We Who Are Forged in Fire, page 1
Also by Kate Murray
We Who Hunt the Hollow
Hi Dad – this one’s for you.
CONTENTS
Cover Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Copyright Page
CHAPTER ONE
The bone fiend shifts to the left with a rattle and a sigh, its sharpened toes digging into snow-covered soil. With a shuffling clatter of disarticulating joints, the monster moves like a tumble of bones thrown through the air and played in reverse. To my other sense it tastes of tombstones, dried meat, and a sharp predatory intelligence. They’re not sentient monsters but they are vicious – grade four savage, malignant beast, high risk, according to the bestiary – with their bodies covered in bony thorns and their mouths full of sharpened teeth.
In comparison, I am unarmed.
I watch as it hunkers down and returns to stillness, the reverse-film paused. There are no eyes on that yellow-white skull, yet it seems to watch me back. Snow gently drifts down, gathering on its ridged surfaces and landing on my eyelashes.
I have to pull that bone fiend apart before it can do the same to me.
To do so, I have to drop control of my superpower – my other sense – which I hold tightly in the back of my mind. I have to send the full furious storm of it out, direct it at the monster – and unravel the Hollow energy powering it.
The snow falls and neither the monster nor I move.
Behind me, Arnold isn’t saying anything, but I can feel the exasperation coming off my mentor like steam from a kettle.
Click, clack, like knucklebones dropping. Then the bone fiend launches towards me, all spines and teeth.
I step back, putting out my hands, as if that could possibly stop it. I try to let go of my power, but I can’t.
Can’t trust my own power under my own control.
My other sense stutters and starts, and the bone fiend tears up the ground towards me.
I squeeze my eyes shut and brace for the slash of its talons.
Arnold steps past me with a whisper of caramel and cinders, unleashing his power. I can taste it even if I can’t see it. Taste the echo of my own power. I feel the way he tears apart the Hollow energy powering the bone fiend, extinguishing its life force. Bones fall to the ice with a clatter. Something skids and comes to rest against the toes of my boots.
I look down. A single claw, still curled in attack mode, its wicked point gleaming.
I look up. Arnold’s watching me with narrow, grave eyes, practically radiating vexation. He dusts a snowflake off his cardigan – the grey one, his favourite one, worn Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays – and says, ‘These aren’t training scenarios. They will actually kill you.’
I’m perfectly aware this is real life, thanks. That’s what I want to say. Instead, I swallow and nod. The same frustration he must feel boils inside me too. I should be better than this. How can I still keep getting this so wrong? Why can’t I just do what he wants me to do: control my power?
‘You can do this,’ he says, as if reading my mind. ‘The problem is that you won’t. You’re suppressing your power. You have to learn how to wield the lightning or one day it will burn you from the inside out. Believe in it, Priscilla. Believe in yourself. You must let it go.’
Let go of the power that churns within me, that can kill familiars and steal other warriors’ powers and summon monsters in the blink of an eye. Let go of the power that is the rarest of all among Hollow Warriors. The power that only he and I have.
Easy to say. Hard to do.
I kick the claw away, my power simmering, unused, in the back of my mind. A building hurricane that keeps advancing from category to category, surging beyond my grasp every time I think I have a handle on it. He’s right. I can feel it within me, and it’s starting to scorch the inside of my skin.
Fox comes around from where she’d been sheltering behind us, cautiously lowering her little black nose to the remains.
Ugh. Bone fiends are so gross, my familiar says in my mind, lashing her white-tipped tail.
Arnold sighs, and smooths his salted moustache. ‘Let’s wrap up.’ He zips his coat over his cardigan and I hear a faint cheep from Canary, his familiar, who is tucked away in one of the pockets.
I follow as Arnold starts trudging down the snowy hill. The remnants of dead vineyards stretch away around us, the tangled rows leading to long-abandoned villas, their caved-in roofs open to the pewter sky. He didn’t say a single word on the long walk here from our base this morning, and it looks like it will be a similarly silent journey back.
At least out here, there’s no-one in harm’s way as I fail to do what Arnold wants me to do in my definitely-not-pretend showdowns with actual monsters. Monsters summoned by him from the evil universe with his power to manipulate Hollow energy.
My familiar noses me. Hey, you’ll get there, she says encouragingly. Remember, it’s not even been four weeks.
Longest four weeks of my life. Leaving home to embark on my training feels like it happened an age ago, to a different Priscilla. Four weeks of constantly disappointing the short, quiet man in front of me. I don’t know what I thought my mentor would be like, but somehow Arnold still surprised me. He’s one of the most powerful Hollow Warriors in history – like I will be, one day – and yet he walks everywhere with his narrow eyes down, not acknowledging anyone he passes.
I’ve been trying to crack through Arnold’s stern exterior, but I’m starting to wonder if there’s anything softer to be found beneath.
I guess he could be a robot.
Don’t be ridiculous, Fox says, jogging ahead. A robot wouldn’t wear cardigans.
Grit crunches beneath my boots as the maybe-robot and I return to civilisation, a neighbourhood where people still live in the houses and the streets are cleared of snow for the occasional hovermobile to whirr past. Behind its iron fence, the Vienna base of the United Warrior Families guild comes into view: a huge stone mansion with tarnished copper turrets, golden light spilling from its windows onto the grey snow piled around its skirts. When the Hollow first invaded our world during the Fires, generations ago, it was already hundreds of years old.
As we get closer, a series of floaters lift into the air from behind the base, the thudding of their engines accompanied by the distant mournful wailing of an emergency siren. Both of our wristbands buzz with the alert for the call-in.
Arnold takes out his handset and taps at the screen. ‘Civilian notification from the other side of the city,’ he says as we pass through the wide gates into the grounds. ‘Only a cluster of minor ghouls.’
Only ghouls, but even the smallest call-ins get a four-vehicle response now, and it’s not because the monsters leaking through from the Hollow have got more dangerous lately. These days, the danger can come from our own world, too. From people who were once part of the guild.
The two armed guards outside the main entrance lift their weapons as we approach, their scrutiny palpable even after they recognise who we are. I tell myself they don’t trust anyone: that’s their job. Even so, I know I’m not imagining how they seem particularly disinclined towards me and Arnold. Everyone here seems so disinclined.
Arnold ignores the guards as he walks past them into the glass-covered porch. He’s good at ignoring. Practiced. I try to act like him as I follow him up the steps to the main doors. He strides away without a word once we’re inside.
‘Thanks for the training sesh, Arnold! See you at dinner!’ I yell after him, maybe a little louder than I need to. He only grunts as he starts up the grand staircase, leaving me in the huge parquet-floored foyer.
I start climbing the stairs myself, tracing the curve of the marble steps. Despite holding my power in check, I can still sense the Hollow Warriors in the building around me. Because that’s easy. Because, once, that was all I could do with my power: sense Hollow energy.
Then, last year, it evolved. Now I can manipulate it … when I’m not too scared to try.
Echoes of the Hollow Warriors around me flow through to my other sense, a kaleidoscope of unique tastes reflecting the collection of unique superpowers, each one with an animal familiar channelling Hollow energy into them. Although it comes from the Hollow universe, the energy itself isn’t evil. It’s neutral, like electricity – and it powers our abilities. I can tell who flew out on the call-in by whose powers are absent, including Cynthia Vyse’s, the base commander. As I pass the second floor, I can sen
I head all the way to the top level where the trainees’ living quarters occupy one of the wings, entering the corridor as another trainee comes the other way: Ruby, from the Divided Kingdom, with her rabbit familiar hopping behind her heels. Her face – blank expression, refusing to make eye contact – says you don’t exist, Priscilla Daalman. Her shoulder, as it smacks into mine, says except make sure you get the hell out of my way.
I rub my shoulder as Fox, teeth bared in anger, looks back at the disappearing Ruby. I can’t believe she just did that!
‘Forget it,’ I mutter. I haven’t figured out what’s worse yet: being stared at with suspicion, or being actively – physically – ignored.
She hasn’t given you a chance. None of them have, Fox grumbles.
‘Oh, she’s just …’ But I trail off, unable to make an excuse for Ruby. Four weeks ago, the rebel war hadn’t begun. Renegades weren’t attacking guild bases or warriors attending call-ins, not like they’re doing now. And we had no idea Renegade spies were hidden throughout the guild’s entire global network of bases. And yet four weeks ago, when I arrived in Vienna, the other trainees and warriors here still treated me suspiciously. They were standoffish and unfriendly, weirdly cliquey. Now it’s worse – now they treat me like they think I’m one of the Renegade spies. I don’t know why, since I’m doing everything I can to help the guild bring down the rebels. I hate the Renegades. Personally. There’s no way I’d ever be a spy.
I give myself a mental dust off and continue down the corridor. I have to ignore Ruby – ignore them all. Ultimately, what they think doesn’t matter. What really matters is becoming a fully fledged monster hunter. I’ve been working my whole life towards this. I’ve taken my two oaths – the oath of power and the oath of service – and now I have the final five years of training ahead of me. Then I’ll finally be able to step into the role I was born to have: Hollow Warrior in the United Warrior Families guild. It’s a role fulfilled by every Daalman before me and one that will be fulfilled by every Daalman after me. My family are all Hollow Warriors. Have been since the Fires, when superpowered humans first came to exist and started fighting back against the evil universe.
This is my legacy.
I can hear the other trainees gathered in the common room: there’s laughter, and the burble of music. Sounds that would disappear if I dared to step inside. I walk past, going straight to my bedroom, and close the door behind me, shutting away the rest of the base, my fellow warriors and how they treat me. Fox jumps up to her usual spot on my bed, where she can watch the world outside the window. I sit at my desk, tucked into the corner of my little room. When I first arrived, this room was a blank slate, kind of like me stepping into my adult life. Now I have some pictures up of my family, my old familiar, Mouse, and my girlfriend, Onyeka. Above the bed, on a green ribbon, I’ve hung the mermaid scale my sister Cheryl gave me – a symbol of my family’s love and a reminder to trust in myself. I’m slowly making the room my own, even if I’m not quite making myself into the Hollow Warrior I want to be yet.
I hit the on button for the console on my desk, the blue glare of the screen lighting up the room. There’s a message from my grandmother, with a new packet of work. Just the thought of opening it bores me to tears, so I ignore it. I’m supposed to be working with Geema over there, in Prague, at the UWF guild headquarters. Actual work with her and her team of operatives in Internal Affairs, tracking down and arresting Renegades, not this mind-numbing data analysis I’ve ended up doing. It isn’t the work she originally arranged for me – but then the Renegades kicked off their war, and the guild wouldn’t give me security clearance to go to headquarters. They said it’s because I’m not a ranked Hollow Warrior yet and there’s new security protocols in place. Part of me can’t help wondering if it’s protocol … or if it’s because they don’t trust me.
If Geema minds – like I do – then she doesn’t show it. I guess she’s busy, as the senior warrior in charge of hunting Renegades. I guess she can go wherever she wants. And nobody looks at her sideways.
Review this data for unusual patterns, she’s written, not even signing it off. It’ll be a list of Hollow Warrior payments, or communications, or shipping registries. The dullest kind of homework invented in the history of homework.
A familiar feeling of insecurity bubbles inside me, a noxious swamp I haven’t quite eliminated. Unable to control my own power. Ostracised by my fellow trainees. Relegated to unimportant jobs. None of it feels like the story of the makings of a great Hollow Warrior.
I bet Geema never dealt with any of this.
I find myself staring at the console, but not seeing anything on it.
Maybe Onyeka senses my misery over in Munich, because my handset starts ringing, the icon with her smiling face popping up on the screen.
I’m relieved to escape my sour thoughts. ‘Hey, you.’
‘Hi,’ she says. ‘You got a sec?’
‘I have more than one.’ I look at her face on-screen, and wish we were in the same place. I can almost smell her coconut, rose and musk perfume.
She blows me a kiss. ‘Miss your face.’
‘Miss yours more. What are you doing?’
‘I’m still running those cell culture assays to see if any of the therapeutic candidates exhibit lysis against tumorous cells.’
‘Ohhh,’ I say. ‘That.’
Onyeka laughs, but trails off. ‘You all right?’ she asks, with a flicker of a frown. She’s always so perceptive.
‘It’s nothing in particular,’ I sigh, ‘it’s just … this isn’t how I thought it would be.’
‘Today?’
‘Every day.’
‘Why don’t you tell me about it?’ she says.
She’s a great listener – always has been – but Onyeka will never truly understand what it’s like to grow up in a family of famous Hollow Warriors, to know someday you’ll become one yourself, but then have the reality of that becoming be so much more challenging than you expected. As much as she welcomes me doing so, I don’t like to talk her ears off about things that are so outside her experience as a norm.
‘I mean … it’s nothing new on top of what I’ve already told you. Same stuff. Different day.’
I thought I’d overcome the obstacles in the way of me becoming a Hollow Warrior: I started learning how to accept myself. I realised I did fit in with the rest of my family. I survived the challenges of my power evolving, of losing my first familiar, Mouse, and of accidentally dating a Renegade in disguise. I got back together with Onyeka and we even live on the same continent now.
This was supposed to be the straightforward part. Instead, somehow, me becoming a Hollow Warrior feels more precarious than ever.
‘I might not be a superhero like you,’ she says, ‘but you can still share your burdens with me. Doesn’t matter if you think I’ll get it or not. That’s the magic of you and me. Together, we make it work.’
I smile at her. ‘It’s fine, though. Like, I don’t expect you to share all your science stuff with me.’
‘Science stuff?’ she repeats, mock-enraged. ‘It’s like you don’t know what a cell culture assay even is.’
‘Maybe after you show me round the lab, it’ll start making sense to me.’
‘Two weeks to go.’ She sighs. ‘I can’t wait to have you here.’
Being long distance was hard even before I came to Vienna. Now we’re only a three-hour hypertrain ride apart and yet I’ve only seen Onyeka once in the last four weeks, when she came to visit me one weekend.
‘Two weeks will crawl by,’ I say as a cascade of chimes rings out over the base comms: the bell for dinner, served in the grand dining room downstairs. ‘I better go, before all the bread rolls disappear,’ I add. I’m kind of salty they don’t let me help out in the kitchen here. If I was allowed to cook – which I love to do – we’d never run out of bread rolls and I’d have an outlet for my stress.
‘Call me after?’
‘’Kay. Love you.’
‘Love you.’
After dinner, I return to my room and call Onyeka. We talk until it’s late, watching the night sky. The same sky, now, without the great bow of the world between us. We talk until her yawns get too loud for me to ignore, and I tell her we both need to get some sleep. She has work, and I have training.
