The Orphan Queen (The Orphan Queen #1)(4)
The others were there, starting a small fire and rinsing their wounds. I shut the window behind me and tossed my bag of medical supplies to Quinn Bradburn.
“Ezra.” I nodded at him. “Glad you’re awake. That was quite the hit you took.”
He ducked his face and shrugged. “I’m better now.”
I raised an eyebrow at Connor, who gave a small, frantic shake of his head; he hadn’t done anything. A knot of tension in my chest untangled. I smiled and moved on to gathering the stray weapons the boys had tossed everywhere. “Good. Next time, try not to get knocked out or cut, you two. It’s embarrassing. People are going to think kittens trained you.”
“What was wrong with those men?” Connor winced as he dabbed a damp cloth on his throat where the glowman had cut. “They looked human, but they were wrong.”
“They were huge,” Ezra added. “And strong.”
“They were glowmen.” The tiny room was packed, three sitting on the bed and two in the only chairs. I perched on the windowsill, ignoring the way the old wood creaked. Muffled shouts and thumps came from the lower stories; the inn stank of waste and smoke and sweat.
Connor finished inspecting his neck in a tarnished silver mirror he kept in his pocket; he’d fallen hard for the whole mirror-and-wraith superstition. With a frown, he set the mirror aside. “What are glowmen? And are there glowladies?”
“There are women like that, but the term is just glowmen.” I raised an eyebrow at Quinn—Ezra was her younger brother, after all—and she nodded. We couldn’t keep the younger boys sheltered forever, especially now that they’d faced a pack of glowmen. “Sometimes people use wraith to make themselves feel happier, stronger, whatever. Like people once used magic.”
“Wraith isn’t magic, though.”
“Wraith was magic. Once.” Quinn shook her head at the boys. “Haven’t you been paying attention to your lessons?”
Both boys slumped. “Yes,” said Ezra. “If magic is like fire, then wraith is like smoke. Magic isn’t created or destroyed. It just gets changed.”
“That’s right.” I leaned against the window, the glass cool on my spine. “Wraith is another form of magic—a toxic form.”
“Wait.” Ezra held up a hand. “We’re not finished. We did study.”
“People once used magic for everything, from building to farming to war.” Connor parroted the history papers we’d written for the younger Ospreys. “Radiants had even built a railroad system for transporting goods and people. Magic was useful, and families with a lot of radiants became powerful and rich. There was always wraith, but never enough of it to be a danger.”
Ezra took up where his friend left off, his voice pitched to mimic Quinn’s: his impression of her giving lessons. “But just over a hundred years ago, the western kingdoms noticed the wraith accumulating, obscuring sunlight, and making storms worse. It’s been creeping across the continent ever since, destroying everything in its path. Liadia was the most recent victim.”
“When the wraith was first discovered as a problem, King Terrell Pierce the Second, sovereign of the Indigo Kingdom, forced most of the surrounding kingdoms to sign the Wraith Alliance, making magic illegal, and now radiants are persecuted and hunted. People call them flashers now, to be rude. The once-powerful families and businesses who’d used magic to gain their wealth were replaced by those who could produce similar results without magic. Lots of people went into ruin, even in Aecor, which didn’t sign the treaty. But Aecorians did change their methods of industry, and the kingdom became a safe place for radiants to hide. Until the One-Night War.” With a chuckle, Connor snapped and thumped his chest at Ezra—the Osprey salute.
“I’m glad your studies amuse you so much,” said Melanie.
Connor turned back to me. “But what does history have to do with glowmen?”
I shook my head. “Wraith isn’t magic like people are used to, it manifests physically. But wraith is still magical. Sometimes people add certain chemicals to wraith mist and sell it to others to drink or inhale. That’s called shine. A little will make people feel however they want to feel. Stronger. Braver. Bigger.”
The boys exchanged glances and raised eyebrows. “That doesn’t sound bad.”
“It’s dangerous. If you take too much, the changes become real and permanent. You don’t just feel amazingly tall or muscled. You are. Those people will never be normal again.”
“When they’re caught, glowmen are exiled to the wraithland.” Melanie placed her bag on the small desk and fished out a notebook and pen. “I’ve seen the prison wagons. The glowmen are sedated, loaded like sacks of grain, and taken as far west as horses are willing to go.” Almost nonchalantly, she shook a bottle of ink and twisted off the cap.
Both of the boys were silent.
Theresa nodded. “It’s true. They’re dumped while they’re still unconscious. Sometimes soldiers in West Pass Watch can see the glowmen waking up, if it’s still light out. If the wraith beasts don’t find them first, the glowmen usually attack one another and—”
“That’s enough.” Quinn twitched her little finger at Theresa, who just smirked at the rude gesture and unfolded enough bandages for everyone’s wounds.