Burning Kingdoms. Lauren DeStefano

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      “Will you come too?” she says.

      “Sure, if you want.”

      “And—could you tell Judas not to tag along?”

      “I can talk to him, but—”

      “If you want me to try and convince my grandfather to come out, those are my terms,” she says. “Let me get dressed.”

      She shoos me from the room and closes the door.

      “Glad you’re feeling better,” I mutter to the knob.

      Judas doesn’t take kindly to being left out, but it’s enough of a relief to see Amy up and about that he concedes to her demands, though not without grabbing my arm at the door and warning that he will kill me if anything happens while she’s in my charge.

      It isn’t the first time he’s threatened me in this way, but it is the first time I believe him. Now that his betrothed is dead, Amy is the only thing he has resembling family. Her frail health and stubborn bravery give him good reason to be concerned.

      “I’ll guard her as if she were my own,” I say.

      “If you had given birth to me when you were five,” Amy says snidely. Her way of reminding us that she isn’t a child.

      “Don’t worry,” Nimble says. “I’m an old pro at driving in this weather.”

      He drives slowly, glancing back at us in the mirror every now and again. “I couldn’t help noticing the tracks outside this morning,” he says.

      “We’ve never seen snow before,” I say.

      “Then this must be a real shock,” he says. “What do you get? Rain?”

      “Rain?” I ask.

      He laughs, turns the wheel against his open palms. “Oh boy.”

      No matter how far we drive, we never seem to get any closer to the city in the distance. We do pass the field of strange machines I noticed when we landed, though. “What are all of those?” I say, nodding to the machines outside my window.

      “Rides,” Nimble says. “That’s the theme park. Roller coasters and biplane rides to give you the sensation you’re flying higher than airplanes. For a penny you can get a look at the underside of the magical floating island through a telescope.”

      “The magical floating island?” Amy says, scrunching her nose. “That’s what people call us?”

      “What do you call it, then?”

      Amy says “Internment” at the same time I say “Home.”

      “Internment,” Nimble repeats several times, testing the word on his tongue. “As in ‘confined.’ Creepy.”

      “It isn’t creepy at all,” I say.

      “Maybe it is,” Amy says. “Not at first. You’d have to be there a while to see it.”

      She’s quiet after that.

      We pass what appears to be a sort of garden made of rocks, and Amy’s breath catches. Her chin snaps up attentively and her eyes are sharp.

      “What’s wrong?” I ask. “Do you feel another fit coming on?”

      She climbs onto her knees and watches through the back window as the garden gets smaller.

      “That place gives me the heebie-jeebies too, kid,” Nimble says.

      “What is it?” I say.

      He raises his eyebrows at me in the mirror. “Where do you put your dead on Internment?”

      Amy’s voice is small and fading when she says, “We burn them. Until they’re nothing and nowhere.”

      I try to explain the tributary to Nimble, how we burn the bodies of our dead so that all the bad in them can fall away, while all the good becomes a mass of colors in the sky that can’t be seen by the living. I’ve believed it all my life, but now that I’m on the ground, it doesn’t make as much sense as it once did.

      Down here, they bury their dead. Mark the spot with a stone, with dates and names. Leave flowers to remember.

      It must be nice to have so much space to squander.

      “Have you ever buried anyone?” Amy asks.

      “Can’t say as I have,” Nimble says.

      That must be nice, too.

      “Here we are,” Nimble announces, stopping the car. The bird is several paces away, surrounded by men in coats who appear to be convening.

      “Morning, boys,” Nimble says, and opens the door for Amy and me. “We all figured you wouldn’t have much luck talking him out, so I’ve brought someone to help. This here’s the old man’s granddaughter.”

      After a brief discussion, Jack, who seems to be heading this unsuccessful operation, agrees to let Amy inside. “Go with her,” he tells Nimble.

      “No,” Amy says. “It won’t do any good unless I go alone. He’s quite stubborn.”

      The men all exchange glances. Jack hesitates. Amy nods to the red metal funnel that’s in his hands. “May I?” she says.

      He’s so perplexed by her straightforwardness that he hands it to her. She holds the funnel near her mouth. “Grandpa, it’s me. Amy.” Her voice is magnified. “I’ve come to talk to you.”

      She hands the funnel to Jack. “Thank you,” she says.

      Nothing happens for a few seconds, and then there’s the unlatching of locks. Amy breezes past us and opens the door, disappearing into the darkness and then closing it behind her.

      The men are all astonished. With a few words she’s managed to do what they’ve been trying to do all morning.

      Nimble folds his arms. “She’s a real firecracker, isn’t she?”

      I don’t know what that means, but it sounds apt. “She’s hard to stop …” My voice trails as I step back and look at the bird. Just as the ground looked like a patchwork quilt of land, the bird is a patchwork of metal in varying hues. It’s at least three stories high, it tilts to one side, and it stands on legs that are made of blades for burrowing through the soil. The wings are folded now, like a beetle that has fallen dead.

      It doesn’t look like it would fly so much as hurtle through the sky and then destroy the ground it hit. But I am still astounded by the sight of it. Astounded that such a thing could be designed, assembled, welded, and created in secret, quite under the king’s nose. It was a refuge for us. It’s the embodiment of our rebellion, our liberation. It’s the thing my parents and Amy’s sister and countless others died for. It was nearly a lifetime in the making.

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