defenders of the empire, the Phoenix Riders had abandoned their posts and sworn their loyalty to Avalkyra Ashfire instead. This made them traitors, and phoenixes along with them. While Avalkyra was the true heir to the throne, she’d committed treason and been labeled a criminal before she was old enough to be crowned, and had been chased from the empire. The governors threw their support behind the nonmagical sister, Pheronia, instead, while Avalkyra set herself up in Pyra. She and her supporters had soon been deemed “rebels,” refusing to abide by empire law or answer for their supposed crimes. In the years following her death, the empire had destroyed anything that could be construed as supportive of her and her legacy—phoenix imagery most of all.
It was no easy task, as phoenixes had been a part of empire history from the very beginning. They were symbols of the royal line and sacred to the empire’s highest god, Axura—translated to “Azurec” in the Trader’s Tongue, the common language of the empire. One by one temple statues were removed and sacred prayers altered. Axura—who had always been depicted as a phoenix—was anthropomorphized, and even songs, poems, and plays that featured phoenixes were forbidden.
Though they had begun this process during the Blood War, it had taken the Council of Governors years to finish the job. Veronyka had caught small glimpses of the phoenixes’ continued presence up until her last days in the empire several months ago: faded frescoes peeking out from under a peeling coat of paint or crumbling concrete revealing glass mosaics underneath.
Veronyka would often daydream about returning to those places on phoenix-back, scraping the paint clean or cracking the sidewalk in half to reveal the truth beneath.
With a jolt, she realized that this daydream now had the potential to become reality.
Veronyka watched her sister warily; first Val put away the food stores, then she tore open the bag of cornmeal with her teeth, pouring some into a small bowl and stirring in dollops of honey, producing a fine, grainy paste.
“For the bird,” she said at last, nodding her head in the direction of the phoenix. “Later it will be ready for dates and fresh fruit, if we can get them.”
Val knew everything there was to know about phoenixes, thanks to their maiora, who had been a Phoenix Rider back in her day—one of the few who had escaped the empire’s notice, at least for a time. Their grandmother loved to tell stories, and while Veronyka had been interested in epic battles and romances, Val had wanted to know more practical things.
Veronyka took the bowl from Val, who refused to meet her gaze, and placed it on the ground next to the phoenix. The bird inspected the mixture for a moment before dipping its beak into the sticky-sweet concoction. “The other one’s gonna hatch soon, right, Val?”
Val looked at the rocklike egg, sitting among the burning coals.
“Going to,” she said, avoiding the question and closing the shutters with a loud clack.
The phoenix’s head popped up at the sound, but it quickly returned to its meal. The broken shutters blocked out most of the late-morning sunlight, leaving the cabin in near darkness, save for the warm glow of the fire.
Strange that there were three of them now, when it had just been Veronyka and Val for most of their lives. Their parents had died in the Blood War, and their grandmother, who had raised them for a time, had been beaten to death by an angry mob almost ten years later.
While the immediate aftermath of the war was apparently the worst, there had been many incidents throughout the years—trials of famous Riders discovered in hiding, small groups of rebels and dissidents rounded up and executed—that had caused new fervor to ripple through the empire. The council—the ruling body of the empire, made up of the four provincial governors as well as lawmakers, bankers, landowners, and other important political leaders—made an example of anyone who didn’t fall in line, doling out punishments that were swift and severe. Animages grew more fearful and went deeper into hiding, while those who’d grown to hate them thanks to the war became eager to hunt them down and ferret them out again.
It was one such riot that had taken their grandmother. It began outside the courthouses after a trial and spread toward the Narrows, where many animages lived in secret.
When their maiora heard the mob coming, she’d told Veronyka and Val to flee and leave her behind. The girls