3

Torchtop

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Still Queen Apoleia pushed a wheelchair down a hall in Kindoliya Palace’s residential wing. Since acquiring her rightful position as queen of the Still Kingdom a year ago, Apoleia had spent an hour at the end of every night with her father, Gennaio Still. She had yet to miss a day for both of their sakes.

Despite the cruel reality of Gennaio’s complete paralysis, she cherished every moment spent with him. He was her hero. His hair had thinned and grayed, his muscles atrophied, but his heart was still capable of melting the palace’s frozen corridors with its warmth. He had done more for Apoleia in his life than her mother ever could.

Apoleia pushed open a door and guided Gennaio through. After undressing him down to his underwear, she gingerly removed him from his chair and placed him into a crystal tub, her hand behind his head as cushion. She smiled at her father, who could do nothing but stare straight ahead. Occasionally, she’d spot a slight muscle twitch around the eyes.

Walking to the side of the room, Apoleia collected a few buckets of water that had been placed there earlier by her younger sister, Ropinia. She set them near the tub, then dipped her hand into its warmth. The liquid was room temperature—plenty hot enough for a Stillian. The Still Kingdom’s frigid temperatures rendered pipe systems useless—not even kilns could fully do the trick. Water would freeze long before it reached its destination, so they were forced to heat buckets of water via flame close by.

She plunged a rag into the bucket, and then pulled it back out and pressed it against Gennaio’s shoulder. Without the ability to counter her force, his body jostled as she scrubbed. Her reflection in the tub’s crystal surface caught her eye. Her neck was as naked as it had ever been. Granted, a couple fresh cuts still hid beneath her chin, but most had become scars. She dragged the fingers of her free hand down her neck, each bump a coping mechanism to distract her mind from her past.

Whenever Apoleia was around her father, her inability to control her facial expressions disappeared. She’d relax, and the tension from her anger or glee would be replaced by tranquility more akin to her daughter, Olivia, than the placidness of her Stillian predecessors.

Gennaio had fought for Apoleia, not only throughout her life, but immediately following that dreadful incident in her hideout. He had gone toe-to-toe with Mendac LeAnce—a fight he never had a chance to win—ultimately being stripped of bodily control for the rest of his life.

A knock sounded on the door, wrenching her from her memories. She turned, sliding her glasses up her nose with the back of her hand. “Who is it?”

“Ropinia.”

Apoleia looked back to her father. “Come in.”

She heard the door open and close, followed by a short pause. Apoleia wrung the rag above Gennaio’s chest as her sister finally approached and sat on the edge of the tub.

“Hello, Father,” Ropinia said with a smile.

Apoleia sighed. Of course, there was no response. She understood what kind of emotion being called “father” brought forth from the man, even if he couldn’t show it. Once a Stillian female experienced her first cleanse—the official transition from girl to woman—she was no longer allowed to use such a term. This meant that men around the city would never hear their daughters call them “daddy,” usually, after the age of thirteen. The two royal sisters had decided to end that law the moment Apoleia entered power.

“I’ve received word that Garlo has been helpful in Phelos,” Ropinia said. “The uprising was a success, and he played a role.”

Apoleia moved the rag down Gennaio’s leg and asked, “Do they request any more assistance?”

“They made it seem as if everything is under control.”

“Thank you for the update.”

Silence swept through the room, interrupted by an occasional splash of water. Noticing her sister’s discomfort, she asked, “What’s bothering you?”

Ropinia hesitated, then said, “I question the sense of this alliance.”

“Just because we’re Still-born doesn’t mean we must literally embody our cold feet,” Apoleia stated. “Besides, we’re not as invested in this war as others. It’s not like our kingdom is a target. The Archaic and Dev Kingdoms are the ones who True Light cares about—possibly the Power Kingdom, too.”

“I don’t fear for the safety of our land,” Ropinia explained, “but the preservation of our bloodline. Bryson and Olivia fight for True Light. If either of them dies, our royal family would lose the ability to possess a Bewahr.”

Apoleia leaned back, her jaw clenching. “I know what I’m doing, Ropinia. Toono has made Olivia off limits to our alliance. Nobody would harm her.”

During a pause, Ropinia’s gaze fell to her lap. “Bryson cannot die. They’re twins; we don’t know which one of them has the trait.”

After tossing the wet rag into the bucket, Apoleia reached for a towel and began drying off her father. She hadn’t informed Ropinia of Bryson’s Branian—mainly because it would have alarmed her. After all, it was odd that Bryson hadn’t received a Bewahr.

“We have a person on the inside,” Apoleia reminded her. “Just remember that.”

“And you trust Titus?”

As the Still Queen lifted Gennaio’s arm and dried his side, she said, “With all of my frozen heart.”

* * *

Major Peter led Bryson and Olivia out the back of the palace and into the northern grounds. As they strolled between training pens, Bryson kept his eyes peeled for a young redheaded boy whom he hadn’t seen in a little over a year.

“So there are separate barracks for infantry and archers?” Olivia asked.

“Yes, but those aren’t the only separations,” Peter explained. “Infantry is also divided into two smaller barracks: intrinsic and specialty.”

“Specialty is comprised of the soldiers skilled with their energies,” Olivia said.

Peter nodded. “And intrinsic is close-quarters combat.” He glanced back and waved a hand. “You know ... rush in with a sword and try to take someone down that way.”

“Why call them intrinsic?” Bryson asked.

“Because what is the very nature of battle?”

“Typically, chaos,” Olivia said. “While war is tactical and sluggish, a battle tends to be a chaotic mass of swinging swords and falling bodies.”

They broke free from the barracks and approached an open field stretching thousands of feet across—a giant expanse of grass slapped in the middle of one of the most congested cities in the Light Realm. Major Peter stopped just before stepping off the gravel.

Units were scattered throughout the field. Each one practiced a different aspect of archery, from loading and drawing a bow to shooting at targets that seemed an impossible distance away. Bryson gazed down both lengths of the field. A wall stood at either side, and he could barely see the archers lining the tops. Directly across the green was a small wooded area.

“Where’s Simon?” Bryson asked.

Peter pointed and said, “The western wall.” He grinned. “He shouldn’t be too difficult to distinguish from the rest of them.”

Gazing at the wall once more, Bryson saw someone bouncing up and down, frantically waving their hand. Bryson laughed and waved back, until an incoherent order was heard in the distance. The response was a collective drawing of bows from the archers—Simon included. A woman walked slowly behind them, inspecting the stance of each of them, occasionally adjusting an elbow or a head.

Once satisfied, she shouted another order. An arrow whizzed across the sky before sinking as it lost speed, inevitably striking the sod a mere few dozen feet away from the eastern wall. Now Bryson understood why there were barricades around the perimeter: to make sure no wandering souls fell victim to friendly fire.

Several other archers were given the same order. Most of them hit the sod within the barricaded area, and Bryson was beginning to think that was the objective. Then one woman let an arrow rip. This time, its flight stayed straight and reached the other side of the field in an instant. Bryson’s eyes widened as the arrow struck halfway up the wooden wall.

“Wow,” Bryson said.

“Just wait for it,” Peter said.

Simon came next. A few of the archers on the ground turned to watch. The woman gave the order, and Simon’s bow emptied. A loud thud came from the east.

“Look at the top of the opposite wall,” Peter instructed, cheers erupting from the field. “There are human-modeled dummies up there.”

A dummy directly across from Simon had an arrow in its temple. “What’s the distance between both walls?” Olivia asked.

“Two hundred and thirty yards.”

Bryson was shocked. He’d always vouched for Simon’s skill. Heck, he was the reason why Simon had gained an audience with King Vitio and Princess Shelly. But he never could have imagined talent such as this—especially in the short time Simon had been training here. Over two hundred yards with a beeline trajectory?

“How rare is something like this?” Bryson asked, watching as other archers tried to match Simon’s success.

“I believe he just turned fourteen,” Peter said. “For someone of that age, it’s rare to the point of never-seen-before. Commander Magnolia Aloi, the woman giving the commands behind them, is one of the few archers who can do what Simon just did.” He paused and chuckled. “But even she couldn’t achieve it until her early twenties.”

“They’re going to put him in the thick of things as soon as possible,” Olivia said, a hint of disdain in her tone.

“That goes without question,” Peter replied. “He’ll prove highly useful in this war. You haven’t even seen him on the move ... wending between trees and swinging in the canopies.”

Unease fluttered around Bryson’s stomach. When he had decided to introduce Simon to the royals, he hadn’t envisioned him risking his life ... at least not so soon. He was still a kid.

Peter’s gaze fixed itself onto Bryson. He must have realized what plagued Bryson’s thoughts. “He’s only a year younger than Rhyparia was when she became a Jestivan.”

“And look where that got her,” Bryson muttered.

Not long after that, Peter returned to the palace, and Bryson and Olivia spent the rest of the afternoon watching the redheaded boy perform flawlessly in every drill. Eventually, Bryson drifted off, his head leaning against his sister’s shoulder ...

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Bryson stood on top of the world. The starry sky swallowed him whole, and the altitude made the chill unbearable and breathing a struggle. What kind of place could create such a sensation?

Sounds of cracking glass below him brought his gaze toward his feet. He stood on a glass surface, looking down on a room he was very familiar with. Dropping to his hands and knees, he saw the royal princess sound asleep in bed, her pixie cut untroubled by her tossing and turning. His gaze fell to the lump under the blankets—a developing fetus that’d soon enter this beautiful, yet cruel, world. Everything seemed normal. The room was still and peaceful, and Bryson became lost in the serenity of the scene below.

Then the room’s floor began to open at the center, signaling the platform below had been triggered. Who could that be?

Curious as to why she wasn’t waking, Bryson glanced to Shelly. Hearing glass cracking again, he looked around. His heart skipped a beat as he realized that it wasn’t breaking glass that he heard—rather, ice creeping along the glass. As a frigid blast shot through his spine, he panicked. The last time he recalled such a sensation had been when he had heard his mother playing the piano for the first time.

Glancing below, this familiarity proved telling. A head of violet hair entwined with beads of frost stood at the platform’s center. A crown of crystal sat atop her head. Bryson banged his fists against the glass ceiling, screaming to alert Shelly. Why wasn’t she waking up?

Though Shelly couldn’t hear Bryson’s warning cries, the woman on the platform could. As she was lifted into the room, her head snapped upward, a sinister smile contorting her face. Frost-infused blood seeped from the cuts that lined her neck. Jagged pieces of ice replaced her teeth, making her look more like a beast than a human.

In an effort to break the glass, Bryson unleashed a surge of electricity from his entire body. He tried this five times, each successive attempt lighting up the night sky, more powerful than the last. Once that proved useless, he figured he could make it to the edge of the ceiling, drop to the balcony, and enter through a doorway. But the ice that had crept along the glass was now halfway up his legs and arms, pinning him down and making sure he was only a spectator to what was about to unfold below.

Through a kaleidoscope of frozen glass, he saw as the platform connected with the bedroom’s floor. Apoleia strolled across the room until she was next to the bed. Bryson screamed, tears crashing down his cheeks. Wake up!

Translucent clouds billowed from Shelly’s nose as she slept, unaware of her impending doom. Extending her index finger, Apoleia then flicked it upward. A pillar of ice shot from the floor beneath the bed, obliterating the glass ceiling before coming to a stop in the sky above Bryson.

Shelly sat in the air, eyelids slightly ajar to reveal a green sliver of iris, skewered by a pillar of ice through her stomach...

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Bryson was jolted awake, his shoulder jostled by Olivia. Blinking the daze out of his eyes, he tried to regain his wits. While he was thankful the nightmare had ceased, he was bothered by the lingering chill it left.

“Was I fidgety?” he asked. “Did I make any noises?”

“No,” Olivia said. “You became unbearably cold—even for me. My shoulder felt like it had been dipped into a pit of fire.”

“I’m sorry,” Bryson said, rubbing his eyes and groaning.

“What happened?”

Bryson dropped his forehead into his hands and grabbed a fistful of hair. “I think Shelly was right. This baby is going to be a bigger mental hurdle than I thought.”

Rubbing her shoulder through her tunic, Olivia gazed out at the field again. After a short pause, she said, “I can only imagine, Bryson. I think about it every hour of every day, and I’m only an aunt.”

“And the godmother,” Bryson said.

She smirked, looking back at him. “How about you discuss that with the woman carrying the baby first? I’m sure she has her own sister in mind.”

He shrugged. “I suppose.”

The sun was setting by the time archers headed off the field. Simon walked alongside Commander Magnolia, the two of them in the midst of conversation. The top of his head only reached the base of Magnolia’s neck, but that might have been more telling of Simon’s height than hers. He had yet to hit a growth spurt.

Making eye contact with Bryson and Olivia, Simon shook his commander’s hand and sprinted toward them.

“See you tomorrow, Torchtop,” Magnolia said.

Bryson laughed, embracing his small friend. “I guess that nickname stuck, huh?” Torchtop had been a name given to Simon by Princess Shelly when Bryson first introduced them to each other.

“I like it,” Simon said.

“Why?”

“Commander Magnolia explained it as me being a beacon. I guide other archers to reach the level I’m at.”

“You’re as cocky as the princess,” Olivia said.

Simon snapped his fingers and pointed at her with a sly look in his eyes. “Confidence.”

“I take that back,” she said. “You’re Toshik.”

Simon’s lips flattened. “How is he?”

Bryson and Olivia exchanged looks before Bryson said, “He’s coping in his own way.”

“Doesn’t answer my question, but alright.”

They strolled down the gravel path that split the barracks in two. Bryson smacked Simon’s back and said, “Ponytail, ay? Not letting the waves splash freely?”

“Have to keep my hair out of my face,” Simon said. “It’s better than the commander’s ulterior solution.”

Bryson laughed, taking two fingers and pretending to snip away at the boy’s hair. Simon’s entire body recoiled, throwing up his arms to shield his face, giggling maniacally in the process.

“Good to know you still have that kid in you,” Bryson said.

Bryson figured Simon was taking them to his assigned barrack, but instead the boy veered left and approached a small building. They stepped inside of a quaint shop where people browsed all kinds of archery merchandise: arrows, arrowheads, traditional bows, crossbows, feathers, limbs, bowstring, bolts. It was an archer’s dream shop.

None of it seemed to enamor Simon, as he cut straight through and out a back door. They entered an outdoors work area, and, unlike inside, only two people lingered out here. An ink-haired woman sat on a tree stump, rounder in the belly than most archers Bryson had seen so far, but a far cry from someone like Passion King Damian. As she attached arrowheads to their shafts, she spoke with an older gentleman standing at her side.

Simon waved to her, and she returned the gesture with a smile and a nod. “We received a shipment of yews today,” she said, cutting off the man mid-sentence.

“Awesome!” Simon exclaimed. He ran toward countless logs piled against the back fence. He retrieved a yew log, brought it to an empty tree stump, and sat on the stump almost exactly like the woman across the yard. He then grabbed a knife from a nearby stump and began to carve into the yew.

“You make your own equipment?” Bryson asked.

“The occupational term is fletcher. But no, I don’t make it for myself; I’m not a narcissist,” he said through a laugh. “This is my job slash hobby. Archers fork over a lot of coin for custom-tailored equipment.” He paused to look around. “But as you can tell, not many people have the funds for such luxuries.”

“So you don’t only shoot the arrows; you make them,” Bryson said.

Simon smirked, his face flushing a slight shade of pink. “I learned a lot during my year of training in Lingens Rainforest ... survival, foraging, self-preservation, maneuvering in the trees, shooting techniques, and, yes, crafting my own equipment. When you’re in the wild or far away from civilization, what are you going to do if something happens to your bow or if your stockpile of arrows depletes? The only resourceful option is to make use of the land.”

Simon paused and looked at them. “But that is the only time you use your own equipment.”

Bryson shook his head in disbelief, floored by Simon’s growth. Tree stumps speckled the ground—over a dozen of them at least. Some were empty, likely serving as seats; others had fletching equipment strewn atop them.

“Who is she?” Olivia asked, looking in the direction of the woman from earlier.

“She’s the head fletcher; she runs this establishment.”

“What’s her name?”

“I know her by Whistle,” Simon said, his focus still on his own craft.

Bryson raised an eyebrow. “Whistle?”

“It’s not her real name,” Simon explained. “They call her that because of the sound her arrows make when they’re ripping through the sky ... and it’s not an exaggeration. It sounds like what I’d imagine a Linsani sounds like—high pitched and violent.”

“If she’s enlisted with the Intel military, her real name has to be on record,” Bryson said.

Wood shavings collected at Simon’s feet. “She’s not active duty anymore. But yes, she’s on record. Only high-ranking officials have access to such information, however ... Commander Magnolia, General Lars, or the admiral.”

“Simon knows more than you do, Bryson,” Olivia teased.

The boy gazed up from his work, brushing a few fiery strands of hair from his face. “I could never be anything like any of the Jestivan. You’re all heroes.”

Bryson wanted to sigh. If they were any kind of “heroes,” Yama would still be a Jestivan and Jilly would be alive. But who was he to crush a boy’s dreams?

“From the looks of things,” Olivia stated, “you’ll be given plenty of chances to become a hero yourself. Are you prepared to be thrust into a battle or mission without notice?”

“Yes,” Simon said. It was the quickest, firmest affirmation from any fourteen-year-old kid.