Wings of Shadow

by Nicki Pau Preto

  “I’ve got updates, soldier,” she said. “Lord Rolan is about to be on the move.”

  “Tell me,” Sev said eagerly.

  “I didn’t hear anything. Lord Rolan had a meeting with his advisers yesterday, but I was not a part of it,” she said stiffly, and Tristan frowned at that. As a captain, she should be apprised of the governor’s plans and preparations, especially if she was to be involved in organizing protections and escorts. Rolan was obviously a secretive man, but Tristan couldn’t help but wonder if he knew or suspected he had a spy in his midst.

  “Then how did you…?” Sev began, but he trailed off, grinning. “I knew she’d be of use.”

  “Who?” Tristan asked, but then more footsteps heralded the arrival of another visitor. She was older than Yara, gray hair drawn back from her face in a tight bun, but her posture was straight and her eyes sharp.

  She turned to Tristan, and he was hit by a shock of recognition. Distant memories from his childhood reared up as the woman approached the bars.

  “It’s amazing what a man will talk about when he thinks there are only servants afoot,” the woman said, speaking to the others. Then her full attention settled on Tristan. She smiled. “Goodness, you’ve grown. You’re the spitting image of him.”

  “M-my father?” Tristan asked uncertainly.

  She shook her head, gaze wistful. “Lucian, your grandfather. It’s a shame you never knew him.”

  Then Tristan remembered—this woman had been a healer at the governor’s estate in Ferro back when Tristan’s family still lived there. They had left that house when he was young, but she and some of the other servants had traveled with them to one of his family’s other properties in the wake of the war. That was when his mother was still alive. They’d eventually had to leave that home as well after his mother’s death and his father’s exile, and that time, none of their servants could go with them.

  Still, he remembered her, a calming figure pressing a cool cloth to his feverish forehead or bandaging his scraped knees.

  “Hestia,” he croaked, and she beamed. He was a bit overwhelmed at what she was doing, working against her current employer for the benefit of her former. Then he remembered that Hestia’s sons had died in the last war. Of course she did not want another conflict.

  “What did you overhear?” Sev asked, bringing the conversation back to the topic at hand.

  Hestia turned. “Lord Rolan is departing in five days. And he isn’t the only one.” She nodded at Tristan. “Rolan is traveling to Qorlland City to try his hand at recruiting some of the southern lords and ladies to his side. After that, he’ll no doubt make for Aura Nova, as he mentioned no immediate plans of returning to the estate. When he departs for the south, his highly valuable prisoner will head north to an old fortress in the Spine.”

  Tristan’s heart sank—they’d been having a hard enough time finding a way out of some rich lord’s house. How on earth would they get him out of a fortified stronghold?

  Sev saw his expression and stepped forward into the lantern light. He was smiling. “You’re thinking about it the wrong way,” he said, as if he could read Tristan’s thoughts. “We don’t need to get you out of the castle—we have to make sure you never arrive.”

  “An ambush,” Tristan said, voice hushed even though his heart was galloping in his chest. “There’s no better place for a Phoenix Rider to attack than in open space. It’s perfect.”

  “We’ll have to find out the exact route they plan to take so that we can coordinate with your… other associates,” Yara said.

  Tristan guessed that her burns hadn’t happened in a house fire. He wondered why she was helping him at all.

  “And I’ll need to get on escort duty,” Sev added, and Yara nodded her agreement. “In the meantime, I’ve got a letter to send.”

  Good King Orl—or Orl the Odious, as he was later dubbed by his sister and heir—ruled over the kingdom of Qorlland from his seat of power, the infamous labyrinthine castle of Orlmoat.

  When construction commenced, it was initially met with much excitement and interest in the kingdom. Qorlland had recently expanded their territory by conquering the nearby kingdom of Tulland, which made its wealth along the river. The castle, built on the once-border between the kingdoms, was seen as a unifying gesture. Indeed, King Orl hired Tulland workers to build the structure, Tulland watermen to design the moat and fill it with flesh-eating fish, and he even hired his brother-in-law, a Tulland architect who had recently married his younger sister, Ilona, to engineer the labyrinth that would be its primary feature.

  All was well during the ten-year construction, and King Orl celebrated its completion with a grand feast for all who had had a hand in building it.

  And come morning, every one of them was dead.

  Perhaps unsurprisingly, his sister, Ilona, did not take kindly to having her husband murdered, and likewise, the Tullanese people within Qorlland began to rebel. King Orl now needed his over-the-top safety measures more than ever, retreating deeper and deeper inside Orlmoat until it was said he rarely left the labyrinth’s center and insisted on being holed up there alone with mountains of food and wine.

  While the cause of his death is unclear, some sources suggesting asphyxiation or heart attack, what is clear is that the only living person who knew the way through the labyrinth was his sister, who eventually found his body some days—or possibly weeks—later. She had been busy taking his kingdom from him while he lived in isolation, and so the revelation of the dead king’s body was a simple formality in ensuring her ascension to the throne.

  It is said she fed his corpse to the flesh-eating fish in his very own moat and gave the families of the dead his bones—as well as whatever golden rings, jeweled earrings, and other extravagant ornamentation remained on his person—as recompense.

  —“The Curious Case of Stellan Architecture: Decoys, Death, and Dismemberment,” from Stellan Art and Culture, by Olbek, High Priest of Mori, published 129 AE

  We were the first of our kind: apexes each.

  Opposites, echoes, and evenly matched.

  - CHAPTER 9 - VERONYKA

  VERONYKA AND THE REST of Tristan’s patrol stayed in Rushlea for several days.

  Since they were a Rider short, Doriyan accompanied them—not only was he without a patrol of his own, but he was from Rushlea, and so knew the town and the people better than any of them. It also helped to have someone with a bit of age and experience on hand, since the oldest person on Tristan’s patrol was Ronyn at nineteen.

  Veronyka was glad to have him. He’d done dozens of similar missions in his lifetime, and considering that their last encounter with the farmers had involved threats and assault, it was clear they needed all the help they could get.

  Still, he let Veronyka take the lead.

  “What would you like us to do?” he’d asked as they’d landed outside the village proper, temporarily taking the role of her second-in-command. He looked much better than he had when Veronyka had first met him—no longer wild-eyed with matted hair and a scraggly beard, but calm and clean-shaven.

  Despite those improvements, something of the manic agitation she recalled resurfaced whenever they were together, and Veronyka had to admit she felt some of the same unease. He had been there the night she was born, had helped Ilithya Shadowheart spirit her away from her own father. Veronyka knew he wasn’t truly to blame, that he’d been following orders—both magical and otherwise—and it had been wartime. He was hardly the only person to do something he regretted.

  He’d also been told to hunt down and kill her father, which he had not done. That counted for something in Veronyka’s books, even if it didn’t count for much with her aunt. Alexiya had grilled him before departing to search for her brother—Veronyka’s father—and had made it plain that she saw Doriyan as Avalkyra Ashfire’s bootlicker and no more.

  Veronyka knew it was more complicated than that. Her shadow magic allowed her to feel his remorse, his heartbreak—his own self-disgus
t. And his dreams? They were some of the worst she’d ever endured.

  Besides, he was trying, which was more than Veronyka could say for the other surviving member of Avalkyra Ashfire’s patrol. Sidra hadn’t been seen since she’d swooped in to scoop up a savagely burnt Val and fly her to safety, but it was clear that while Doriyan regretted and was attempting to atone for what he had done, Sidra felt no such need. She was the true bootlicker, and Veronyka suspected wherever she was and whatever she was doing, it was on Val’s orders.

  Veronyka had considered how to approach things on the flight over and found herself thinking back to their time in Vayle after the empire’s attacks had left the village damaged and the bridge destroyed.

  “I’ll call a town meeting to field questions and complaints,” she said, remembering how Tristan had handled things. “Hopefully, we’ll get a fuller picture of what’s been happening and let the villagers know they’re being heard. In the meantime, the rest of you will distribute the supplies we’ve brought and help in any way you can—repairs, cleanup, whatever they need.” Doriyan nodded and moved to join the others, but Veronyka called after him. “I’d like you to join me.”

  Lysandro’s gaze flickered—he was their unofficial clerk and correspondent, managing the messenger pigeons, sending letters, and taking notes at meetings. He had also accompanied Tristan in Vayle when he’d done the very same thing Veronyka was doing now.

  However, she wanted a read on the people in the room more than she wanted a detailed record of what they said. She needed to know if they were afraid, angry, or resentful, and Doriyan was familiar with them. She had to nip any discontent in the bud and win them over—to the Phoenix Rider cause, yes, but also to her own. They didn’t know who she was, but someday they might. And if Veronyka claimed the throne, she’d need Pyra’s support.

  She was proving herself everywhere she went, with every action and word. It was a daunting thing to think about until she considered how she’d already done it before.

  When she’d first met Tristan, he had actively disliked her—and she’d won him over, had she not? It wasn’t about tricks or deceptions. It was about showing them who she was and what she stood for. She had to prove that she was different from Avalkyra Ashfire—the renegade queen hell-bent on war—to everyone else, and also to herself.

  “Lysandro,” she added, before he could turn away. “I need you to pay attention to everything people are saying outside the meeting. There will be those who think the meeting is useless and want nothing to do with us. They’ll be hardest to please—and potential allies of the farmers.” He seemed surprised to be singled out but listened carefully to her orders. “I’d like a brief summary later—just the major points.”

  He nodded, chin high, any sense of being looked over or forgotten evaporating. Not only had she asked him to do something important, but she was trusting him to sift through what he found to give her what he deemed valuable. While Ronyn was oldest, Lysandro was youngest on the patrol. He was nearly as desperate to prove himself as Veronyka.

  Like he had with her patrol, Doriyan followed her lead with the villagers, speaking up only when he had information to offer or insight that might help Veronyka better understand the situation. The meeting had been long and exhausting—and so well attended they’d had to hold a second one the following day.

  It became clear fairly quickly that it wasn’t only the farmers who were unhappy—or who were causing trouble for the villagers. Without proper government or military, the Pilgrimage Road was always dangerous to travel, whether alone or with wagons filled with wares. There was no one to protect civilians, and no laws to be upheld in the first place. But as Fallon had reported, coordinated attacks were happening all across Pyra, not just on the road. Supplies, winter stores—even livestock—were being stolen, and anyone who dared object was met with anger and violence.

  “They call themselves the Unnamed,” one of the villagers explained on the second day of their town-wide meetings. “They carved it into my fence post.”

  “I thought it was the Untamed?” said another.

  “Suppose it could be either,” the first villager said dryly. “Their penmanship left something to be desired.”

  “It’s the Unnamed,” said Doriyan.

  Veronyka turned. “You’ve heard of them before?”

  “Rumors,” he said with a shrug. “Ran into a handful of raider types months ago outside Petratec. Claimed to be ‘nameless’ when I asked who they were and ‘homeless’ when I asked where they were from.”

  “Close enough,” Veronyka muttered. If they’d taken a name—or, she supposed, the deliberate lack of one—then it seemed they had indeed banded together in a larger sense.

  “It’s hard to know if they are related, but the Unnamed were an organized resistance to Ashfire rule in Pyra centuries ago,” he continued. “Some said they were the remnants of the Lowland civilization, rallying together for another attempt to seize control. All they managed to do was attack travelers and make the poor poorer, and eventually their revolt was put down. Still, judging by the reports coming in… this behavior is much the same.”

  “Is that what they want, then? To rule Pyra? Or to take rule from us, the Phoenix Riders?”

  “I suspect their interest is in a lack of rule,” Doriyan clarified. “They might pretend at high ideals—and certainly some of their supporters could actually hold to them—but they are, at the end of the day, criminals robbing civilians. What they want is the ability to continue to do so without obstruction.”

  “So they don’t want us here, but they don’t want the empire here either,” Veronyka said, and Doriyan inclined his head.

  The farmers who’d accosted Tristan’s patrol roughly two months back had had legitimate complaints, and she could hardly blame them for their anti–Phoenix Rider and anti-empire stance. The problem was that they were taking out their frustration on the innocent people of Pyra. Perhaps the Unnamed had more grievances against the province as a whole than the small faction of farmers, but until they turned up somewhere and made accusations—or demands—Veronyka would be unlikely to know.

  What she did know was that while the Unnamed didn’t want war with the empire, they didn’t want peace, either. They didn’t want to open their borders and welcome an influx of travelers and trade—and the soldiers that would come with them. They wanted their independence, and Commander Cassian’s flock was just another government to them, his Riders just another kind of soldier leaving fire and death everywhere they went.

  And they weren’t wrong.

  Veronyka realized that even her wildest dreams—no war, peace with the empire, and freedom for animages and Phoenix Riders alike—weren’t perfect. Whatever the farmers wanted to believe, Pyra couldn’t stand on its own. It needed to be unified with the empire again. It needed the infrastructure, the trade, and yes, the soldiers to enforce laws and make the roads safe. Only then could it truly thrive again, but with Pyra itself divided, there was no one solution to make everyone happy.

  Veronyka hoped they could talk sense into the farmers’ faction, but she didn’t know how to convince them—her first problem being that they were nowhere to be found.

  As for the road and the villages under threat, there wasn’t much the Riders could do. They didn’t have the numbers to post permanent patrols, and Veronyka feared that might exacerbate the problem anyway.

  It was sunset when Veronyka and Doriyan emerged from their final meeting with the villagers. They joined the rest of her patrol—finishing their cleanup tasks for the day—before returning to camp.

  They’d set up in the same place they had camped together in the summer… except this time, Tristan wasn’t here.

  An ache started building in Veronyka’s chest. This was the place where she’d abandoned him, and it had ultimately led to his imprisonment. And before that, it had led to hers and Xephyra’s.

  She’d made so many mistakes—grave, terrible mistakes—and it was hard not to hate herself f
or them. To lose all confidence. How could she hope to be a queen, to rule over and protect an entire empire, when she couldn’t even keep herself and her dearest loved ones safe?

  She thought of Val, of the fact that every time Veronyka tried to embrace her power, her identity, it always meant facing her sister again. In the world and even in her dreams.

  It’s okay, Xephyra said.

  Veronyka was sitting on the ground, pulling up fistfuls of grass and dirt under the same tree where she and Tristan had shared their first kiss. Xephyra loomed over her, visible in the twilight through the now-bare branches of the gnarled tree. The rest of her patrol were down the slope, seated around the fire.

  Veronyka shook her head. It’s not okay. I hurt him. I hurt you—both of you, she added, nodding at Rex, who stood just behind. The commander had allowed Veronyka to bring him, after she’d argued that patrol members—whether human or phoenix—should stay together as much as possible. For unity and flight patterns. For magic and morale.

  For any and every reason she could think of, because she couldn’t bear the idea of leaving him behind.

  Xephyra huffed, tossing Rex an exasperated look before facing down her bondmate once again. Not the boss.

  Veronyka sighed. She regretted teaching Xephyra that word. It had started when she’d called Xephyra “bossy” for ordering around some of the younger phoenixes; then it had devolved into a long conversation about semantics. Rex had eventually flown away out of boredom.

  No, Veronyka conceded. Not the boss. But I am your bondmate. I have your trust, and I shouldn’t have made such a mistake.

  Xephyra shook her head, but it was Rex who spoke.

  Not how trust works. Trust not… He struggled for the word, but it was Xephyra who found it.

  Conditional, she said proudly. Veronyka realized her phoenix was fast becoming a know-it-all.