When the rains came, the stars slept on the beach. Candor stood facing the ocean, head thrown back to the ceiling of the sky. The storms that had shaken the village the night before had passed, leaving the air clear to the heavens. At the edge of the surf lay hundreds of starfish, winking brilliantly in the infant sunshine.
“It’s so blue.” Letti murmured.
“Blue after thunder, red after dawn.” Candor sang quietly, before folding herself into a seated position next to her friend. “Lettishae.” Candor spoke with mock seriousness. “Do you know why the sky is blue?”
Letti groaned and flopped back on the sand. Her thick, dark hair contrasted with the fine, white sand, and Candor noticed her curls scooping up grains of the earth.
“Lola says it’s because the sea is blue.” Candor mirrored her friend and laid next to her, eyes on the sky once more. “There is a sea in the sky and it’s clear as glass. It mirrors our water down here.”
Letti snorted. “That makes no sense, most of the land is not blue, it’s green. By that logic we’d have a blue sky and a green sky.”
“By that logic, we wouldn’t know what color the sky is beyond this tiny patch.” Candor sat up quickly, annoyed. “Maybe if we were ever to leave this place, we’d have a better idea.”
“Maybe.” Letti spoke softly, but she too sat up. “I’m not sure I want to leave.”
“I do.” Candor stood, leaving Letti alone on the cliff of sand, a small reminder of the violence the night before. “I want to leave, I want to see, I want to know more than this tiny plot of land.” Candor spun around, linen trousers flapping slightly in the sea breeze. “Mo and Lola travelled for their entire lives before they settled here.”
Letti sighed. She knew all this.
“And they won’t let me go further than the edge of the teeth.” Candor ground her own teeth together.
Thoroughly displeased though not surprised at the turn the conversation had taken, Letti glanced back at the mountains that ringed their village. The Kotemor Mountains, or the Black Teeth, were as uninviting as they were storied. Darkness literally seemed to hang between branches, as if some shadow refused to evaporate from pieces of their forests, despite the persistence of the northern sun. No one who ventured into them ever returned. Candor and Letti and their small village subsisted entirely on what they grew and what they fished. Not even a poor harvest could press them into those peaks.
“Lola and Mo made it through them.” Candor’s countenance changed capriciously, and Letti grew suspicious. That face usually appeared right before a scheme, a scheme of which Letti and Candor usually found themselves on extra clamming duty.
“No.” Letti spoke quickly.
“No what?”
“No to whatever you’re thinking.”
“How did you know I was thinking anything?” Candor backed closer to the water, careful not to disturb any of the sea stars. Letti knew the myth by heart. It was one of her favorites. When the storms clashed with the coast, Sakjerst and Lettishae, the Goddess for which Letti was named, grew so sad that they wept stars, the one piece of the heavens through which they could still feel each other. The stars fell to the storm, and the storm brought them to the beach to apologize. Knowing that the stars themselves were alive, the girls were fairly certain they just did not like being underneath the swirling sea during storms and moved themselves to the beach for safety. Letti understood this feeling; she preferred surety to possibility. She could not understand why Candor craved to escape.
On edge, Letti stood, waiting for Candor to strike. Candor grew still, letting the foam billow around her legs, and just as Letti felt the tension reach a crescendo, Candor let out a long whoop, turned and dove into the waves. Startled, Letti stumbled and let the breath whoosh out of her lungs. Lightheaded, she charged into the water after her best friend.
Candor and Letti let the current whisk them west along the beach for a while before returning to the sand. As the sun began its lazy descent to the north across the water, the sea stars slipped back into the sea.
“I guess the fight is over.” Candor seemed to deflate, a desperate sadness flitting across her face.
Letti’s heart contracted; if there were one thing in the world she hated more than Candor’s constant talk of leaving, it was Candor’s sadness. Letti snuck her arm around Candor’s waist and hummed quietly.
“I love that lullaby.” Candor offered a small smile, but her eyes were distant. “I don’t belong here, Lettishae. I don’t. I can’t explain it, but I know in the soles of my feet, I should be elsewhere.”
Letti didn’t respond, but withdrew her arm, leaving her pinky linked with Candor’s. She felt safer touching her friend, as if with contact, Candor would not slip away. The lullaby was Lola’s, no one else in the village knew it. The only reason Letti had it memorized was because she’d stayed at Candor’s home overnight almost as much as she’d slept in her own home when the were younger.
“Come on.” Candor shook herself. “You know they’ll worry if we’re out after dark.” Candor rolled her eyes.
Letti privately agreed with the parents of the village; something did not feel right in the land. Something was shifting; the earth itself seemed to be acting on a long-awaited change. Nothing good happened after dark when the air itself breathed.
Candor snatched up her sword and buckled it around her waist. “Mo will know that I didn’t spar today.”
Candor made a face. “She’s going to make me fight before dinner.”
“I wish my parents drove me like that.” Letti tried to make Candor feel better.
Mo and Lola, Candor’s moms, were an odd couple. Evidently educated, they had shelves of books in their hill house, and Lola was the most intelligent person Letti had ever encountered. She had an answer and explanation for everything, even the darkness of the Teeth, though Letti had never asked her. Mo was a swordswoman. Trained somewhere she would not say, Mo had sharpened Candor from the moment she could walk. Quieter than Lola, Mo frightened Letti with her poise; she never seemed to move in a way she did not directly wish. Letti was sure she had never seen Mo stumble. It would have seemed unnatural if Candor were not also possessed of this same grace. Letti shivered slightly, and as she frequently did when considering Candor’s family, put the matter out of her mind entirely.
The girls clambered up the small dirt path that led to the village. In the small copse of wide-leafed trees that sunned themselves at the edge of the ocean, Letti held her breath. She opened her mouth to tell Candor—but then she closed her mouth again and followed her friend out into the open air as she had for the last week.
Closing her mind around her heart, Letti asked instead, “What are we doing for your name day celebration?”
Candor grimaced. “I think a small dinner.” She shrugged. As happy an occasion was as Candor’s name day, it reminded her that she did not know her biological parents. Letti and the rest of the young adults of the village had birthdays. Candor had a name day.
Letti fell silent as the small wooden buildings began to line the widening road.
“Candor! Letti!” A man’s voice boomed out of the lengthening shadows.
“Greetings Yer Hroth.” Both Candor and Letti touched the tips of their fingers to their mouths and dropped their hands to offer him their palm, as was the traditional custom when approaching someone of greater age or standing.
A large bear of a man, Hroth’s forearms looked comparable in size to Candor’s thighs. A lifetime of working the forge had done nothing to shorten his stature. Indeed, Candor thought, he seems to draw energy straight from the fire.
“How’s this sword working for you?” Hroth’s eyes twinkled. He knew full well that his work did not last long in Candor’s hands, not under Mo’s tutelage.
“Seems to be holding better than the last one, Yer Hroth,” Candor replied politely. “But I haven’t been home as much.”
“I’ve noticed that.” Hroth frowned. “It’s bad business to be spending so much time away from the village these days, girls. Something feels off in the world, I can feel it in mine bones.” By the end of his warning, Hroth had dropped back into his original accent.
Candor and Letti both knew their village was an amalgam of people who were running from something. It had been that way for generations; nobody asked too many questions, and when they had arrived their descendants did not leave; nobody left. Instead of assimilating completely, however, their accents and specific mannerisms seemed to have frozen in time, giving the village a cosmopolitan sound, if not feel, when many voices grew in volume at once. It was peaceful enough, but there had not been any new blood since early in Candor’s childhood.
“My mothers say the same thing.” Candor nodded. “Not that we would have any idea what it is.”
“Ach, Candor.” Hroth waved a large finger at the girl, “you’ll learn someday that peace is a hard enough thing to come by. What your mothers have done for us…”
Candor relented. She knew Mo and Lola ran the village well and had for several generations. No one seemed to acknowledge, or indeed comment at all, that Mo and Lola did not age. Somehow, it did not seem to be a problem. Despite her reading, her wheedling, and her outright bribery, neither of her mothers would tell her what or who they were. It was a source of constant consternation to young Candor.
“Come back when you need a new sword.” Hroth donned a smile once more, and the darkness of their previous conversation faded. “I know that one has had some abuse.”
Candor thanked the big man, offering the same gesture of respect as they turned to go.
“Abuse is an apt word for it.” Letti quipped. “Practice is too kind a description.”
“Practice would also imply that I have an actual use for sword work.” Candor huffed. “Which seems silly.”
Letti did not reply. This had become a near daily conversation, and despite Letti’s cautions not to tempt fate, Candor never drew from her restlessness.
At the edge of the village, Candor and Letti parted with promises and plans for the next day. Letti trotted away, and Candor watched her before turning and trudging home to the hill house. Most of the village lived in huts constructed of palm and wood from the edges of the mountain forests. Lola, Mo, and Candor lived inside a hill where the land sloped up to form the base of the Black Teeth. Mo built various rooms off the side of the hill, but the largest pieces of their home, their beautiful living room and their kitchen, sat in the warm embrace of the earth under the meadow.
Before Candor could open the door, she heard a slight shift of the air to her right. Pulling her sword, she barely had time to block a strike from Mo.
“You did not spar today.” Mo accused her daughter.
Candor parried, feinted to her mother’s right before trying a slice at her inner thigh. There were many ways to kill a person, Candor had learned, but the best ways were to try for their arteries. Mo’s unending lessons in anatomy fostered Candor’s understanding of deathblows and force application.
“Sloppy, daughter.” Mo sidestepped and lunged at Candor, who ducked. Both women controlled their breathing. Candor had tried letting Mo win to get to dinner; Mo had forced her to spar until the stars were high and the moon was bright and Sakjerst himself looked down from the sky. Candor had not employed that tactic again.
Mo’s tattoos glistened in the late afternoon heat. Her head shaven to the skin and her arms and legs bare but for the simple tunic she always wore, Mo’s skin shown through the patterns and symbols and images that often seemed to Candor to be alive. Even her hands held runes, the meaning of which Candor did not know. Only Mo’s face, palms, and soles of her feet were free of glyphs and renderings. It made her a ferocious sight.
Flipping the sword in her hands so the tip pointed towards the rear, Candor tried to worm her way inside Mo’s arm length. Mo maintained her distance, and Candor soon abandoned that course of action. Flipping her sword around once more, Candor drew her energy and struck at Mo once, twice, three times before finding Mo’s dagger at her throat.
“You must never fight just the sword.” Mo breathed deeply, and Candor was pleased to see that she had lost her breath.
“I know Mo.” Candor sighed, as Mo pulled her into a hug.
“You did well, for not practicing today.” Candor grimaced but returned the hug. Candor knew Mo would give her life to defend her.
“Dinner?” Candor said hopefully, as they pulled out of the embrace.
“Yes.” Now that the battle was over, Mo returned to her taciturn self, but her expression remained soft.
The air inside the house brushed Candor’s cheeks as she stepped over the threshold, warm. It smelled of thick soup, rich spices, and the harvest of summer. Candor smiled in spite of herself and exited to wash in one of the wooden rooms.
As Candor rinsed her hands and face in the washbasin, she tasted the salt that ran off her skin, and grew bitter once more. The room seemed to shrink around her, and Candor gasped for breath. Gripping each side of the basin, Candor met her own eyes in the mirror and studied her reflection. Her white hair, clipped short around her ears and neck, lengthened into a short flow on top, through which she ran her hands. Mo insisted Candor maintain a short haircut, lest she be unable to see in a fight. Mo did not seem to grasp that Candor was never in danger, a fact of which Candor pointedly reminded her mothers at every possible opportunity. Lola always sided with Mo. It wasn’t that she was keen on finding danger, exactly, Candor had seen too many natural accidents to wish for pain. She simply wanted something… more. More than a life in a village, more than the quiet day to day existence between garden and table. There was something out there, Candor knew, something she needed to discover. Something decidedly not in her village.
Candor’s gaze bore into the mirror, as if trying to see through the reflection to her soul. She blinked. Her irises were the source of no small muttering in the village. A bright violet, almost indigo, Candor’s eyes were unlike anyone else’s she had ever seen. Letti would often say she would know her birth parents by their eyes alone, if ever they made contact. Candor had not been amused. Both Mo and Lola had the whitest and the darkest skin respectively. Candor’s dark tan skin belied the time she spent on the beach, and the blood she did not share with either woman.
She sighed. She knew they were waiting for her. Emerging from the washroom, Candor unbuckled her sword and hung it on a peg near the front door. Mo and Lola sat at the large wooden table, a large pot of stew in its center.
Candor sat and held out her hands. “I’m thankful that I am not a starfish.” Candor said. Both Lola and Mo looked at her oddly but did not comment. Each woman offered their thanks to Sakjerst and Letishae before they tucked into dinner.
“Why are you thankful you’re not a starfish?” Lola asked Candor, her warm voice slow and thick as honey.
“Because then I would swim at the whim of the tide.” Candor stabbed a potato in the soup. “I would wash up on shores after falling from the face of Anaia, or whichever God or Goddess was sorrowful. I’d have no will of my own.”
“And will, you are not short of, my dear.” Lola sipped at her spoon.
“And yet I can’t seem to get myself out of this place.” Candor burst out. “I want to travel, I want to see what else there is! I want to visit swamps, plains, deserts. I want to talk with people who have known more than this village.”
“First rule chaos—”
“Second rule peace, I know Mo.” Candor, stymied for the moment, relaunched her assault over her broth. “I will calm in a moment, I will, but I seek to impress upon you how trapped I feel here. There’s more to my life than this. I can feel it.” Candor sat back, winded.
“Candor.” Mo said softly. “This is as close to peace as we can give.” Candor often found this mantra calming, a quiet reminder of their home together. Lately, it felt like an omen, a reminder of her cage. Peace without contrast offered little rest for the young mind.
“There is nothing for me here.” Candor replied bitterly, embarrassed as tears stung her eyes.
Lola leaned forward and waited for Candor to compose herself. “This land is no longer one of connections. The unity that once offered an easy existence no longer endures. We fled long ago, and this place is shielded from many forces that would do you harm.”
“What forces? How did you shield us?” Candor leaned forward; this was more than her mothers had ever said about their flight. “Please. I want to know.”
Lola and Mo glanced at each other. “She’s not ready.” Mo murmured. Lola turned her gaze on her daughter.
“Have you read about the mad king in the library?” Lola asked.
“I—no.” Candor frowned. She had read all the books, scrolls, and scribbles that filled the bookshelves in the hill house.
The problem was, Candor discovered soon after she had learned her letters, that the books did not contain any history. There were no stories of the land. There were myths, explanations for various and sundry natural phenomena, and books that mentioned majik. There was also one map, which Candor poured over relentlessly. None of these topics satisfied Candor; it was as if she were looking at stars without seeing the moon. Something to make sense of the sky was missing. These were the only relics of her mothers’ pasts that would reveal anything, however; Mo and Lola were silent as stones.
“That is because once he fell, the history of the land grew fragmented. For the last few centuries, humans have lived and died and fought for the smallest of goals. Once this land bore great things, great people.”
Candor made to interrupt, but Lola held up her hand.
“The Citadel, if it is even left, is a ruin of what it once was. There is nothing for us out there.”
A thrill ran down Candor’s spine. The Citadel was a piece of Icaria’s history Candor had discovered. A short scroll on the Citadel had been tucked, flattened, into a book about eastern fungi. Candor had devoured it. After three or four reads, Candor had approached her mothers. It was one of the only times Candor had observed her mothers angry at each other. Neither seemed to know how the crushed paper had ended up on the bookshelf. Candor had slunk away, her heart a deep blue for making her mothers fight, her curiosity momentarily abashed. She had not, however, returned the scroll. Her mothers had not asked for it. The fragile paper had not offered a satisfying explanation of the Citadel. It simply offered a brief description of the students who attended. Students who would become witches and nuns. That Mo and Lola were willing to discuss the Citadel at all finally indicated to Candor that they heard her plea for freedom.
“You’ve been to the Citadel, right Lola?” Candor lifted her voice and tried to sound innocent. She knew she was not supposed to know this; Lola had let it slip during a recent fight.
“Yes.” The word snapped from Lola’s lips like a trap. “A long time ago. A long time ago.”
“What did you—”
“Enough Candor.” Mo’s tone finished the conversation.
Candor scowled and pressed her feet into the floor. She did not try to continue; she was going to have to learn better how to wheedle information out of someone, she reasoned, if she were to ever leave this place. Even in her tiny hamlet, Candor had learned that knowledge was power.
Later that evening, Candor lay on her blankets, starring at the ceiling. A lamp hung by her bed, and she tipped it so it would swing. By its light, Candor watched the shadows in her room rock and tilt, each holding a slightly different form as the flame flickered in the airflow.
Candor swung her legs around, stood as quietly as she could, and tiptoed through the main space of the hill house. At the door to her mothers’ room, she paused, breathing as quietly as she could, then murmured “aincha”, open. Candor had heard Lola use this word when she couldn’t crack preserves; it was one of a collection of precious words Candor had stolen from her mother’s careless usage. Candor knew they were majik, but she had never bolstered the nerve to ask Lola how she knew majik. That was a power indeed; Candor’s education lacked in many spheres, but she was well aware of the significance of majik.
At the word, Candor could hear Mo and Lola speaking in hushed tones. Candor frowned; she wondered if Lola had tried to majikally keep her from listening. The thought made her rather proud.
“She’s going to leave one of these days,” said Lola. “I would offer her more than sword skills before that day comes. Were we to give her more of the lost history, she might stay longer.”
“You could feel the currents the day she was born as well as I.” Mo responded, and Candor nearly gasped. Mo never used so many words in a single sentence.
Mo continued. “She’s destined for hardship and pain. That’s all that is left in this world. I would protect her from that entirely.”
“So, you taught her swordplay for seventeen years.” Lola’s wry smile sang through her words. “That didn’t give her a taste for adventure?”
“That was a gift, a way to learn confidence.” Mo sniffed.
“If you thought she were destined for this village, you would not have taught her thus.”
Mo did not reply.
“I’m not saying there’s—”
“You didn’t teach her majik.” Mo interrupted.
“I didn’t teach her majik for the very reason you taught her to fight. I want her to survive in the world. This is not the way to teach majik, especially not to her!” Lola, unflappable Lola, sounded angry. “We do not know how she will take it.”
“That is coward speak and you know it.” Mo said coolly. “You blind her to a world she will now have to learn to see on her own.”
“At least I did not give her false sight.” Lola’s chill matched Mo’s tone. Candor had rarely ever heard them fight this way.
“How do we proceed?” Mo finally asked.
“I don’t know.” The anger drained out of Lola, and Candor heard her sigh.
“For now, I suppose. We continue to wait.”
~.~
The next few days passed quietly. Candor rose early and tended the village gardens with Letti; neither mentioned the turning of the world or Candor’s desperation to leave. The hill house, drained of its tension, rang with laughter and the crossing of swords.
On the morning of her seventeenth name day, Candor rose early and snuck out to the gardens. Walking through the summer-tall plants, she drifted her fingers through the leaves, drawing warm pleasure from being so near to life.
Candor stopped short, drawing her body together to halt all movement as she heard singing. Padding forward, Candor saw Letti with a basket on her hip at the bean wall. Each summer, the village changed the geometry of the garden, moving beds to support new plants, to supplement the soil with specific minerals and nutrients last planting had leached. This year, the bean wall sat at the north end of the garden, stretching as wide as several houses. Letti sang as she picked, her voice weaving a complicated melody into an old song Lola used to sing to the two of them.
"And when the fire finally died
The land, the wind forgot to cry
And in the center of the land
Grew death plains unfit for man
Where once the green and plenty grew
The dust and ash—AAAHHH"
Candor scooped Letti up from behind and swung her around, scattering all her beans in the process.
“Candor!” Letti cried. Her cheeks were flushed.
“Can’t you ever sing happy songs?” Candor knelt to help gather the spilled pods.
“Can’t you tell me when you’re coming?” Letti stuck out her tongue at her friend but looked pleased.
“Oh, come on,” Candor cuffed Letti’s chin. “It’s my name day!”
“I thought you didn’t like celebrating your name day.” Letti, having gathered the errant beans, stood, looking haughty.
“I like using it as an excuse to get what I want!” Candor crowed. “Come on, let’s go to the beach.”
“I have to put away the beans.” Letti started walking away, skirts swishing.
“Bring them!” Candor grabbed Letti’s elbow and pulled her towards the north edge of the garden. “We’ll need a snack!”
The sand had not changed much from their last visit, though the sand stars had vanished. The tide had drawn close to the trees, and the girls spent a cheerful few minutes stripping and swimming.
“Guess what.” Candor declared, floating spread eagle behind the breaking waves.
“What?” Letti asked.
“Mo and Lola gave me a semi-actual answer as to why they won’t let me leave.”
“Besides the fact that they want you to stay safe and they can’t go with you?”
Candor sat up, feet dropping through the clear water to the sand below. “Yes. They almost told me about the fall.”
“The fall?”
“The fall!” Candor waved her hand, as if everyone knew about the event she herself had just learned about. “The reason we are the way we are now. The reason Lola’s books have no history, and the danger that binds us to this tiny village.” Candor knew Letti could follow; Letti had poured over the books just as much as Candor had when they were little. Letti was one of the few other young people in the village who could read the common tongue.
“You know when we used to ask Mo and Lola about why they didn’t have any more recent writing?” Candor asked excitedly. “This is it. The fall. There’s been no history written since then, or at least none that’s been widely dispersed. More than a hundred years of silence.”
Letti looked worried. “And this is exciting to you why?”
“It just means I—” Candor stopped, crestfallen. “I don’t know.” She finally said. “It means that Mo and Lola placated me for a little and bought some time.”
Letti remained quiet as Candor grew angry.
“I’m leaving soon. You’ll see. I can’t stay here anymore if I don’t know anything. What is the point of that sort of life?”
Letti sighed. “Some people are content with life and love and food on their table.”
“Shortsighted, smallminded.” Candor scoffed.
“My parents are.” Letti replied simply.
Candor deflated, looking guilty. “I know. And I respect that.”
“No, you don’t.” Letti said quietly. “You just haven’t seen enough to know how kind that existence can be.”
“And how,” Candor replied desperately, “Pray tell, am I to see enough to learn that for myself.”
Letti shrugged, swimming back to the shore. “I don’t know.”
The two friends returned to the village in an uncomfortable quiet.
That night, Mo and Lola opened the hill house to the village to celebrate Candor’s name day. They had sumptuous fish dishes, cheeses, and fresh fruit and vegetables covering every flat surface, and all the faces of Candor’s childhood meandered through her vision. She smiled and greeted and waited and laughed. She thought of her mother and father, as she always did on her name day, and she thought of how much she loved Mo and Lola.
Letti watched Candor from the far side of hill house. The interior curved, making corner creeping impossible, so Letti simply stood out of everyone’s way. The town was content enough to pass her by; rarely did anyone pay Letti the mind they paid Candor. Her dark tresses, dark eyes, and tan skin were hardly a standout in the community. Candor’s white hair and violet eyes acted like fire on a dark plain; the village saw her a mile away. Letti didn’t mind. More often than not, she was happier that way. Attention made her nervous, and she did not harbor the same compulsion to legacy she suspected Candor did. Still, as Letti waited in the dark curve of the room, her heart twinged. She hated to leave Candor with bitter words between them. She would wait for a lull, Letti decided, and she would ask Candor outside to look at the stars. Candor loved looking at the stars; there they would reconcile, and Candor would know how much Letti yearned for her to stay in the village and grow in the garden and float on the sea forever.
Candor noticed Letti leaning against the wall in the shadows of the house. Candor’s hot shame had dissipated somewhat, but she was not yet certain she was willing to approach Letti. Candor had not intended to disrespect her friends’ parents, nor had she meant to make Letti feel small. Yet, Candor knew, she had let her temper and her desires get the better of her, and her pride had not allowed for an apology.
“Candor!” Hroth’s voice boomed from the front door.
“Yer Hroth.” Candor greeted him, hand to mouth. “I’m glad you came! I will need a new sword soon.”
“And this is what I bring you.” Hroth beamed, and from behind his gigantic back pulled a hand and a half sword.
“This is my best to date!” Hroth handed Candor the new sword and its scabbard. “I think you’ll have a little trouble denting this one!”
“I think you’re right, Yer Hroth.” Candor unsheathed the sword gently, enjoying the quiet friction of its release. “It’s a fine weapon.”
“It’s a proper blade for a fighter coming of age.” Hroth puffed out his chest. “I hope you never need it.”
Startled, Candor looked up and met Hroth’s stern gaze. She shifted uncomfortably but did not look away. Satisfied, Hroth touched her shoulder, before moving off to find some mintweed. Both Candor and Letti, and indeed the whole village, knew that Hroth’s wife Ingra did not let Hroth smoke unless there was an event. He was not one to spurn an opportunity.
Still marveling at her new sword, Candor thanked a few more well-wishers before she heard Letti’s short gait approach. Candor looked up.
“A walk?” Letti asked.
Nodding, Candor strapped her new sword to her hip, and followed her friend to the meadow. In the starlight, the wildflowers formed a swaying carpet; no paths existed on this side of the hill house as no one ventured further than their home. They lived in the shadow of the teeth, and while there was a fierce beauty to having the Kotemor outside your back door, not a soul dared their foothills, not even Mo and Lola.
Letti plucked a flower, eyes on the top of the shaggy hill. “I don’t want you to leave.”
“I’m sorry I said what I did.” The girls spoke at the same time.
Letti dropped her gaze. “It was honest. I appreciate that.”
Candor snorted. “Candor has never been my problem.”
Letti laughed, and the air seemed to grow much warmer. Candor threw her arms around her friend. “I hate when we fight.”
“That wasn’t really a fight.” Letti rolled her eyes.
“It was an unpleasant situating of our beings.” Candor pulled away and snatched the wildflower from Letti’s hands. She tucked it behind her friend’s ear. Letti’s breath caught.
“Come on.” Candor grinned. “I might actually enjoy this small dinner now.”
Both girls trotted towards the back door, leaving the stars winking and watching and waiting.
The next morning, Candor met Letti on her front stoop. Waving at Letti’s father, Candor led the way to the beach, before turning west. Letti slowed.
“Are we going to the cliffs?” She asked suspiciously.
“Yes,” said Candor.
Letti stiffened slightly but did not argue. She had no interest in repeating their frigidity. Distinctly fainter than the paths to and from the village, the trail to the cliffs bespoke its few visitors. Letti was certain that she and Candor were its only visitors these days. When they had been younger, more children from the village would cliff dive. As the cliffs were further away from the village than anyone seemed willing to travel now, Letti and Candor were the only two pairs of feet that maintained the lightening trail.
The sun climbed higher in the sky as Candor and Letti finally scurried up the last incline to the white cliffs overlooking the sea. Salted wind swept the thick grass over the girls’ feet, whisking Letti’s hair over her shoulder. Candor grinned.
“This place makes me feel free.” She unbuckled her sword and danced to the cliff’s edge, stretching her arms out over the sea. Letti’s stomach dropped.
“I’m going to practice.” Candor stepped back from the ledge and struck up a stance. “Want to join?”
Letti sighed but took off her shawl and untied her skirt. All the women of the village wore loose fitting trousers under their short skirts, the latter used more often than anything for makeshift baskets. Candor never wore her skirt; Mo didn’t either.
Candor began to flow through her battle poses. When they were growing up, Letti had participated occasionally as Mo had taught them the Aiadar, the muscle memory dance intended to limber, lengthen, and impress movement into the mind and body of its practitioner. As Candor and Mo’s practice intensified, Letti had thanked them, but returned home when they began their work. She was still familiar enough with the poses, however, that Candor would occasionally drag her out to some field (away from the potential interference of Mo) and perform it with her. Letti knew Candor just liked the company.
A few moments passed as the girls twisted, reached, and lunged slowly. Candor had once seen a butterfly land on Mo as she was practicing the Aiadar. Candor had never reached that level of control. Letti was an earthquake.
The wind breathed around their skin, cooling their sweat. Before she could understand why her arms had stopped moving, Candor’s gravity shifted. The sun blazed, highlighting the world in a moment of over-brightness and the sea shimmered as if it were brittle, about to crack.
Lola’s voice rippled through Candor’s mind, as if she were speaking into Candor’s ear. “The Citadel!”
Instead of an echo, Candor’s mind rang with silence as Lola’s voice receded. Unable to remember where her limbs were in relation to the earth, Candor collapsed.
Uttering a yelp, Letti dropped next to her friend, who was shivering.
“Something has happened.” Candor panted. “Lola spoke to me.”
“What?” Letti frowned. Candor was not making sense. Perhaps she had hit her head when she fell. Letti quickly grew concerned.
Candor sat up, face as pale as Letti had ever seen it, and tried to recount what she had heard.
“Candor, I don’t—”
But Candor did not wait for Letti to finish. Hair askew, Candor scrambled to her feet, grabbed her sword, and took off running. Letti, snatching her shawl and skirt, sprinted after her, curls tumbling in the wind.
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