Right now, he’s grinning openly, enjoying the commotion—but he knew what I was going to say. My mothers might have raised me, but it’s my bio-donor, a man who wasn’t even supposed to be identified, who really understands me. At least on this. For years I didn’t know him—he was allowed to pass on birthday presents, but never his name.
When I was five, a model glider started my forbidden fascination with flight. When I was ten, a sci-fi vid about an impossible cloudship that landed Below, on the actual surface, sent a thrill through me that never went away—though the animated beasts the shipwrecked explorers fought gave me nightmares for weeks. By the time he was outed as my bio-donor when I was fifteen, I felt like I already knew him.
Now, Talamar nods, lifting his inhaler again, eyes creased in a smile. Go on, his gaze says. You can make them see what you see.
So I draw a breath and raise my voice to cut through the arguments around me. “Esteemed council members,” I try, which catches a few of them. “Your Majesty,” I continue, just as loud. “Your Highnesses.”
The last of them—Damerio, a sinking skeptic—falls silent, eyeing me beadily. Just waiting for his chance to launch back into his favorite argument. I hustle on with it before he can try.
“You’ve all been to the air festivals here on Freysna. You’ve all seen the stunts and the races. And you all know that the best of the gliders is the Skysinger. It’s faster and more nimble than any of the others, its pilot more skillful, and its design simply better. And perhaps you know that half the engineers at the academy would give up their tenures for the chance to meet that pilot and spend an hour looking over his machine.
“Well, I know that pilot. And I know why the Skysinger is so much better than anything else in the air. It’s because his engine uses tech salvaged from the sky-engines.”
Beatrin’s voice is very quiet when she speaks, very dangerous. “That would be illegal,” she points out. “The engines are not to be touched.”
“It’s not illegal, it’s practical,” I retort. “We don’t know what half the parts of the engines are even for, or whether they’re necessary. The pilot’s been working on a new kind of engine, and with the tech from the Skysinger, he could build a cloudship capable of landing a pilot on the surface Below and returning him safely to Alciel. With funding, and with academy support, he could do it as quickly as this time next year.”
“Impossible!” Councilor Damerio finally loses his temper and shouts his reply, standing and puffing himself up like a yellow-tailed sparra trying to impress a mate. His puffed-up hair has always reminded me of feathers, his pouched cheeks and pursed mouth doing nothing to detract from the impression of a self-important little bird. “Your Highness, with respect, the very idea that we would endanger the engines over a perfectly natural fluctuation in altitude, that we would trust a renegade glider pilot to tinker with our engines—”
“Indeed.” Finally, my grandfather speaks, and the king’s voice silences Damerio instantly. “Tell me, North,” he says slowly. “How did you come to know this pilot?”
I can see in his steady gaze that he already knows the answer.
Trust me, I beg silently, looking back at him. Listen to me. I can do this.
If this doesn’t work, I’m about to give up the thing that matters most to me in the world.
But it will work. It has to work.
I take a deep breath.
“I know it can be done,” I say. “Because I’m the pilot and the engineer of the Skysinger. I can build you that cloudship, and I’m volunteering to pilot it.”
The room erupts into chaos, councilors coming to their feet, voices raised, hands lifted, half a dozen displays from their chronos jostling for room in the projection square atop the table.
“There have been years like this before,” Damerio’s shouting, gesturing wildly at his bar graph. “We are not sinking!”
Talamar stands shoulder to shoulder with Gabriala, a councilor from one of the other small islands, their voices tangling with one another.
“The small islands are sinking faster than—”
“You cannot simply vote us down every time we—”
And I’m stuck in the middle of this, mouth half-open, watching as if I’m outside my own body. Because this is the same argument they’ve been having for years. These are the same words. And nothing I’ve said has even made a dent—even the ones who believe in altitude loss aren’t talking about my cloudship, aren’t talking about invention, or creation, or discovery.
They’re just screaming along to the same old script.
I gave them the Skysinger, and I’ve been forgotten between one heartbeat and the next.
A hand grabs my wrist, and I whip around to see Anasta, eyes huge, mouth trembling. My heartmother’s always been the one to find some way to applaud everything I’ve tried, but right now she looks like she wants to pass out. When she silently draws me toward the door that leads to the royal quarters, I don’t resist—not even when I see my bloodmother stalking furiously after us.
Nobody but my grandfather even notices us leave.
Anasta doesn’t even bother making it to my mothers’ room—she just stops once we’re out in the hall, dropping my wrist and leaning back against a window as if she needs the support. Behind her, the clear blue of the sky stretches away forever, except for a bank of clouds that loom like a mountain from a fairy tale, ready to tumble down and bury us all.
“North,” Beatrin snaps from behind me, and I spin around so I can face both of them. “You cannot be serious. I don’t even know where to start—with your deception, with the risks you’ve taken, with your decision to defy us in front of the entire council? I have never been more disappointed than I am right now.”
Anasta’s buried her face in her hands, and she speaks through them, still pulling herself together. “When were you doing this?” she demands, voice shaking. “When you were supposed to be studying? Was this your research? You know how precious you are, not just to us, but to Alciel.” When she lowers her hands, her eyes are brimming. “If anything ever happened to you, North—when I think about you up there in the sky, nobody knowing you need to be kept safe, gliding out over all that nothingness …”
“I was safe,” I protest, trying to keep the snap from my voice, knowing I’m failing. “I’m good at this—I’m the best, Anasta. All these years telling me to search for the way I can contribute to my kingdom, and now—”
“You can’t contribute if you’re dead!” Beatrin snaps. “It took an army of medtechs for you to be born. What do you think happens if the heir dies and the bloodline fails? You are the Prince of the Seven Isles, second in line to the throne of Alciel, and a Guardian of the Light. Your foremost duty is to continue our line. The moment this train reaches the palace, you will tell security where this glider is, and it’ll be brought back to the academy. And you will never, under any circumstances, fly that thing again.”
A bolt goes through me. “You can’t do that,” I snarl, tossing restraint to the wind—it hasn’t helped me, anyway. “I’m not a child, Beatrin, you can’t confiscate my toys. You can’t forbid me from doing things. The Skysinger is mine, and if you think I’m giving it up—”