I huddle in a cramped compartment, barely able to breathe through the thick bolts of cloth between me and the thin cracks in the wood. As the carriage rumbles over the uneven dirt road, every bump risks throwing my head into the floor above me. I close my eyes, but it doesn't make the space any more comfortable.

  Three days like this. The first took me away from Cloud Palace and the Fire Palace. The second brought me to the edge of Fire Clan territory. Now the carriage continues south through Air Clan territory. In the distance, I hear the battle cries of water warriors and the whooshing of air against the crashing of waves. We're not near the coast--I never knew the fighting had come this far inland.

  What was I even doing in the palace, while not learning something so important?

  Air Clan territory is the least safe. The clan has been leaderless since they were nearly destroyed thirty years ago, and being on the border with the water kingdom has done them no favors. But south of here is the Beast Clan, and south of there is the Forest Clan. Their territories are larger with plenty of cities and towns to lose myself in.

  The carriage rolls to a stop and Thalia taps her claws on the wooden floor. "Trouble ahead," she murmurs.

  Trouble ahead, trouble behind.

  Thalia follows the other paying passengers out of the carriage, and I hear her arguing with daytime robbers. They are more and louder and evidently stronger than my feathered friend, as suddenly her shouting ceases and they roughly search the carriage. The pull me out by the scruff of my neck and deposit me next to her unconscious body.

  Beast Clan scavengers take everything of value, then realize the usefulness of the carriage and put it all back, leaving us to rot.

  "Thalia." I kick her with my bare toes. "Thalia!"

  She rolls over and blinks at me. "Hwat?" She frowns up at the sun and covers her big eyes with clawed hands.

  "Fly back. I don't want you to get in trouble." The two dryads are already on the path heading south, and I intend to follow. Thalia argues, but Air Clan territory is too grassy and open for her.

  I run to catch up, and the Forest Clan Dryads react expressively by slowing their pace and almost looing in my direction. One's antlers even twitch, a pointy ear turned towards me. "Thank you."

  They can apparently walk forever, continuing right past a sleepy village as the sun sets over the distant Shadowlands. I try to find a sheltered place to rest, eventually settling down between a couple of large boulders, and wae on a sinking boat in the middle of a lake to the sound of wisps chanting.

  My instinct is to draw flame through my skin, which quickly burns through the flimsy wooden raft and leaves me stranded in water, defenseless and cold. On the lakeshore, the villagers call down wind to stir up the waves and plead for the lake monster to be satisfied as I am forced underwater.

  Is there any flare that knows how to swim? Weighted down by the thick dress they smothered me in, I sink away from the starlight. Ridding myself of it only pushes me further away from the surface, and the water itself grows heavier. It stings my eyes, but I still watch as the world fades away.

  At least my sisters will never know I died so quietly. No one will drain my blood. And a new phoenix will be chosen, one who is stronger and better suited to lead.

  A bubble of air envelopes me, pulling me down to the murky depths. The water rushes up past me, seaweed and sea creatures floating by. Below, the world grows gradually lighter until the air around me merges with the light and drops me into a blaze of color and onto a couch. Above, the lake hangs suspended, fish swimming at the bottom.

  Dizzy, I look around. The room is familiar in spite of its strangeness: the soft carpets, the elaborately carved pillars, the impressively detailed embroidered wall hangings and elegant furniture all whisper of royal wealth. The rooms are round and wide and carefully decorated, and the ceiling conspicuously absent. If that was not enough of a hint, the motifs are all wispy and white, as if every surface was painted by a breeze.

  I read that all the Air Clan palaces were destroyed. Perhaps this one was hidden under the lake to preserve it.

  Have I been sacrificed to clean it? Rather a waste of a phoenix, even if I am the weakest to have ever existed. Shouldn't I be standing on the battlefield with the wisp warriors, fighting off the thunderbird and his sprites?

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Instead I am in a palatial reception room, reclining on a couch next to a small refreshment table with a view of artistic works designed to humble and impress. The carvings and paintings of air dragons fiercely battling nature make Cloud Palace's depictions of phoenixes quite plain by comparison.

  Archways open to a dining hall on one side and a ballroom on the other. In front of me, windows that once probably overlooked ornamental gardens now separate the room from the lake, the size of the sea creatures unbelievable until I remember that Air Clan doesn't eat meat. Behind me, proper walls with real doors hide the rest of the palace.

  Hopefully, it has full closets. My skinsuit is designed to protect my clothing from me by channeling and containing my fire. It does not keep out the humid, cold air at all.

  The first door I open brings me to a hallway that curves and splits off, taking every opportunity to pause with a tower or a terrace. The floor below is more functional, housing the servants' quarters, crafters' quarters, kitchens, libraries, studies, and the throne room. From the throne room, a spiral stone staircase leads down to cavernous crypt where stone tables make a cold final resting place for elderly wisps--pale and white and altogether too well preserved for comfort.

  I return to the third floor to breathe an idea of fresher air and remember that wisps prefer high, exposed places. In a palace, the towers should have bedrooms.

  Except that the bedding is a bit stiff, they are quite well-kept. All the expected furniture is present, but the wardrobes and dressers are disappointingly empty. When the third tower proves equally unhelpful, I wrap myself in the blankets instead and go to sleep.

  The light never changes, a soft glow keeping the palace gently visible. The air is quiet and still, and the water silent against the palace walls and windows. It is tempting to stay in the blankets forever--would the phoenix sustain me if I did?

  When it feels like I might as well, I rise to explore again.

  The bedroom has a connected bathroom, the same air motifs running along textured walls. But the light fixtures are decorative, holding neither storm-power nor flame. Where does the light come from? In the mirror, a woman with streaks of red and gold in her dark hair looks back at me, the mark of the phoenix visible between her eyes.

  Since when?

  I am not the phoenix yet, not really. I should be spending a year in the Cloud Palace as the mantle settles. Instead I am here, in an Air Clan palace underwater, and the signs are faint. I look nothing like the paintings of past phoenixes, but it is happening. I am becoming her.

  I reach for a faucet and find only smooth ceramic. There is a basin and a tub for washing, but no pipes. A pot on the floor between the tub and washstand gives me a memory I don't have of a time before running water. Although the palace is surrounded by it, there seems to be no way to access water. Sending waste out...

  I back away slowly, and reconsider the soft bed. Perhaps if I sleep long enough, the palace will learn to fly again.

  But I fail to sleep and go to check other rooms. Two towers are almost identical to mine, and the small libraries between them have all the books and none of the expected dust and hint of mildew. The kitchen has its own curiosity: it is entirely empty of food. There are all manner of cookware and utensils, but nothing to cook and no wood for the fires.

  It is as if the palace was built by someone who was only imitating the grandeur of old palaces, and did not understand human needs. The Cloud Palace had freezers and pantries of food, closets with vintage dress, old torches and electricity and running water. I should have just stayed there, and risked getting murdered in my sleep...

  "All that planning and discomfort, and I still die in a palace." The sound of my voice startles the air, and I half expect to see a lizard running for cover as I look around. Nothing moves, yet the feeling of a presence persists. "Hello?"

  I walk back into the hallway, peering around doors and up tower stairwells. "Is anyone here?"

  A whisper of a breeze sighs somewhere ahead. "Hello?" I follow the feeling and find myself back in the first room with its couches and columns. "Hello?"

  A single hand waves from behind a thick pillar, on which a dragon flies majestically. "Do you live here?" I feel silly talking to a hand, but when I circle to see the rest of him he still keeps behind the pillar. "Are you hideous? I'm sorry, I shouldn't ask that." I back away and sit on the couch. "Was it you that saved me today? Yesterday? Earlier?"

  "You're the phoenix."

  My hand covers the mark on my forehead so quickly that I have to laugh at myself. It isn't the only sign. Before I took the mantle there was already the glowing red, orange, and yellow flaming phoenix mark across my back and shoulders. Now it's also in the streaks of color in my hair and the brightness of my eyes, features I cannot hide.

  "Why are you here?" HIs hand creeps away.

  "I think I have been sacrificed to appease the lake monster." A sensitive, shy monster.

  A wisp of white hair appears from behind the pillar, and a breeze rustles across the room, disturbing the wall hangings. "Odd."

  "I think it was a mistake. Lake monsters cannot have much use for Fire Clan magic." Air monsters either, unless he's cold like me.

  "Fire Clan?"

  "I thought the wine red skin and cherry black hair gave it away..." The villagers certainly thought so, from their confidence that I would drown.

  A white eyebrow in a pale forehead arches with a persistent question.

  I hold my hands together and conjure a ball of fire. "Fire."

  Another breeze shoots out, this one swirling around me and snuffing out my fire. "Air."

  "Well met." Not really, though, since he still hides. But a bony protrusion in the center of his forehead is bringing to mind someone I've seen somewhere before. Who? Where? I dismiss several possibilities before the tapestries catch my attention. The designs of dragons in human form have the same bone structure. "That's..not..likely.." The destruction of the dragons was not a small note in the history books.

  Then again, Air palaces are also supposed to be gone. "Are you a real dragon?"

  Piercing ice-blue eyes peer at me from behind the pillar. "Only if you promise not to have an attack of the heart."