Elf Saga: Bloodlines (Part 1: Curse of the Jaguar) Read online

  “Ready!” Rajani twirls out of the door and curtsies, displaying a long skirt covered in dye-prints of faeries and flowers. She’s wearing a loose cotton blouse, but over it is a snug leather bolero with a frilly collar. “How do I look?”

  “Are you kidding me? I thought you were packing another bag.” There are already four big bags crammed under the boat’s seats, and I know for a fact that only one of them has any food or tools in it.

  “No, just getting my traveling clothes on.” She shuts and locks the door behind her, and then slowly crosses the lawn toward the ship as she arranges a dark golden scarf over her hair, tying her green locks down securely.

  “You look fabulous,” I grumble. “Can we go now please?”

  “Absolutely.” She climbs up into the boat and takes her place at the controls.

  “Nice knife.” I point at the strange blade tucked into the leather sheath at her side.

  “Oh, yeah.” She lifts it up to show me. It’s a narrow, triangular blade carved out of pale gray dragon bone, with a narrow gap dividing the weapon into two half-blades, each wrapped in thin copper wires. A small amber rod sits in the grip. “Little Mom made it for me. For emergencies.”

  “Looks fancy.”

  “She wanted me to be safe, you know, without having to kill people.”

  I frown. “Last I checked, knives can kill people.”

  “This one is different.” She grips the handle and I hear the soft click of a switch. The amber rod glows and the wire-wrapped blades spark and crackle with tiny electric arcs.

  I nod approvingly. “Nice.”

  She puts it away and wipes her hands on her skirt as she turns back to the console.

  “So you’re sure you can fly this thing?” I ask. “No more crashes?”

  “Please!” Rajani smiles and shakes her head. “That was years ago. I’m much better at this now.”

  “Okay. Good.”

  The boat lurches up into the air, and all of her bags shift and thump under the seats.

  “Oops. Sorry!” she sings out. And before I can suggest that she take it slow, she shoves one of the little crystal levers and we rocket away from the windmill, zooming over the gentle green hills of Aram and sending hundreds of terrified goats fleeing from their minders below us.

  “There we go.” Rajani flashes a bright smile back at me. “See? No worries!”

  “Oh, I have worries,” I mutter, gripping my seat as the wind lashes my hair in my eyes and mouth.

  “So, where are we going?” she asks as we curve back around toward the windmill.

  “Well, a talking fox told me that one crystal ship can find another,” I say loudly over the wind. “Do you know how to do that?”

  “No idea, honey, but I’m sure we can figure it out.” She fiddles with the levers and knobs for a moment, and then smacks the little crystal globe beside her. “There we go. See?”

  “See what?” I peer at the globe and see the thin outlines of continents and islands, and a handful of bright glowing dots. Most of the dots seem to be very close to where we are.

  “These lights.” She taps the globe. “Navigation points. Places that I marked back when I first started flying. Mostly just the villages near here, and a waterfall I liked, and a meadow where I saw some unicorns once. I didn’t get to record many places before the whole crashing business. But these dots out here?” She points to the ones on the far side of the world. “Those must be the other crystal ships. One of them must be your mom.”

  “But which one?” I frown at the map.

  “No way to tell.” She shrugs and points to the closest of the distant dots. “Maybe this one? This is in Oyera where Queen Amina lives. She was friends with our moms, back in their wilder days. Maybe your mom is there visiting her. Oh oh! Maybe your mom is asking Queen Amina to help her! She’s getting the old band back together!”

  “I don’t know, maybe.” It doesn’t sound like her, but what do I know? I blow out a long sigh. “Sure. Let’s start there. It’s the closest one, at any rate.”

  “Excellent.” Rajani swings her little levers. “And away we go!”

  Oh, we go all right.

  We go very, very fast. The world turns into a horrible blur of green and gray, which just turns to blue and white when we reach the ocean. And the ship shivers and shudders, just a little bit, from time to time. I think it’s making me sick. I close my eyes. She talks. I nod. I have no idea what she’s talking about. I just want this shuddering to stop. My head is swimming.

  It takes most of the day to cross the Valmora Sea and reach the coast of Oyera, hour after hour of sitting in the buffeting wind with the sun blazing down and a cold spray of sea water just barely landing on my skin, just enough to make me wish I had a winter coat on. So between that and the shuddering, I decide it’s time to take a long nap.

  When I wake up, the sea has been replaced by sand and I barely have time to decide that I don’t like this desert any more than the one in the Union when the sand ends and the grassy plains begin, and then, just as we approach the dense greenery of some sort of forest that actually looks quite beautiful and strange, I see the white walls of a city. It’s a wide, sprawling city punctuated by narrow obelisks and enormous statues of men and women that seem to stride between the vast tiled domes of the larger buildings.

  “Welcome to Kanero,” Rajani says. “The food here is delicious. And so are the men!” She bites her lip. “You know, if you’re... into that sort of thing?”

  I sigh. “Yes, I like men too.”

  “Oh cool! I mean, it’s cool either way, I was just curious, because, you know, I’m curious, but not in that way, at least not anymore, and…” she keeps talking.

  We slow down as we get closer, and then we gently coast over the wall and float down toward a flat green lawn at the eastern end of the city.

  “Is it okay to leave the ship here?” I ask.

  “You’re supposed to.” She points to the flag poles and tents at the edge of the lawn. “This is the landing field for flying ships. See?” She points behind me and I turn to see another, larger crystal ship hovering beside us. It has an enclosed deck and enormous sails that seem to fold up against the ship’s hull, ready to be deployed when it takes flight.

  It’s stunning. Long sweeping arcs, tiny etched details that look like dragons and flames, and through the cloudy crystalline walls of the cabin, there are large shadows, making me wonder what’s in there. Part of my mind instantly begins cataloging the tiny swirls and arcs, imagining how I might create similar shapes in the wooden hull of a canoe. But the rest of my mind can only see evidence of Mother.

  “She’s here!” I stand up and reach for my hatchet as I look around for signs of chaos, brutality, and generally pointless violence.

  “Well, no, sorry,” Rajani says as she pulls the crystal levers out of the console and tucks them into her shoulder bag. “That’s my moms’ ship, the new one. That’s the Virago.”

  “Virago.” I nod. So Mother isn’t here.

  “Yeah. Oh hey, I forgot to tell you, my baby here is the Valkyrie.” She pats the console proudly.

  “Huh. Funny name for a ship.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, don’t valkyries carry the dead to the afterlife?” I ask.

  Her smile fades. “Really? I just thought it sounded cool and sexy.”

  “Oh, it does.” I shake my head and look back over at the beautiful Virago. Damn it. Lozen isn’t here. That whole flight was for nothing. “So I suppose we’ll have to head for the next light on the map and try again. More flying. Yay.”

  “Oh stop, it wasn’t that bad. At least we know that this is where my moms are taking their honeymoon. Or part of it, anyway,” Rajani says. “I bet they’re having a great time.”

  “I bet.” I massage my eyes. They’re both throbbing, even the blind one. And as I look out across the city, I realize that everything looks strangely flat. Nearby flags, distant towers… oh right. No more depth perception. Great. Becaus
e that won’t cause me any problems.

  “Hey, hey, it’s okay!” She rubs my arm. “Listen, I know you’re bummed that your mom isn’t here, but we can go talk to my moms, and maybe go see the queen. They know your mom too, right? Maybe they can help.”

  I doubt it, but at least there won’t be any flying for a little while. “Sure. It can’t hurt to ask.”

  Ten minutes later, I’m lying on a hard stone courtyard with six armed men pinning me to the ground, and I can barely grunt out the words, “Maybe it actually can hurt to ask.”

  “Please, stop! Don’t hurt her!” Rajani is shouting.

  The soldiers aren’t listening. They’re all, “Tie her hands! Watch out for her claws! Not the rope, get the chain! Call the captain, hurry!”

  It takes me a moment to recover from the initial tackle. I may be strong, but I’m no warrior goddess, and when I walked up the steps toward the palace gates, I was more interested in admiring the statues and listening to the music in the square behind me than worrying about the very tall men with the very long spears. And the fact that I now have a literal blind side didn’t help much either.

  Two more men dive on top of me. There are hands all over my arms and legs, whole bodies trying to hold me down, hold me still. But as soon as I blink the stars out of my eyes and take a deep breath, I’m ready to deal with these jokers. I yank my arms down under me and shove myself up to all fours, which knocks about half of the men off my back. They’re all yelling, and Rajani’s yelling, and I think her faeries are flipping out, whirring through the air and making a half-assed attempt at growing vines on the soldiers.

  It’s all giving me a headache.

  I shove the man off my right arm, and then the one off my left. They both go tumbling back on their asses. Then I start to stand up, but the men who fell off my back are rushing back at me already, so I slam my palms into their chests as fast as I can. Mostly I manage to hit them, but sometimes I have to try twice. Stupid lack of depth perception! Two men fly back and hit a stone wall and three more crash into the other guards. Weapons and chains rattle and clatter all around me.

  The men who are still gripping my ankles and belt each get a hard kick in the chest and they go flying, and then I finally get to stand up and brush the dust off my clothes. “Damn it. Sorry, Raj. I got your shirt all dirty.”

  “Freeze!”

  I look up.

  Another half dozen elves run into the courtyard, and these guards all have flintlock pistols with glowing rounds shining in their barrels. Acid bullets made by the alchemists of Aztera, just like the ones I saw with the soldiers back in that Chirika village.

  Mother once told me they burn like hell. And she’s a lot tougher than I am.

  They level their guns at me from a short distance. I could probably jump on them and strip away the guns pretty quickly, but not without taking a few shots at point blank range, and that sounds very unpleasant, so I raise my hands. Not very high, mind you. It’s not like they’re actually scaring me. I’m just tired of this crap. “Okay, okay. I’m freezing.”

  “Captain!” one of the men calls out.

  A moment later, a very tall, very muscular woman with extremely long ears and the darkest skin I have ever seen strides into the courtyard with ten more elves in the white and gold uniforms of the Oyeran army. The captain has an ornate pistol on her right hip, a jeweled knife angled in the front of her belt, and a general aura of command, anger, and disdain. She glares at me, glares at the men with the guns, and glares at the men who are still picking themselves up from wherever I threw them.

  “Sergeant?” the captain peers at one of the gunmen.

  “Ma’am, they just walked straight up to the gates a moment ago,” he reports.

  “Did they.” The captain frowns at me, and then at Rajani. “And how did they attack you?”

  “They…” The sergeant hesitates. “Well, just look at her hands, ma’am. Jaguar spots.”

  “Yes, sergeant, I can see her hands. Please lower your weapons.” The captain glares at them as every gun is pointed at the ground, and then she turns back to us. “I am Captain Olayinka Oda. Who are you?”

  “Rajani dal Rezhiri, ma’am, Feyeri priestess, at your service, very happy to meet you, you look very nice today, ma’am,” the green-haired girl says breathlessly, her eyes fixed on the tall woman.

  “Rezhiri?” The captain nods. “I see. You’re Nadira’s daughter?”

  “Yes, ma’am. And Niya Shakarna’s. Ma’am.”

  The captain looks at me again. “And you?”

  “Genesee Marev. And yeah, I’m Lozen Xocolatl’s daughter.” My arms are feeling a little sore, so I put my hands down.

  “You have my sincerest apologies,” Captain Oda says. “I believe my guards mistook you for your mother. They will be disciplined.”

  “Well, I guess it’s totally understandable that you would mistake me for someone twice my age with twice as many eyes.” I crack my knuckles. “And it’s just so heart-warming to see that fancy people in giant cities can be just as stupid and violent as simple folk in little villages. We really are all the same on the inside, aren’t we?”

  “Again, you have my apologies. Lozen paid us a brief visit several weeks ago, and left under rather unfriendly terms.”

  “How unfriendly?”

  “Banishment.” The captain points to a wall above and behind me. “We’re still completing the repairs from her visit.”

  I look up and see a large hole in the wall, the stoneworks all spider-webbed with cracks, and a protective scaffolding surrounding the damage.

  “Yeah, that’s Mother,” I say. “She can be a real stinker.”

  “She crippled two of my men,” Captain Oda says grimly. Then she looks over at Rajani. “Fortunately, they both recovered with the assistance of your mother.”

  “Yay for Big Mom,” Rajani cheers weakly. “We saw their ship in the city. Are they here? Can we see them now please?”

  “Your mothers are outside the city, visiting with the desert sages,” the captain says. “We don’t expect them back for at least another week.”

  “Oh, poo.” Rajani shrugs. “Well, maybe you can help us. We’re trying to find Gen’s mom.”

  “Are you now?” Oda turns a cool gaze on me.

  “Don’t worry, I don’t like her either,” I say with a shrug. “I’m just trying to get some answers.” I look over at the bruised men still giving me dirty looks. “I have my own personal brand of mommy issues.”

  “You have my sympathies, but I’m afraid there isn’t much else I can offer you.” The captain turns and gestures for us to follow her inside the palace. As we proceed down a broad corridor past small offices and dorms, she says, “Lozen was here less than an hour. She demanded to see Her Majesty, then grew tired of waiting and forced her way into the throne room in the middle of a closed council meeting with two visiting royals.”

  We turn and enter an office, and the captain squeezes around the desk to sit in an old wooden chair.

  “Yeah, that sounds like Mother.” I glance around the small, dark, cold room. How can anyone sit in a room like this, day after day? I’d go insane before lunch.

  A voice echoes from the hall behind us. “Where is she? Where? Where did she go?”

  Uneven footsteps slap on the stone tiles, punctuated by the hard clacking of something made of wood or metal beating on the floor.

  Captain Oda leaps to her feet just as a tall, slender woman sweeps into the doorway. She’s young, dressed in at least two wool robes of brightly patterned yellow and blue, displaying jeweled rings on eight fingers, wearing her thick black hair in tightly braided locks that all end in golden beads that clink together around her shoulders, and clutching a black cane with a golden lion’s head handle.

  “Your Highness.” The captain bows her head.

  Rajani curtsies. I don’t. Because screw that.

  “Lozen? Where is…?” The newcomer frowns at me. “Why, you’re not Lozen at all, are you?”
>
  I shrug. “Well, I guess I’m half Lozen, technically. Sorry to disappoint you. But I’m looking for her too, and if I find her, I’ll be sure to let her know you’re looking for her.”

  “Your Highness, please forgive Miss Marev. She is apparently unfamiliar with palace etiquette and protocol,” Oda says, giving me a stern look.

  “Oh, I’m familiar with them,” I tell her. “I just don’t give a damn. But I’m sure you all have things to do, so we’ll get out of your hair. Excuse me.” I slip by the tall bit of royalty into the hall and start walking back the way we came.

  “Wait! Stop right there!” The young woman follows me, limping and clacking on her golden cane.

  I don’t slow down. “Something I can do for you? Princess, is it?”

  “Amara Zarinde, Princess of Oyera, ninth in line to the throne,” she wheezes weakly, but to be fair, she does wheeze in a very aggressive and angry way. Her voice seems to shift wildly between the calm, silken tones of a smug aristocrat and the feeble gasps of a drowning cat.

  “Genesee Marev, third love child of a short-order cook and a spotted maniac.” I hold out my hand to her as we walk along.

  She stares at my hand like she’s never seen one before, so I reach over and grab her free hand and give it a good hard shake. She winces.

  Her cane slips and she staggers. Luckily Rajani is right behind her and she steadies her. I keep walking.

  “Miss Marev, I insist that you stop and speak with me!” she demands as loudly as she can, which is not quite as commanding as I’m sure she would like to sound.

  I stop and glare at her. “Look, Princess, I’m not my mother. I’m sorry for whatever she did to you, but it’s not my fault and I’m not going to answer for whatever violent tantrum she tantrumed around here, okay?”

  “What the devil are you ranting about?” She glares at me, leaning on her cane with a shaking hand. “I know perfectly well that you’re not your mother, and I have no grievance with either you or her. But you did say that you were looking for her, and I know where she’s going. She revealed her destination just before she left.”