Chapter 2: The Tavern's Tremolo
The lock of Aria's hair burned against Lyra's chest, a cold fire searing through her tunic with every step. King Veyl's phantom hoofprints glowed ahead, winding through the skeletal trees like a serpent of starlight. The bone flute hummed against her hip, its pulse syncing with her heartbeat, thief-thump, thief-thump, as if it had carved a hollow in her ribs to nestle deeper.
"Faster," the flute murmured, Aria's voice syrup-sweet and serpentine. "The king's hunters won't linger."
Lyra's breath fogged the air. Three days she'd walked, surviving on melted snow and the leathery mushrooms that clung to dead birch trunks. Her reflection in icy puddles horrified her: cheeks gaunt as a starved hound's, eyes twin pits of smudged charcoal. But the flute? It thrived. The crimson veins threading its bone had thickened, pulsing like exposed nerves.
On the fourth dusk, smoke smudged the horizon.
A village.
Lyra crouched in a thicket, watching farmers haul ale casks into a thatch-roofed tavern. The sign above the door creaked in the wind: The Merry Moth. Lute music and laughter spilled out, along with the scent of roast hare and mulled wine. Her stomach clenched.
"No," she whispered.
The flute laughed. "You reek of desperation, sister. They'll smell it too."
But hunger outmuscled fear. Lyra tore a strip from her cloak's hem, wrapping it around her head like a beggar's cowl. She slipped inside.
Heat hit her first—a sweaty, beer-soaked warmth that made her lightheaded. Then the stares. A dozen pairs of eyes flicked to her mud-caked boots, her singed tunic. She hunched her shoulders and slid onto a stool farthest from the hearth.
"What'll it be?" The barkeep's beard was frosted with ale foam.
Lyra hesitated. Aria had always handled the coins, the bartering, the smiles. "Bread," she rasped. "Whatever's stale."
The man snorted but tossed her a heel of rye bread. She devoured it, the crust scraping her throat. At the next table, an off-duty soldier in king's colors slammed his tankard, slurring a ballad about Veyl's victory at Blackwater Ford.
"and the river ran red, hah! Red as a whore's lips.."
Lyra's fingers twitched toward the flute.
"Don't".
Too late.
The soldier turned. His gaze snagged on her wrist, where Aria's bracelet, a braid of silver and midnight hair, peeked beneath her sleeve. Recognition flared in his bloodshot eyes.
"You." He stood, chair screeching. "The girl from the caravan."
Panic licked up Lyra's spine. The flute purred, "Yes."
The tavern stilled. The barkeep froze mid-pour.
"Think I don't know a String Clan trinket?" The soldier lurched closer, hot breath reeking of caraway and rot. "Heard they dragged a little mouse outta the ashes. You her?"
Lyra stood, but he caught her wrist. The bracelet snapped, hair and silver scattering.
"Pretty thing," he sneered. "Bet you sing prettier."
The flute's hum became a snarl.
Lyra's vision blurred. The tavern's noise distended, laughter stretching into screams, the lute's chords warping into a sickening minor key. She fumbled for the flute.
Don't don't don't…
The soldier drew his dagger. "Let's see what's under that rag."
Lyra blew.
The note was shrill, a faltering *C-sharp* that skittered across the room. Glasses shattered. Patrons clapped hands over ears. But the soldier laughed, untouched, blade glinting..
Until the hearth exhaled.
Flames surged sideways, clinging to walls, tables, and skin. The soldier's laughter curdled as fire slithered into his open mouth. He collapsed, clawing at his throat, his screams harmonizing with the flute's rising crescendo.
Lyra tried to stop. She really did.
But the flute played her now.
Stone groaned. The tavern's central beam cracked, splinters raining down as the ceiling buckled. A woman yanked her child beneath a table. A man's leg snapped under falling timber.
"Stop!" Lyra screamed into the bone, her lips splitting.
The flute drank her blood greedily.
With a final, thunderous bellow, The roof collapsed.
Silence.
Lyra staggered through rubble, the flute's satisfied hum vibrating in her molars. Smoke stung her eyes. Beneath a shattered ale cask, the soldier's hand twitched, his skin blistered black.
Murderer, she thought.
Survivor, the flute corrected.
Outside, snow fell ash-gray. Lyra retched, but only bile came up. A child's whimper echoed from the ruins. She turned…
"Don't." The flute's voice hardened. "You'll mourn them better when the king's bones decorate your feet."
Lyra ran.
By dawn, she'd fashioned a new disguise: a minstrel's patched cloak looted from a dead traveler's pack, his lute strapped to her back to mask the flute's silhouette. She smeared dirt on her cheeks, matted her hair with pine pitch.
"You'll need a sweeter lie," the flute said as they approached the capital's outer farms.
Lyra plucked a name from the ashes of her old life.
"Call me Marrow," she whispered.
Somewhere, Aria laughed.
The capital's spires pierced the horizon, sharp as lyre strings. Lyra adjusted
her stolen lute and stepped onto the king's road.
The flute crooned a lullaby only she could hear.