The Unbroken Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2021 by Cherae Clark

  Excerpt from The Jasmine Throne copyright © 2021 by Natasha Suri

  Excerpt from Son of the Storm copyright © 2021 Suyi Davies Okungbowa

  Cover design by Lauren Panepinto

  Cover illustration by Tommy Arnold

  Cover copyright © 2021 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  Map illustration by Tim Paul

  Author photograph by Jovita McCleod

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  First Edition: March 2021

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Clark, C. L. (Cherae L.), author.

  Title: The unbroken / C.L. Clark.

  Description: First edition. | New York : Orbit, 2021. | Series: Magic of the lost; book one

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020027495 | ISBN 9780316542753 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9780316542692 (ebook)

  Subjects: GSAFD: Fantasy fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3603.L356626 U53 2021 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020027495

  ISBNs: 978-0-316-54275-3 (trade paperback), 978-0-316-54267-8 (ebook)

  E3-20210219-JV-NF-ORI

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Map

  Part 1: Soldiers Chapter 1: Change

  Chapter 2: A Homecoming

  Chapter 3: The Governor-General

  Chapter 4: Captives

  Chapter 5: The First Broadside

  Chapter 6: A Family

  Chapter 7: The Governor-General, Again

  Chapter 8: The Lieutenant

  Chapter 9: The Court-Martial

  Chapter 10: The Assistant

  Part 2: Turncoats Chapter 11: The Modiste

  Chapter 12: The Ball

  Chapter 13: A Dance

  Chapter 14: The Bookseller

  Chapter 15: Rebellions

  Chapter 16: Another Broadside

  Chapter 17: Little Talks

  Chapter 18: Shālan Lessons

  Chapter 19: History Lessons

  Chapter 20: For Research

  Chapter 21: Grains of Sand

  Chapter 22: An Alliance

  Chapter 23: A Hope in the Dark

  Chapter 24: Citizenship

  Chapter 25: A Family, Broken

  Part 3: Rebels Chapter 26: A Duty

  Chapter 27: Waking Up

  Chapter 28: A Line in the Sand

  Chapter 29: The Many-Legged

  Chapter 30: A Hunger

  Chapter 31: A Warning

  Chapter 32: A Family (Reprise)

  Chapter 33: A Family, Broken (Reprise)

  Chapter 34: A Matter of Faith

  Part 4: Martyrs Chapter 35: An Unearthing

  Chapter 36: Reparations

  Chapter 37: A Reminder

  Chapter 38: A Sickness

  Chapter 39: A Panic

  Chapter 40: A Sacrifice

  Chapter 41: To Unknit

  Chapter 42: The Rain (And Yet Another Broadside)

  Chapter 43: Waking Up (Reprise)

  Epilogue: To Knit

  Acknowledgments

  Discover More

  Extras Meet the Author

  A Preview of The Jasmine Throne

  A Preview of Son of the Storm

  In Memoriam

  Samira Sayeh: Le soutien, l’inspiration, et la sagesse

  Clarence Lewis “C. L.” Clark: The O.G.

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  PART 1

  SOLDIERS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHANGE

  A sandstorm brewed dark and menacing against the Qazāli horizon as Lieutenant Touraine and the rest of the Balladairan Colonial Brigade sailed into El-Wast, capital city of Qazāl, foremost of Balladaire’s southern colonies.

  El-Wast. City of marble and sandstone, of olives and clay. City of the golden sun and fruits Touraine couldn’t remember tasting. City of rebellious, uncivilized god-worshippers. The city where Touraine was born.

  At a sudden gust, Touraine pulled her black military coat tighter about her body and hunched small over the railing of the ship as it approached land. Even from this distance, in the early-morning dark, she could see a black Balladairan standard flapping above the docks. Its rearing golden horse danced to life, sparked by the reflection of the night lanterns. Around her, pale Balladairan-born sailors scrambled across the ship to bring it safely to harbor.

  El-Wast, for the first time in some twenty-odd years. It took the air from the lieutenant’s chest. Her white-knuckle grip on the rail was only partly due to the nausea that had rocked her on the water.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Tibeau, Touraine’s second sergeant and best friend, settled against the rail next to her. The wooden rail shifted under his bulk. He spoke quietly, but Touraine could hear the awe and longing in the soft rumble of his voice.

  Beautiful wasn’t the first thing Touraine thought as their ship sailed up the mouth of the River Hadd and gave them a view of El-Wast. The city was surprisingly big. Surprisingly bright. It was surprisingly… civilized. A proper city, not some scattering of tents and sand. Not what she had expected at all, given how Balladairans described the desert colonies. From this angle, it didn’t even look like a desert.

  The docks stretched along the river like a small town, short buildings nestled alongside what were probably warehouses and workers’ tenements. Just beyond them, a massive bridge arced over shadowed farmland with some crop growing in neat rows, connecting the docks to the curve of a crumbling wall that surrounded the city. The Mile-Long Bridge. The great bridge was lined with the shadows of palm trees and lit up all along with the fuzzy dots of lanterns. In the morning darkness, you could easily have mistaken the lanterns for stars.

  She shrugged. “It’s impressive, I guess.”

  Tibeau nudged her shoulder and held his arms out wide to take it all in. “You guess? This is your home. We’re finally back. You’re going to love it.” His eyes shone in the reflection of the lanterns guiding the Balladairan ship into Crocodile Harbor, named for the monstrous lizards that had supposedly lived in the river centuries ago.

  Home. Touraine frowned. “Love it? Beau, we’re not on leave.” She dug half-moons into the soft, weather-worn wood of the railing and grumbled, “We have a job to do.”

  Tibea
u scoffed. “To police our own people.”

  The thunk of approaching boots on the deck behind them stopped Touraine from saying something that would keep Tibeau from speaking to her for the rest of the day. Something like These aren’t my people. How could they be? Touraine had barely been toddling in the dust when Balladaire took her.

  “You two better not be talking about what I think you’re talking about,” Sergeant Pruett said, coming up behind them with her arms crossed.

  “Of course not,” Touraine said. She and Pruett let their knuckles brush in the cover of darkness.

  “Good. Because I’d hate to have to throw you bearfuckers overboard.”

  Pruett. The sensible one to Tibeau’s impetuousness, the scowl to his smile. The only thing they agreed on was hating Balladaire for what it had done to them, but unlike Tibeau, who was only biding his time before some imaginary revolution, Pruett was resigned to the conscripts’ fate and thought it better to keep their heads down and hate Balladaire in private.

  Pruett shoved her way between the two of them and propped her elbows on the railing. Her teeth chattered. “It’s cold as a bastard here. I thought the deserts were supposed to be hot.”

  Tibeau sighed wistfully, staring with longing at some point beyond the city. “Only during the day. In the real desert, you can freeze your balls off if you forget a blanket.”

  “You sound… oddly excited about that.” Pruett looked askance at him.

  Tibeau grinned.

  Home was a sharp topic for every soldier in the Balladairan Colonial Brigade. There were those like Tibeau and Pruett, who had been taken from countries throughout the broken Shālan Empire when they were old enough to already have memories of family or the lack thereof, and then there were those like Touraine, who had been too young to remember anything but Balladaire’s green fields and thick forests.

  No matter where in the Shālan Empire the conscripts were originally from, they all speculated on the purpose of their new post. There was excitement on the wind, and Touraine felt it, too. The chance to prove herself. The chance to show the Balladairan officers that she deserved to be a captain. Change was coming.

  Even the Balladairan princess had come with the fleet. Pruett had heard from another conscript who had it from a sailor that the princess was visiting her southern colonies for the first time, and so the conscripts took turns trying to spot the young royal on her ship.

  The order came to disembark, carried by shouts on the wind. Discipline temporarily disappeared as the conscripts and their Balladairan officers hoisted their packs and tramped down to Crocodile Harbor’s thronged streets.

  People shouted in Balladairan and Shālan as they loaded and unloaded ships, animals in cages and animals on leads squawked and bellowed, and Touraine walked through it all in a daze, trying to take it in. Qazāl’s dirt and grit crunched beneath her army-issued boots. Maybe she did feel a spark of awe and curiosity. And maybe that frightened her just a little.

  With a wumph, Touraine walked right into an odd tan horse with a massive hump in the middle of its back. She spat and dusted coarse fur off her face. The animal glared at her with large, affronted brown eyes and a bubble of spit forming at the corner of its mouth.

  The animal’s master flicked his long gray-streaked hair back off his smiling face and spoke to Touraine in Shālan.

  Touraine hadn’t spoken Shālan since she was small. It wasn’t allowed when they were children in Balladaire, and now it sounded as foreign as the camel’s groan. She shook her head.

  “Camel. He spit,” the man warned, this time in Balladairan. The camel continued to size her up. It didn’t look like it was coming to any good conclusion.

  Touraine grimaced in disgust, but beside her, Pruett snorted. The other woman said something short to the man in Shālan before turning Touraine toward the ships.

  “What did you say?” Touraine asked, looking over her shoulder at the glaring camel and the older man.

  “‘Please excuse my idiot friend.’”

  Touraine rolled her eyes and hefted her pack higher onto her shoulders.

  “Rose Company, Gold Squad, form up on me!” She tried in vain to gather her soldiers in some kind of order, but the noise swallowed her voice. She looked warily for Captain Rogan. If Touraine didn’t get the rest of her squad in line, that bastard would take it out on all of them. “Gold Squad, form up!”

  Pruett nudged Touraine in the ribs. She pointed, and Touraine saw what kept her soldiers clumped in whispering groups, out of formation.

  A young woman descended the gangway of another ship with the support of a cane. She wore black trousers, a black coat, and a short black cloak lined with cloth of gold. Her blond hair, pinned in a bun behind her head, sparked like a beacon in the night. Three stone-faced royal guards accompanied her in a protective triangle, their short gold cloaks blown taut behind them. Each of them had a sword on one hip and a pistol on the other.

  Touraine looked from the princess to the chaos on the ground, and a growing sense of unease raised the short hairs on the back of her neck. Suddenly, the crowd felt more claustrophobic than industrious.

  The man with the camel still stood nearby, watching with interest like the other dockworkers. His warm smile deepened the lines in his face, and he guided the animal’s nose to her, as if she wanted to pat it. The camel looked as unenthusiastic at the prospect as Touraine felt.

  “No.” Touraine shook her head at him again. “Move, sir. Give us this space, if you please.”

  He didn’t move. Probably didn’t understand proper Balladairan. She shooed him with her hands. Instead of reacting with annoyance or confusion, he glanced fearfully over her shoulder.

  She followed his gaze. Nothing there but the press of the crowd, her own soldiers either watching the princess or drowsily taking in their new surroundings in the early-morning light. Then she saw it: a young Qazāli woman weaving through the crowd, gaze fixed on one blond point.

  The camel man grabbed Touraine’s arm, and she jerked away.

  Touraine was a good soldier, and a good soldier would do her duty. She didn’t let herself imagine what the consequences would be if she was wrong.

  “Attack!” she bellowed, fit for a battlefield. “To the princess!”

  The Qazāli man muttered something in Shālan, probably a curse, before he shouted, too. A warning to his fellow. To more of them, maybe. Something glinted in his hands.

  Touraine spared only half a glance toward the princess. That was what the royal guard was for. Instead, she launched toward the camel man, dropping her pack instead of swinging it at him. Stupid, stupid. Instinct alone saved her life. She lifted her arms just in time to get a slice across her left forearm instead of her throat.

  She drew her baton to counterattack, but instead of running in the scant moment he had, the old man hesitated, squinting at her.

  “Wait,” he said. “You look familiar.” His Balladairan was suddenly more than adequate.

  Touraine shook off his words, knocked the knife from his hand, and tripped him to the ground. He struggled against her with wiry strength until she pinned the baton against his throat. That kept him from saying anything else. She held him there, her teeth bared and his eyes wide while he strained for breath. Behind her, the camel man’s companions clashed with the other soldiers. A young woman’s high-pitched cry. The princess or the assassin?

  The old man rasped against the pressure of the baton. “Wait,” he started, but Touraine pressed harder until he lost the words.

  Then the docks went silent. The rest of the attackers had been taken down, dead or apprehended. The man beneath her realized it, too, and all the fight sagged out of him.

  When they relieved her, she stood to find herself surrounded. The three royal guards, alert, swords drawn; a handful of fancy-looking if spooked civilians; the general—her general. General Cantic. And, of course, the princess.

  Heat rose to her face. Touraine knew that some part of her should be afraid of oversteppi
ng; she’d just shat on all the rules and decorum that had been drilled into the conscripts for two decades. But the highest duty was to the throne of Balladaire, and not everyone could say they had stopped an assassination. Even if Touraine was a conscript, she couldn’t be punished for that. She hoped. She settled into the strength of her broad shoulders and bowed deeply to the princess.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you, Your Highness,” Touraine said, her voice smooth and low.

  The princess quirked an eyebrow. “Thank you”—the princess looked to the double wheat-stalk pins on Touraine’s collar—“Lieutenant…?”

  “Lieutenant Touraine, Your Highness.” Touraine bowed again. She peeked at the general out of the corner of her eye, but the older woman’s lined face was unreadable.

  “Thank you, Lieutenant Touraine, for your quick thinking.”

  A small shuffling to the side admitted a horse-faced man with a dark brown tail of hair under his bicorne hat. Captain Rogan sneered over Touraine before bowing to the princess.

  “Your Highness, I apologize if this Sand has inconvenienced you.” Before the princess could respond, Rogan turned to Touraine and spat, “Get back to your squad. Form them up like they should have been.”

  So much for taking her chance to rise. So much for duty. Touraine sucked her teeth and saluted. “Yes, sir.”

  She tightened her sleeve against the bleeding cut on her left arm and went back to her squad, who stood in a tight clump a few yards away from the old man’s camel. The beast huffed with a sound like a bubbling kettle, and a disdainful glob of foamy spittle dripped from its slack lips. Safe enough to say she had made an impression on the locals.

  And the others? Touraine looked back for another glimpse at the princess and found the other woman meeting her gaze. Touraine tugged the bill of her field cap and nodded before turning away, attempting to appear as unruffled as she could.

  When Touraine returned to her squad, Pruett looked uncertain as Rogan handed the older man off to another officer, who led him and the young woman away. “I told you to be careful about attracting attention.”