes off at the re-birth, and then I interfered when she attacked one of the White Wings – a girl called Krista-belle.’

‘With the chair? I heard it was you but I didn’t believe it.’

‘What Brand was doing … was like the warden and I-I got angry. Anyway … Brand and Modai have been watching me.’ She took a breath. ‘Suki and I and Rollo went to the Youth Circle meeting. They are going to use Markes as bait to lure Ruzalia. I tried to warn him against joining them but Brand took me from there … and she found my obedience strip. When she cut it out, it tore my artery. Lenoir came and stopped the bleeding.’

‘Lenoir?’

‘Yes. Lenoir is trying to protect us all. He says the Peaks go to a better place; he calls it the next stage of pleasure.’

‘You believe him?’

Naif took a deep breath. ‘I-I do. I think. At least, I believe he believes it. But the Ripers are divided. Brand wants to take over from Lenoir. They’re voting on it in two passes. If Brand wins, they’ll hunt the League down. All the gangs will be disbanded.’

Joel made an angry sound. ‘Your friend, Rollo, came to us with a similar story but we weren’t sure if he was telling the truth. I must warn Eve. We’ll make sure Ruzalia knows. Is there anything else you can tell me?’

Naif’s heart gave a painful thump. Suddenly she felt used. ‘I’m not your spy, Joel. I’m your sister. I don’t want to be a part of any gang. I want you to come with me. To leave Ixion.’

‘Leave?’ said Joel. ‘Why would I want to do that?’

Naif clasped her fingers together. ‘This place – it’s not how it’s supposed to be. It’s –’

‘Flawed? Dangerous?’ said her brother. ‘Just like Grave. But I can change Ixion. Eve has shown me that. In Grave I couldn’t do anything. The Council, our parents, they suffocated us. But Eve has plans here. She’s amazing. I wish you knew her.’

‘Can you really change anything, Joel?’ Naif couldn’t keep the bitterness from her voice. She’d longed so much for her brother’s company again, gone through so much to reach him, and now … ‘Do you just want to be a hero?’

Joel didn’t like her questions. ‘What’s happened to you, Ret? You used to believe in everything I did. You made it bearable for me at home, and I tried to protect you. Remember when Father found the Angel Arias?’

‘Of course I do,’ said Naif fiercely. ‘And do you know how it felt when you left? You didn’t even tell me you were going.’

‘I couldn’t,’ he protested. ‘It was safer for you that way.’

‘Safer! Did you even think about how it would be afterwards? Father punished me every day for what you did, and Mother cried. She just cried all the time.’ Naif felt her anger returning. She wanted to shout at her brother.

She’d never been angry with him like this before. Seals didn’t behave like that. But she wasn’t a Seal anymore. Lenoir had changed that. Lottie had changed everything. ‘Then the wardens came and put their electro-eyes in my bedroom. They watched me when I bathed and … Joel, they watched me do everything. And if I tried to leave the compound … the pain.’ She touched her wounded thigh automatically.

His silence might have been guilt. Or indifference. Naif had no way of knowing without seeing his face. And she longed to do that. ‘Joel? Please …’

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered. ‘Bye, Ret.’

‘My name is Naif,’ she replied.

Nothing. No rustle of the bushes, or scraping of gravel. But she knew he’d gone.

‘Joel, wait!’ She started down the path after him. ‘Please come back.’

But when she stopped again to listen, all she heard was the faint strains of music from Agios and a scrabbling sound.

She swivelled, catching the slash of a dark figure in her corner sight. Not Joel. He wouldn’t try to scare her like that.

Where was Agios? She could no longer see the church. Her haste had taken her past a large rock face that jutted above her now, obscuring the view behind.

Just follow the path back, she told herself.

But the path – so well lit before – had dimmed with barely enough light to see one step ahead. Naif began to retrace the way she thought she’d come, but the bare dirt disappeared and her feet became tangled in undergrowth.

She stared blindly into the dark, seeing only the outlines of low bushes and, further down the mountain, the brilliant webbed lines of the kars.

Away from the pungent musky scent of the church, the dark smelt dangerous and charged with energy, as if lightning had just struck the spot where she stood.

But there were no storms on Ixion, just the constant, prickling heat.

Naif heard scrabbling again, a few feet ahead. And to the left. Then behind. Something circled her, or more than one thing. Dread twisted in her stomach. Modai had warned her. Test had warned her. Don’t stray from the path.

She wanted to run but didn’t know which direction to go.

A snuffle and then a soft squealing; a long tail lashed out from the bushes. It tore through the delicate material of her dress and little barbs hooked into her ankle.

She collapsed and the tail began to drag her, the barbs sawing into her ankle bone. She couldn’t fight it, couldn’t think above the depth and height of her pain.

She moaned and writhed in its grasp but the pain only intensified. Spines scraped her face, wrapping around her arms as it dragged her deeper into bushes.

Then, as suddenly as it had attacked, the creature let go of her ankle. The release from pain brought an ecstasy of relief, but the elation vanished as it threw its entire weight upon her legs and began sucking at her bleeding ankle.

She tried to move but it shifted in counterbalance, sniffing and nibbling, working its way up her body until it sat on her chest. It touched her hair, playing with the strands and tugging them.

See you. Follow you. Want you.

Naif forced her eyes open to confront it; a smooth-skinned creature from what she could see, with a small, almost human-shaped torso. But ungainly, clawed limbs sprouted from its lower body, and tentacles curled out of its shoulders. Or were they unformed wings?

And its face … so appalling. So utterly bestial.

Pity eroded some of her fear. Instinctively she reached out and touched its face.

The creature grew still, startled by her action.

She traced the contour of its ridged forehead with a trembling finger. It felt slick, coated in a layer of mucous, and the flesh underneath sprang back like bed foam.

The creature tilted its head forward, making it easier for her to reach.

Naif scratched gently along the ridge and it made little grunts of pleasure.

They stayed together, in that position, until her arm began to ache and the weight on her chest became impossible to bear. ‘I must … sit up,’ she whispered.

The creature cocked its head as if thinking. Then it shifted its body, easing the pressure on her lungs.

She lay, gasping in air, for a few moments. But as she tried to sit up, its body became rigid. In one quick movement it leapt to its claws, gripping her flesh for balance. The sudden weight crushed the breath from her lungs again and her head began to spin.

She tried to roll and catch her breath, but it was too agile, and merely adjusted its stance. She grappled for its ankles to push it away but her hands slipped on her own blood.

‘Naif!’

She heard her name like a roar in her head; a piercing cry of anguish. And then the beast was gone, knocked from her by an attack from another powerful being.

‘No!’ Naif struggled to sit up as the two forces battled close to her. ‘Lenoir! Stop!’

The creature screeched – at first in anger, and then in pain. Their bodies thumped and tumbled and Naif ’s mind filled with the terrible crack of breaking bones.

The path began to glow again. She could see it just a body length away. She’d been close to it all along, only a few steps.

Gritting her teeth she crawled towards it, ignoring the prickle of spine bushes and sharp twigs, until she felt the smooth packed gravel underneath her body. Her fingers clutched the hard pebbles and tears of relief spilled down her face. She crawled along it towards the edge of a rock face. Around the edifice would be Agios. If she called out, if she –

But as she reached the rock, Lenoir appeared before her, his silken hair hanging in strings, wet with blood, and his cloak torn away.

‘Are you hurt?’ He loomed over her.

She tried to sit up. ‘I didn’t think … it would … harm me. It wanted to be … petted.’ Her tongue had trouble forming the words, too dry to moisten them properly.

Lenoir dropped to his knees and pulled her into his arms. ‘It would have killed you, Naif.’

Naif swallowed and tried licking her lips. ‘Wh-why do you say that?’

He stared out into the darkness. ‘Leyste has been following you since the moment you left the Register.’

‘Leyste? You’ve said that name before. Who is Leyste?’

‘Leyste is a Night Creature who likes to linger around the new ones. This is the first time, though, he has stalked one.’

Stalked. ‘Yes. He spoke to me outside the Register. And other times. But I was the only one who could hear him.’

‘The Night Creatures have our ability to place sound. It is not usual that they use words, though.’

Naif thought about how Lenoir’s voice seemed so close to her when he was speaking to a crowd. ‘H-how m-many c-creatures are out th-there?’

Lenoir lifted her as if her weight counted for nothing and began to carry her back along the path. ‘There are many and their form varies.’

He didn’t look at her or speak again after that.

As they climbed closer to Agios, Naif’s adrenaline faded and pain replaced it. Her ankle began to throb and the cuts and scrapes on her skin stung. She clamped her lips together so as not to moan.

The music grew louder – not Markes playing, but a fast, discordant sound – and Lenoir’s arms involuntarily tightened around her. ‘What were you doing out here, Naif?’

She tried to think before she answered. Despite her anger at Joel, she would never betray her brother to anyone. But Lenoir was clever and she was not practised at lies.

‘I came outside to talk to Markes – the musician. We … argued and I walked away. I lost sight of Agios when I passed the rocks. Then the path faded.’

‘Leyste,’ he said the name grimly, almost as though he was angry with himself. ‘He found a way to tamper with the light relays. I had not thought him clever enough. Nor any of them. Not unless …’

Naif lifted her head from his chest. They’d reached the side door that she and Markes had used, but Lenoir walked straight past it, along the high stone wall, towards the rear of the church.

‘Neither of us can go inside Agios looking like this. I’ll take you to Vank. Charlonge will clean your wounds.’

‘You think that Graselle has probably seen enough of me?’ Naif gave a soft, humourless laugh.

‘It is not safe in the Dominion while the vote –’ He cut off his sentence as they turned around the corner of the church.

A dull, metallic, octagonal compartment half the size of a cable kar and lit by its own spotlights sat alone on a flat piece of ground. Test leaned against it, frowning. When she saw Lenoir she straightened and opened a door in the side of the compartment.

She stood back then, arms folded, legs astride, her whole stance disapproving.

Lenoir didn’t acknowledge Test at all. Instead he lifted Naif inside onto a softly upholstered seat and climbed in after her.

A rush of memories hit her: the brass trimmings of the interior, the deep scent of the leather seats. It could have been one of the Grave Elders’ horse-drawn carriages. She’d travelled in them with Father to probation hearings, his anger like a priest’s grille between them, her shirt damp still from her mother’s tears.

A sudden jerking movement forced her to grasp hold of the seat.

‘The carriage is merely unfolding its legs. In a moment you’ll feel nothing,’ said Lenoir.

Naif held on until the rocking sensation stopped.

After a couple of reassuring glances out of the window, she settled against the seat and let her eyes close. She drifted to a place where neither thought nor action dwelt; an in-between place of nothing – away from the pain.

‘Naif!’ Lenoir roused her from petite nuit with a rough hand. ‘Take this now or the pain will harm you.’ He pressed a pod into her hand.

Remembering what Graselle had said to her about healing, she didn’t argue. She chewed it carefully and waited for the effects.

It wasn’t long before heaviness crept into her limbs, dulling everything including her reticence. Her head felt woozy but in a more pleasant way.

She glanced over at Lenoir. He stared moodily out of the window, his lips pursed. His beautiful hair matted by dark blood.

She wanted to ask him about Leyste but other words came out of her mouth. ‘Why was the party for me? You said that before when we were in the gallery,’ she asked.

Lenoir didn’t look at her. ‘If the vote goes against me things will change. I will not be able to do the things I choose. I wanted you to see how beautiful parties can be, how elegant.’

Naif gave a spontaneous smile. ‘That got messed up, didn’t it?’

He shrugged dismissively. ‘We are here.’

Naif sat up straighter, wondering if the pod had distorted her senses. ‘We’ve only been moving for a few minutes.’

He turned to her now, his face almost unsightly, streaked with blood and wearing an oddly vulnerable expression. It frightened her to see him that way.

He reached a hand to her face and the fingers that had burned her skin in Agios felt warm and soothing. He kneaded her cheek between his thumb and forefinger.

‘I thought that Leyste had already killed you, baby bat.’

‘I s-still don’t think he’d have hurt –’

He pinched her skin and let go. ‘Yes. He would.’

There was something so convincing in his tone that she let the argument go.

He leaned towards her until his mouth found the graze above her lips. Then he licked it gently, as he had done once before, like a catling with its baby.

Naif’s body dissolved, all sensations nullified, other than the pressure of his tongue and the tingling wetness of it. Obeying a welling of instinct, she shifted under his touch until her lips aligned with his. She pressed up hard against him. Her lips opened artlessly and her tongue found its way to his. He tasted salty with the tang of her blood, but that flavour ebbed and another took its place. She craved the moisture, thirsty for more of his special taste.

His fingers clamped around her upper arms, lifting her from the seat onto his lap. With every gentle pull she made on his tongue, he clung tighter to her, as if he would compress her into a tiny portion of herself.

Sensation, numbed by the pod, returned to her body with such crashing intensity that it left every nerve raw. She wanted to scream with elation and with pain.

Lenoir’s teeth closed on her tongue and raked the sides of it, causing her to arch in his grasp.

A growl ripped from his chest. He pushed her away and she glimpsed his face, so contorted that she barely recognised him. His cheeks seemed to have grown fuller, concealing his bone structure, and his brow heavier. His lips curled back, revealing the glistening of his gums.

‘Lenoir,’ she gasped.

He flung her back onto her seat and fled from the carriage.