Trials (Rogue Mage Anthology Book 1) Read online

  But below the freedom, beneath the fierce independence, Pearl could hear an echo of loneliness in his mind. Could sense the fear there. The disgrace. He pulled away in a whirlwind of shame, but not before she saw the image of the storm that destroyed his family’s house. An angry wind, out of control, powered by the fury of a young boy’s rage. And the vision of the beam that had fallen on his little sister. Anna. She had died. He had run, just ahead of the villagers who threw stones. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I’m only now learning how to control the wind. How to control myself.

  I destroyed the village’s fishing boat, she thought at him, showing him the small craft caught on a shoal, holed through. When his thoughts made of it a small thing, she thought at him, If they can’t fix it, they’ll go hungry this winter. Death is death. And because of it, they hate us—with reason.

  There is no one to teach us, he thought. The Most High should have sent us teachers.

  The Most High? Does He even know that we are? That we exist?

  Where are you? he asked, his mind darting fast from thought to thought. He showed her where he stood, inland. And he carried her back toward the sea, the wind of their passage held firm by her mind now as the salt tried to weaken his incantation.

  He saw her, standing on the shore, sunburned, dirty, her pearls catching the sun, glistening. You are close. His thoughts sped, like a heated breeze. You are beautiful. I can walk to you. Tonight. I’ll be there by tonight.

  She opened her eyes, staring into the sky. And she laughed. “I’ll catch some shrimp or crabs and a fish or two,” she said aloud.

  I’ll start a fire as soon as I arrive. We can eat together. And sleep warm.

  And Pearl knew she was no longer alone.

  TNT

  23 PA / 2035 AD

  Faith Hunter

  Junior knew the town was still there, buried beneath the snow and ice. His dad said the town was there, so it was there. Charles Crawford Senior had been hunting with his own father, high on the mountainside, when the seraphs’ judgment had doomed the town. Together they had watched the entire town die in minutes. The old man, Junior’s grandpa, had gone crazy with rage when the seraphs killed them all, and had raced down the mountain, firing his shotgun into the sky. He’d died of the plague too.

  Charles Senior had turned his back on civilization and joined with the few survivors on the far side of the mountain to eke out a life by living off the land. Later he’d taken up trading, traveling through the growing ice age to scattered settlements, exchanging a surplus of this from one community for an excess of that in another. That was the name of his business—This-N-That—TNT. Clever, Junior thought. Senior had met his wife that way—trading. And now Junior was going to start a new phase of the family business, back at the site of the town where his grandparents lay buried.

  A lot of people thought the plague was still active, that if you touched the bones of the past, you’d be infected and tainted with the deadly disease of the judgment. Junior figured that was hogwash.

  Some other people, mostly the new spiritual “orthodox,” thought that the towns that had been judged were no longer there, just vanished under the power of the seraphic judgment. Junior thought that was hogwash too. The seraphs had done a lot of crazy things, but making things vaporize into nothingness wasn’t one of them, no matter what the new religious police were saying.

  And it wasn’t evil to uncover what nature and the perpetual winter had hidden—so long as the new Elders didn’t find out. And Junior had covered his tracks well.

  He stood beside the rock promontory his dad had described. From here he should be able to see an outcropping of tumbled red brick down below, less than a mile to the north. But the road leading down didn’t look the way his father had described it. There had been an avalanche at some point in the last few decades, and the tree stumps, broken boulders, and huge ice chunks had buried what was left of the old road. And it was covered by the last stubborn drifts that remained when the rest of the winter snow had melted off the southern face of the mountains. Because no one had been here since the judgment, there wasn’t a path even a sure-footed mule could navigate. Junior had to make one.

  He tethered his two mules and his workhorse at the promontory near a bale of hay he’d brought. They’d be okay until tomorrow, and if he didn’t make it back, they would find their way back home. The big Friesian was smart and strong, and no tether would hold him for long.

  Then Junior shouldered two picks, a good, Pre-Ap shovel, and his pack of supplies and started down the mountain.

  Junior reached the ice-covered rubble pile in just under six hours. The red brick had once been a drugstore and Charles Senior said it was full of useful stuff they could trade. The ice was only a few inches thick in most places, and he easily chipped through it. And the first thing he saw was bones. Scattered everywhere, bones, scarred and broken. Human bones. It looked as if they had been gnawed on by spawn of Darkness.

  He almost ran—until he saw the tread of a tire. The rubber was in pretty good shape. So was the rim. A cobbler could make a lot of boots from the tire. A good blacksmith could work a rim into any number of things. And where you find one tire, you sometimes find a bunch.

  Money. That’s what he was seeing among the bones. Money. Charles Crawford Junior didn’t run.

  Two weeks later, a very changed Junior and his now-skinny horse-stock made their way back to New Hope Township. They were loaded down with Pre-Ap treasure: steel sewing needles, six pairs of scissors, four electronic stethoscopes that still worked, crutches, four wheels and tires, and jewelry taken from among the dead. This-N-That had a new niche market—mining the houses and businesses of the dead. And more importantly, Junior knew where to find more. And it was going to make the whole family rich.

  Epena’s Epiphany

  34 PA / 2048 AD

  Lou J Berger

  The siren went off just before noon, shrieking into a blue sky and rolling across Moloka’i’s western plain, scaring the silverbill birds nesting in the scattered kiawe trees.

  Epena Kawai glanced up, brushing her hair out of her eyes. She held the knife poised against a peeled taro root, ready to cut it into chunks. Had that been three blasts or four? Three blasts meant the stone fish ponds on the coast were in danger. Four meant the nearby elementary school, the one her little cousin attended.

  The siren sounded again, a long warning tone, then four short ones. The knife clattered to the counter.

  Akamu.

  She jammed her feet into slippers, and ran down the dirt road toward the school, a mile away. She’d walked him there just hours earlier.

  She’d enjoyed his six-year-old excitement at discovering the world all over again, as he did each day on their walk to school. His sharp eyes had spotted red ’apapane birds drinking nectar from the crimson blossoms of the ’ōhi’a trees. Then, later, he laughed at the angry, waddling gait of a hissing nēnē as it passed him. He chattered constantly, leaping from one topic to another, pointing at oddly shaped clouds, the orange trumpets on a lantana bush, and this morning the latest addition to her kakau uhi, her collection of tattoos.

  What’s that honu mean?” He squatted in the dirt, brown legs splayed, squinting at the green turtle newly inked on her lower left leg.

  She’d turned her foot to better show it. “It means good luck and long life.”

  “I want one,” Akamu had said, his lower lip thrust out. “I want a long life, too!”

  Her breath grew ragged as Epena ran toward the school. Smoke curled from the clustered buildings, but there was no sign of ’Ana’ana, the Dark seraph who ruled the islands. He’d destroyed and moved on, like he always did.

  When she saw the splintered remains of the kindergarten, she stopped, feeling her knees go weak. Emergency workers pulled injured children from beneath the building’s collapsed roof.

  The uninjured students gathered in a small crowd, chaperoned by teachers.

  Epena ran to one of them. The woman’s f
ace was pale and haggard. A stray tendril of raven hair hung from an otherwise severe bun.

  “Akamu?” Epena gasped, searching her face. The teacher only stared back at her, wide-eyed.

  Epena turned to the small group of children. “Akamu,” she pleaded, “has anybody seen him?”

  One little girl, dirty, with a torn dress, pulled a thumb from her mouth and pointed to the ruined kindergarten building.

  Epena sprinted to the wreckage. An EMT grabbed her arm. “Sorry, miss. It’s not safe.”

  “My cousin is in there,” she snapped, yanking her arm free. Stretchers lay on the ground behind a low wall. White sheets shrouded three tiny, still forms.

  She fell to her knees, her strength draining away. Her shaking finger pointed at the stretchers. “Is he . . .”

  The EMT glanced to where she pointed. “What was he wearing?”

  “I don’t remember.” He’d squatted in the dirt road, pointing at her kakau designs. What had he worn? “White shorts and an aqua shirt, big collar.”

  The EMT glanced over at the stretchers again and shook his head. “He’s not there. He must still be inside, or on the way to the hospital.”

  The roof rested at a steep angle. It was hard to imagine anybody had survived.

  But then another emergency worker came from behind the building, and Epena gasped. Akamu walked beside him, looking like a clay figurine, coated in chalky dust. Blood stained his white shorts, and he held his left arm tucked against his chest, inside his shirt. Tears had carved runnels through the dust on his face. When he saw Epena, he ran to her.

  Still on her knees, she opened her arms and absorbed the impact of his little body.

  “Epena, it was horrible,” he yelled. “’Ana’ana came and threatened us! He wanted to know who’d been hiding from him! We didn’t know and he broke the school!” He glanced over his shoulder at the wreckage.

  Epena stood and walked Akamu to a crowd of kids gathered around the school nurse, who was focused on applying bandages to minor cuts and bruises.

  When Akamu’s turn came, the nurse ran expert hands over his tiny frame, paying particular attention to his left elbow.

  “He has a dislocated elbow. Nothing major.” The nurse pushed a thumb into the bend of his elbow, looked the boy in the eye and smiled. “Take a deep breath, Akamu, and when I push on your arm, yell as loud as you can.”

  Akamu inhaled deeply, wincing in anticipation. The nurse turned his wrist until Akamu’s palm faced his shoulder. He paused, looking Akamu in the eye. “Ready?”

  Akamu’s eyes grew big and he bit his lip. “Okay.”

  With his thumb still in the crook of Akamu’s elbow, the nurse pushed Akamu’s wrist toward the boy’s shoulder with a swift, decisive motion. When Akamu’s palm struck his own shoulder, he yelled, but not so loud that Epena missed a muffled click.

  “Hey,” said Akamu, testing his arm’s range of motion. “That’s better!”

  The nurse smiled, ruffled his dusty hair, and turned to Epena. “He’ll be fine. Some aspirin tonight, maybe, and an early bedtime.” He glanced at the ruined building. “You might as well take him home; no more school for awhile.”

  “Thank you. I wish I could stay and help.”

  The nurse shook his head. “He was one of the lucky ones. Go on, get him out of here.”

  Epena and Akamu walked along the dirt road toward home.

  That night, Epena sat outside with her aunts and her grandmother, a roaring fire fighting back the evening chill, and told them about the school and the tiny forms under white sheets.

  The stunned women silently stared into the crackling flames.

  “Tutu,” Epena said, her brow furrowed. “Why does ’Ana’ana hate us so much?”

  The aunties glanced at one another with guilty expressions. Her grandmother’s eyes were like black cinders, peering into her soul.

  “Aunties,” said Tutu with a hint of iron. “Leave us. It is time I spoke with Epena about her mother.”

  Epena’s eyes widened. Discussing her mother’s death had been avoided as if it were kapu. The aunties gathered their things and walked to the house.

  Tutu stared into the fire. “I noticed you had more work done on your uhi. You added a honu to your left leg?”

  “Yes. For long life.”

  Tutu’s face wrinkled mischievously. “And is that lazy boy designing your patterns?”

  Epena shook her head. “No, Tutu. I design them. And his name is Kanoa, not ‘lazy boy.’ He’s studying to be an engineer, but he’s also the best on the island with the kakau stick. He lets me use my ink.”

  “Your ink?”

  “I find the cruelest chunks of ’a’a lava, and I grind them into a fine powder. Kanoa mixes the powder with seawater and taps the patterns into my skin.”

  Tutu’s voice fell to a whisper. “Wahine, why do you use powdered lava?”

  Epena clenched her teeth. Memories of girls at school calling her mud-girl and orphan came flooding back. “My name means mud, right?”

  Tutu’s voice snapped. “Your father’s name means stone, not mud, and your mother gave you a boy’s name out of love for him. Kawai, our family name, means water, and honors the ocean that surrounds us on all sides. You are a mixture of both, but stone and water doesn’t make mud.”

  Epena stared into the fire, her jaw set. “I’m a mud-girl named after a boy, and my parents are dead.”

  They sat in silence for a bit, and a pueo owl glided by, flying close to the fire before wheeling away.

  “Do you know how they died?” Tutu’s voice floated on the darkness like gossamer.

  “You told me they died in an accident.”

  “No, it isn’t true. You are very late in embracing your kuleana, your life path, like your aunties did when they were younger than you are now. You work around this house like an old woman, when you should be attending college or working a real job. For you to finally grow up, it’s time you learned what really happened.”

  Epena frowned. “It wasn’t an accident?”

  Tutu’s face grew stony. “’Ana’ana came to the islands when I was still a young woman. He was evil. He hungered for all the power he could acquire, even if that power was in the frail bodies of two teenagers—your parents.”

  “What power did they have?”

  “They were both neomages. They could draw energy from stone. It didn’t seem like much; when they were young, I remember them playing games where they used to make sparks leap from lava rocks to their fingertips.”

  Tutu’s expression softened.

  “Our families were close and the two of them grew up together. Eventually you were born. On a day when I was away shopping, ’Ana’ana visited your mother, disguising himself as your father. Your father heard them talking and tried to attack the dragon. ’Ana’ana killed him.”

  Epena stared, but Tutu wouldn’t look in her direction. She kept speaking, unshed tears reflecting firelight.

  “I returned from my shopping to see your mother standing over your father’s broken body. She snatched up a chunk of ’a’a from the ground and dragged it across her bare belly, drawing blood. She held the stone to the cut, which caused her to glow for a moment, and then hurled a bolt of energy at the dragon.”

  Her grandmother took a shuddering breath, but continued. “More energy flowed into her from beneath the ground, and I watched your mother die, burning from the inside out as the lava’s fire overwhelmed her. I still hear her screams in my nightmares.”

  “And the dragon? What happened to him?”

  “’Ana’ana limped away, burned. He’s been angry ever since, and has sworn to root out and destroy any other mages he finds.”

  Ice water poured into Epena’s veins as she remembered walking along the shoreline after dropping Akamu at school that morning. She touched her scraped knee, where she’d fallen against the cruel lava rocks and felt harsh vibrations coming from the stone.

  She stood. “Tutu, thank you for sharing this with me. I ha
ve much to think about.”

  Tears finally flowed down her grandmother’s lined cheeks. “Epena, my sweet child, I only wish I had told you sooner.”

  Epena bent and gently wiped her grandmother’s face. “Tutu, I love you. You told me now.” She kissed her grandmother. “I have to go.”

  “At this time of night? Where are you going?”

  “I need time to think.”

  Epena ran into the night, away from the fire and toward the shore.

  Toward Kanoa.

  Kanoa’s light still burned, so she knocked and turned the knob. The tattoo parlor’s interior was brightly lit, and paper kakau patterns were scattered across all the walls. A little bell over the door tinkled as she stepped inside.

  “Hey, Epena. What brings you out this late?” Kanoa pushed aside the book he was reading, stood, and hugged her. He let his arms linger around her bare shoulders just a few moments longer than she was comfortable with. She liked him enough, but he sometimes got a little too fresh. She pulled back and shook her head, grimacing.

  “‘Ana’ana attacked the school today.”

  “He did?” Kanoa asked, his brow furrowed. “Is Akamu okay?”

  “He hurt his arm, but the school nurse fixed it.”

  “Oh, Epena.”

  Epena sat down on the closest table. “I think it was my fault.”

  “What? How could that be? That dragon is evil and does whatever he wants. You had nothing to do with it.”

  Epena shook her head. “My Tutu told me tonight that my mother could draw energy from ’a’a. She burned ’Ana’ana with it, but the energy she’d pulled from the lava built up inside her and consumed her in fire.”