The Final Strife

“Wasn’t quite the big finish I was going for.” She gave Anoor a lopsided grin as she sat up.

The tidewind had begun to rage outside; it shook the foundations of the tower, rattling the sand in the rafters. It fell down around them in glitters of blue rain. An errant piece of debris hit the metal window shutters and made them jump.

“It’s a bad one tonight,” Sylah said.

Anoor was quiet for some time. Sylah watched her and listened to the wind howl.

“Who do you think of when you fight? Whose anger do you use?” Anoor asked.

Sylah thought about it. For years they had been trained to use the anger of a community, the anger of the Dusters. That still smoldered deep within, but it wasn’t the main driver. She thought about Papa, about the reckoning he’d wrought on her childhood. She thought about Anoor, the girl who stole her life. But there was one anger that eclipsed them all, and it was driven by guilt and shame.

“Mine.”

—

The tidewind was half a strike early. Marigold hadn’t arrived yet; they were still above ground leading the last family to freedom.

Hassa wanted to pace, but the Ghostings around her were already nervous. Their journey was going to be a long one.

The tidewind’s begun, are we leaving now?a young woman asked. She was leaning on the tunnel wall, her face cast in shadow, but her signing clear.

We’re waiting for a few more.Hassa moved through the Ghostings and counted again, but she knew the number she’d come to. Sixty-seven. Nowhere near the hundred they had expected.

They were below an entry point to the tunnels, a few handspans north of the apothecary where Hassa bought her hormone herbs that aided her transition. Marigold should have been here by now.

I’m going up to check, Hassa signed to the nearest Ghosting, who nodded vaguely, tears of fear already streaking their face.

Hassa climbed the ladder lithely; her agility had made her invaluable to the elders. That and the fact that her birth wasn’t documented anywhere in the empire. Hassa was invisible.

Once Marigold had cut Hassa from her mother’s womb and tested her blood ran clear, they took her to the elders. It was there, in the Nest, where they severed Hassa’s hands and tongue. The officers would have eventually found her and tested her blood in a blood scour. Then her birth would have been reported to the Auditors, sealing the same fate in a Ghosting abattoir. By doing the deed themselves, the elders created a child off the books. A spy who could go anywhere, be anything. But still a Ghosting.

It was ruthless but necessary, and she was glad of it. She’d spent her life learning from and listening to others. Her servant uniform was the perfect veneer despite her never having worked in any one place. Hassa made it her business to be everywhere and nowhere.

Hassa pushed open the trap door above the ladder. The tidewind sounded angrier than she’d ever heard it. It shook the ruins of the house she had emerged in and whipped around debris so violently she had to shield her face.

There was no way she was going to be able to make it outside. Not without killing herself. She tried to look around the villa, but sand kept flying into her eyes. She screamed in the back of her throat, a calling sound to anyone who was out beyond the walls of the villa. The tidewind swallowed Hassa’s pathetic cry and howled back in response. Hassa tried again, moving toward the crumbling wall that was protecting her from the full force of the tidewind.

She heard a cry in response, though she couldn’t sense the direction. She brought her wrists to her eyes and moved toward a gap in the wall. Blue talons made of desert sand clawed through the gap. Hassa laid her back against the wall and watched the wind swirl in like it was searching for prey to drag back out into the night.

The wind heaved and paused for a heartbeat. In that moment Hassa rushed to the crumbling hole and looked through, screaming all the while. She saw a group of people huddled together on the other side of the street. They were taking advantage of the brief respite and moving quickly through the open. Their steps were a strange, jerky march, and Hassa realized they held their clothing above their heads, an umbrella of eru leather and cotton giving them extra protection. It wouldn’t be enough. Hassa knew that when she saw the look on Marigold’s face as they locked eyes.

Go, run, run to that hole in the wall. Go.Marigold dropped their protection and signed frantically to the other Ghostings. They had seconds, mere breaths before the tidewind—

Suddenly the villa was filled with Ghostings, and Hassa had to move out of the way to let them through. Each one of them was running for their life. She shepherded them down the ladder and went to help Marigold, who was at the back of the pack.

A pregnant Ghosting was struggling to make it. Marigold was pushing them along. They had ten handspans or fewer to go. Then Hassa felt it and Marigold did too. The tidewind inhaled. With a final push, Marigold propelled the pregnant Ghosting forward, pushing them into the gap in the villa and Hassa’s waiting arms before the tidewind flooded the night.

The tidewind slammed across the left side of Marigold’s body, the grains of sand imprinted into their skin for a moment, entombing them in blue glass. Hassa looked away, refusing to see the flesh ripped from their bones, preferring the perfectly blue statue in her mind.

When she looked back, Marigold was gone.