When the headmaster agreed to help her, Ember sighed, failing to conceal her relief. “The relationship that you’re describing is indeed rare,” he began. “Bloodlust and petrification are usually specific to predator and prey, but there is one exception. What exists between you and Roland Raiford is the phenomenon of natural enemies.”
He turned, walking briskly down the stairs, and Ember rushed to follow. Without pause, he pulled a tome from the bookshelf and cleared a space on a nearby table with a sweep of his hand. By memory, he flipped to the book’s center, thumbing through the pages until he located a lifelike drawing of a black hawk-eagle.
“This is Roland’s species,” he said, taking a moment to scan the paragraph beneath the drawing. “Spizaetus tyrannus, originating from the region around the equator. It’s a relatively small eagle, but its agility and strength allow it to hunt large prey, including snakes. It prefers humid forests, so much of its prey is arboreal.”
She looked up at him, sensing that there was more to say. “Until a decade ago, this was all that I could have told you. That’s when the author of this book, Dr. Salvatore Thompson, returned from the untamed southern lands.” Ember fidgeted, willing him to continue faster. “He observed that some boa and python species had pit organs for infrared detection, but as non-venomous constrictors, both posed no threat to aerial predators. There was one taxonomic family, though, that raptors seemed to avoid: the viper.”
Ember listened attentively, hardly breathing. “Members of this family have one of the most potent venoms on earth, and raptors are not immune. When a misguided raptor did hunt a viper, Dr. Thompson observed a success rate of less than fifty percent. And when a small raptor perched in a viper’s territory, the roles were often reversed.”
Ember wiped her mouth, meeting his gaze slowly. “How strong is it? The venom, I mean.”
He closed the book. “It varies from species to species, but it is not unusual for a single dose to contain enough venom to kill twenty human men.”
Ember gripped the edge of the table, her head spinning. No wonder Roland was afraid of me. Her tongue once again flew to the gap between her teeth, this time expectantly. Will a fang descend where my canine once was?
“Stay here,” Corax said. He crossed the room, only to return a moment later with an empty flask and two liquid-filled vials: one a dark red, and the other a cloudy white.
“Professor, what-” she began, but he held up a finger, indicating for her to watch silently. She closed her mouth, trying to stay patient as he uncapped the vial of red liquid and held it over the flask. A viscous stream flowed from the vial, filling the flask a third of the way.
“This is human blood,” he explained, and Ember’s stomach turned unexpectedly. “And this,” he raised the vial of cloudy liquid, “is the venom of the jumping viper.” He titled the vial, tapping just a couple of drops into the blood. Then, he grabbed the flask by the mouth, swirling its contents.
After about thirty seconds, he placed the flask gently back onto the table. Ember observed his movements carefully, increasingly fearful of what he intended to show her.
His thin, meticulous fingers re-gripped the flask, inverting it a foot above the tray. Ember watched, horrified, as a gel-like blob of blood slid downward. It tattered on the glass lip, then collided with the tray with an audible plop. “Like the venom of most viper species, this is a hemotoxin,” Corax explained. “This is what it does to a person’s insides. It is a slow, incredibly painful death, one in which blood coagulates, the organs fail, and the tissue rots from the inside out.”
Ember nodded once, weakly. Then, she turned her head to one side, her stomach heaving, and vomited all over the floor of Corax’s office.
***
Lightning cracked outside, illuminating the interior of the study with a flash of white light. A rumble of thunder followed soon after, powerful enough to rattle the treehouse. Corax used his foot to scoot a metal bucket across the floor, where it caught a minor leak with a ping.
Ember wrapped her hands more tightly around the ceramic tea mug. The dark liquid within reflected her drawn, mortified expression. “I’m so embarrassed,” she said, speaking up to make herself heard over the roar of the rain. Everything had caught up to her at once: the day’s exhaustion, the constant headache, and the shock of what she’d learned.
One corner of the headmaster’s mouth turned up slightly. “It is not such an unusual reaction.” She grimaced, turning her head to the left to avoid looking at the wet spot on the floor. Corax had given her space while she cleaned, a disgusting proposition that had almost caused a repeat of the original incident. Nearby, the blob of coagulated blood remained macabrely on the table.
Ember brushed a hand over her face, which felt hot to the touch. “What are the chances that I’ll develop functional venom glands?”
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Corax tapped his fingers on the table. “Based on the precedent, it is not unlikely. Still, it will take some time for the accessary organs to develop.”
“Should we increase my dose of the treatment?”
“Describe your symptoms to the pharmacist when you pick up your next prescription, and they’ll decide. There’s nothing urgent about your development; I’d say it’s an ideal progression.”
Ember rested her head between her hands. I wanted to become stronger, but not like this.
“Take heart,” he encouraged. “I suspect that you will find your mutations to be a gift rather than a curse.”
She nodded halfheartedly. Any situation in which I need to kill twenty men would be a curse in itself.
The conversation lulled, and the sound of the storm outside, the scratching of Corax’s quill, and the splashing of the water into the bucket took its place. Ember sipped her drink, waiting for the rain to abate. The warm liquid soothed her mood, and she recovered enough to continue observing the headmaster’s collection. Flickering lantern light illuminated the maps, some of which showed the constellations, the playground of the gods. Her eyes traced each point, committing them to memory. A curious thought took place in her mind: that if her knowledge of the world could be contained onto a single needlepoint, Corax’s would be a vast, inky pool.
About thirty minutes passed before the storm moved north, leaving the campus behind. Ember stood up, donning her damp coat once more. “Thank you,” she said, “you’ve given me much to think about.”
Corax inclined his head. “Come back any time—preferably on a settled stomach.”
***
It was a boisterous Friday afternoon. The sound of upbeat folk music rose over the forest, overlapping with thousands of cacophonous voices. Vendors had set up shop for acres around the hippodrome, enticing prospective customers with mouth-watering dishes and merchandise in support of both fighters. Students dashed between booths, eager to spend their midterm stipends, and more than a few cups of sweet alcohol were grasped in relaxed hands. The animals sensed the excitement, and several brave individuals wandered through the crowd, rooting for scraps.
The surrounding trees had been richly decorated with garlands of flowers and nuts. They attracted droves of birds and squirrels, which balanced along the fibrous twine for a nibble. Some leaped to the shoulders of nearby Linnaeans, coveting their prizes.
Naz jumped up, grabbing a purple flower and pushing it behind Ember’s ear. Ember gave her a small smile in return, grateful for the reassurance. She had agreed to accompany her friends only at their insistence; though the headache had lessened enough for her to begin training again, she had yet to fully recover her mental fortitude.
Still, she could not help but be awed by the pre-match celebration. It was the largest gathering she had ever seen, and growing by the minute as Linnaeans arrived from their workplaces in carriages and on draft animals. She kept close to Carn’s side, trusting him to lead them safely to their hippodrome seats.
“Here,” Morgan exclaimed, appearing behind them with a handful of paper funnels. She distributed them evenly, much to Carn’s delight.
“I knew it was the right idea to invite you,” he announced.
Naz rolled her eyes. “The right idea, maybe, but it wasn’t yours. Give Ember some credit.”
Only half-listening, Ember looked inside her portion, sniffing the contents. The funnel was piled high with cinnamon-covered pecans, a common dessert in Mendel. She pinched one between her fingers, biting it in half. Though it wasn’t meat, she found the taste pleasantly unique, and she satisfied her interest with a couple more before surrendering the remainder to Carn.
The four took their time wading through the crowd, stopping to look at the various goods. At a booth with a grill, Ember indulged in four strips of bacon for herself and a spit of grilled insects for Morgan. Carn bought a flask of warm berry wine, and they passed it between them for the rest of the journey. In the crisp air of late November, its warmth was more than welcome.
The sound of the music surged as they neared the entrance to the hippodrome. Morgan looked at Ember mischievously, grabbing her hand and dragging her in the direction of the band. Carn and Naz jogged closely behind, their faces split into wide grins as if they knew exactly what she was planning.
A band of seven was playing from atop a five-foot-tall wooden platform surrounded by a large crowd. The listeners had formed a decently sized semicircle, in the middle of which a dozen partners were executing a brisk, lighthearted dance. Their feet moved quickly over the forest floor, kicking up the fallen autumn leaves. They spun around each other, their laughs bubbling in the air like a birdsong.
It was a beautiful, spontaneous dance. Through the rapid, almost frantic movements, even the beginners blended into the whole. At random, one of the dancers was tossed into the air or slid between someone’s legs. Partners were swapped at only a nod, and others were snatched unexpectedly from the crowd by joyous friends. All the while, the spectators shouted words of encouragement.
“Come on,” Morgan said, looking at Ember from the corner of her eye.
“No!” Ember insisted. “No, no, no!”
Someone pushed her from behind, and she stumbled into the clearing with Morgan by her side. She looked back to see Carn’s smug grin, which was wiped from his face as Naz dragged him in after them.
“Relax!” Morgan shouted, grabbing Ember’s shoulder with one hand and her wrist with the other. Patiently, she showed her how to step forward and back, creating a rising and falling pattern that followed the cadence of the music.
Though they were moving slower than some of the others, Ember could sense that they did not stand out altogether. The wine had dulled her overactive mind, and she let Morgan guide her to and fro to the seemingly endless song. She found herself dancing with Carn and then with Naz, both of whom took up the mantle as her guide with only a moment of uncertainty. A kaleidoscope of horns, fur, claws, and scales whirled around her.
It wasn’t until Morgan pulled her away from the clearing that her senses returned. The four friends looked at each other, their breaths heavy and their faces slick with sweat.
Carn grinned, his tousled fur making him look like a farm dog after a long day of play. “Let’s go,” he said, “I want to get good seats for the last match of the season!”