A Throne for Sisters

She struck and she struck, until the boys fell back. They might have been prepared to join the army, but the Masked Brothers on their side didn’t teach them to fight. That would have made them too hard to control. Kate struck one of the boys in the face, then spun back to hit another’s elbow with a crack of iron on bone.

“Stand up,” she said to her sister, holding out her hand. “Stand up!”

Her sister stood numbly, taking Kate’s hand as though she were the younger sister for once.

Kate set off running, and her sister ran with her. Sophia appeared to come back to herself as they ran, some of the old certainty seeming to return as they raced along the corridors of the orphanage.

Behind them, Kate could hear shouting, from boys or sisters or both. She didn’t care. She knew there was no way but out.

“We can’t go back,” Sophia said. “We have to leave the orphanage.”

Kate nodded. Something like this wouldn’t earn just a beating as punishment. But then Kate remembered.

“Then we go,” Kate replied, running. “First I just need to – ”

“No,” Sophia said. “There’s no time. Leave everything. We need to go.”

Kate shook her head. There were some things she couldn’t leave behind.

So instead, she raced in the direction of her dormitory, keeping hold of Sophia’s arm so that she would follow.

The dormitory was a bleak place, with beds that were little more than wooden slats sticking out from the wall like shelves. Kate wasn’t stupid enough to put anything that mattered in the small chest at the foot of her bed, where anyone could steal it. Instead, she went to a crack between two floorboards, worrying at it with her fingers until one lifted.

“Kate,” Sophia huffed and puffed, catching her breath, “there’s no time.”

Kate shook her head.

“I won’t leave it behind.”

Sophia had to know what she’d come for; the one memento she had from that night, from their old life.

Finally, Kate’s finger’s fastened around metal, and she lifted the locket clear to shine in the dim light.

When she was a child, she’d been sure that it was real gold; a fortune waiting to be spent. As she’d gotten older, she’d come to see that it was some cheaper alloy, but by then, it had come to be worth far more than gold to her anyway. The miniature inside, of a woman smiling while a man had his hand on her shoulder, was the closest thing to a memory of her parents she had.

Kate normally didn’t wear it for fear that one of the other children, or the nuns, would take it from her. Now, she tucked it inside her dress.

“Let’s go,” she said.

They ran for the door to the orphanage, supposedly always open because the Masked Goddess had found doors closed to her when she visited the world and had condemned those within. Kate and Sophia ran down the twists and turns of the corridors, coming out to the hallway, looking around for any pursuers.

Kate could hear them, but right then, there was only the usual sister beside the door: a fat woman who moved to block the way even as the two of them approached. Kate flushed red as she immediately recalled all the years of beatings she’d taken by her hands.

“There you are,” she said in a stern tone. “You’ve both been very disobedient, and – ”

Kate didn’t pause; she hit her in the stomach with the poker, hard enough to double her up. Right then, she wished it were one of the elegant swords that courtiers wore, or maybe an axe. As it was, she had to settle for merely stunning the woman long enough for her and Sophia to run past.

But then, as Kate passed through the doors, she stopped.

“Kate!” Sophia yelled, panic in her voice. “Let’s go! What are you doing?!”

But Kate couldn’t control it. Even with the shouts of those in hot pursuit. Even knowing it was risking both of their freedom.

She took two steps forward, raised the poker high, and smashed the nun again and again across her back.

The nun grunted and cried with each blow, and each sound was music to Kate’s ears.

“Kate!” Sophia pleaded, on the verge of tears.

Kate stared at the nun for a long time, too long, needing to ingrain that picture of vengeance, of justice, into her mind. It would sustain her, she knew, for whatever horrific beatings might follow.

Then she turned and burst out with her sister from the House of the Unclaimed, like two fugitives from a sinking ship. The stink and noise and bustle of the city hit Kate, but this time she didn’t slow.

She held her sister’s hand and ran.

And ran.

And ran.

And despite it all, she took a deep breath and smiled wide.

However short it might be, they had found freedom.

CHAPTER TWO

Sophia had never been so afraid, but at the same time, she had never felt so alive, or so free. As she ran through the city with her sister, she heard Kate whoop with the excitement of it, and it both set her at ease and terrified her. It made this too real. Their life would never be the same again.

“Quiet,” Sophia insisted. “You’ll bring them down on us.”

“They’re coming anyway,” her sister replied. “We might as well enjoy it.”

As if to emphasize the point, she dodged around a horse, snatched an apple from a cart, and ran across Ashton’s cobbles.

The city was bustling with the market that came to it every Sixthday, and Sophia looked around, startled at all the sights and sounds and smells. If it weren’t for the market, she’d have no idea what day it was. In the House of the Unclaimed, those things didn’t matter, only the endless cycles of prayer and work, punishment and rote learning.

Run faster, her sister sent.

The sound of whistles and cries somewhere behind them spurred her on to new speed. Sophia led the way down an alley, then struggled to follow as Kate scrambled over a wall. Her sister, for all her impetuosity, was too quick, like a solid, coiled muscle waiting to spring.

Sophia barely managed to clamber over as more whistles sounded, and as she neared the top, Kate’s strong hand was waiting for her, as always. Even in this, she realized, they were so different: Kate’s hand was rough, calloused, muscular, while Sophia’s fingers were long and smooth and delicate.

Two sides of the same coin, their mother used to say.

“They’ve summoned the watchmen,” Kate called out in disbelief, as if that somehow wasn’t playing fair.

“What did you expect?” Sophia replied. “We’re running away before they can sell us off.”

Kate led the way down narrow cobblestone steps, then toward an open space thronging with people. Sophia forced herself to slow as they approached the city’s market, holding onto Kate’s forearm to keep her from running.