THE REFORGED TRILOGY: BOOK 3 — HAMMER OF TIME
Chapter 13: Glass
“It was in a place of desolation and dust that we found ourselves.”
– Ferris Verridian (234 PA)
Duaal’s haste in selling the phennomethylln had cost him some of the profits, but the money was enough to feed the growing number of Arcadians for a while. There was even some color left over to buy tents and pavilions to set up on the site of the old Nihilist cathedral.
But before sending anyone there, Panna and Logan wanted to check the site.
This time, Panna borrowed a scarf to wear over her face. It was more of a veil, really, but if it would keep Stray’s endless red dust out of her mouth, Panna would have worn a bag over her head. She wiped the steam from the mirror and checked her reflection. She looked so… human.
Even after years without them, Panna was always surprised and a little sad not to see her wings rising up from between her shoulders. She had lived more of her life without wings than with them… Did that make her less Arcadian? Duke Ferris certainly seemed to think so.
There was so little of the old Arcadian nobility left. That hadn’t always been the case, of course. Those of noble blood had been evacuated from the failing White Kingdom first, leaving behind the common fairies and most of the knights to cover their hasty exits. But the same virtue that had given them the first chance to flee Arcadia had made them poorly suited to their new lives as Alliance refugees. Without their riches and high glass towers, servants and knights, the fairy nobles fell quickly into the depths of depression. Those not killed by coreworld diseases took their own lives.
Logan was waiting for Panna at the cargo bay airlock. The Prian had not changed his wardrobe for Stray, but she didn’t think that he cared very much about the local weather. Duke Ferris was there, too, standing on the other side of the airlock with his arms tucked into long, pale sleeves.
Panna inclined her head to the duke.
“Your Grace,” she said. “What can we do for you?”
“He wants to come with us,” Logan answered.
“You… do?” Panna looked at Ferris. The old Arcadian man had his gray-streaked golden braids and pointed ears covered in a deep lavender hood. “We’re only inspecting the old cathedral site, Your Grace. Just to make sure it’s stable and clean enough for our use.”
“Vyron’s trying to find out who owns it,” Logan said. “No luck yet. There’s a record of the sale, but the name on it is a fake.”
“Gavriel didn’t own it?” Panna asked.
Logan shook his head. “He had no money. Gavriel didn’t own anything.”
“That does not sound unlike us,” Duke Ferris answered. “Let us begin.”
Duaal had landed the Blue Phoenix near the collapsed cathedral and Logan opened the airlock, then led the Arcadians outside. It was early in the day and the dim, oversized sun squatted on the horizon. The wind hadn’t picked up yet. Panna pulled off her scarf with a sigh and stalked out of the ship after Logan.
In the year since the Nihilist church’s collapse, the desert had almost entirely reclaimed the land. If Panna had not seen images of Gavriel’s black cathedral, she would have had no idea that anything ever stood in the sifting orange sands. All that remained were red dunes and a few dark patches of tough black weeds.
“What happened to the Nihilists’ cathedral?” Panna asked. “Did the Gharib police tear it down?”
Logan crouched on one of the small dunes and dug through the dust. He pulled a piece of twisted metal free and inspected it.
“No,” he said. “It’s just been buried by the desert.”
Duke Ferris flew to the top of a larger dune and landed to pick up a handful of fine sand. It sifted from between his fingers and fell in red and orange-brown streams to the ground.
“An entire cathedral lies buried beneath us?” the old nobleman asked, frowning.
Logan shrugged. “Not intact. Tiberius knocked it down with the Blue Phoenix. Without maintenance, the tunnels beneath probably filled with sand, too. But we won’t know for sure until we can get a survey densitometer out here.”
“It’s going to take a lot of upkeep to build anything here,” Panna said. She sat down on a russet rock and sighed, feeling suddenly drained. “The desert is just going to bury us alive. Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”
Ferris glided down to Panna and, to her surprise, smiled.
“The queen does not think so,” he told her. “She agrees that this remains an excellent location for our new home.”
“Has Maeve seen it?” Panna asked a little more sharply than she intended.
Duke Ferris noticed and his more familiar frown returned. “You should not question Queen Maeve.”
Panna wanted to point out that she had actually known Maeve far longer than the duke had, that she was one of those who had urged the queen to take the throne, but Ferris wasn’t done.
“We discussed it this morning,” the duke said. He brushed some sand from his sleeve. “The sands here are not a curse, but a blessing. It is not the same as that of our lost home, but I believe that we can make glass from it.”
“Glass?” Panna repeated. “You mean Arcadian glass?”
“He certainly doesn’t mean the kind we put in windows,” Logan answered. He was rubbing some dull red-orange sand between the fingers of his right hand. “This isn’t going to be the same as the kind of glass in Maeve’s spear.”
“Do we have anyone who knows how to make it?” Panna asked.
She had studied everything she could find about the hard and strong Arcadian glass, including the molecular structure and chemical composition, but that didn’t mean she could create it.
“I spent some time glass-singing as a younger man,” Ferris said. “Only small things, sculptures and such. But both Hyra and Lorren know the songs.”
“They do?” Panna asked, shaking her head. “Then why didn’t I see a single piece of glass on Sunjarrah? If all they need is sand…”
The older Arcadian gave her a pitying look. If she didn’t understand already, Ferris didn’t seem to think she could learn.
Panna sighed and hoped that he didn’t hear her. The duke was just as bad as Xartasia, in his way. Neither of them thought much of the young fairies. Xartasia left them behind and Panna wondered if Ferris would do the same — if only Maeve would let him.
Panna stifled another sigh. It was an unkind and unfair thought. Ferris’ idea about the glass was a good one. Even with all the coreworlders’ extensive and impressive science, they couldn’t reproduce Arcadian glass. It was unique to the White Kingdom. Panna knelt and ran her fingers through the red sand.
“Coldhand, how long are the profits from the phenno going to feed us?” she asked.
The tall Prian considered for a moment before answering. “At our current head count, with cheap food and no fuel for the Blue Phoenix, about five weeks. But if our numbers rise, that estimate is going to fall drastically.”
“Queen Maeve will win the hearts of all the Arcadians here on Stray,” Ferris assured him confidently.
“And they’ll need somewhere to live,” Panna said. “So we had better get started. Where can we get a densitometer?”
“Sure, we’ve got a densitometer,” Vyron told Duaal. “It’s on a survey truck. The old owner couldn’t pay his repair bill and left the whole thing. I can pull it out tonight, if you want.”
“Don’t bother,” Duaal told the Dailon man cheerfully. “Does the truck run?”
“Not very well.”
“As long as we can get it over to the old cathedral site, it will do the job.”
Vyron nodded and took a few notes on a datadex. “Are you sure you don’t want a proper survey team?”
Duaal shook his head. “No. There isn’t enough money or time for that. Maeve’s making her first speech tomorrow night.”
Unbreakers was actually quite busy, with a dozen customers all squeezing through the narrow aisles and filling shopping baskets with bits of electronics and machinery, or waiting surreptitiously to buy a canister of Xyn’s black-market phennomethylln. Vyron leaned over the counter and asked if they needed anything, but those who acknowledged him at all did so only with grunts or waves of their hands.
“Kessa’s been asking about the speech,” Vyron said, returning his attention to Duaal. “Do you think we could come to listen?”
Duaal hesitated. Maeve liked the little Dailon family and talked about them all the time, but she seemed nervous about the speech. The new fairy queen had locked herself in the Blue Phoenix mess with Panna and Duke Ferris to review every word.
Duaal grinned.
“Sure,” he told Vyron. “I think Maeve would love for you and Kessa to be there.”
Maeve wondered if she was going to pass out. Her head swam and spots of color burst like miniature fireworks behind her closed eyelids. Logan held her upright like a fainting bounty mark.
“How many?” Panna asked, stunned.
“Three hundred or so,” Ferris repeated.
“So many?” Maeve whispered. She wasn’t sure if anyone heard her, or if she had spoken aloud at all.
“Sir Calathan addressed at least that number on Sunjarrah,” the duke continued. “And Xartasia’s numbers far surpass our own. By the time this is done, we must be able to sway thousands.”
“Thousands?” Maeve asked. Her mouth was as dry as the desert outside. “I cannot do this! I am not a politician. I… I am not even a knight anymore!”
“No,” Ferris told her. “You are the queen of Arcadia. Your people need you.”
How often had she heard those exact words from Panna? More times than Maeve could easily count. But did her black hair really mean anything? If Cavain’s blood ran through her veins, why didn’t she feel more like a queen? Shouldn’t she feel some sort of glorious righteousness? But Maeve only felt sick.
She ran to the sink and retched, but all that came up was a thin trickle of acidic saliva. The would-be queen spat and leaned against the counter until she could stand on her own again. Maeve felt Logan, Ferris and Panna watching her. She splashed water on her face.
Maeve’s reflection was warped and indistinct in the metal of the sink’s bottom. All Maeve could see was a pale oval with dark smears in place of her eyes. It was the face of a ghost, of one long dead and set to wander the worlds without a home.
Was that how Arcadians looked to the Alliance, forlorn shrouds empty of life?
Perhaps. But that is how we see ourselves, Maeve thought. That is how Xartasia sees us. However terrible her plan is, at least she gives our people a purpose.
It didn’t matter how sick it made her, how watery her knees felt or how much her wings shook. Maeve didn’t feel glorious, but she had to pretend.
It was a lie, but maybe it was better than Xartasia’s lie.
Maeve scowled at her distorted reflection. At least Xartasia had Calathan’s help, and probably many others. Briefly, Maeve considered asking Panna or Ferris to make the speech for her, but decided that it was hardly fair. It wasn’t the other fairies’ fault that Maeve was nervous.
She turned away from the sink and smiled a little.
“Three hundred,” she said as clearly as she could manage. “It is a good start. We will hope for more next time.”
It had been Panna’s idea to join the rest of the crowd for Maeve’s speech, but now she was beginning to wonder if it was a good idea.
The other Arcadians were staring at her. Some seemed to think she was human, but it was those who recognized her as one of their own that made Panna bite her lip and bury her hands deep in her pockets.
The three hundred or so pale-haired and white-winged fairies gathered in the sandy bowl between two dunes. A camp of dusty tents rose up on one side like the solidified peaks of choppy water. They were all empty, though. At Duke Ferris’ request, the Sunjarrah Arcadians were mixed into the crowd, not unlike Panna.
Logan and Vyron had raised a small stage on top of the smaller dune. It was little more than a sheet of metal bolted to four concrete blocks. Hyra and Lorren were still trying to figure out how to sing the strange Stray sand. The only glass they had managed so far was cloudy and brittle, prone to shattering under the slightest pressure.
On the other side of the audience basin, Panna saw a tall Dailon holding their black-eyed baby up for a better view. Panna hurried through the maze of feathered wings and extended her hand.
“You must be Kessa,” she said. “I’m Panna Sul.”
The Dailon balanced Baliend against her hip and shook Panna’s smaller hand.
“Maeve told us a lot about you,” Kessa said. “She says you know more about fairies than she does.”
“Queen Maeve said that?” Panna knew she shouldn’t grin at the praise, but she couldn’t help herself.
Kessa laughed.
“Queen Maeve,” she repeated. “It’s strange to hear you call her that. She yelled at me once just for thanking her. Maeve was a very unhappy woman.”
Panna had a hard time imagining it. Not Maeve being unhappy, but being impolite. She knew it had happened… Duaal had plenty of stories about the queen’s misdeeds and Panna knew that Logan Coldhand had tried to capture Maeve for a bounty not so long ago.
But now Maeve Cavainna was her queen. Panna could admit to herself that she might not have been as naturally commanding as Xartasia seemed to be, but the younger Cavainna really was trying.
“There she is,” Kessa said suddenly, pointing.
Panna looked up to see Maeve landing on the makeshift stage. Duaal and Ferris — who had landed beside the queen and furled his wings against his back — must have selected her clothes. Maeve Cavainna wore flowing red and gold that streamed out behind her in the dry wind like a flaming banner. Her long black hair danced as though alive.
Logan climbed up the dune to stand beside the queen. Panna smiled to herself. He was never very far from Maeve and it drove Ferris to distraction. Logan Coldhand wasn’t Arcadian, as the duke so often pointed out. He had no business in their politics.
It struck Panna as more than a bit unfair. Duaal Sinnay was not Arcadian, either, but Ferris didn’t seem to object to his help.
Kessa cheered Maeve’s appearance wildly and Panna joined in. Other voices rose through the crowd, but not as many as Panna had hoped. Probably only the Sunjarrah fairies, who were already at least somewhat loyal to their new queen. The far more numerous and suspicious Stray Arcadians remained silent.
They had been here before, Panna realized. Here, on this spot in the unwelcoming Gharib desert, listening to Gavriel and his talk of comforting death.
Maeve seemed to be saying something, but Panna couldn’t hear her. Ferris spoke into the young queen’s ear and she nodded, then stepped up to the edge of the stage and raised her white wings. A figure dressed in purple that Panna thought might be Duaal raised one palm toward the crowd.
“I thank you for coming today,” Maeve said.
Her voice shook, but now Panna could hear her clearly.
“After a hundred years of exile in the core, it is no easy thing to reach for hope. What I tell you now is difficult, but hope and pain are two wings of the same set.
“You have heard, I am sure, of two queens who would lead you. Xartasia, who was Princess Titania and daughter of King Illain before the fall. And me. I am Maeve Cavainna, daughter of Princess Beltain. I have no claim to the throne of the White Kingdom and to your fealty, but I fear that I must ask it.
“It is Xartasia who should be before you now, who should lead the Arcadians. My cousin says that she can restore Arcadia. She claims that the White Kingdom will be as it once was. But she has cheated and killed in her purpose, and summoned the Devourers themselves! She has taken up the mantle of the Nameless, the dark goddess that brought pain and death to our people.
“I am not my cousin,” Maeve said. “I was never prepared to take the throne. I was trained as a knight. I was taught to protect, not to lead. But I see our people suffering, without Xartasia and with her, though they may not know what they have given up to her. I never wished to rule. I stand here before you not out of ambition, but because I cannot kneel before her.”
Maeve gestured broadly to the dunes and then up into the thin blue-green sky of Stray. Panna looked at Kessa and then at the Arcadians all around them. They were watching, staring intensely at the little queen in red and gold. Was it working? There was hard work ahead and the Arcadians were an exhausted and broken people. Could she convince them?
“We are all sons and daughters of Aes and Erris, sun and song,” Maeve said. “Our gods made us to sing and dance and create anew when they could not. What has been can never be again. But we can create something new. Here, on Stray.
“We have lived as refugees long enough. We have waited for the Alliance to recognize us, to admit to our loss, but they have problems of their own. So be it! We are Arcadian! We are stronger than they know! We will sing glass towers from the sands of Stray. With you, I will build a new kingdom in this very place. A new home, here and now.”
Maeve held out her hands toward the audience.
“We cannot bring back the past,” she said. “But neither will I allow our people to go on suffering. The time has come to rise, to fly again. The time has come to build a new kingdom and to build our future.”
The fairies didn’t applaud. They sang. Just a few dozen voices at first, and some of the Arcadians spread their wings to fly back into Gharib, but more of the fairies remained. They lifted their faces and wings. A handful of voices became a hundred and then two hundred until the air thrummed with the single word.
“A’shae.”
The night.
Your Majesty.
Panna sang, too.
