Excerpt: Canyon of Crystal
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Chapter 1
Alara
Alara woke with a start, her hand reaching for the dagger tucked in her belt. It was more reassurance than protection—the blade had remained dull over the last week as they trekked through the thick cloud forest. Still, she found herself checking for it every few hours, even in the middle of the day, as they took turns sleeping.
It was a moment before she recognized what had awoken her. Runeo leaned over her, dark eyes shining in the twilight. His long dark hair hung limp around his shoulders, forgotten over the past few days. Around them, the small clearing came to life in the growing shadows. Small purple flowers had opened up along the ground, giving off a faint glowing light. It would have been beautiful if Alara had the energy to appreciate them.
“We should head out soon.” Runeo’s voice was a clear and commanding whisper. He stepped away without waiting for an answer, shaking Quenti and Khuna, who curled together nearby. Mitteo was already sitting up, eyes cloudy with sleep. Suri gave Lili a small shake on her shoulder and the tierren batted her hand away with an annoyed movement. Alara knew things were bad when the even-tempered Lili was showing her irritation, her hazel eyes narrowed and pale skin flushed.
Alara was too tired to do more than roll over and take in the forest around them. The trees were thick, wide trunks with a tangle of vines and moss blotting out the sky above. A contradiction of silent, constant movement settled over the trees as animals moved through the branches, somehow quieter than a whisper.
Runeo drifted around the clearing in complete silence. Even while he was in his element, surrounded by the forest, his shoulders remained slumped.
It had been a few days since Alara had heard his voice crack with grief, and she wondered what he locked behind the grim look of determination. She learned not to mention his brother Micos’s name after the third day, when the word sent Runeo into a spiral that ended with him not talking for hours.
Alara stood up, trying to shake the exhaustion and ache of hunger from her bones. It didn’t work, but at least her brain had stopped spinning. She couldn’t blame Runeo for how he felt. Her own gut clenched with grief whenever she dwelled too long on the events that had brought them here.
A botched escape from the Haven that led to an all-out battle, assisted by the bruyas who had hidden among the ranks of the mages for decades, and a brother who was lost to their mind-cleansing— now brainwashed like the very worst within the Haven. It had all seemed so simple at the time, but Alara knew that what they’d done at the Haven would have ramifications all across Sombria. She only hoped their strange ensemble of magites, bruyas, and even one mage could make it to Arbol before they were faced with the consequences.
“Alara.” Suri’s voice was close to her ear and she realized everyone else was up, eyes focused on her. “Are we clear?” The sole mage of the group’s tone was patient, her brown eyes ringed with dark circles, easily visible under her pale skin. Her short hair stuck up in every direction, a result of her ongoing habit of running her fingers through it when she was thinking. Or tired. Or distracted.
Alara imagined her own knotted curls didn’t look much better. She gave her a halfhearted smile before closing her eyes. She reached toward her core, fumbling with the familiar threads, trying to grasp her magia with any semblance of control. A wave of cold nausea rolled through her, but she grabbed a strand of power and sent it out around her.
She searched the surrounding trees, but nothing beyond the cold absence of magia greeted her. Not even a magiaful beast was within a mile of them. Over the past week of using her mind-stalking skills to scout out a path through the forest, grasping onto this power had become almost second nature. She’d even grown to notice the magia-filled cores of the animals that lived here—a few howlers and a fruit bear so far. The forest contained more magia than even the Council likely knew.
When Alara opened her eyes again, Lili, ever the caretaker, was at her side, hands hooked under her elbow. She leaned heavily on the tierren, another wave of nausea rolling through her.
“No one for at least a mile.”
Alara tried to move her weight to her own legs, but instead she nearly collapsed, her knees shaking beneath her.
“We’ll head south then,” Runeo said.
“We should prioritize food. It’s been two days of nothing,” Lili noted.
“If we cross the river, we may find more game.”
“Don’t you think the councilguards have planned for that?” Quenti said. “There’ll be just as many problems hunting on the south side of the river.”
“So, what do you recommend?” Runeo said. “That we keep hiking in circles?”
“Those circles,” Lili said, “have helped us avoid councilguard confrontations thanks to Alara.”
Runeo’s eyes bore into the ground with a fierce intensity Alara knew too well. Perhaps it was the hunger or the exhaustion, but everyone had been on edge over the past couple of days.
It had been a week since they had fled from Cielo, and they did so with only a meager amount of supplies. The morning after their escape, they woke up with plans to cross south over the river and head into the cloud forest toward Arbol. They hadn’t even broken out of the trees before they’d heard yelling and the pounding of feet.
Runeo and Khuna had climbed a nearby tree to scout out the commotion without being seen. When they dropped down from the treetops, eyes distant and panicked, Alara knew her mind-stalking abilities hadn’t lied to her. A platoon of councilguards were marching down the road, spreading out along the river, preventing their most direct route home.
They’d been running non-stop since, sleeping among the trees or in hidden clearings during the day and walking at night. But no matter how many directions they tried, they remained trapped by the councilguards staked out along the road and river. The borders within Sombria were officially closed, and they were stuck on the wrong side, far from the sanctuary of Arbol—their one beacon of hope, and the one place they couldn’t get to.
It’s something Runeo had never forgotten. Runeo, who had pushed them to keep going beyond exhaustion upon their escape.
His face reddened, and Alara was sure he was coming to the same conclusion. “This wouldn’t have been a problem if we’d just kept moving that first day,” he said in a sharp whisper.
Lili placed a hand on his shoulder. “Anger will take more energy than we have.”
He jerked away from her hand, but didn’t speak again.
***
The seven of them moved silently under the darkened sky, weaving between roots and low-hanging branches, heavy with moss and vines. Even Mitteo and Suri, both raised in the Haven for much of their lives, moved with relative grace across the soft ground. Alara could almost forget that the two of them had sacrificed everything to assist her and the other bruyas. That they’d given up everything... only to stumble through the dark alongside them, fugitives to the realm of Sombria. The occasional glowing flowers and glimpses of moonlight through the thick trees helped guide their way in the darkness, but they still moved slowly. Alara kept a light touch on her magia, sending out threads ahead of them to scout out the councilguards.
In a rare stroke of luck, each of the troops they had almost stumbled upon over the last week held at least one mage for Alara to sense. Amid this, she noticed a strange pattern emerging. In some cases,
she could have sworn she was able to sense the blameless guards alongside the mages. It was a skill that was proven unreliable in the days since, so she dared not speak of it to anyone. Not yet, at least. A part of her wondered if she was turning delusional with hunger. After all, she’d never read about mind-stalkers sensing a non-magia core.
Regardless, it was something she knew to keep an eye on. If there was anything she’d learned over the past few months, it was to never brush o$ any aspect of her abilities, no matter how unreliable or inconvenient.
Emaru would be proud, Alara thought with a sharp pang of guilt at the memory of her guardian-turned-enemy. She didn’t even know if the councilwoman had survived the battle. Had she seen the last of the woman who’d cared for her like a mother? Would she even want to see her?
Alara placed a hand on the dull-bladed dagger at her hip. She thought, not for the first time, of the core she had sensed when she’d first found it. During her watch as the others slept, she’d taken to wrapping her threads around the trinket. A few times, she thought she had felt something, a sensation not unlike what she’d felt when detecting the blameless guards. But an instant later, it was gone, the dagger just as useless as it had always been— save for those few times when its dulled edge mysteriously sharpened.
Okay, maybe she was going crazy with hunger. She needed—
“Fish!”
For a moment, Alara thought she may have spoken her own
thoughts out loud, but the group had stopped and was looking at Quenti. The aguen was smiling and pointing to a small clearing up ahead. In the silence that followed her exclamation, Alara could make out the trickle of water that signified a stream.
A stream... a pond...
“Fish.” Khuna didn’t wait for the others, but sprang forward, her hands already outstretched. Quenti darted after her and the rest trudged ahead with all the energy potential food could muster from them.
Khuna and Quenti were already bent over the pond by the time Alara made it through to the clearing. The water was black and still in the night, its surface reflecting the light of the moon that filtered through the thick forest in a perfect mirror.
Alara knew something was wrong before she could pinpoint the root of her unease. Khuna’s hand held steady above the water, eyes shut. Quenti’s brows furrowed.
“I can’t sense anything,” Khuna said, cracking her eyes open.
“That’s because there’s nothing left.” Quenti pointed to the edge of the pool. The moonlight was dull, and Alara used the "int she had tucked in her sleeve to light a small floating fire.
In the sudden luminescence of the flames, the shore of the small pond was visible, along with the dozens of fish that laid still and unmoving in the mud.
Looking back at the pond, Alara took in the unbroken surface of the water. Not a single bubble or ripple interrupted the mirrored reflection. The pond was empty of any life.
“What happened?” Lili’s small hand covered her mouth and nose as she looked down at the dead fish.
“Mages,” Suri said grimly.
“I know they’ve been scaring the game away, but how could they... why would they?” Lili’s voice quivered. Alara wasn’t sure if it was from seeing life snuffed out so unceremoniously or from them losing their first meal in days.
“We were studying new ways of fighting bruyas.” Suri paused, looking apologetically at the bruyas around her. In their travels over the past week, it had been easy for Alara to forget that Suri had spent most of her life undercover as a mage. Like Alara, she’d been one of them, and that included knowledge of some of their deadliest secrets. “The air and water mages worked together. They found a way to take the air out of water sources. Kill the lake, kill the fish, kill the people that rely on them for a source of food.”
“That’s disgusting.” Mitteo spoke for the first time that night. His voice was rough and deep. “Humans are not the only ones who rely on water sources for food and survival.”
“As long as the bruyas are dead, what do they care?” Runeo said, his voice cold.
No one spoke, but they all seemed of the same mind as they continued moving, leaving behind the dead pond.
***
Sweat dripped down Alara’s back, the forest air laying thick and humid, even as the dry season was reaching its peak. It didn’t rain as they walked through the darkness of night, but the air still clung wet to every leaf, tree, and piece of clothing. Her stomach sent a sharp wave of nausea to protest its emptiness.
When they’d left the Haven, she’d allowed herself to be naïve enough to expect the travels to Arbol would be quick—that it would only be a matter of time before she could settle into her new home. Now, they were on the verge of starvation.
She hoped the others who escaped Cielo were faring better than her group.
Guilt gnawed at her chest as she eyed her companions. She was the reason they were here—the reason the network of rebels outed itself within the city of mages. Her mind spiraled. If only she hadn’t been caught by trying to sneak back to the Haven... If Khuna and—Alara’s mind stuttered over the images of Zinita and Micos. One dead and one lost. So much death and grief and no time to process.
She forced herself to stop the moment her thoughts tried to skim over Adelmo’s face. She’d already spent the first three days on the run crying into her arms, trying to drift off to sleep rather than feel that pain. It felt like she was drowning, the weight of it pulling her down by her chest, trying to suffocate her.
But she’d locked away that piece of her in a small wooden box at the corner of her mind. There would come a day when she would have the time and energy to examine it. But not now. Now, she needed to focus on moving forward, one step at a time.
“We can’t keep walking forever.” Alara startled herself with her own words.
“She’s right,” Runeo said. “We’re going to starve before we make it across the river. And none of us is in any shape to face a councilguard in a fight, which is what this may come down to.”
“What, then?” Suri asked, tone dry. “We march into the next town and ask nicely for some roasted cuy?” Alara tried not to think too hard about the fact that the lifelong spy in the group seemed as helpless as Alara felt.
“El’dyo, that doesn’t sound half bad,” Mitteo said. The week in the woods had thinned the boy’s body, chiseling away at some of the roundness, but it left him looking gaunt rather than fit. The perpetual dark rings beneath his eyes and the lank dark hair didn’t help the look.
“I was thinking more sneaking and thieving,” Runeo said, ignoring Mitteo’s comment.
Alara rubbed her fingers along the raised skin of her scar on the side of her neck. They had been heading west over the last few days, along the river and toward the sea. That meant that they were approaching the city that hugged the coast of Sombria.
“Hurazon isn’t far from here,” she said, almost absently.
Quenti "inched at the name of her home town, eyes finding Alara’s in the darkness. “No.”
“Your dad—”
“Is just as likely to give us supplies as he is to throw us at the councilguards himself.”
Runeo watched the exchange, but seemed to ignore any subtext he might have heard. “It’s settled. We’re going to Hurazon to resupply.”
Quenti opened her mouth to respond, but it was Alara that spoke first. “It’s hardly settled. Give us a moment, will you?”
Runeo looked just as taken aback as Quenti did as Alara pulled the girl away from the others.
“I know it’s not ideal, but Runeo has a point,” Alara said in a whisper.
Quenti leaned against a tree. Her eyes were black spots in the darkness, but they bored into Alara all the same.
“It’s a stupid plan. Papa was practically dancing as he packed my bags when you... when Emaru caught me.”
Alara flinched at Quenti’s correction. It wasn’t a correction; it was a lie to make Alara feel less guilty for being the reason Quenti was ever dragged into any of this in the first place.
She was the one who had sensed Quenti’s abilities in that early morning a million years ago. She was the one who blurted them out. She was the one who led Quenti into the Haven, kick-starting the series of events that resulted in them spearheading an escape from the very place Alara called home.
If it wasn’t for Alara, none of this would have happened.
“His daughter had magia,” Alara said. “He was thrilled, like most parents are.” She met Quenti’s lie with one of her own.
Quenti’s look was deadpan. “Even if I believed that, he wouldn’t be excited to see me begging at his door as a fugitive.”
“Then maybe we don’t knock,” Alara said slowly.
“Okay...” Quenti narrowed her eyes.
“We need supplies. But Suri’s right. We can’t just march into
town and buy what we need, but we can steal them. And you know Hurazon better than any of us. Besides, don’t you want to shove it in his blameless face?”
“He’s right, though, isn’t he?”
“Who? Your dad?”
“No. Runeo,” Quenti said. “This is the only way. And I can’t be the reason why we die in the middle of the forest. I just... need a second.”
Quenti closed her eyes and her shallow breaths grew deep. Alara wondered if, for a moment she’d fallen asleep when her soft voice broke the silence. “I hate this.”
Alara fought her instinct to respond immediately, but let the comment linger in the air.
“I hate the way he makes me feel,” Quenti said. “Even now. After all this.”
“That’s parents for you, eh?” Alara said, giving a sigh of empathy. Alara recognized the shame the girl felt. It was the same shame Alara had whenever she put any thought into how small Emaru made her feel. She grasped Quenti’s arm. “Cheers to shitty parents,” Alara said.
Alara and Quenti returned to the clearing to see their five companions huddled and deep in conversation.
“Let’s do it. Let’s go to Hurazon,” Quenti said. Khuna moved forward and wrapped her hand around the other girl’s. “And I think... I think I know of something else we can steal to help.”