Children with Stars in their Veins (Chapter 51)

a/n: hey, thanks for checking out Starry Veins! This is the novel I wrote for Round V of LMS, and it's still a first draft! While I don't discourage any feedback, I prefer not to receive feedback on grammar! I'm not polishing this draft up yet, so I'm not as concerned about editing. I am, of course, open to all feedback, but I ask that you keep this in consideration! Thanks <3

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[Ember]

My beloved troublemakers and Alanna,

I hope you are all well and keeping things lively and wonderful back home. Mishal and I miss you all terribly (don’t scowl, Cassius, because it’s true and you cannot change the facts) and both wish to see you again. Soon, hopefully.

We have not seen any ruins yet, as our first venture towards the Marrow Valley did not turn out so well. We were set upon by two young rocs (Cassius, you would have been so delighted! I know how dearly you love the stories of such creatures. I’m sure you are wondering—their element was lightning. And Ori, I so wish I could have sent you a feather or two, but we were in a bit of a rush to leave, as you might imagine) and sustained some losses. But Mishal and I are fine. We are going now to the City of Bells and the Sundown Ruins beyond.

Would that I could offer you somewhere to respond to this letter, but even I’m not sure it will arrive reliably on time. I so dearly wish that I could hear back from you, though I’d be even more grateful to see you all again.

Oriole, happy birthday! I hope you got your fill of caramel sweets that you love. I send my love (and Stormy’s) to you. I’ll bring something back for you. And to Ember, whom I will likely not see until you’ve already turned fourteen, the same to you on both accounts. Gracious, you’re all getting far too old. Soon you’ll be passing your coming of ages and you’ll be adults! What a frightening thought.

Hopefully with this letter, Jax brings good humour and stories for the four of you, to put you in good spirits. I can’t wait until I’m back so I can share some with you all! And no doubt, you have some for me as well, given how much tomfoolery you all, individually, get up to each day (though perhaps to a lesser extent, my little Pika, as you are very kindly and well behaved and I could never accuse you of getting up to such mischief as the other three).

Ember and Alanna, Mishal has asked me to remind the two of you to keep training (and not just with a hammer, Ember!)

I send my wishes for everyone’s good health and joy and send the knowledge that Mishal and I are thinking of the four of you. We love you all (again, Cassius, do not make a face).

Yours affectionately,

Isadora (and Mishal, in spirit).

Ember folded the letter carefully, in her senses enough to not simply crumple it in her fingers, much as she wanted to. The idea had even flickered in her mind to burn it the third time she had read it, so she didn’t have to look at it and see the reminder.

Cassius had read it about a thousand times since they’d left Glacier’s Keep, and she could see his fingerprints pressed in smudges of dirt at the edges.

She was getting nauseated anyway, trying to read it as they walked. She stuffed in back in her pocket and readjusted her pack, which was resting hot against her back, and heavier now that she’d shoved Cassius’ in with it.

Don’t think about it.

Once she and Enoch got to Chromium, she could write them back. Send it back, and hope they got it, but it was better than nothing, and it would be some communication between them. They were all the way across the country, and she hated that.

Of course, if she wrote them, it would mean she would also have to mention the small fact that Cassius had been captured by the Grey Masks.

She glanced back at the makeshift, deformed sled they’d made for Artemesa out of lashed together branches and blankets. She was still breathing, the rasping noise audible enough to listen to, and Ember hated to admit it since it was so pained, but it was comforting to hear. Her eyes were cracked, barely even enough to notice, and glazed over.

There was only so much they could do for her. She needed someone who had medicine and real knowledge of medical practises. Enoch had treated her as best he could, had stopped the bleeding and cleaned the wounds, but they didn’t exactly have sewing kits, and the gashes weren’t magically disappearing. Her feathers were now a rusted, sunset orange with old, dried blood.

Ember wondered if half the reason Artemesa was so beaten was due to Cassius’ absence. It seemed strange for such a magical and powerful creature as a dragon to be brought so low. Then again, Artemesa was only about two seasons old. She wasn’t a creature of conflict or aggression.

She followed the straps of the cart to Enoch’s boots, and stared at them instead of looking up at him. She didn’t want to look up at him. Wasn’t sure she could trust herself not to start crying again, and it was such a stupid thing to do now anyway.

In her periphery, she spotted his hand. She’d noticed it before, and he was trying to conceal it, but she could still see the seared skin on his palm and curling around his fingers. It was the hand he’d grabbed her with. He hadn’t said a word about it, hadn’t even treated it.

She looked down at her own feet and scowled. It had been three days since Cassius’ abduction. Enoch had barely said a word.

“Just get it over with then. Say you told me so.”

She didn’t look up, but didn’t have to, to know that he was watching her now. As the silence dragged on, she wished she was angrier. She wanted to yell at him, wanted to yell at herself. Wanted most of all to yell at Cassius because it would mean he was here.

But instead she was empty. Their hunters had badly incapacitated Artemesa, and they had taken her best friend, and she had been too busy stupidly arguing about stupid things that didn’t matter.

“I don’t want to,” Enoch said finally.

“No, say it. Throw the worst life has to offer at me. You were right, and I was wrong, and Cassius was wrong, and you should be rubbing it in my face.” She swallowed, hard, even though her throat was dry as the Ruby Desert. She wasn’t even sure she could cry, though she certainly felt capable.

Enoch sighed. “Will you listen to what I have to tell you, then?”

“Sure, whatever.”

“I’m sorry.”

She glanced up at him, a spike of surprise, or maybe grief, lancing right through her stomach. She tried to swallow again and frowned to cover up what she was feeling.

“I’m sorry. For that, for what I said. And for Cassius.” He stared straight ahead, his brow bent downwards as though he was in pain, or deep consternation. Or both. “I shouldn’t have pushed him.”

She narrowed her eyes. “But he got captured, just like you said. Why are you apologising?”

Enoch shook his head. “He got captured because it was two, three, fighters on horseback against a kid and a tiny dragon. They wanted to grab him, he was outnumbered, and he was alone. No amount of training you give anyone can overwhelm the advantage of numbers in a situation like that.”

A weird, slimy bubble rose in her chest. This wasn’t how she imagined this conversation going at all. He wasn’t saying anything rough that he normally would. Frustration heated her cheeks.

“Whatever.” She kicked at the impeccably upkept road. “You got your wish. You know you don’t have to keep escorting me. You can go. Find someone that will actually pay you.”

Enoch sighed much louder this time. “I never wished for that.” He tilted his chin up and stared towards the sky. He stopped walking, and the sled slid noisily to a halt behind him. “I became a knight’s squire with all the ideals and naivety that any young boy would have. And I was good. But if that young boy could see me now, he’d be ashamed. And disgusted. You were right, I am a coward. Gods dammit, Ember, I don’t say this lightly, so at least listen this one fucking time—I’m not leaving you. I’m sorry about Cassius.” He turned to face her now, staring down at her with a… a vulnerable expression. “You said they wouldn’t hurt him, didn’t you?”

She scoffed, blinking even though she wasn’t sure whether crying was even in her retinue right now. “Not yet.” She rubbed her eyes, feeling dusty and sticky and vile and exhausted. “But they will. They’ll bring him to the ruins and he’ll probably die there, and he’ll think I abandoned him.” She glowered as her eyes started burning. “And he’d be right.”

Enoch crouched in front of her with a deep frown. “And why the devil would they take him to the ruins and kill him?”

Ember stared at him and held his gaze. He watched her, still more open than she’d ever seen him. She thought of his burned hand, and the way he’d stepped in front of her when the Grey Masks had come, and again when she and Cassius and Alanna had been ambushed.

He had been exiled and stripped of his title because he killed his mentor, not because he had betrayed Chromium. And knights were loyal first and foremost to the royal family.

A tear dripped down her cheek. “Because curses are like locks, and the Chronicler’s Guild thinks trueblood will unlock the ruins’ curse. Because they stole all the trueblooded heirs. That’s why the Glacier’s Keep princess doesn’t have trueblood.” She gasped, suddenly free of a weight she wasn’t even aware was crushing her. “None of them do.”

Enoch stared at her.

…and kept staring.

A tension began to rise in Ember’s chest the longer his expression remained motionless. She sniffled and blinked and tried to compose herself, wiping her tears off her cheeks, but they fell faster, burning in her eyes and down her face. Her hands were shaking, and she realised she had said it out loud. That she was of trueblood. A princess.

She had trueblood.

Ember took a step away, heart pounding, as Enoch’s brows furrowed forward. She put her hands over her mouth. Her breath staggered and locked in her chest. A wash of vertigo rocked her.

Enoch cleared his throat as she staggered and moved forward, reaching as if to catch her should she fall. Then he rocked back again, shoulders dropping, and stared at her again, like she was some great puzzle that proved impossible to decipher.

Finally, he said, “Now, come again?”

A sob bubbled out from her lips. “Oh gods,” she said. “I’ve said it. It’s real.”

He shook his head. “Ember.” His voice, his tone, had grown grim now, solemn. “What are you saying?”

She stared at him in a panic. She had known it, she had talked about it, she had read Mama’s letter a hundred times, but she hadn’t… It wasn’t…

Her hands shaking, she reached into the pocket inside her vest, where she stowed away both her Mama’s letter and Isadora’s for safekeeping so there, to be ensured they would not leave her side. She had only asked to borrow Isadora’s letter to read it the night before Cassius was taken. She had meant to give it back.

She pulled out the leather-bound wrapped parchment and held it out to Enoch. He took it as though he believed it would bite him. Slowly, so slow that it spread through her chest like a punch reverberating through her ribs and rising all the way up to rattle her teeth, he unrolled it.

Ember had memorised the letter by now. It is believed by the council that trueblood could be the key to accessing the ruins across the lands. There was nothing about the bearer of the trueblood, only the trueblood itself. She pressed her fingers back against her lips. “Moon’s mercy, they are going to kill Cassius to get into the ruins.” She whimpered without meaning to. “But— but Margaretta wouldn’t— that doesn’t make sense— Isadora and Mishal—”

“Ember.”

She met Enoch’s gaze and felt all the weight that had taken wing came right back, crushing her. “Enoch,” she whispered.

He rolled back up the letter, brow furrowed. “I know that you and Cassius have a certain… affinity for mischief and deception—”

“No!” Her eyes widened. “This isn’t mischief or deception! There are six of us. Isadora is the oldest, she turned seventeen right before the new year, Mishal is next, he’s sixteen, and his birthday is early in Cloudburst, Oriole is next and they’re fifteen, and they’re birthday is the middle of Sun’s Reign, you remember us taking about it. Cassius turned fourteen early in New Bloom, I turn fourteen late into the Land’s Ball, and Alanna is ten early into the Winds. The story of the missing Glacier’s Keep princess, that’s Alanna, she’s Isadora’s younger sister. And—”

“Fuck, Ember, yes, I got it.” He grimaced as he handed back the letter and rubbed his face. “Fuck. Do you know what this means?”

She sucked in a sharp breath, then hiccupped. “Do you believe me?”

He stared at her, face twisted into something between a sneer and a wince. It curled the scar rising off his lip, stretching it, to the point that it looked painful.

“You look like her, like the Queen. Shit. You do, you look a lot like her. And Cassius, too, I’ve seen Queen Juliette… Fuck, Ember.”

“I don’t know what that means except that you’re freaking out and it’s making me freak out so give me something more than swearing, please.” She wrapped the letter back up and hugged it to her chest, pressing it so tightly to her skin it might leave a bruise later. “I don’t know what to do.”

Enoch’s head fell back, and he stared towards the sky. She wondered if he was praying. In that moment, though she did not commit herself to any that would ask for them, she considered it.

He let out a heavy exhale as he turned back to her. “Is that why you wanted to go to Chromium? To… prove your status? To go through the ritual and sit on the throne? I mean, do you have actual, tangible proof?”

“No!” she said. “And I mean, no I haven’t gone through the ritual. But no! I’m no princess, and I’d sooner scrape out my eyes than be one. I want to be a blacksmith. I want to go to Chromium to see it.” She ducked her chin. “Because you told me about it. And because I want to have a home again.”

“And you realise what will happen to Chromium when Princess Eydís bleeds into her fire and it turns black?” He put his hands on her shoulders. “This is no child’s fable, Ember.”

She frowned. “But the kingdoms only fell when the trueblood weren’t there at all. I’ll still be there.”

He shook his head. “That isn’t the issue. I don’t think a matter of blood is enough to topple a kingdom, and you know how many people have traces of trueblood in their veins? That’s a lot of people to kill, but there is no conclusion as to why this supposed tale would make sense. It’s the political ramifications. What do you think the other kingdoms would do should one of the kingdoms lose all its formal leaders?”

“I…” She wiped her cheeks and put the letter away. “I don’t know.”

“Do you know how many people would kill if they knew who you were?”

She inhaled sharply and stared at him. “People want to kill me?”

The fierce, panicked expression on Enoch’s face softened and he exhaled deeply. Then he squeezed her shoulder and stood. “I’m not going to let anyone touch you. And once we get to Chromium, we stay low. We don’t draw attention. It’ll be safer than out here.” He looked down at Artemesa. “I don’t know what we’ll do about her.”

“You’re coming into Chromium with me?” She hated how small her voice came out, but she hadn’t meant to ask that either. “I mean, I thought you were only bringing me to the gates.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, then shook his head once more and grunted. “Be a pretty shitty thing of me to do, wouldn’t it?”

She smiled. “Yeah, kinda.”

“Between the two of us, we could fetch a bounty hunter a very nice retirement.” He nodded down the road. “We just have to hope they haven’t given the gargoyles a taste of my blood and they rely on sight only.”

She wrinkled her nose. “They do that?”

He heaved the rope to Artemesa’s sled around his torso and began to pull it along. “You have a lot to learn about Chromium.”

word count:

2,839 (yes I do realise this is an incredibly long chapter that I did not split up and I apologise for that)