Read the book: «The Diminished»

CHAPTER ONE

VI

The first queen built the Alskad Empire from scorched earth and ash after the goddess Dzallie split the moon and rained fire from the sky. The god Hamil called the sea to wash away most of what was left of humanity, but the people who managed to survive gathered in the wild, unforgiving north, calling on Rayleane the Builder to help them shape an idyllic community that would be home and haven to the descendants of the cataclysm.

They failed.

I came up feared and hated for a thing I had no control over in a world divided. My childhood wasn’t the kind of unpleasant that most brats endure when their ma won’t let them spend all their pocket money on spun sugar or fried bread filled with jam. No. My days coming up in the temple ranged from lean and uncertain to hungry and brutal with shockingly little variation.

There were bright moments among the terrible ones, sure, and my best friend, Sawny, was there for most of them. But even the shiniest days as a dimmy ward of the temple were tarnished. It had to do, I think, with the endless reminders of how unwanted I really was. Even Sawny and Lily, whose ma’d given them up, enjoyed a little more kindness than any of the anchorites ever managed to show like me.

One night, a month before I turned sixteen, I waited in my room, boots in hand, for Sawny’s knock on my door. It had been about an hour since our hall’s anchorite called for lights out. She was a rich merchant’s daughter who’d recently committed to the religious life, and she slept sounder than a great gray bear. Though we’d be hard pressed to find an anchorite who cared that two brats nearly old enough to be booted out of the temple were sneaking out in the middle of the night, Sawny and I were still careful. Neither of us had the patience to endure even one more tongue lashing, halfhearted or not.

Keep them sleeping, Pru, I thought.

While I’d stopped praying to the gods and goddesses years ago, I kept up a sort of conversation with my dead twin, Prudence. Ridiculous as it sometimes felt, a part of me wanted to believe that she was looking out for me—that she was the reason I’d been able to keep myself from slipping into the violent grief of the other diminished for all these years. All Ma’d ever told me was her name and that she’d died a couple months after we were born. After that, it didn’t take long for my ma to dump me at the temple in Penby, unwilling to raise a dimmy. Ma and Pa visited from time to time, bringing my new sisters and brothers to see me when they were born, but we never got close. Getting close to a dimmy’s about as smart as cuddling up with an eel. Not even my ma was that dumb.

There was a soft tap on the door. I slipped out of my room and padded down the dim hall after Sawny.

We raced up the narrow staircase, our hushed giggles echoing through the stillness. Even the adulations were silent at this hour; the anchorites chanting over the altars of their chosen deities were tucked away in their rooms under piles of blankets and furs. At the top of the stairs, I jammed my feet into my boots and slid open the casement window, letting a shock of brisk night wind whine down the stairwell. Once I’d shimmied out onto the slate-tiled roof, Sawny passed me his knapsack and climbed through the window with practiced ease.

“Lily’s asleep?” I asked, flicking my thick, dark braid over my shoulder.

“Snoring like a walrus,” Sawny confirmed. “I put some of Bethea’s sleep herb in her tea. No chance she’ll wake up and rat us out.”

It wasn’t that Sawny’s twin was a tattler—not exactly. Or that she hated me. She didn’t. Not quite all the way to hate, anyway. But when you spend half your life being lectured about dimmys and how dangerous and unpredictable we are, you tend to not want your twin to go clambering across rooftops with one of us. Especially a dimmy whose twin’s been dead as long as mine. Lily would’ve been a lot happier if Sawny would do as she asked, and stop speaking to me. She didn’t want to become one of us, after all, and every minute Sawny spent with me increased the odds that he’d be around when I finally lost myself to the grief. Frankly, I didn’t disagree with her. But she knew—as did I—that Sawny would never turn his back on our friendship. Not after all this time.

So Lily ran to the anchorites every time she caught us breaking the rules. It was all she could do, and I didn’t blame her. But that didn’t mean I wanted to get caught.

We scrambled from one rooftop to the next until we were well away from the temple’s residential wing. Our favorite spot was next to a window tucked between two slopes of roof over a rarely used attic next to the temple’s tall spire. It was safe, for one, but the view didn’t hurt, either.

Though only a sliver of one of the moon’s halves was visible, the early summer sky—even at midnight—wasn’t black, but the same dark, cloudy gray as my eyes. I settled in, my back against the wall of the spire, and drew my layers of sweaters in tight around me. Summers in Alskad were merely chilly, not the biting, aching cold that sank into your very bones the rest of the year. But even though I hated the cold, I found myself wishing for winter, when Sawny and Lily and I’d nestle in close under a blanket and watch the great, colorful strands of the northern lights play across the sky.

“What’d you nick for us?”

“Couldn’t get much, what with the kitchen buzzing with folks getting ready for tomorrow, but I managed a bit.”

Sawny closed his eyes, smiled and stretched out next to me on his back, his long black lashes smudged against his dark olive skin. He was all heavy muscles and broad shoulders. Sawny’s easy good looks drew appreciative glances from anyone able to see past the overly mended hand-me-downs we temple brats wore—which, to be perfectly honest, was a fairly small group. My pale, freckled skin and dark, unruly curls might’ve been considered pretty at one point, but my twice-broken nose, combined with a face that rested somewhere between furious and disgusted, made folks’ eyes slip right past me. I couldn’t say I minded. Being a dimmy brought me attention enough.

“Well?” I held out a hand expectantly. “I’m ravenous.”

Sawny put his hand in mine and squeezed. “I’m going to miss you, Vi.”

“Shut up. You’ll find work,” I said, but the lie felt sharp on my tongue even as I spoke the words. “You and Lily both. Though Dzallie protect whoever hires her.”

“Vi,” Sawny cautioned.

I threw my hands up defensively. “I didn’t mean anything by it. You know as well as I do that your sister can be prickly. That doesn’t mean you won’t find work here in Penby.”

“We’ve been looking for months now, and there’s nothing. Nothing that pays enough to afford a room, anyway.”

Sawny rummaged in his bag and handed me half a loaf of bread thick with nuts and seeds. I turned it over in my hands. Guilt over my thoughtless expectation that Sawny would keep putting himself at risk by stealing food from the temple kitchen, same as he’d always done, gnawed at my stomach. His position was so tenuous now that he and Lily had come of age.

“There’s no way the temple’ll get rid of you,” I said, forcing assurance I didn’t feel into my voice. “You make the best cloud buns and salmonberry cakes of anyone in the kitchens. Don’t you think they see that?”

Sawny ducked his head. “Sure. If I was on my own, I might be fine, but Lily needs connections to get bookkeeping work, and we’ve none. The anchorites can’t get away with letting us stay much longer. We’ve been of age for nearly a full season now. I’m surprised they haven’t already kicked us out.”

I looked out across the wide square at the palace. It was an old-fashioned, elegant thing, all clean lines and contrasting angles with none of the frippery and decoration that was the style now. It’d been built a generation after the survivors of the cataclysm had settled in Penby, around the same time the people’d built the temple where Sawny and I’d grown up. The two buildings were practically mirrors of each other, with the same tall spires and the same high stone walls and narrow windows. But somehow, even though it was a stone’s throw away, the palace had always been impossibly out of our reach.

Sawny and I’d come to this spot for years. We’d look across the square at the lights glowing in the palace windows and imagine the people inside. The palace seemed so much warmer, so much friendlier than the temple. The lives of its inhabitants so much happier. I thought probably they were, but Sawny always reminded me that it only seemed that way because we couldn’t see their dark secrets the way we could see our own.

I caught a flash of white fluttering in the shadows between the palace and the temple. I nudged Sawny and jerked my chin. “Shriven. Think they can see us?”

He shook his head. “Nah. Even if they could, what do they care?”

The whites of their eyes stood out against the background of the black paint they wore across their foreheads, mingling with their stark tattoos. I could almost feel the weight of their gaze settle on me, sending shivers down my spine. The Shriven were always in the background of my life. They patrolled the city, looking for people like me. Keeping the citizens of Penby safe from dimmys on the edge of breaking. They served as the spine and the fist of the temple, and no crime in the empire escaped the ever-watchful eyes of the Shriven. Everyone followed their orders, even the palace guards and city watch. And while everyone in the empire knew better than to cross them, their shadow fell darkest on people like me—on the diminished.

“At least the Shriven watchdogs don’t track your every move the way they do with us dimmys.” I shuddered, remembering the last time one of the white-clad Shriven warriors decided I was up to no good. They may’ve been temple-sworn, same as the anchorites, but I’d never believed they were holy. Turning back to Sawny, I said, “You can get away with a few more weeks of looking. Maybe they’ll hire you over there.” I jerked my chin at the palace.

Sawny laughed. “Sure. And her Imperial Highness Queen Runa will take a liking to me and set me up with an estate of my own. Come on, Vi. The palace would never hire a temple foundling. Those jobs are passed through families, like heirlooms.”

I wished there was a way to argue with him, but he was right. Folks like us had to claw our way up to the bottom of the heap, and dreaming of anything else was setting ourselves up for failure.

Us temple brats worked long, hard hours to build the temple’s wealth and power with no praise, no pay and little enough reward, apart from the barest necessities to keep us alive. Meanwhile, the anchorites draped themselves in the pearls I harvested from the cold waters of the bay and wore silks and furs tithed to the temple. But even their indulgence was nothing compared to the Suzerain, the twins who led the religious order of Alskad. Their power was nearly equal to the Queen’s, and it didn’t take an overly observant soul to see the greed and corruption that colored their every move, like the silver threads that embroidered their robes.

Because of this, Sawny and I had our own brand of morality. It was fine for him to steal food from the temple kitchens because they were charged with our care, and we were always hungry. I wasn’t above swiping the occasional crab that wandered by the oyster beds during my summer dives, and in the winter, when I worked in the canneries, few days passed when I didn’t pocket a tin of smoked whitefish or pickled eel. I surely didn’t feel an ounce of guilt over taking a bit of that work back for myself. None of us did.

Sawny and I took our petty crimes a bit further than most temple brats, though. While most of them stopped at stealing from anyone beyond the temple, we’d no problem with nicking baubles and the odd tvilling off the rich folks who swanned around wearing furs and jewels and waving handfuls of drott and ovstri at poor folks, like the fact that they’d money to spend somehow made them special. We were smart about it, and the likelihood we’d get caught was so slim that the benefits always outweighed the risks.

But I’d gone even further than that over the past few years. The way I’d built my own little store of stolen wealth was too dangerous, so far beyond the line, that even knowing about it would put Sawny at risk. I couldn’t tell him. But I could hint—especially if it convinced him to stay, at least until my birthday.

“I’ll be of age soon. We could go north, the three of us. I can dive and fish—the two of you could work on some noble’s estate. We’d find a way to make it work.”

Sawny took the chunk of bread from me, broke it in two and smeared both sides thickly with birch syrup butter from a crock in his knapsack. He handed half back to me and eased himself back onto his elbows, chewing thoughtfully.

“Lily wants to take a contract in Ilor.”

I sucked in a breath, not wanting to believe it could be true. Ilor was a wild, barely settled island colony, but there was work to be had, and no shortage of it. The estate owners and the temple’s land managers there were desperate enough for labor that they’d pay ship captains to bring willing folks from Alskad. All Lily and Sawny had to do was walk onto a sunship.

A part of me knew this had been coming. Lily’d talked about leaving Alskad since we were brats. Their parents were dead, and they’d no family left in Penby. What family they did have had immigrated to Ilor before they were born, hoping for a better life, more opportunities. It made sense that Lily had always seen their future on those hot, jungle islands.

“You can’t actually be considering it. Haven’t you heard the rumors? Just yesterday a news hawker was lighting up the square with a story about an estate burned to the ground by some kind of rebel group.”

Sawny laughed. “And last week I heard one of them say that Queen Runa had taken an amalgam lover. Come on, Vi. You know better than to believe everything you hear.”

“There’s no such thing as amalgams, you oaf.”

“You grew up with the stories, same as me.”

The amalgam were the stuff of childhood horror stories, meant to scare children into good behavior. Twins who’d become one in the womb, they were said to have magic that let them see the future and control the minds of other people. They were supposed to be more ferocious, more bloodthirsty than even the diminished, willing to do anything to gain power and influence. Legends said they thrived on fear and power, like most monsters. I’d never believed they were real. If they were, they would’ve ended up under the temple’s watchful eye, like every other threat.

Like me.

I made a face at him. “Stop trying to distract me. There’s got to be something for you here. Surely you don’t have to cross the whole damn ocean to find work.”

“It’s only a few years, Vi. We’ll work hard and save our pay, and when the contract’s over, we can start a new life. Maybe I’ll open a bakery. Hamil’s teeth, you could even come over with us.”

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t be an idiot. No captain would ever let a dimmy onto a ship planning to cross the Tethys, Hamil’s blessing or no.”

“You don’t know that.”

I tore a piece of bread off my chunk of the loaf and rolled it between my fingers, considering, before popping it into my mouth. The sticky butter clung to my fingers, and I licked each one, unwilling to waste even a ghost of sweetness and glad for a moment to think through what I’d say next.

“The only work you’ll get is on a kaffe farm.”

Sawny pushed a hank of black hair behind his ear and nodded. “We know.”

“It’s hard work. Backbreaking, and there’s no law there. None to speak of, at least. Nothing to protect you if something goes wrong.”

“Fair point,” Sawny said. “But since when did laws ever do any good to protect folks like you and me? The work’ll be hard, sure. Harder than anything we’ve had to do here.”

“Maybe not harder than enduring Anchorite Bethea’s worship seminars.”

Sawny’s laugh burst out of his chest, shattering the stillness of the night.

“No,” he said. “Not harder than those. But there’s no other option, Vi. And once we pay off our passage, we’ll earn a wage. Can you imagine?”

I could imagine. I’d spent hours thinking about the day I’d be free of the temple and earning my own living. Free to live what was left of my life happy, or as close to it as I could manage with the threat of inevitable, violent grief looming over me. For a moment, my mind slipped away from thoughts of that life and pondered the path our friend Curlin had chosen. She’d—Magritte’s teeth, it made me so mad!—gone and joined the Shriven. Broken every promise we’d ever made to each other and to Sawny.

That was the only other option for Sawny and Lily. It’d keep them safe and fed and earn them a kind of respect none of us could ever hope to gain on our own. We all knew it, but—unlike Curlin—we respected the promise we’d made each other, and we wouldn’t break it. Not even if it was the only sure way to keep us together. It wasn’t worth what we’d have to become.

I didn’t need to say it. I could tell Sawny was thinking the same thing.

“When’ll you leave?”

“Couple of days, I think.”

I reached out and smacked his arm, hard, without thinking. “A couple of days? How long have you been planning this?”

He scowled at me, but when he saw the tears streaking down my cheeks, he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and drew me close. “Vi...” His voice trailed off, and I knew there wasn’t anything he could say. Our friendship, no matter how important it was to both of us, was nothing compared to the bond between twins.

“You couldn’t’ve told me sooner?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

“Lily only settled the details yesterday. I didn’t want to tell you until it was a sure thing.”

I shoved my anger and pain down, cinching it tight into a heavy ball of misery in the pit of my stomach. Anger was dangerous, and I wouldn’t let Sawny’s leaving be the thing that broke me. Not after all this time. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too, Obedience,” he said, teasing me with the given name he knew I hated.

I elbowed him in the ribs. “I take it back. I won’t miss you at all,” I said, laughter slipping into my voice.

But we both knew that wasn’t true.

* * *

Some days, there was no way to avoid the actual temple itself. On high holy days, the cusps of each season and the Suzerain’s Ascension Day, every person who ate at the temple’s table or was under their protection was expected to stop everything and haul themselves to adulations. Most folks in Penby made a show of attending adulations, even the Queen. Not many had so little to lose that they could afford to find themselves on the bad side of the Suzerain. Even folks like me, folks with nothing, weren’t stupid enough to risk it. Because I knew that even with nothing at all, I might still have something to lose.

On the day the Suzerain celebrated their twenty-third Ascension Day, I sidled into the haven hall just after the adulation started, but—thank all the gods—before the Suzerain made their entrance. Lily and Sawny were perched on the edge of a bench on the far side of the hall. As I navigated my way through the crowd toward them, Lily caught sight of me first. She shot me an evil look, but I grinned at her and winked. Even though she’d never have to think about most of these folks again, the girl still couldn’t stand to be seen with a dimmy.

“Scoot,” I whispered.

Sawny passed me a cantory, and Lily heaved a sigh as he nudged her over to make room for me. I settled onto the long, scarred wooden bench next to Sawny just as the gathering sang the final note of the Suzerain’s Chorale. The anchorites were at the front of the hall decked out in their finest, with pearls gleaming at their necks and wrists and their hair tied up in intricate braids, freshly shorn on the sides. Their silk robes, in shades of yellow and orange and red, whispered as they stood, and a hush fell over the crowd. Everyone’s eyes turned to the two initiates drawing open the thick metal doors at the back of the haven hall. The high holiday adulations followed the same damned formula every single time, but somehow, folks still acted like it was some kind of glamorous and captivating performance.

The Shriven initiates entered the hall first, their white robes and freshly shorn heads gleaming in the light of the sunlamps. Their staves smacked the stone floor in unison with every step as they filed to the front of the hall and spread out to flank either side, leaving gaps at each of the altars. Sawny elbowed me.

“See Curlin?”

I shook my head. “Don’t know how you could pick her out at this distance.”

“She’s the one with the black eye.” He pointed, squinting. “She’s gotten more tattoos since the last time I saw her.”

I rolled my eyes. “Give it up, Sawny. She’s one of them now. Our Curlin is dead to us, and starting tomorrow, you’ll never have to see or think of her again.”

My words struck a nerve in my own heart, and I knew they’d hurt Sawny, as well. I missed Curlin, and every time I saw her or one of the other Shriven, the thought of her betrayal poured salt water into the still-fresh wound. We’d promised years ago, in our spot on the temple roof, that we wouldn’t join them. None of us. For a lot of temple brats, serving as one of the Shriven was the best option. The only option. But over the years, the four of us had seen what the Shriven did to dimmys—to people like me and Curlin—and not one of us wanted any part of that brutality.

Or so we’d thought. Until three years ago, the day Curlin turned thirteen, when she’d disappeared from the room she and I had shared. The next time we saw her, her head was shaved and her wrist was banded with the new ink of her first tattoo. She’d not spoken to any of us since, but where I held on to that betrayal like a weapon, Sawny’d always wanted to find a way to forgive her.

Steady me, Pru, I thought, leaning on the comfort I felt when I reached for my long-dead twin.

The catechized Shriven prowled into the hall on the heels of their initiates, all dangerous feline grace and coiled energy. They weren’t the only people in the empire who had tattoos, but few bore so many or such immediately recognizable designs. The Shriven’s tattoos favored stark black lines and symbols that evoked a time long forgotten. It was as though they’d inked a language all their own into their skin. Even in plain clothes, a person always knew the moment one of the Shriven came close. Everyone sat a little straighter on their benches and chairs, and their eyes flicked to the dimmys in the room, looking for a reaction, a sign, a threat.

I gripped the cantory in my lap and stared straight ahead, trying to calm my nerves.

At most adulations, Queen Runa was the last person to enter the haven hall. On Ascension Day, however, she shared her entrance with the Suzerain as a token of respect. They were an odd triumvirate. The Suzerain were tall, with porcelain skin and white-blond hair that, when combined with their white robes, made them look like a pair of twin icicles. Castor, the male Suzerain, was covered in grayscale tattoos of flowers that crept up his neck and onto his scalp, a portion of which was shaved to show off the largest of the flower tattoos. The female Suzerain was named Amler. Her hands were covered in a network of tiny black dots so close together, it looked as though she was always wearing gloves that faded up her arms and over the rest of her body, growing sparser the farther they got from her fingertips.

Before Curlin’d joined the Shriven, she used to joke that Amler looked as though she’d been spattered with ink.