Page 17 of Under the Iron Sky

Raina pulled a roll of white cloth down to cover the back wall all the chairs were facing. “Nope. It was made before we used solar energy, so you just place a candle beneath the glass on the bottom compartment, pop a slide on the top part, and you get an image—and put that wrench away. It doesn’t need upgrading.”

Soraya put away said wrench that she absolutely had not just pulled out of her back pocket and slunk into the stool beside the ancient beast.

“What’s wrong?” Raina asked.

“I can’t help but feel like we’re moving backward. I mean, look at all this.” She made a sweeping gesture to the desks. “When we were at school, we had all the technology in the world at our fingertips, and now …” If she closed her eyes, she could see it so clearly. The pale blue charts and maps on the walls. The high arched windows with sunlight blazing in to charge the Sunflowers on their desks. The gold furnishings. The glass chandelier above their heads that changed color with the seasons, and the gold dome on the floor that projected holographic charts or images of whatever they were learning that day into the air. Raina had done her best to replicate it, but it would never live up to what they’d had. Soraya doubted anything ever would again.

Raina’s lips thinned into a tight smile, as if remembering those days too. “I know—but at least we still have these resources. At least we’re still here, able to moan about our scars. At this point in the war, growing old to feel these aches is a privilege many don’t get.”

“How can you still be so optimistic?”

“Because the alternative frightens me to death.”

Students began filing into the room not long after that. Soraya tried not to look too long at their faces. All so small and excited for their chance to change the world one day.

“Welcome,” Raina announced when everyone was seated. For a woman who’d never seen a day’s battle in her life, she was awfully good at commanding a room. “Let’s not waste any time, shall we? Who can tell me why we are here today?”

A boy with blond hair and an arrogant smirk asked, “Shouldn’t you be telling us that, professor?”

A few children scoffed, and Soraya found herself sitting a little straighter.

Raina gave a faint nod toward the back of the room, and Soraya obediently lit the candle that’d been laid by the device’s base. She added the first slide, and an image appeared on the wall. A portrait made of colored glass, of a beautiful olive-skinned woman wearing a flowing white gown.

“Who is this?” Raina asked. Several hands shot into the air. Raina purposely ignored the rude boy and chose a red-haired girl in the third row.

“That’s Queen Aleena Savros. Last queen of the great Vordellian empire—and the longest-reigning monarch of all time. Nearly two hundred and two when she died.”

The slide wasn’t at all how Soraya remembered her. She looked strong in this portrait. Her shoulders, albeit slender, were set proudly from atop her throne, her chin raised toward the sky while a golden crown that looked like a setting sun, large opals welded into each ray of sunlight, sat atop her head.

Raina’s answering smile was soft. “Correct. Why is her passing so significant?”

More hands. Raina nodded to a girl on the far left.

“Because she’s the one who trapped the Dar’rak underground.”

Raina smiled again. “Correct. We used to believe that magic was just that—magic. A fairy tale. Before any of you were born, many of us grew up on bedtime stories about fairies and dragons—and it wasn’t until Queen Aleena’s death that we learned the truth. That these stories and creatures were all very real, and they were trapped right beneath our feet.”

Noreen said it was a protection measure. To let the children of Vordell hear stories about all these strange creatures so that when they were told about their planet’s true history at age eighteen, it would be easier to swallow.

Not that it will make a difference, Aleena apparently used to say to the guards closest to her. They’re probably all dead anyway, but it would not be wise to leave ourselves ill-prepared.

But they were not dead—and while the Vordellians had been readying their own arsenal for any eventuality, so had the enemy.

Soraya changed the slide, and the room fell eerily silent as the projection showed a crownless Aleena standing beside a man dressed in a black cloak. His face wasn’t visible beneath his hood, but everyone recognized the heavy black chains around his neck and the crimson crescent moon hanging from it, swinging like a reaper’s scythe.

“I know we all know who this is.” Raina’s previously steady voice was a little quieter now. More unsure than she usually was. “Ramapheal. They call him the Ancient One. According to Queen Aleena’s logs, he came to Vordell twenty years into her father’s reign. His people were from a dying land on the other side of the planet. Fairies, golems, Ethereals, Arakna, dragons, and the creatures we would later come to call the Dar’rak.”

“And we just let them in,” the rude boy said with a scoff.

“And why shouldn’t we have?” Raina asked with a stern quirk of her brow. “According to reports, Ramapheal and his followers were peaceful to begin with. They were weak and starving, and all they wanted was food and shelter.”

“Aleena’s father didn’t believe them, though,” the boy cut in again. “He turned them away. Said there was something off about them, but Aleena’s mother convinced him to let them stay.”

Now Raina’s patience thinned a little. The only time Soraya ever saw her lose her usually cool exterior was when she was interrupted. “If you know the story so well, why don’t you come up here and teach the class, Mr. Monothor?”

Soraya almost rolled her eyes. Of course this lad was related to Vander. Who else found time to be arrogant at the brink of extinction?

The Monothor boy’s face now a lovely shade of pink, Raina continued. “Now, the thing we need to bear in mind is that during this time, none of these creatures had magic—except …”