Shards and Ashes

is even better. It doesn’t hurt that they lost their blacksmith in a raid last year.”

“Good. So now . . .”

I took a deep breath. My heart hammered so hard my hands shook. Braeden squeezed them.

“It’ll work. The hard part is over. Now we just need to—”

The tent flap opened, and in walked a massive man with grizzled black hair and blue eyes, one cloudy and sightless.

“So, girl,” the man said. “What are we going to do with you?”

The Branded. That’s what those in the fortress called them, in hushed tones with averted gazes. They might fear the hybrids and the tribes, but it was the Branded they invoked to frighten children. The greatest danger in the Outside, one the fortresses themselves created by casting out those with supernatural powers and branding them. Did they not realize that those branded outcasts would find each other? That they’d create their own tribes, more organized, more powerful, and more dangerous than anything in this barren world?

This was why I had informed on Braeden, rather than just helped him sneak over the wall. He needed that brand. While not every branded Outcast was accepted—those rejected were killed on the spot—we knew he’d be a prize recruit. As long as he bore the mark.

A mark I did not bear.

“The boy tells me you have no powers,” the grizzled man said. “You’re certain of that?”

“As far as I know.” If I had, this would have been much simpler. I didn’t say that, of course, only dropping my gaze respectfully.

“That’s a shame. You would have made a good addition to our tribe.”

Beside me, Braeden stiffened. “She brought you—”

I quieted him with a hand on his arm. I tried to be discreet, but the man noticed and laughed.

“He said you were a smart one,” he said. “I see he’s right. I’m well aware of what she brought, boy. Reminding me is not appreciated.”

“I’m young and strong and healthy,” I said. “I can read and write. I can cook. I can sew. I can farm. I can tend livestock. I can fight, too. With weapons or without. I can ride. I can hunt. I can slaughter and skin. I can do anything the tribe requires of me.”

“Almost anything,” Braeden said, his voice a growl as he gripped my hand.

“Put your back down, boy,” the man said. “You’ve made the situation clear, and I don’t need that reminder either.”

The man circled me, his gaze critical, assessing my health, my strength.

“Anything I don’t know, I can learn,” I said.

“I’m sure of that. Braeden tells me this plot was your idea?”

Not entirely true, but it did me no good to be modest, so I nodded.

“I don’t know what you’re expecting, girl, but life here isn’t going to be as easy as it was in the fortress.”

“No life is easy,” I said. “It’s just a different kind of hard.”

“True.” He looked toward the door. “It’s a good horse. We were hoping for two, but we can raid those that stole the other one. About the girl, though . . . You’re sure her father wants her back? She’s not a son.”

“Yes,” I said, “but without a son, she’s the only way he can hold on to power and pass it along to his kin. The First is old. He will die before next winter ends. Everyone is certain of it. He has no living child. Both the Second and Third will want the position, and they know that an alliance is the best way to solve the problem. If Priscilla marries the Third’s son, both can rest assured of their legacy. They will each move up one post with the promise that the son will become First after Priscilla’s father.”

The grizzled man shook his head. “It’s all too complicated for me. But that’s the fortress way, and if you’re as smart as you seem, you’d know that your gift is useless if they don’t want her back.”

“They will.”

“You took a big risk, expecting her to follow you. Would have been easier just to take her.”

“I knew she’d come, and it worked better if she thought it was her idea. Also, this way, the fortress will never know I betrayed her, so they won’t have the excuse to exile my friends.”

The man smiled. “Good. Loyalty is important here. All right then. We accept your gifts. Welcome to the Branded, girl. There’s just one more thing we need to do. . . .”

I stood by the fire. There was no crowd here. No onlookers at all. Only those who needed to attend. Everyone else continued with their work.

It was Braeden who held the brand in the fire. The camp had been using the stable master as a smith, and the grizzled man—the camp leader—offered to let him do it, but Braeden said no. The leader seemed surprised, but I understood. Braeden didn’t trust anyone else to do it right.

Braeden gave me a piece of leather to bite down on. I didn’t refuse it. I couldn’t start my life here screaming in agony.

“If you have to cry out, they’ll understand,” he whispered as he took out the brand.

“I won’t.” I smiled back at him. “It’s only a burn.”

“I wish I didn’t have to—”

“I trust you.”

“I mean I wish it wasn’t necessary.”

“It is.”

He moved me into position, lying flat on my stomach, which he said would be easier. I lifted my head and looked at Priscilla’s tent. If I strained, I could hear her crying. Did I feel guilty for what I’d done? Yes. Did I wish I hadn’t? No. I knew what I had to do, and I did it. Sometimes, that’s the only choice you have.

Braeden lowered himself to one knee beside me, and I could feel the heat of the brand over my shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“I’m not,” I said, and closed my eyes as the metal seared into my flesh.

Necklace of Raindrops by Margaret Stohl

1. R A M A

Everything is loud in the air.

Partly it is the wind. Partly it is the machine, the blades slicing the blue-black above him. Zhishengji are loud, even for sky choppers.

Partly it is his heart, pounding itself into a broken arrhythmia. Beating itself literally to death.

His breath in his ears.

The boy, Rama, sits on his scuffed boot heels, staring out into the dying day and the growing night. Beneath him, the faded sprinkling of lights that was the Southlands, that is what remains of the Southlands, spreads like the scattered beads of a snapped necklace.

Behind it, in the distant black, is the ocean. Haiyang, as they call it. There are no lights there at all. It looks like death.

Siwang. The great darkness.

How Rama imagines it.

Vivid. Lightless. Gone.

Rama steadies himself, catching his breath as the chopper twists and the metal floor panel slides backward,