Kiva.
What does she think she’s doing?
She left. I saw her. We all saw her.
Sneaking away like a thief. Sneaking away to—what? To see that boy?
Kiva and the Stranger.
I can’t allow myself to think these things. She’s the Vagra.
But I just don’t trust her.
Kyne. We should have listened to Kyne. Maybe it’s not too late.
I wish we’d … Kyne all along … she knew …
The voices began to break up in Kyne’s mind. She clamped her eyes shut and concentrated, reached for the thoughts of the Sisters, willed them to be whole in her head once more.
… Kyne knew … isn’t ready … that Stranger boy … threat …
Kyne sighed and let her eyes come open. It was no use. The voices were gone.
The maiora was wearing off.
She glanced at the small square table next to her bed, where a leather pouch sat. She reached inside and pulled out a small ball of maiora. She rolled the cottony substance back and forth between her thumb and first two fingers. Her tongue was wedged between her lips, anticipating the bitter taste of the stuff—but she didn’t put it in her mouth. Instead, she put the ball back in the leather pouch with the rest of the maiora, then put her hands on her thighs and stood up.
She’d been using maiora for only a few days—but already, Kyne feared that she was unable to stop. She’d gotten some when she visited the Forsaken camp with Po. After she left Xendr Chathe’s hut she’d snuck to the den at the edge of camp and stole a couple fistfuls of the stuff, unnoticed by the maiora-eaters lying senseless on the floor.
Kyne had turned up her nose then at the Forsaken men who couldn’t stop taking maiora, so obsessed with the stuff that they’d obviously gone days without washing—but now, as she strode through her hut and made her way toward the door, she realized that she’d become just like them. When she first took the maiora, she told herself that she’d only use it occasionally, to hear the thoughts of the Sisters and see what visions the substance might give her. All she wanted was to gather enough information to know if there was any chance for her to restart her rebellion, if there was still any discontent with Kiva among the Vagri and the Sisters. Once she knew that, she told herself, she’d be done with maiora.
Now, Kyne knew that it wasn’t quite so simple. The feeling of being on maiora was similar to the feeling of communing with the Ancestors, of receiving a vision or hearing another person’s thoughts—except more intense. The problem was that when the maiora was humming through her veins, Kyne could sense only fragments: disconnected words and phrases from the minds of the Sisters, bits and pieces of visions. As the visions subsided, it was hard to shake the feeling that she’d been so close, the feeling that if she took just a little bit more, then the thing that seemed to be trying to break through at the edges of her perception would finally become clear.
Kyne stood at the doorway and pulled aside the cloth. As she cast her eyes over the Sisters’ camp, all she saw were more huts. The camp seemed almost devoid of life. Kyne wasn’t the only one who’d scarcely left her hut since the Strangers had come. Most of the Sisters were inside, hunkering down in their isolated dwellings as if preparing for a storm.
The village was quiet. But it wasn’t peaceful.
Something was building.
Kyne opened her eyes again. She’d heard enough of the Sisters’ thoughts while on the maiora to know: her rebellion wasn’t over. Not by a long shot. There was discontent in the village. It could be exploited.
But it wasn’t enough. She needed more. She needed something on Kiva—something she could use to turn the village against her once and for all.
Kyne returned to her bed. She reached her hand inside the leather pouch and pulled out the small, feathery ball of maiora once more. She held it between her fingers for a moment, thinking. Then she reached inside again and grabbed more—a small fistful, more than three times the amount she’d ever taken at a single time.
She took a fast, quivering breath through her mouth. Licked her lips. Then put the whole fistful of maiora into her mouth. It melted at once on her tongue.
Kyne’s vision blurred. Her skin went numb. The world surrounding her seemed to shrink to a single point of light, like the flame of a lamp burning in a dark room. Then even that single light collapsed in on itself and became a kind of black hole, a portal that sucked Kyne in with a force she couldn’t resist—and as Kyne’s consciousness hurtled through the portal faster than the speed of thought, images flashed before her eyes.
A barren, dust-swept planet, suspended in blackness.
Creatures who looked just like the Strangers—except there were thousands of them. Thousands upon thousands—millions, billions.
Lined up under a merciless sky, the creatures waited to enter the belly of a massive stone bird.
The vision pulled back to reveal a hundred more birds just like it, with Strangers streaming into every one.
So many—how could there be so many? And all of them coming to Gle’ah.
Then the vision shifted again, and Kyne saw waving grasses.
Gle’ah.
Po, her twin brother, loosed an arrow from its bow, and it struck Matthew in the chest.
Kiva, kneeling over Matthew’s body, smearing her blood over the wound.
Kiva and Matthew, alone, walking together across the plain. Their lips moved, but Kyne couldn’t hear what they were saying.
And then.
Matthew slipped a hand around Kiva’s waist, cradled her neck with the other. Leaned in.
Kiva standing limp in his arms at first, then reaching her own arms around Matthew, pulling him deeper into the kiss.
Kyne came out of the vision with a gasp. She snapped her head back and forth, half-expecting to see apparitions from the vision standing in the room with her—but no. She was alone.
Kyne stood, her whole body trembling. The remnants of the maiora still thundered in her veins, and she paced in circles around the room, unable to let her body be still. She ran a hand through her hair: it was greasy to the touch. She stopped and looked down at herself, seeing the toll that a day and a half eating one clump of maiora after another had wrought: her dress was streaked with grime, and her skin glistened with sweat. She lifted an arm and sniffed cautiously at her armpit.
Oof.
She had to get cleaned up before she went to the Sisters. She had to look completely collected, completely put together—when she spoke to the Sisters, there could be no doubt that the accusations she was making against Kiva were true.
Her eyes drifted once more to the table next to her bed, to the leather pouch that still held enough maiora to last her for the rest of the day and into the dead of night.
But no. Kyne had had enough. The vision she’d had while under the influence of maiora was gone, but it didn’t matter—she could remember every image.
The Strangers, greater in number than the blades of grass on the prairie, escaping their planet to come to Gle’ah.
Kiva, healing Matthew when she could have let him die.
Matthew kissing Kiva. And Kiva kissing him back.
That was enough for Kyne to work with. That was more than enough.