Skyglass: Chapter 13

PHOENIX

Devin collapsed, as he keened onto the stage. I wasn’t worried–I could tell it was part of his show. When Devin was really actually unhappy, the air got thick as petrol; his misery became a cosmic burden. Right now, the only thing in the air was bubbly electricity.

The giant’s throat grew blue and transparent as she swallowed the bird, its form tumbling and blurred as it passed down her esophagus, lighting up each new cavity ’til it landed–wings aflutter in panic–in her stomach, now clear and round as a glass bulb.

As Skyglass pitched into their last song, and the oceanic juices of the woman’s stomach slopped over the bird, I headed down the backstage steps and into the crowd. Father number two would be here. Even though Zinn’s auto-hacks had been silent all the hours and hours since we’d arrived at Midmoon, I knew the man I would end tonight was somewhere in the press heaving before me. I was the flame, he was the moth. I will burn you up, I thought, and struck into the crowd.

Above me, the belly-trapped bones of the bird were crystallizing–red-hot quartz fractals in the woman’s digestive enzymes–until that belly was an egg of frozen amber fire. In the thick yolk center, an ember flicker flickered, then burst as Skyglass tore into the peak of their finale: Devin belting out a piercing note, Moss hitting and choking his cymbals, Sable and Zinn speed picking as fast as they could while sparks caught between pick and string. The woman’s body shredded into graceful, frenzied ribbons as the bird beat its way out for its first gasp of rousing air.

Now, I thought, knowing this was the moment father number two would come for me. I spun around, and–sure enough–he was there. Right behind me.

He was as pale and unpolished as ever, wearing a simple white shirt tucked into white pants, both stained at their hems to look freshly blood-soaked. A hooded lantern swung from one hand, but that was his only adornment; he’d donned no protective suit this time. Stupid, I thought, tightening my hands into claws and filling the cage of my fingers with fire.

“Hello, my lovely,” he said. His voice echoed in my head, via my com. “Ready to come home with me?”

“You ready to die?” I snarled back, also through my com. “Because you look like you are, sweetling.”

He looked down at himself, as if realizing for the first time that he’d forgotten his fire armor. Then he grinned.

“Oh, don’t worry about that, sunling. I know you wouldn’t dare use your fire here. You’ve got no control; I saw what you did to those brothels and my poor satellite. If you tried killing me now, your power would raze this ExTOP to the figurative ground. You’ve got friends now–you wouldn’t want them dead, would you?”

I seethed. He was wrong. “I came here to kill you. I won’t let them or anything else stop me. If they die when you die, so be it.” A squicky feeling burbled in my gut, but I stomped it down. I’d spoken true. I had. I had.

“I figured you might say that,” he said. “Glad to hear you haven’t lost your rage, though it does makes things a bit trickier for me. But don’t worry.” He reached down to unhood the lantern. “I came prepared.”

The palest, pinkest, and hottest of fires danced in the glass trap of his lantern. I hissed at him, having no curses to do his vileness justice. He’d captured the youngest, most fragile of flames–just a baby.

“Yes,” he said to me. “Newborn fire. Just got her from a contact of mine. You know what you can do with her? You can eat her. And you know what that will do? Sever you. Such a tender thing works like a scalpel. She’ll free you from the flesh you hate so much, Phoenix. Think! A new life, your old life.”

I snarled without words; it was all I could manage. He laughed at my fury, dry as rustling paper. “Ah, yes,” he said. “I suppose I did lie to you–there’s always an escape. But before you were human, you were only free, so how could you ever know something like that?”

I spat boiling saliva at his eye, which sizzled down the flesh of his cheek–but all he did was groan and open his mouth to catch the ooze on his soon-to-be-blistered tongue. What the rot had he done–killed his sensory receptors?

“It’s your old life back, or I eat her, and become flame myself. Your choice.” He wagged his bubbling tongue at me.

“My choice?” I scoffed. “Why’d you even come? Why not just eat her and be done with it?”

He opened his mouth to answer, but the press around us surged as Skyglass crushed into their last brief riff; their final note actually threw us into the side of the venue. I grabbed for his throat, caught it, and held him hard against the wall.

“Careful,” he gurgled. “She’s breakable. Too much air will put her out.” I looked down and saw his hand gripped around the lantern’s glass, ready to crush it against the wall.

I backed off, snarling. Father number two straightened, smiling crookedly.

“Anyway,” he said. “To answer your question–how couldn’t I come? You’re the prettiest thing I’ve ever made. I’ll always want to see you, no matter the danger. And–I admit–I do like showing off. And the opportunity to watch fire eat fire? Too good to pass up. The hottest of heats.”

Around us, everything had gone silent. A shower of red and gold feathers from the once-dying bird swept between us. I felt the crowd’s attention turn toward us, ever hungry for a shiny new narrative… But for once, I ignored the audience, narrowing my eyes.

What to do? Father number two had cornered me, worse even than when he’d stuffed me in this girl-body. I wanted so badly to scorch him–to engulf him in fire retched from my mouth–and cushion my baby sister in a blanket of heat. But I was pinned. Impaled on the spot.

“PHOENIX!” Moss was screaming at me from somewhere, probably whittling down his vocal cords in his anxious fury.

I ignored him. My father had to die. He had to–but I couldn’t move, I couldn’t do it. Boiling spittle foamed on my lips. Rage stabbed through my sinuses, into my brain.

I’d come so far for murder–and now, with my victim cackling before me, I couldn’t make the killstrike.

Proceed to Chapter 13, page 3–>