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Fire, first. The first test they give her to see if she can flow with the magick. The King’s Magick, they say, like the words mean anything to have a half-starved kid in the Outlands.
Easy, easy, they say. But nothing is easy. Nothing is ever easy, she doesn’t know easy, not like she knows strife. The struggle is inside her, thrumming, and when tell her release—she does, and:
Ignites.
Flames explode from her and it doesn’t hurt. She’s burnt herself before, curled too close to a fire that was her only warmth. But there’s no burn—just a tingling through her body, but the smoke—smoke everywhere—and she remembers—
Her town. The flames eating up the homes, screaming, the smoke choking her as she fled —
The fire flickers and dies, but how? She started the fire, but did she stop it? No. The Glaive steps forward—the important one with the crest—and puts a hand on her head. “There you are. Good girl,” and the praise gnaws on all her raw nerves. “So then, shall you join us? Fight for hearth and home?”
Home? Hearth? She’ll fight for tomorrow’s bread, as she always has. She nods.
Training, and not much else. Sharpening her and all the others into the perfect Glaives, but most are thankful. Those who aren’t disappear. She sticks with Libertus and Nyx, and causes just enough trouble to stir interest.
Something intriguing is worth keeping.
Crowe’s not stupid enough to think she has anywhere else to go. She doesn’t think there are any prospects for ex-Glaives in this Safe City.
Fire and fighting come easy, but that’s all that seems to. Until one day—they’re training, and her body aches. So sore from hours of practice the day before that left her spotted with bruises, and she knows—the next hit is going to connect, and it’s going to hurt, and she’s fucking tired of being hurt. More than anything, she wants to stop hurting.
And Drautos gets blown back by a fierce wind. The air swirls around her, like a shield, and nothing can penetrate. He tries. With training sword and fists, and the wind howls and catches her hair in its fury. It forms a tornado, swirling out around her, and no one can touch her—
Nothing can hurt her and she laughs and laughs and laughs—
There’s nothing to fear.
They’re cleaning up after Niffs in a town near Ravatogh. The Niffs left a smoldering ruin, burned all the houses and markets and crops. Like her own town—but that’s the way of the Outlands.
While the Capital gets fatter.
Bile in her throat as she lays out another body: too late to save them all. New town, same story.
A cry goes up on the other side of town followed by a splintering, terrible crash. A building? “Nyx! Libertus!” Pelna yells.
Her boots slap the scorched earth, her stomach twisted like starving. Not like this. An old stone building crumbled, where they’d been locating bodies. Buried. Alive. Her breath catches.
“We’re okay! For now, but we’ve got to hurry!” Nyx’s voice.
Relief slams her, and before she knows what she’s doing—
Crowe holds up her hands and lifts.
Her magick catches stone and heaves it to the sky. Earth bends to her, moves for her, and Nyx and Libertus are freed. Covered in dust from the rubble, staring at her—“Move,” she barks, and they bend to her easily as the earth did.
She casts it back to the ground, and her boys sweep her up into their arms.
They tell Crowe the school burned first, and she thought her hate spent, but it burns ever hotter. “Later,” Nyx reminds her, grim yet gentle.
“Gotta put this fire out!” Libertus calls as the copter drops more water.
People in buildings cry out, a wordless scream of agony over this doomed town. This fire isn’t going out anytime soon.
The river is fat with snowmelt.
Crowe runs for the river, thinking of the Tide Mother, who cultivated life in and out of the seas. The Tide Mother, who fought so ferociously in the War.
She draws a wave from the river, and sends it skyward, so that it rains down on the town, stronger than the copter could ever provide. Steam rises, hissing and spitting, and the next wave she throws on the town directly.
The other Glaives redouble their efforts with the hoses, and the fire—
Goes out.
People escape and cry, clutching one another.
And this, this is why they fight… Not for bread, but hearth—and home. Even if it’s not theirs, but others? She wavers on her feet, and her Glaives, her brothers and sisters, they catch her.
Libertus, in her ear, “Nice going, little sister.”