One
Aspeth
27 Days Before the Conquest Moon
The coach taking us to Vastwarren City is creaky, the seating is uncomfortable, and I paid far too much for the ride. But it's also very obviously an artifact, which is why I wanted to take it. The exterior looks the same as every other coach that was waiting on the street in front of the inn, but this one had no horse harnessed to the front, nor a yoke for it. Instead, there was a symbol carved into the wood that I recognized as Old Prellian.
The coachman charged a pretty penny but I didn't care. I wanted to ride in that damned artifact coach.
And now here we are, and it's a dreadful, bouncy ride. I can't help but eye the coach covetously anyhow. It speeds along the cobbled roads without a horse to draw it, heading for the city in the distance. The driver is a cheerful sort, too, and seated inside with us instead of riding on a bench atop the coach. He faces the windows and holds reins as if he's steering a horse, yet there's nothing pulling us along. More symbols in Old Prellian crawl over the front of the coach and I'm absolutely dying to lean forward and read them, but I'd have to shove my face into his lap to do so because my vision is so dreadful. I have to content myself with the knowledge that the coach is indeed magical and the merrily chatting coachman won't sell it. No one sells an artifact.
Well, no one except my foolish father.
I bite my cuticles, squinting out the window as the magic coach barrels past a field with a great deal of people standing in it. They dig at the dirt with shovels, and it looks as if there's a booth at the far end of the muddy land. A sign next to the booth reads in bright, colorful letters, DIG FOR ARTIFACTS! YOU FIND YOU KEEP!
"Does that work?" I blurt out to our driver as we pass by. "Does anyone truly find an artifact in the fields?"
The driver chuckles. "Oh, no, that's purely for the tourists. Everyone shows up with a few pennies and their spades, ready to turn their luck around. They all think they'll find the next automaton or Pitcher of Endless Wine. No one does, but they leave at the end of the day happy. I heard some of the more unscrupulous sorts take broken artifacts and bury them in the fields so people can find something." He shakes his head. "You're better off avoiding that sort of thing."
"But your coach is an artifact," I point out, ignoring the stomp of Gwenna's foot on mine. "How did you acquire it?"
He reaches out and pats the coach like it's a person. It might as well be. Any working artifact is more prized than gold. "A gift to an ancestor from the king. It's been in the family for generations. I'm lucky to have her."
"It's quite rare," I agree. "No one's tried to steal it from you?"
This time Gwenna pinches me.
"It'd be useless if they did," he tells me cheerfully, oblivious to my line of thought. "It dies at sunset and there's a magic word to make it activate at sunrise. That word is a carefully guarded secret in my family and we wouldn't share it, even upon pain of death."
I think perhaps this man just hasn't been pressed enough yet. Surely someone could coax a magic word out of him with the right sort of convincing. Then I'm disgusted at my own thoughts, because I'm imagining someone torturing a coach driver (who's been quite lovely, honestly) over his artifact.
It's just that the Honori family needs artifacts dreadfully. I debate how to approach my next question in a delicate manner, and all the while Gwenna stares at me with narrowed eyes. "I don't suppose you'd sell it?" I ask. "I'd make you a very wealthy man."
I'm lying, of course.
If I had two pennies to rub together, I wouldn't be fleeing Honori Hold. If I had two pennies to rub together, I would have married Barnabus Chatworth despite the fact that he's a title hunter. As it is, I am quite, quite broke . . . but that doesn't mean I can't try. If I could get him to sell this carriage to me, it wouldn't solve my problems, but it'd be a step in the right direction.
It'd be something.
"Oh, I can't do that," the coachman says, and I'm not surprised. "I inherited this girl from my father, and she'll be going to my son after me." He caresses the front of the coach again, like a lover. "I can't sell my family out for money when the money will come in simply because of the artifact."
"I understand." I still think someone could torture the word of power out of him, but I understand.
He glances at the back seat of the coach, where Gwenna huddles next to me, holding my cat's carrying sack. "Some things aren't for sale."
If they were, then my problems would be solved . . . or would they? Considering I have no money as well as no artifacts, I wouldn't know. "Indeed."
"So you ladies are heading into Vastwarren? This your first time in the city?"
"First time," I agree, glancing back at the dirt field as it disappears from view. I'm tempted to grab a spade and try my luck with all the others, just to see if one can truly find an artifact in all that mud. If there's even a chance, it's worth trying, isn't it? For a moment, I dream about shoveling a few spadefuls of dirt, just enough to put in a bit of effort, and then striking down upon metal. I'd pull it up and uncover a gilded, gleaming artifact. Not just any artifact, either. One with endless charges, just like the coach we're in right now. Or perhaps one of the ones that recharge in sunlight.
And it'd have to be something useful, too. Nothing like the glass candle that creates an endless wisp of rose-scented smoke. Something like one of the shielding crystals that are used in the capital would be perfect. Or something that creates a sought-after item from thin air, like the decanter that pours serpent venom. An artifact of war from Old Prell, that's what Honori Hold needs. Several of them, actually. We need defense, and a way to fund our hold.
And we need those artifacts to actually work. The ones currently filling our vault are all dead. A dead artifact is as useless as . . . well, as a holder heiress with no funds and no artifacts to defend her family's holdings. I bite back a sigh and lean my head against the window of the coach, watching as another family hurries toward the field with buckets and spades in tow, chattering excitedly.
Gwenna nudges me, and I realize the coach driver was talking to me.
"Mmm?" I inquire, straightening.
"You didn't say who you are and why you're heading to Vastwarren City. Attending a party of some kind?" The way he says it sounds hesitant, as if he doesn't understand why anyone would host a party in Vastwarren. The king avoids the place because it's said to be rough-and-tumble. That makes me a little nervous. When I envision "rough-and-tumble," I think of some of my father's stableboys and how they get loud after they've had a few drinks. But that's only a few stableboys. I cannot imagine an entire city of that. Leaning forward, I peer out the windows of the coach to the city in the distance. It looks like a great big stain spread over a hill, with the smog of a thousand chimneys polluting the air overhead. All of it looks dirty, but that doesn't mean it's unsafe . . .
Does it?
I've read a heap of books about Vastwarren City, but mostly in a historical context. I know all about how this spot on the plains between two rivers was once the hub of a large ancient city called Prell, and Prell was full of magic. The gods grew angry at the people of Prell and had it swallowed up by the ground, where it was forgotten for hundreds of years. Then, three hundred years ago, the Mancer Wars broke out. At the end of the conflict, magic was outlawed, and a new industry was started-artifact retrieval. Vastwarren City was built atop the bones of Old Prell.
Vastwarren is truly the only city that's not under holder rule. The rest of Mithas is divvied up into great estates lorded over by holders like my father, and all of the holders are ruled by the king. But Vastwarren? It's a place unto itself, and the Royal Artifactual Guild holds sway over it.
I don't know what the city looks like inside. I know Old Prell had grand plazas with magical fountains, and the inhabitants imbued everything they used with magic, from cups to horse carts to weapons. It sparkled with energy and the people there were rich and glorious . . . but the dirty stain on the horizon tells me that Vastwarren City is an entirely different sort of place, and so are its people.
The coach driver wants to know if we're attending a party, but he's just making conversation. Everyone knows that the nobility avoid Vastwarren and its hardscrabble, rough people. We stick to our isolated holds and to court.
But the driver doesn't know I'm noble, and he wants an answer. Might as well give him the truth. The new truth.
"My name is Sparrow," I tell him, and just saying the name fills me with pride. I straighten, squaring my shoulders. "And I'm heading to the city to join the Royal Artifactual Guild."
I expect him to make the appropriate awed noises that such a pronouncement deserves. Guild artificers are exciting, dangerous individuals, the ones stories are written about. They're respected everywhere they go, and every holder employs the best artificer teams to hunt for them. Everyone reveres an artificer.
Not our coach driver. Instead, he looks back at the two of us again and bursts into laughter.
Rude.
Once we’re deposited onto the outskirts of Vastwarren City with our baggage, Gwenna glares at me with anger before I can even take a good look at our surroundings. She pinches my arm, scowling the moment the coach lumbers away. “You absolute fibber! Why did you tell that man your name was Sparrow?”
Squeaker howls for attention in her carrier, the sound loud enough to make people pause in the busy street. I open the specialized satchel and heft the large orange cat into my arms. It's like hugging a sack of flour that sheds, but my pet is mollified once she's held in my arms like a baby. I run my fingers over her white chest fur while she purrs. Poor sweetheart. It's been a terrible ride from home. Bad enough that I had to spend the last three days in various coaches bouncing across the countryside. My poor Squeaker had to spend them in a bag. I couldn't leave her behind, though. She's all I've got.
Well, her and Gwenna.
I frown at my maid. "I'm not a fibber. I told you before. Everyone who joins the Royal Artifactual Guild takes on a bird name. It's to honor the first artificer, who was turned into a swan by a cursed artifact. Everyone in the guild is a bird, and the applicants are called fledglings. I've decided that I like the name Sparrow." I pause and then add, "I know this isn't your dream. It's not too late for you to go home. We can say you were kidnapped. Better yet, I can write you a lovely letter of recommendation that would get you hired at any hold. Just say the word."
Gwenna gives me a narrow-eyed stare. "Why are you chasing me off?"
I resist the urge to raise my fingers to my mouth so I can bite my cuticles. Grandmama thinks it's a disgusting habit-and it is-but I can't help myself. When I get anxious, I nip away. I scratch at them with my thumbnail instead. "I just . . . I appreciate your companionship, Gwenna. Truly I do. But this place isn't for proper ladies, and I don't want you to feel trapped into a fate not of your choosing."
She stares ahead at the bustling street in front of us. People of all kinds crowd the cobblestone ways, and all of them look like they come from the rougher parts of the city. Then again, perhaps all of Vastwarren is rough.
"Do you remember when I was nine and you were fourteen? We were girls and my mother had just been hired into your father's kitchens. We played in the garden together before your tutor came and found us. Remember what you said to him?" Gwenna asks.
I squint at her, because I don't recall this day at all. Most of my days as a child were spent sitting alone in Honori Hold with a tutor, because Father would be away at court. Sometimes it would be a mathematics tutor, sometimes an etiquette tutor. The best tutor was the one who encouraged my interests in Old Prell, and the worst was the one hired by Grandmama who wanted me to sew and "work on my laugh" so I could catch a husband. "I'm sorry, I don't recall. What did I say?"
She looks at the buildings around us, holding a hand to her eyes to shield them from the late-day sunlight. "You asked if I could take lessons with you. That you wanted a friend at your side and you liked me."
I smile softly, because I still don't remember, but it sounds like something I would have done. I was so lonely as a child that I was desperate for any sort of attention. "I don't recall. Did we take lessons together, then?"
"No." Her voice goes flat. "Your tutor said that I was a servant, and there was no point in educating someone destined for a kitchen. That educating me would be a waste." Her jaw hardens and she meets my eyes. "I remember that, and I remember the next day that a position was found for me in the scullery, and I had no choice but to say yes, because my mother needed the coin. I think about that all the time."
My mouth goes dry. "I'm sorry, Gwenna-"
"I'm not. His words made me angry." She sets her shoulders back. "It made me realize I wanted more than just a job. I want to learn. I want to be something. Someone. And I'm going to make my own path if it mucking kills me."
Copyright © 2024 by Ruby Dixon. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
