Black the Tides Read online

  I freeze, flipping through the possibilities. Glitter? Mask? Drugged drinks? Severed head?

  He unveils a chunk of wood with a flourish. It’s alarmingly familiar.

  “What have you got there?” Susan peers over his shoulder.

  Ravel shrugs. “Flame chucked it at my head out in the woods, so I figured it must be important to her.”

  “If only he’d actually been a ghost,” Cadence says, mirroring my thoughts.

  I snatch the knot of wood from him. “It’s nothing.”

  He plucks it back. “Really? I’ll hold onto it then. I like it. Shiny.”

  He runs his fingers over its twists and hollows. Traces of black polish and paint still stain his hands.

  Susan holds out her upturned palm.

  He shrugs and passes it over. “Or I could make a gift of it?”

  Susan brings the cursed thing to her face, seeming to breathe it in. Mist swirls from her skin to the wood, making it look like a knobbled extension of her hand.

  Creepy.

  The silver ebbs from her eyes as she finally meets mine. “Where did you get this?”

  “Uh, the woods?”

  “Let me rephrase: who gave this to you?”

  Now she wants to talk to me? Not interested.

  “Some tree-creature gave it to her,” Cadence says.

  Traitor.

  Susan’s lips twitch—almost, but not quite a smile, which doesn’t make a lot of sense, but then, what does anymore?

  “You need to keep this close,” she says. “It’s a gift. Don’t take it lightly.”

  “What did I miss?” Ravel asks, tracking the bit of wood as if he regrets handing it over so easily.

  “Monsters are giving me presents now,” I say, baring my teeth. “Things have changed, in case you hadn’t heard.”

  He returns the kind of wolfish grin I wish I could pull off. “Oh, I’m counting on it, flame.”

  “That’s unkind.” Susan holds the forest’s “gift” out. When I don’t move to take it, she plants it on the table in front of me. “That wasn’t a monster and you know it.”

  Enough of this. I head for the door.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?”

  I swing back, intercept Ravel mid-reach, and snatch the bit of wood away, if only because he wants it and I’m not above punishing him. “Not hungry.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Out.”

  “I really think we need to—”

  The door slams shut on her last word—and bounces open again. Ravel bounds after me, calling his thanks over Susan’s protest.

  I pick up my pace.

  “Good, now we can talk,” he says, loping along without breaking a sweat.

  Or that’s what I expect. But when I glance out of the corner of my eye, his teeth are set and the skin around his eyes tight. His steps, though fast, fall in a lopsided rhythm. He’s limping.

  The thought of what must have been a brutal journey cheers me up.

  “I have nothing to say to you.”

  “No worries, flame, I’ve plenty of news.” He grabs my shoulder.

  I spin, smacking him away with one of the practiced moves Steph has taught me. I don’t pull it off as well as she does, but it’s more than enough to send Ravel staggering.

  “Don’t want to hear it,” I snap, to cover my surprise—and the unexpected wave of panic his fleeting touch had sparked.

  But after a few steps, I hesitate. “Ange is . . . ?”

  “They haven’t reached Under. Yet. But, Cole . . . it’s going to be soon. It’s bad. We need you back. I—I wouldn’t have come if there were any other way.”

  I hate it when he sounds like this. Honest and real and vulnerable. The scared little boy peeking out from his hiding place, not the dazzling and treacherous young master of Freedom. I raise a foot to take another step away from his manipulation and find myself pivoting to face him despite myself. I set my shoulders and widen my stance to keep from curling into a protective ball.

  He looks around. “Is this a good place to talk? We don’t want anyone listening in . . .”

  The path’s empty, and the windows on the nearest buildings are closed. No one to overhear—or to come to my rescue. I want to run away, but sick curiosity pins me in place. “It’s fine. But I really can’t help you. You saw what happened, the last time I—”

  “Trust me, the last thing I wanted to do was drag you back into danger. But there’s no one else—”

  Grace rounds the corner with a huge grin. “Hi! You must be Cole’s ghost. I’m—”

  “Waiting for me, I know.” I cut between them, steering her away. “Sorry, I know I’m late. We should get going. No time to waste.”

  “Ravel. Lovely to meet you.” He swoops to plant a kiss on Grace’s hand with an absurd flourish. She blushes. He smolders.

  “Get a room,” Cadence says.

  “Any friend of flame’s is a friend of mine.” Ravel tucks Grace’s arm in his. “I’d love to hear how you two met.”

  “Nope.” I grab her other arm and pull. “Gotta go. Busy day. Important things. No time to waste.”

  “About that,” Grace says. “Turns out your friend will be joining us. The elders decided you two need special treatment. Gran and I have just been appointed as instructors of the new remedial class.”

  “Remedial?” Ravel says with distaste.

  “No way,” I interrupt. “It’s not like he can learn anyway. He’s not one of us.”

  “He actually beat your assessment score. Apparently he ‘has potential.’ So it’s back to basics for both of you. Um, Steph said she’d come around later, though, so there’s that.”

  I don’t even know where to start.

  “What’s a ‘Gran’?” Ravel asks.

  “Hmm? Oh, Susan’s my grandmother.”

  Ravel leans in under the pretense of getting a better look.

  Grace bats her eyes. “See the resemblance?” She preens and giggles at the stream of compliments coming her way.

  “This is a waste of time,” Cadence says. “Ditch him.”

  I couldn’t agree more.

  Chapter 23: Remedial

  I walk fast to escape their banter.

  It’s not just how irritating they’re being, or even Ravel’s history of manipulative and cold-blooded behaviour that’s the problem. Time is running out for Ange and everyone else back home, and I’m so far from being back in fighting form it’s as if I haven’t started.

  Which is why I can’t afford to waste any more time persuading Grace to ditch Ravel.

  I veer off toward a quiet patch where a thin strip of orchard borders a cultivated area of mixed crops and press both hands to the soft earth. I close my eyes and reach—

  But irritation is the only thing that fills my senses. That, and the chirping and cooing of a couple of idiots.

  “What’s she doing?” Ravel stage whispers.

  “Meditating.” Grace practically stands on top of me.

  I take a deep breath and try to block them out.

  “It’s the only thing that seems to help,” she continues. “She’ terrible at weaving, and my sister has been trying to teach her to fight, but she hasn’t been making much progress on that front, either.”

  I dig my fingers deeper into the soil. Focus. Breathe. Block them out.

  A thump shakes the ground. Sudden warmth heats my back.

  “Am I doing it right?” Ravel’s voice, too close.

  Something brushes my hands, and I swat, connecting with a satisfying smack.

  “Ouch,” he says. “I feel something. I think it’s working.”

  Grace laughs. “Connection is the first step. I’m not sure meditation is your path, though. Come on, I’ll teach you to weave.”

  “No, I’m getting something here.” He hums. “Yes, yes, I feel it, a whole world opening up before my eyes—”

  I hiss with irritation and scoot a few inches away. Focus. Focus . . .

  It’s no good
. I whirl on Ravel. His eyes are closed, lips upturned in a smirk.

  I kick him. Not as hard as I could, but it’s enough to send him sprawling. Anger flashes across his face. But he blanks it out in an instant and raises his hands in mock surrender.

  “This isn’t a game,” I snarl. “Go play somewhere else. I have real work to do.”

  “He was just—” Grace starts.

  “You don’t get it. People are dying out there. Who’s going to stop it? Not you. Not him. Not your precious council.”

  She backpedals. But I’m in no mood to let this go.

  “Did you forget? Think I was like you? Playing at power to fit in or sooth my pride or whatever? I can’t afford to fail. People are counting on me. My friends are counting on me.”

  “We’re your friends,” Ravel says, coming up to put an arm around Grace.

  She’s slack jawed and pale, not because a beast who sacrifices human beings to feed his own desperate lust for power has her in his grasp, but because I’ve hurt her. Obviously the only thing left to do is turn on him instead. He’s had it coming for a long time. “Friends don’t try to feed each other to monsters.”

  His mouth flattens. “That wasn’t—”

  I bristle, bracing for his defence, preparing for him to turn it around on me, to make his crimes somehow my failure, or maybe to turn to Grace for sympathy. His deviousness is beyond my capacity for understanding, I know that much. I’ll just have to be ready for his lies this time, poised to hit back harder than whatever he can throw at me.

  But instead of fighting back, he just sighs, visibly deflating. “You know what? Never mind. You’re right. I was an ass. I used you and I’d do it again. I’m doing it right now, chasing you down to drag back into my mess because I can’t handle it alone.”

  He pats Grace reassuringly, pulls away, and drops to his knees in the dirt, turning dangerous eyes up at me. “I need you, flame. I’ve betrayed everyone who ever looked to me for help, and I can’t make that right without you. So, here I am making trouble for you yet again.”

  He raises his hands in an attitude of supplication, though his mouth quirks at the edges even in this show of humility.

  And a show it is, for manipulation is in his nature, just as being pushy is in Cadence’s.

  “Hey! Don’t you ever lump me in with him,” she complains. “You know he’s no good. We don’t need him.”

  I close my eyes. Take a deep breath. Reach for the expressionless, emotionless calm I learned under Refuge’s harsh tutelage. If he won’t fight fair, there’s only one thing left to do.

  When I face them again, I am ice all the way through. “I’m walking away now.”

  This time only silence follows me.

  IT’S THE LAST DAY BEFORE my big showdown, and I’m no closer to winning that idiotic challenge than when I first made it.

  I haven’t even been able to find my way back to that almost-vision of threads, though I’ve broken every nail and scratched my fingers to bloody shreds trying to claw that connection back from the earth. I’ve huddled in what feels like every clearing, garden, and quiet stretch of pathway in town, and even snuck out of Nine Peaks to try various groves and out by the stream, but no luck.

  Susan made a bed up for Ravel in her main room that first night, and he’s been staying with her ever since. He still insists on calling us roommates at every opportunity. Grace spends all her time hanging on him, begging for glamorous stories of Freedom as she and Susan teach him to master everything I’ve failed at. Even Steph has been falling all over herself to teach him to spar.

  As far as I know, despite his newfound skills in gardening, weaving, housework and fighting, he can’t actually dreamwalk, but I’m not about to enquire. Whenever I enter the room, their happy chattering stops and they all stare. Their questions are tentative, neutral, their attempts at humour forced. I refuse to respond, refuse to so much as look in their direction. No matter what I do or say, I can’t seem to counteract Ravel’s charm offensive. But that doesn’t mean I have to be party to it.

  The night before my challenge, Grace finds me pounding my hands into the packed dirt in front of the side gate we use most often.

  She sits down without comment. Her quiet, even breaths are calming.

  I relax ever so slightly, fists uncurling, senses expanding. There’s a brush of—something. A sense of light—but my eyes are closed. A fluttering at the edges of my awareness, a pulse, a tangle of threads—

  “You really don’t notice stuff, do you?” she says.

  I let out a soft hiss of frustration. Almost. I was almost there.

  “You’ve never asked me where my parents are.”

  I frown, squeezing my eyes tighter shut, drilling fingers deeper into the cool soil where I’ve scraped and scratched it to some measure of softness.

  “They died when I was four. Left us with my dad’s family, went off on some mission and never returned. For the longest time, no one even told us they’d died. We just kept waiting.” The breeze rustles around us, carrying a scent of night-blooming blossoms. “You’re not ready. You won’t win tomorrow. You can barely tap in, never mind cross over.”

  I let my head fall back. The rest of me follows, stretching out on the ground in utter exhaustion. “I have to try.”

  But the image of myself, bleeding into the sand of the training ring while the entire city points and laughs, won’t let me go. My pulse picks up, cold sweat beading on my skin, because as bad as public humiliation is going to be, there are worse things than failing in front of my enemies—and, if these people would abandon my entire city to the monsters, then they are my enemies.

  My embarrassment would be nothing compared to the true cost of tomorrow’s failure.

  “Ravel told me,” Grace interrupts my horror. She scoops up a handful of dirt and lets it patter back down like gritty tears scattered across the earth. “You were right. I don’t know what its like to see people killed right in front of me. I don’t know what it’s like to fight for the lives of my friends. But there are things you don’t understand, either.

  “There is not one single person here who hasn’t lost someone they loved. No one wants you to fail. They just don’t want to see more of your life wasted. You only just came back to us.”

  “But they’re willing to abandon a city full of people?”

  Her shoulders slump. “It’s not that simple. The council has to weigh the costs, choose the battles we have a chance of winning. They have other priorities to consider. Our missions are about more than just fighting monsters.”

  “It’s a whole city!” I take a breath, lower my voice. “They’re my friends, Grace. And even if they weren’t, they don’t deserve to die.”

  “The council’s made its decision. They’re not going send anyone out.” The words are harsh, but she leans against me in silent apology.

  I close my eyes. “It doesn’t matter what happens tomorrow, does it? They never had any intention of helping me, of sending me back, even if I could fight properly. Did Ash know? When he brought me here?”

  “Ash can be . . . determined, when it comes to his goals. He would have put your safety first, I know that much. I don’t think it occurred to him he’d be sent away after bringing you back.”

  I wrap my arms around my knees and rock, grieving all my plans, all my hopes. My friends, and all the others who will fall to the nightmares.

  Lily, her family who’d only just reunited. Ange, still fighting for a better future for all of us, even after Cass’s death. The hunger of the Mara rampaging unchecked until there’s no one left.

  My ability to combat the Mara isn’t coming back. The council won’t send anyone in my place, and Ash won’t be able to fix anything, even if he returns tonight.

  I hadn’t realized just how much I was relying on his return to set things right until this moment.

  I keep making the same mistakes. I’d pinned my hopes on him saving the day in Refuge, too. And before that, tried to rely on Refuge’s
rules for protection, and then on Ravel and his ridiculous little kingdom. But in the end, there’d been no one but me to stand against the Mara and—

  Hang on. Ravel. Escaped.

  “And good riddance,” Cadence says.

  No, that’s—I’d known Ash could move through the barrier around the city and take me across it. But Ravel . . . He got out on his own.

  I jump to my feet, buzzing with the implications. Grace stumbles to her feet, knocked off balance by my sudden move. I turn and seize her hand.

  “Where’s Ravel?”

  She studies me. “I’ll show you, if you tell me why you want to know.”

  “I’ll explain on the way.”

  Chapter 24: Showdown

  I know what I have to do. But when I lead Ravel back to the unguarded side gate, Steph is waiting for us.

  She doesn’t say anything, not at first. She just plants herself, solid and unmoving, in front of the key. The look on her face makes me cringe. But I won’t be turned aside.

  I motion Ravel to wait, and settle into a guard position, the one she’s drilled me on relentlessly. Not that it does me much good. She waits for me to get nervous enough to attack, and puts a quick, painful end to my first attempt—and the dozen or so increasingly desperate ones that follow.

  Ravel stands back and watches me eat dirt over and over again, wincing and calling encouragement, but not interfering. Not that he could beat Steph in a fair fight either.

  When I can no longer summon the energy to pick myself up off the ground, Steph stands over me and scowls. Then she puts out her hand and pulls me to a sitting position.

  “That was the real fight,” she says. “I won. Tomorrow, you will.”

  I can’t do anything but stare—and wobble, almost too worn out to hold myself upright. If her goal was to keep us from running away tonight, she’s accomplished it admirably.

  “Would it kill you to explain?” Grace must have joined us at some point during the fight. “Sorry, Cole. She was just supposed to stall until I could finish talking to the others. We’re coming with you.” She beams, practically bouncing in place.