The Calling

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. But as their scales were the only material powerful enough to withstand the onslaught of hail that was not water, not ice, but literal diamonds, how they arrived and why they agreed to help mattered very little to my people.

In fairness, the Adamas Valley was beautiful if desolate. Sharp, barren, icy peaks circled the city like flames of candles immortalized in stone. The city sparkled like a lake reflecting the stars, each iridescent shingle the sacrifice of a dragon.

“Isla!” my sister, Yves, called. She pulled herself up the final sloping stave rooftop where I sat, feet dangling off the edge. I didn’t go to help her. She managed to get up the first two; she could get up the third. She kicked a few diamonds and ice shards out of the way. “Could…you…at least…pretend to be in as bad of shape as me?” Her breath formed little puffs as she exhaled. It was cold, but it was usually cold in Adamas.

“You’re not in bad shape—you’re carrying two people,” I replied. “There is a difference.”

She clutched the bottom of her growing belly. The baby was still a few months away, but Yves ballooned fast. Niko said it was because the baby was healthy. Our father, Papoo, said it was because Yves always took second helpings at supper. As if either of them knew what it was like to carry a child.

Yves was reluctant to climb up here with me, especially as we had been experiencing more diamond rain lately—what we called gleaming—and it was dangerous to be caught in a storm like that. Life-threatening even.

One diamond to the head could kill someone. Or someones as Yves’ case might be.

But all it took with Yves was a little prodding at her pride.

“Maybe now that you’re pregnant, you can’t make it to the top anymore,” I goaded. And that’s all I had to say. My sister was never one to shy away from a challenge. In fact, it was part of the reason she was pregnant. Niko’s mother said she thought Yves and Niko couldn’t do it.

Apparently, they very much could.

Yves plopped herself next to me and swayed her feet in unison with mine. I’d already kicked the icicles off the edges which was short-lived satisfaction. Our boots were exactly the same, dragon hide and well loved.

“So why in all of the Six Skies did you want to come up here?”

It was a reasonable question, but I didn’t have a good answer.

“The Order stopped by…” she probed. She pulled out a blanket from the pack around her back and draped it over both of our lower halves.

“Did they?” I feigned ignorance and she gave me a very pointed, very knowing look. The Order of the Six Skies was the judge, juror, and savior of Adamas in the sense that it was the Order who discovered dragon scales withstood gleaming. The High Priestesses and Priests were our spiritual leaders, governing body, and the only ones allowed to speak with the dragons. If our valley was a game of marbles, the Order held every single one.

And on your sixteenth birthday, they bestowed upon you in their supreme benevolence a Calling.

“Isla, I think that you have the wrong attitude about choosing—”

“Not choosing. I’m being forced into this.” She sighed; we’d had this conversation many times.

“Everyone has been through this. You think you’re the only one whose dream changed with their Calling? No. The Order provides opportunity. They know how you will best serve our valley even if you don’t know that yourself yet. You could be…a teacher or a priest or a collector—”

I interrupted her again, something she had grown accustomed to. She was my big sister after all. I put a finger up with every point I made. “One. I could never be a debt collector. Two. You and I both know that the collectors are a sham. They are simply spies for the Order sent to figure out who is obedient and who—”

“Shh!” Yves exclaimed as if a debt collector was in close enough proximity to this rooftop scattered with ice, diamonds, and dragon scales to witness my blasphemy.

Another finger went up. “Three. I don’t have the patience for teaching. I hate kids.” I paused, then said to her belly, “No offense.”

“Niko loves teaching. It was the right Calling for him. Even me, I think being a fishmonger, if not the most glamorous Calling, is fulfilling. Papoo loves—”

I cut her off with a groan, “Don’t get me started on him.”

“Why? Being a stone mason is good, honest work. He provides stones for bridges and buildings and—”

“Thank you for explaining what a mason is.” She rolled her eyes, and I continued, “He hates it.”

“Oh, grow up, Isla, he doesn’t hate it. There are good days and bad days but that’s life. He worked hard after Mamoo left, and now, the Order has rewarded him.” It was the reason the Order stopped by this morning, and the reason I was up here, instead of down at the quarry where he needed me. “He’s worked hard and been granted an honor. It’s his biggest project yet. There is gratification in that.”

The Order asked our father to repair the wall around their temple, a cylindrical, tube-like building with an open top, known as the Eye of the Valley as it was dead center in the city. Not only was it the tallest building, but it was the only place in the valley without a roof allowing the dragons to fly in and out as they pleased. It was a project that was a once in a lifetime opportunity.

“It’s time you give up the art; it doesn’t serve the community.” Gouging out my eyes with diamond shards would be less painful.

“I can’t give it up,” I whispered, more to myself than to her. Art gave me purpose. It didn’t matter that it didn’t serve the community. It served me.

“Maybe they’ll make you a fishmonger and we can work together.” She bumped my shoulder and spoke in a tone that was meant to give me hope, but all I felt was churning, nauseating defeat.

I stayed quiet for a moment. I didn’t have a rebuttal that wouldn’t hurt her feelings. Being a fishmonger sounded worse than being a teacher. I was resentful that everyone around me seemed happy or excited to be Called. Just last week, our neighbor Viggo was Called to be a weapons master. He seemed content with it, but he also incinerated his eyebrows once, so why anyone would put sharp, dangerous objects in his hands was beyond me.

Why was I the only one dreading a Calling?

“They’re going to give you something that is right for you. Trust the Order. Don’t be disappointed before you’ve been Called.” She put an arm around my shoulders and gave me a jovial shake, like that was all it took to make me feel better.

The sun leaked through angry purple clouds, the shade of a bruise. This time of year, we received only about eight hours of watery, yellow light. Yves and I could see a pair of ice fishermen reeling in a catch so massive it took the both of them to wrangle it. A herder with a musk ox pulling a wagon was causing a bottleneck on one of the bridges. A vendor with a cart selling what looked to be dragon hide vests rang a bell. Everything went on despite the feeling that my world was coming to a sudden, screeching halt.

There wasn’t much more to be said and I was comfortable with silence in the same way a fish is comfortable in water.

Above, the flap of enormous leathery wings thundered over the vendor’s bell, and it was such commonplace that Yves didn’t look up.

But I did.

The wings of the dragons were like curtains opening and closing the windowpanes of the sky. Each wing was an accordion, able to contract or expand to the unheard music of the heavens. The wings extended to a thin, thorny tip, crowned with a claw. Their scales were far more beautiful when they were on their bodies as opposed to our rooftops. They shimmered like sunlight on water and were exquisite enough to make the stars jealous.

They were headed towards the Eye. It was rumored that the dragons were looking for trees when they left the valley since none grew in Adamas. Wood was our most valuable material, apart from dragon scales. Trees were more myth than dragons.

My voice cracked like the thick layers of ice covering our lakes and rivers. “Let’s get down.”

As soon as we were on the ground, Yves went back to her shop, but not before pressing her forehead to mine and whispering, “It’s all going to be okay.” I didn’t believe her, but I didn’t say that.

After she left, our father cornered me. “Come,” was all Papoo said. “Bring a pencil.”

“But I have to—” I started. I only had one more afternoon of freedom; I wanted to spend my time on my own terms.

“Don’t argue, Isla.” He gave me a stern look, one that somehow made the metal rings in his braids sharper. I gritted my teeth and copied the look, hoping to silently convey my displeasure. But it was a game of chicken I would never win.

It was my mother who told me to sculpt, albeit inadvertently. It was before she left, but even if she stuck around, I don’t think she could have predicted I would become obsessed. She was merely trying to find a way to help me focus my thoughts, and to this day, it was one of the few things that kept me present.

In one of my clearest memories of Mamoo, she was comforting me about something. I wished I remembered what paralyzed me with fear that day, but of course, I started to cry about it. With a brain like mine, thoughts started off innocent enough, but quickly spiraled into something destructive. It was probably something mundane, like jam on toast becoming the entire world being doomed, the dragons disappearing, and never, ever being able to escape sparkling rain that hits harder than a bullet.

I had the scars to prove it.

But she sat me on her knee and made me count backwards from one hundred. She held me as my breathing became steadier and my hiccups less frequent. She smelled like sweat and spiced gingerbread. The ends of her two thick braids tickled my forearm.

Her hands picked up a chunk of marble from the quarry, a piece as discarded as I felt, and held it up to my face. “What is this?”

I blinked, and a few stray tears cascaded over my cheeks. “A rock.”

“Is it?”

“Yes,” I insisted.

“Take a closer look.” She held it out to me, and my fingers couldn’t wrap around it, so I had to take it with both hands.

“It’s a rock, Mamoo.” She was tricking me somehow, I was convinced of that, so I doubled down on my stance.

“This,” she said, tapping the rock once, “can be anything you imagine.” She paused. “You,” she continued, tapping my chest, right over my heart, “can be anything you imagine.”

I frowned. “How?”

“Your imagination is your most powerful gift, Isla. In this rock, there could be a fish, or a sleigh, or maybe it is simply a rock. But whatever it is, you are capable of setting it free. You decide what cages you, and what doesn’t.” Then with the gentleness that only parents are capable of, she said, “There are only two things: thoughts and now. Your thoughts shall not cage you. Right now, find what’s inside the rock, and focus on that for today. Tell me at supper, okay?”

I replied with a small, “Okay.”

Turns out, waiting to be released in that particular chunk of rock was a lamb, but mostly because it was lumpy and I didn’t know what I was doing. But it made Papoo smile when I presented it to him, and Mamoo winked at me like we had a secret. Somehow all the thoughts were held at bay. For a moment.

It wasn’t until I learned about the Calling that I realized she was a liar. The only thing I, and everyone else in Adamas, will ever be, is a servant to the Order. And by that time, she had disappeared.

I tailed Papoo, crossing bridges with oil lamps, walking through the snowy streets of Adamas to get to the Eye. I pulled my fur-lined hood up as light flurries pirouetted around us.

The Eye was bigger up close. Much bigger. It had to be about a mile in diameter.

“How are you going to fix the holes at the top?” I asked. “You’ll need at least six ladders to get up there.”

“We’ll manage,” Papoo replied, pulling out his own notebook. “For today, we need to take inventory of all the places that need repairs. I want each of us to start here. I’ll start on the south side, you, the north side. Take notes, and then we will circle back here and compare.”

“Am I simply noting cracks? Holes?”

“All of it, and take your time; I don’t want us to miss a single thing.” My father’s focus was on the top lip of the Eye as if the rocks were calling to him and he was ready to listen. There was one door somewhere along the Eye for Order members, but it was camouflaged. Even if I wanted to find it, I don’t think I would try.

It was an impossible task. Papoo would likely only consult his notes anyway, but I did what I was told, noting the imperfections within my eyesight. The ones higher up would simply have to wait.

I was about halfway around the Eye kicking rocks and halfheartedly noting the flaws when I saw smoke. I did a double take to make sure I was seeing things clearly. But yes.

Smoke was escaping from one of the cracks in the Eye. It curled upwards and licked the air, rebelling against the rock. I don’t know what overcame me, but I reached a hand out to the stone, to the smoke. I took off my glove and it snaked through my fingers. To my delight, it was…warm. I was momentarily mesmerized. The smoke seemed to have a mind of its own as it coiled and twisted over my fingers. It smelled sweet and musky next to the damp lichen-covered stone.

“Hey! Hey you!” My neck snapped to the right, as my concentration broke. “Get away you urchin!” My nose wrinkled in disgust. Urchin?

Running towards me was a boy a little older than me. He was in Order robes not the diamond white of a High Priestess, but the twilight blue of an acolyte. It was less of a robe, and more of a coat that was shorter in the front and with a longer “V” shape in the back. There was what looked to be ox fur at the shoulders, cuffs, and inside the raised hood. The buttons were plain and there were a few black chains hanging from his belt, along with a gun on one side and a cutlass on the other. Only the High Priestess’ robes were decorated with dragon scales. Underneath the coat, he wore black dragon leather pants.

I looked back at the wall and the smoke dissipated.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded. I chose not to respond. He snapped his fingers in front of my face stealing my attention away from the stone. When I turned to face him, I noticed his eyes were the color of honey, but they looked at me with anything but sweetness. “Hello? What are you doing here?” He snarled, shaking his head as crimson hair poked out of his hood.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I countered. Internally I cursed, wishing I’d said something clever, or whatever it was he wanted to hear so that he would go away.

“Excuse me?”

“Excuse me?” I mocked.

He crossed his arms. “I am a member of the Order of the Six Skies and I demand that you tell me what you’re doing.”

“When you pinch your eyebrows together like that, you look like you’re smelling a day-old fart from a sperm whale.”

It was reckless, but also an accurate observation. And I knew I shouldn’t speak that way to Order members but the look on his face was utterly priceless.

His nostrils flared. “State your business at once.”

“Well, I am—” I put a hand against the Eye and instantly pulled it back because it was scorching. “Ow! Is it always hot?”

The acolyte frowned at me, and his jaw flexed like he was thinking about all his options. After a second, he uncrossed his arms and put one hand against the stone.

“It’s not hot at all.”

“What?” I put my palm back and immediately pulled it away. I massaged it with my other hand. “Feel it again,” I implored.

He obviously thought I was putting him on or crazy or both. “I will only ask you once more.” Ignoring him, I put my hand up to the Eye again, but he grabbed my wrist before I could touch it. His grip tightened, as he growled, “State your business.”

Before I could answer, I heard my father’s voice. “Isla?” He hurried around the bend to stand between the two of us, and even though my father was a solid head taller than the boy, he quaked slightly. “Your Honor, is everything alright?” He bowed at the waist, something I neglected to do.

“You know this girl?”

“She is my daughter, yes.”

“I don’t need to be protected—”

“Be quiet, Isla.”

“It’s him! He accosted me!” I yanked my arm away and he either allowed it or was surprised that I fought back. With haste, I pulled my sleeve as far down as I could.

My father snapped in a voice that I’d never heard him use before. “Be quiet, Isla.”

“I didn’t do any—” Before I could get any more words out, Papoo slapped me. My entire head snapped with a deafening crack. My eyes started to water and I gingerly put my ungloved hand to my cheek. It was as warm as the wall. The sting was nothing compared to the deafening humiliation that followed. To the priest, he said, “If she has offended you in any way, please accept my sincerest apologies. She is bad with people. I am working on the repairs of the Eye. I brought her with me to catalog the places I need to fix.”

The acolyte looked between us, clearly savoring the imbalance of power. Finally, crossed his arms again and replied, “I’ll let it slide this time. But make sure you keep her in line.”

“Yes, Your Honor.” Papoo bowed again. He narrowed his eyes at me. The priest gave me a cocky half-grin as I bowed from the hips.

“Be gone for today. You may resume your work on the Eye tomorrow.” He flicked his wrist with such indifference that it took all my self-control not to grab it and snap it in two. See how he liked it.

One hundred, ninety-nine, ninety-eight. She is bad with people. I clenched my fists.

“Oh, and if you displease me or a member of the sacred Order again…” He waited until he saw my eyes.

Ninety-seven, ninety-six. She is bad with people.

“We won’t be so lenient.”

I almost growled at him. She is bad with people.

Ninety-five. Ninety-four.

“Yes, Your Honor,” Papoo said, grabbing my bicep and leading me home. He didn’t let me go until we crossed the threshold.

“Pa—”

He snarled, “I don’t want to hear it.”

“But—”

“Enough, Isla! Tomorrow is your Calling, and I expect you to behave. I expect you to be respectful. I expect you to accept your Calling and quit fighting, quit questioning, quit rejecting your people. Am I understood?” I said nothing. “Am I understood?”

“Yes,” I said, flat as a stroopwafel. Before he could stop me, I stomped outside. I needed to be alone. I always wanted to be alone. I don’t know what it was about people that irked me, that gave me gooseflesh, that made me grow impatient with the way the world operated. It was like I could only stand others in small doses, and they couldn’t stand me at all.

I ruffled the dust as I entered the shed Papoo let me use a as a workspace. My dragon sculpture was not anywhere near being finished. There was a big block of marble that I hadn’t touched yet, but there was something chilling about my progress. About the dragon emerging from the stone like it was born anew. I worked until it was well past supper.

When I finally went in, there was a plate of smoked salmon, rice, and a small smattering of vegetables. They were difficult to grow here because of the cold and the lack of light. So, I savored that one boiled carrot and was grateful Papoo left me a plate.

I trudged up the stairs, hearing roaring snores as I passed Papoo’s room on the second floor, to my room on the third. For a moment, I stared out the window at the Eye. My window was bolted down otherwise I would have opened it for a better view; the double paned glass was frosted at the corners, but still, I scanned the city. Nothing.

As I got into my top bunk—the bottom of which was empty now that my sister was going back and forth between home and Niko’s—I heard the rather violent tapping of gleaming.

Perfect, I thought, a storm before the storm.

Because tomorrow, tomorrow, I would be Called.

For the first and only time in my life, I was about to come face to face with a dragon. But I couldn’t focus on that because I knew what I felt. The smoke from the tower. The searing heat on the wall.

Something inside the Eye of Adamas was burning.