The Fire Children Read online

The adults resumed their conversation while Yulla ate. For the most part, it was boring, the kind of gossip that had no effect on her. She found it more interesting to listen to how their voices bounced off the walls than to sit while they speculated on whether Old Moll’s great-granddaughter would have a boy or a girl, or when this person might finally admit they wanted to marry that one, or what the merchants might bring along the trade roads come the end of summer.

  She carried her plate and cup to the sideboard and stacked them atop the others without incident. From there she shuffled around the room, counting out her steps, listening to her parents’ and Aunt Mouse’s echoes fade away down the tunnels, or catching the faint murmurs of conversation from other families in other cellars.

  She stepped into the tunnel, walking a little way between their house and the next. Her fingers trailed along the rough length of the rope guide as she went, counting the knots that marked off every ten feet so she’d know how far back home was. Right now, households all over the city were waking up to their first day in the dark. Later, they’d visit each other, a roving party nearly as grand as the feast they’d thrown the night before.

  What was happening up above? Were the Fire Children already in Kaladim? Where? She imagined them flickering through the Worship Hall, pretending to be shopkeepers in the market, racing up and down the streets. She wondered whether parts of the city were burning—not everything in Kaladim was made of stone. The weeks after the Scorching Days were filled with rebuilding, all the craftspeople lending their time and talents to replacing what had been destroyed. Abba said you could hear hammers and saws from the time Mother Sun rose in the morning until long after she went to bed.

  After a while, Yulla turned around and counted the knots until she arrived home. While she’d been outside, Kell had dragged herself out of bed. Yulla followed the voices back toward the cushions. More accurately, she followed the sound of Kell’s chewing. Her sister’s tendency to smack her lips while eating always grated on Yulla’s nerves, but it seemed ten times louder in the dark.

  “What time is it?” asked Kell around a mouthful of food.

  It was a good question; now that she thought of it, Yulla still had no idea how long they’d slept, or even how long she’d been awake. It might have been an hour, though it felt longer and shorter at the same time.

  “A little before noon,” said Abba, just as Amma said “nearly eleven,” and Aunt Mouse said, “no, it can’t even be ten-thirty yet.”

  “You don’t... no one knows?” Kell’s plate clattered to the floor. “But how will we know when it’s time to do anything? Whether it’s morning, or night, or even what day it is?”

  Hearing the worry in her sister’s voice set the alarms sounding in Yulla’s head, too. “How do we know when the Darktimes are over?”

  “What if we go up late and miss the Reemergence?” Kell had picked out a dress months ago for the feast that would be held when the people went back aboveground.

  Yulla’s fear loomed larger. “What if we go up too early? What if the Fire Children are still walking the city?” They’d burn everyone to cinders.

  “The Worship Hall,” said Aunt Mouse, as if that explained everything.

  Kell’s outraged mewling became a grunt. “Uh?”

  “Think of its floor, right in front of the altar.”

  Yulla closed her eyes, imagining it. Or, at least, she thought she closed them; she still couldn’t be certain. The Worship Hall was huge, open on one side, and spacious enough to fit all the citizens of Kaladim within its stone walls. The interior was open, the floors covered by brightly-woven prayer rugs where families knelt during ceremonies. Carved limestone arches spidered overhead, supporting the glass roof that let Mother Sun keep watch over her mortal children. In some places, the glass was melty from where the Fire Children had climbed up and touched it in the past.

  Above the altar was a circular opening that let in the sky. Directly beneath it, a glass panel had been inlaid into the floor. Couples knelt upon it when they said their vows; babies were set atop it in their prism-decked baskets when their parents presented them to Mother Sun for the first time.

  “The Sunglass?” Yulla got an elbow to her ribs for being first to answer. She jabbed Kell back and said, “There’s only stone underneath.”

  “Most of the time, yes.” Aunt Mouse imposed herself between the girls. She did this often when they were ready to snipe at one another. “But don’t you think the Worship Hall has its own cellar?” She couldn’t see them nodding, but she paused for it anyway. “The stone beneath the glass can be moved away. During the Darktimes, it can be opened to let the light in so the priests can look up and tell the time.”

  “But won’t the Fire Children see? Can’t they use it to come down here and explore?” Kell sounded scared—enough to have been distracted from her beloved dress—but Yulla perked up. Did the priests look up through the chute and see fiery faces peering back down at them?

  Could she have a look?

  “It’s warded the same as the doors above.”

  Amma picked up the telling. “Sister Moon might hide Mother Sun’s face, but they still travel across the sky. The priests ring bells to let the rest of us know where they are, what time it is.”

  “I haven’t heard any,” said Kell.

  Yulla had been awake longer, but she hadn’t heard them either, and said so.

  Aunt Mouse laughed. “You haven’t been awake that long. Sunrise, mid-morning, midday, afternoon, and sunset. That’s when they ring. And once at midnight. You two lazy-bones slept well past the mid-morning bells. We thought you might dream yourselves right through—” she broke off as a chiming came from the tunnel behind them.

  “Well, now,” said Abba. “I was closest. You ladies each owe me a penny.”

  “Yes, yes.” Aunt Mouse sounded vexed as she lumbered to her feet. “Go on and get dressed now, girls. We’ll have visitors soon.”

  Coins clinked as they changed hands. The sound of banter followed her and Kell. Though her hands and feet were feeling their way towards the bedroom, her mind was busy puzzling out in which direction the Worship Hall lay.

  THE GIRLS HAD barely finished dressing when the visiting began. Footsteps pattered down the corridor, accompanied by the trills of their neighbors calling hello.

  Yulla could pick out some people by their voices, others from the way they smelled: a draft of yeasty air followed in the baker’s wake; the farrier smelled of hot metal and horsehair; wafts of indigo and lye clung to the dyer. Everyone came bearing something to share. Wicker baskets creaked with their burdens as the visitors drifted in and out of the cellar.

  Amma and Aunt Mouse herded them. Perishables like cakes and soft cheeses and goats’ milk went on one table. Infused oils, cured meats, and hard candies went on another. Still a third held other gifts: games that could be played in the dark, yarn and pencils for crafts that would be guided by feel alone, tiny pots of perfume and potpourri, bells and finger-cymbals and teak sticks for music-making. There was some giggling whose cause Yulla couldn’t figure, though she heard jars of sloshing liquid being placed on a high shelf.

  There was gossip, too, scandalized whispers as someone—one of Old Moll’s sons?—mentioned how a newly married priest and priestess were off celebrating their honeymoon in the dark. “Ishem worships Anur,” he said. “Maybe even more than he does Mother Sun. I hear they missed all of this morning’s rites.”

  Someone made a joke about Anur and Ishem performing rites of their own, and the group burst into laughter that they quickly hushed. “Shhhh,” said Aunt Mouse, “the girls are listening!” The chagrined silence lasted all of a few seconds before they burst into another round of snickering.

  After a while, Yulla lost count of how many visitors had come and gone. She and Kell sat together at one end of the cluster of cushions, out of the adults’ way. Every so often someone would come by and make polite conversation with them, asking how their first day in the dark was going. They excla
imed a bit over Yulla, regaling her with their memories of her own birth—how they’d heard her first cries, or how they’d come to check on Amma and wish her well.

  It got awkward after a while. The stories began blending together—how many different ways could you say I heard your mother howling, and I stumbled through the dark to say hello after she stopped and you started? At least they couldn’t see the way the indulgent, slightly bored smile had frozen on her face.

  Sometimes Yulla heard Abba or Amma or Aunt Mouse slipping away to go visiting, their familiar footsteps drifting away down the tunnels. One of the three always remained behind to play host, greet guests, and offer them morsels from both the family’s stores and the gifts others had brought. When Amma was gone, Yulla noticed, Abba and Aunt Mouse would take those sloshing jars down from the high shelf and pour thimblefuls for whoever had come calling. It smelled of fermented plums and anise, and was sharp enough to make Yulla’s eyes water even from a distance.

  By the time the afternoon bells came chiming through the tunnels, Abba, Aunt Mouse and their guests were giggly and gregarious.

  Kell and Yulla were merely bored.

  “Can’t we go visiting?” asked Yulla.

  “Soon.” Kell didn’t sound like she believed it, though. “When Amma comes back and says we can.”

  It was both a disappointment and a small consolation that no one their own age had come passing through with their families: while it meant the girls weren’t missing out on any fun, neither were their friends having any.

  It might have been a half hour after the bells when Amma returned; it might have been an hour. Yulla kept trying to count off the minutes and losing her place. But return Amma did, nearly as tipsy as their father and Aunt Mouse. An old tune came warbling from her throat, and beneath her perfume was the sharp scent of whatever was in those jars.

  “Kell, Yulla, you’re still here?” She laughed and kissed them each on the forehead. “When we were your age, your Aunt Mouse and I would have snuck off as soon as no one was paying attention.”

  “We raised good girls,” said Abba. “There’s the difference. Oof.” There was a double thwack as Aunt Mouse and Amma swatted at him.

  “Go on then.” Amma pressed baskets into each of their hands. Yulla felt around in hers: candies, mostly, plus some little bells and a set of knucklebones. “Plenty for sharing. Come home when you hear the bells ring sunset. Kell, watch over your sister.”

  Yulla wanted to protest—she was fifteen; didn’t need watching over—but fighting now risked destroying Amma’s good mood. That was never a good idea, especially not their first day down in the dark. Instead she hefted her basket and followed Kell into the tunnels.

  KELL DID AS she was bade, at least at first. She guided Yulla through the tunnels, one hand on the rope guide, the other stretched back to draw Yulla along in her wake.

  They ducked into other families’ sitting rooms as they went, murmuring polite hellos and trading bits of candy with the families there in a smaller version of what the grown-ups had done earlier. In each home, Kell asked politely after the other children. For a while, it seemed, everyone said her friends and Yulla’s had gone off in the same direction.

  Until they inevitably hadn’t. Kell’s friends had gone eastward, Yulla’s west. “There’ll be other kids your age with my friends, too,” said Kell. It was herbe reasonable tone, the one that said she was getting what she wanted anyway, but she’d try convincing you it was For Your Own Good while she was at it.

  “I can find my way back. I know how the rope signs work. And if I get lost I can ask.” She wasn’t entirely sure about the first two claims, but that’s what the third was for. Even in the houses where they didn’t find people, you could still hear voices echoing down the tunnels. Either she could follow the sounds to someone who’d help, or she could stay put and shout until someone came to find her. Aunt Mouse always said Yulla’s voice could be heard a hundred miles away.

  Kell wasn’t swayed. “You’ll get to see your friends later.”

  “But your friends are boring.” As soon as the words escaped her lips, she knew it was the wrong argument to make. She ought to have figured out something to trade, offered to do Kell’s chores, hand over her dessert for the next couple of days, anything but insult her sister’s friends.

  “No. You’re coming with me.” The bony manacle around her wrist tightened, and Kell said the three words that ended any argument: “Amma said so.”

  KELL’S FRIEND SERA, the farrier’s daughter, was playing hostess. Half a dozen girls had taken over the family’s cellar by the time Kell and Yulla arrived. They’d driven the adults away with their laughter; the normal level of hilarity had likely been driven up by the trays of sweet concoctions Sera’s parents had left for their guests. Yulla could almost hear Amma’s tsk in her ears: too much of a good thing, my loves, she’d say.

  But that didn’t stop either of them from taking the sweetcakes they were offered.

  For a little while, the visit wasn’t so bad. The girls weren’t as boring as Yulla’d accused. They let her join their game—Sera even picked Yulla over Kell for her team. They told stories, made up riddles, and made music, always including Yulla. She was almost, almost, having fun.

  Until Kell ruined it.

  They were back around to storytelling. The wild energy from all those sweetcakes was finally wearing off, and the girls were too stuffed to start in on another tray. Yulla sat on a cushion a little behind Kell, who had squeezed her most of the way out of the circle. That was all right, though; she was growing bored. No one would notice if she wasn’t paying attention. She might even have been able to slip away on her own, if she kept quiet enough. She’d started forming her plan, trying to remember what was where in Sera’s cellar, when Kell’s voice cut into her thoughts and stopped them cold:

  “You all know Yulla was born during the Darktimes, don’t you?”

  Yulla snapped to attention. Of course they knew; Kell teased her with the story every so often, and her tellings had only grown more frequent these last few weeks as the town prepared for the Darktimes to come again. Most of the time, it only served to annoy her. Maybe she was finally growing that thick skin Aunt Mouse said she needed.

  But down here, with the darkness thick upon them like a shroud, the tale felt different. “Kell, stop.”

  Kell’s voice dropped lower, so all the girls would have to lean in. “She was born dead, down here in the black, and a malsheen crawled into her skin and made her heart beat again.”

  A shudder went through the ring of girls. Dorit, who had been sitting closest to Yulla, inched away. Yulla heard the shush of her cushion sliding over the stone, felt the breeze cool the air where Dorit’s shoulder had been keeping her warm.

  “I’m not a demon.” She gave Kell a warning pinch.

  “Maybe not in daylight, you’re not.” Her sister pinched back, harder. Yulla hissed in pain, and a few girls let out excited shrieks at the sound. “See?” said Kell. “This demon’s asleep when we’re up above. It’s like a saw-scale. In fact, it’s related to them.”

  More shrieks from the girls, as they pictured the deadly viper Kell had invoked. Yulla herself had only ever seen one, out in the desert with Kell and some of the older boys. It had curled itself into a crescent, and the sound of its scales as they rubbed together was like the winds over the sands.

  Which was about the sound Kell was making now, beside her.

  Yulla sprang to her feet, eliciting screams from the girls. “I’m not a demon, I’m not!”

  The shrieks turned into embarrassed laughter as the girls recovered their wits. Still Kell pressed on. “Yes you are. You’re a demon when it’s all dark like this.”

  “I’m not! If I were a demon, I’d... I’d...” Yulla searched for something to say, something biting that would make them all stop laughing at her and laugh at Kell instead. Or maybe she should do something to give them all a good scare, like Kell had with the saw-scale sound. But Kell’s to
ngue was quicker when she was feeling mean.

  “... you’d what? You’d cry about it? Is that what you’re going to do, demon-girl? Cry?”

  The laughter swelled. Yulla wasn’t crying. She was too old for that. She was furious, but there were no tears, no sobs, nothing to make Kell even say it, but there it was. Someone started the chant: cry-baby, cry-baby. Another changed it to cry-demon, cry-demon,and they all picked it up.

  She had no way to stop it.

  She could hear Aunt Mouse’s advice, the things she usually said when Kell got mean: “Ignore her and she’ll stop. Don’t give her the satisfaction and she’ll get bored.” But Yulla had learned that sometimes that was what the grown-ups told you when they didn’t know what else to say. Things that should work, but didn’t always. Maybe their parents had told them the same—had Amma ever picked on Aunt Mouse like this?—and they just kept repeating it down through the years.

  Kell said something else that Yulla couldn’t hear over the blood pounding in her ears, but it knocked the girls’ laughter up to another pitch. They didn’t even need the sweetcakes this time.

  She couldn’t make them stop, so she did the only thing she could think of.

  Yulla turned and ran into the darkness.

  NO ONE SHOUTED for her to come back; no one chased after her, spouting apologies. The only thing following Yulla was the other girls’ laughter.

  Now that she was alone, a few angry tears fell after all. She brushed them away at first, not wanting to be the cry-baby the girls (Kell) had called her. But no one could see her now, and it wasn’t like the tears were blurring her vision as she ran. So she let some slip free and felt a little better, as if they carried her mortification away with them.

  Voices called out as she passed through sitting rooms. Yulla didn’t announce herself to anyone, even though she knew it was rude not to. They would only try to stop her and make her wait for Kell or Amma to come get her. She didn’t want to see Kell right now.