Firestorm

Smoke moved up beside me. “Lana, what do you mean take orders like that?”

Lana’s eyes flicked to Smoke. “That he was to kill the Enders from the Rim. He said it was wrong, but he didn’t have a choice. He was fine, just fine in the healer’s rooms. But you came back, didn’t you?” Her glare found me and held me tightly. “You came back and finished the job you started, you hateful bitch.” She launched herself at me and I again caught her, despite the lines of power racing up her arms. I didn’t want her to fall, didn’t want to hurt the child in her any more than I already had by taking its father away.

Catching her around the waist as she stumbled and spun, her back pressed to my front, and my hands ended up on her belly. Spirit roared forth within me and slid through us both. I saw her baby, saw his spirit and the beat of his heart. He would follow in his father’s footsteps, be a warrior, if he survived his birth. The cord connecting him to his mother was wrapped three times around his neck.

“You’re going to have a boy,” I said, holding her lightly. She relaxed in my arms, placing her hands on my mine.

“How do you know—”

“The birth will be easy. You won’t feel much pain, but the cord is around his neck. Three times. The midwife will know what to do.”

I helped her stand on her own feet, the words flowing out my mouth. “He will be an Ender, like his father. A good man.”

The images left me, and I put a hand to my head. Lana took my wounded hand, frowning at it as if looking for an answer. “You didn’t mean to hurt him, did you?”

“No, I only wanted to get out alive,” I said.

She nodded. “As do we all.” With a flick of her wrist, she dropped my hand and walked away, her friends following. But not before each of them stopped in front of me and spit at my feet.

Peta, I’d almost forgotten she was on my shoulder, grunted. “That little gesture means they wouldn’t spit on you even if you were on fire.”

“Nice.”

Beside me, Smoke let out a long breath. “That could have been worse.”

“The Enders, were they all healing that first night?” I asked and Smoke looked away.

“I am forbidden to say,” she whispered.

“Forbidden? Or bound?” I asked as I scooped up the overturned laundry basket. There was ash on the clothes, but I wasn’t about to stick my hands back into the river.

“Both.”

“So I have to figure this out myself? That’s what you’re telling me?”

The tip of Peta’s tail flicked along my neck, and I reached up to touch her, finding comfort in her presence. Smoke, though, said nothing, and I assumed that was my answer.

We headed back the way we’d come, climbing the steps into the higher parts of the cavern, the air drying my skin, hair and clothes in a matter of minutes.

“Perhaps I should take you to your friend, Cactus,” Smoke said. “You can do work for him, help him clean his bachelor home.”

I nodded. “Smoke, what about our ambassador here? Could he not stand for Ash in some way?”

She shook her head slowly. “The queen had all ambassadors sent home when things started to go poorly with the lava flows. She did not want to be responsible for them.”

Damn, there would be no help from that quarter then.

Smoke walked with me across the high arched bridge to the far side of the cavern where the singles lived. I wondered why they kept them apart from the families, and Peta must have picked up on my curiosity.

“The men when not bound to a wife can be out of control with their tempers and wild ways. No one wants that near their family,” Peta said, filling me in as we walked.

“How old are they when they move here?” I asked, thinking of Brand and Smoke’s son Stryker. He couldn’t be that far from an age where he was considered an adult.

“Eighteen,” Smoke said.

“And your son, how old is he?”

Her tone trembled. “He has a year left in our home.”

There were no more words as we approached the singles section. It was remarkably quiet.

“They are all kept very busy. It helps with the male aggression to keep them tired.”

“I saw him, in the throne room when we were brought in.” I peered around, wondering which place belonged to Cactus.

Or maybe he lived with a woman. The thought was odd. Cactus had been a player from the beginning, chasing the pretty girls and stealing kisses whenever he could. I had a hard time seeing him settling down anytime soon.

Smoke stopped in front of one of the many doors. Made of a light green granite, the surface was cool even in the heat. I would have said it was beautiful, except unlike the other doors, it was . . .disgusting. Covered in patches of ash, and some sort of dark brown mud, it looked as though Cactus had never wiped it off. The rest of his home was no better, the place was like a human garbage dump, as if whoever lived there was collecting crap just for the sake of piling it in front of their house. I looked past it to the next door down the way, hoping I was wrong in my suspicion. “This is his home?”

She nodded and Peta let out a low hiss. “Disgusting man.”

I couldn’t disagree with her.

I took a step forward and stopped, imagining walking in on him and his latest conquest. Erring on the side of caution, I called out, “Cactus?”

There was a scuffle of feet and then he poked his head out of the doorway, saw me, and frowned. “Lark, what are you doing here?”