by Martha Wells
Stone tasted the air, his gaze on the point where the nearest root stretched out from the tree and disappeared into the dimness and heavy foliage. “How is she doing?”
Moon said, “The same. She’s bored and angry.” He tasted the air too, but all he could detect was Raksura, Kek, green plants and damp. There was a trace of blood scent, but far less than before. Merit must have worked quickly to clean and dress the groundlings’ wounds.
Chime made his way toward them through the mud and moss, carrying a bag. “I took the maps that had spilled onto the floor of the leaf boat and a book the groundlings were writing in. We might be able to figure out where they came from. Also, I was afraid some of it might get ruined if we left it out here.”
Moon told him, “Good idea. Go on up, I’ll be right behind you.”
As Chime leapt for the nearest root, Moon said to Stone, “You should get some rest, too. Floret can handle it.”
“I’ll come in when the others do.” Stone was still staring off into the heavy foliage.
“What is it?” Moon asked, feeling his spines prickle a little. If Stone sensed something out there …
Stone frowned a little. “Nothing. Just nerves.”
Hearing Stone admit to nerves was worrying enough. Moon hissed under his breath and leapt into the air. The sooner the groundlings woke up and told their story, the better.
Moon reported briefly to Jade, who had already heard parts of the story from various warriors and Arbora. Then he got sent back down to make certain there was no problem with opening the root doorway.
Moon arrived in time to follow Knell and a group of Arbora soldiers down into the lower levels of the tree, far below the Arbora’s work and storage areas. Knell asked Moon, “You’re not going out on watch, are you?”
“No.” Moon shrugged his spines. “Jade just wants a detailed description of what happens.”
Knell didn’t question it. He was the leader of the Arbora soldiers’ caste and one of Chime’s clutchmates, as was Bell, the leader of the teachers’ caste. Now that Chime was a warrior, there wasn’t much of a resemblance between the three of them, though both Knell and Bell were tall for Arbora, and Knell did share Chime’s inclination to be stubborn.
The root levels of the colony were completely unused. The passages and open wells were smaller, the stairs were narrow and woven through and around thick folds of wood. The walls were all undecorated and hadn’t even been smoothed down, and the floors were uneven. But it only looked bad if you were used to the lavish living areas in the upper part of the tree. There were still plenty of rooms down here that were dry and had access to clean running water; it was safe and a hundred times more comfortable than living outside the tree.
As they got down to the last stairwell, Thistle, a young female mentor, was going through renewing the light spells on the shells mounted into the walls. The shells down here hadn’t been tended in a while and the light spells faded with time.
Moon followed Knell through the little maze of passages to the lowest stairwell. It curved around toward the outer trunk and met the junction where the door was. The opening was large and round, closed by a heavy wooden panel that slid into place and sealed with bolts. There were other doors, but this was the one that was lowest to the ground, and the easiest to get to from the outside. The warriors who were waiting to take over watch duty clung to the walls and ceiling up and down the passage. They stopped talking as Moon and Knell went past but the rustle of scaled wings still filled the air.
Arbora soldiers already waited nearby and Knell nodded to them to open the door. They slid the bolts aside with difficulty and pulled it into the corridor, releasing a shower of dead beetles and dirt. A damp breeze carrying the intense rotted plant scent of the swamps filled the passage.
This door opened into a narrow crevice in the extended roots that formed a cave. The door was about ten paces up the wall of the tree, with narrow steps leading down to the cave floor, which was covered by a layer of dead leaves and windblown dirt. The last time this door had been opened was on their first full day in the colony. This was where they had found the groundling bones, all that remained of two of Ardan’s people who had displeased Rift, after he had let them into the tree to steal the seed.
Now the narrow crevice was lit with some of Merit’s glowing stones and Briar stood waiting at the bottom of the steps. She turned and called, “It’s open!”
Moon stepped away from the door and the soldiers crowded back down the passage to give the warriors room. They flowed outside, most just climbing along the walls and not bothering to drop to the floor. Moon saw River and Drift among them. River had been Pearl’s favorite warrior before Ember had arrived, and River had taken a while to adjust to having his place in Pearl’s bower occupied by a real consort. He and Moon had hated each other from first sight, but over the past few months they seemed to have come to a mutual truce. Moon still found Drift just as annoying and didn’t expect that to change any time soon.
“The others are coming,” Briar said from outside.
“Any word from Merit?” Knell asked her.
“None of the groundlings are awake yet,” she told him. “Merit thinks there was a poison on the darts.”
It crossed Moon’s mind that the groundlings might die and take their mystery, and potential dangers, with them, and he winced at the thought.
Then Moon heard a yelp and scrabble just outside the door. Instinct almost made him dive outside when Fair said, “Stop shoving.”
“I didn’t touch you, idiot,” someone else answered. Hissing with annoyance, Briar climbed inside. Following her were Vine, Root, Fair, and the other weary warriors who had been in the original search party. Stone, already in groundling form so he could fit through the narrow cave, came last, and said, “Don’t shut the door. We want to be able to get in and out quickly.”
Knell lifted his spines in assent. “That’s what Pearl said to do. And I’m to send two more soldiers out to Merit.”
“Floret’s out there, she’ll show them where he is.” Stone leaned his lanky body against the wall. He didn’t look any different, but there was something about the way he was standing that suggested more than the normal amount of weariness for a night spent on the forest floor. Stone wouldn’t have been able to fly through the lower forest for much of the search; he would have been hopping from perch to perch, keeping an eye on the warriors and Kek while they went through the undergrowth. He had to be more than usually tired. And Moon would have been willing to bet that despite everything, Stone had been hoping to find those Kek alive.
Moon took Stone’s arm and prodded him down the passage. Stone went, which showed that he really did want to go, or there was no way Moon would have been able to move him, even in his groundling form. “Jade wants to see you.” Jade hadn’t said so, but it made a good excuse to get Stone upstairs to his bower, to any bower, where hopefully he would rest.
“I need a bath,” Stone said, but didn’t protest further.
Moon couldn’t sleep that night. He knew it was just a combination of tension and too much inactivity, but lying on the furs next to Jade, it felt like his nerves were about to crawl out of his skin.
He sat up, slowly, but Jade was curled around a cushion and breathing deeply in sleep. That wasn’t a surprise; she had been awake most of the day, anxious about the situation in the Kek village and constantly sending anyone who wandered near the bower down to the roots for reports. She needed the rest and he didn’t want to wake her. Everyone else was sound asleep as well, Chime sprawled on a fur on the other side of the hearth, a book unrolled across his chest, and Thistle and Blossom curled up together opposite him.
Stone had sat with them through the early evening, and then gone somewhere to sleep. He might be in his bower, he might be in the teachers’ hall or near it, or he might be hanging from the stairwell somewhere. Stone’s sleeping habits were not typical even for a line-grandfather.
Moon eased to his feet and walked out of t
he bower into the queens’ hall. Balm and a few teachers sat near the hearth, the teachers all working on stringing copper beads in elaborate patterns. Balm seemed to be occupying herself holding things for them. She glanced up at Moon. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“No.” Moon sat on his heels beside the carefully sorted piles of beads.
Bark, her lap full of half-braided leather thongs, winced in sympathy. “It’ll be a few days yet.”
“I know.” Moon knew he was about to give into the temptation to stir the beads, just for something to do. He pushed himself upright. “I’m going down to the roots, see if anything’s changed.”
All the Arbora nodded as if that was a necessary thing to do, and that the soldiers wouldn’t have come up to report to Pearl if anything important had happened. Balm just said, “I’ll come with you.”
Moon wasn’t inclined to hurry and neither was Balm. They took a leisurely stroll down through the colony’s levels, stopping to greet various Arbora and warriors who were awake for different reasons. If there was no pressing task that most of the court was engaged in, then people tended to sleep when they felt like it, or when they had nothing else to do, and some of the Arbora artisans preferred to work late at night. There was more activity when they reached the root area below the Arbora’s work rooms and the forges, where the soldiers and warriors were getting ready to change the guard for the Kek village.
They passed a chamber where several soldiers and a few warriors were sleeping, then took a wide curving stairwell down to the chamber where Knell and the others sat near a hearth bowl finishing up a meal. Everyone was in their groundling forms, and looked as if they had just woken up; it was clear the watch had been uneventful so far. Knell glanced up as they arrived, asking, “Anything happening?”
“That’s what we came to ask you,” Balm said, and took a seat on one of the woven mats strewn around.
Knell set a nearly empty tray of fruit and baked root pieces aside. The soldiers had said no meat was to be brought down here, to keep the scent from drawing the interest of small predators that might be able to work their way in through the open door, a precaution Moon very much agreed with. Knell said, “No, it’s been quiet. Merit’s out there again, but at the last report he said the groundlings haven’t woken.”
Root and Song sat nearby, and Moon had noticed Vine asleep in the room above, but he didn’t see Floret. “Is Floret still there?”
“Yes, she wanted to take the first two watches, but Sage is about to take her place,” Song said. Root yawned and she gave him a push to the shoulder. “We’ve had a rest and we’re going back out.”
“Don’t let yourselves get too worn out.” Balm picked up a piece of fruit from the tray. “I can round up some more warriors if need be.”
“I think we have enough so far. But if this goes on longer than a few days, we’ll need more help.” Knell brushed bread crumbs off his kilt. “It’s about that time. Star, go and tell—”
A long sustained yell, muffled through layers of bark and wood, interrupted him: a soldier giving the alarm. Moon shifted by instinct, realized a heartbeat later that so had everyone else. He leapt to the ceiling to leave the way clear for the Arbora and the warriors who charged out of the chamber. All they were thinking about was getting outside to the others; all Moon was thinking about was stopping anything from getting inside the tree.
He swung under the arch of the doorway and jumped from wall to wall until he reached the wide point of the passage where the outer door stood open. Knell and the others swarmed out through it, in orderly but furious fashion. Moon clung to the ceiling above the lintel, a snarl in his chest, ready to murder anything not Raksura or Kek that tried to come in.
Serene, Band, and Fair bounced off the walls below and landed on the ceiling nearby, taking guard positions around the door. Moon was glad that Knell hadn’t forgotten this detail. He said, “Where’s Stone?”
Hanging upside down from a knob of wood, Serene said, “He’s near the teachers’ hall, consort. Spring is getting him.”
Moon growled an acknowledgement. The Arbora and warriors had cleared the doorway, except for two soldiers who stood ready to slide it shut. Moon heard movement outside, feet on grass and mud, and somewhere distant a crashing through the brush. The high-pitched cries of Kek were woven through it all. Not screaming or cries for help, but the sounds they used to communicate over distances. Then close by, something made a strange low coughing sound, and an Arbora cried out. The soldiers at the door and the three warriors twitched with the urge to respond. Moon snapped, “Stay here!” and swung down and out the door.
He tore through the cave-like passage and out into the open ground just beyond. Arbora had cleared the brush away earlier and a mentor had spelled clumps of moss and flowers in the nearby saplings for light. In the soft glow, an Arbora soldier used a short javelin to fend off something gray, scaled, and four times her size. Another Arbora lay sprawled on the muddy ground at her feet.
Moon crossed the clearing in two bounds and landed on top of the gray predator. Its back was broad, tapering down to a triangular body, its head flattened and jaw wide. He caught a glimpse of at least six clawed feet and a barbed tail. He ripped his claws across its eyes and felt the predator start to roll sideways. Moon leapt into the air and landed a few paces in front of it. The soldier had wisely broken off her attack and now rapidly dragged her wounded companion back toward the root cave. As Moon crouched, sinuous movement in the dark foliage solidified into two more of the gray predators, much larger than the first. There was more rustling behind them; something else was clearly out there.
Which meant Moon had to take care of these three quickly. He shot forward, slashed the first predator across the face again, caught the barbed tail as it jerked toward him and slammed his weight down on top of the predator’s head. Then he flung himself backward.
He wasn’t certain if it would work, since it depended entirely on how strong the predator’s neck bones were, but he was too blind with rage to care. But he felt the snap jolt through the predator’s body as he landed. He tossed it aside, just as the second leapt at him. Moon lunged forward and met it with his claws to its open mouth. He stabbed it in the soft tissue inside and jammed one hand and both feet against the open jaws when it tried to bite down on him. It twisted and rolled to dislodge him, and he ripped its tender mouth again with his free hand. The rush of blood and a wild convulsion knocked him loose. As he tumbled free, the creature shot back into the undergrowth, spraying blood.
Moon rolled to his feet but the third predator turned and bolted after the second. He tracked its movement through the darkness, the light reflected off water droplets on disturbed fronds and leaves revealing its progress. There was something else out there, he could tell by the erratic path the predator took. Something out there, and it had hung back, waiting for the three predators to clear the way through to the root cave.
Moon stalked back and forth, spines flared. “Come out!” he yelled toward the darkness, his voice deep and raspy with rage. “Try again, come on!”
He couldn’t see movement but he could sense it. Something was out there, considering, gauging its chances. It wanted him to move away from the entrance passage, to come after it in the darkness and confusion of the undergrowth. Moon bared his fangs, dropping his lower jaw to let the full array show. No, you come to me. Come out here and die.
Something large went past high overhead, arrowing down toward the village, but Moon knew it was Stone. An instant later he caught a flash of gold in his peripheral vision and Pearl landed in a crouch on the trampled bloody ground. She eased smoothly upright, her spines flared and wings partially extended. She tilted her head and hissed.
Moon tasted the air but there was nothing but the bitter blood scent and stench of the dead predator. He still didn’t detect any stir of movement in the dark, but his sense of a presence was gone. “It left,” he said to Pearl.
She paced a few steps, her tail lashing. Lights moved in the
distance, flickering past the dark shapes of the arched roots. The chorus of cries from the Kek died away. A swish of wings and three warriors landed in the clearing, Floret, River, and Aura. Floret said to Pearl, “There were three attacks at once—” She glanced at the predator with the broken neck. “Four. One was at the opposite end of the village from here, the other two midway between. No one was killed, as far as we know. The Kek are still checking their own people. Six warriors were injured, and four Arbora.”
“Merit?” Pearl asked.
River answered this time, “No, not him or the groundlings. Nothing got into the village.”
Pearl inclined her head toward the dead predator. “All the attackers were like these?”
“No. They were different.” Floret’s spines flicked in agitation as she realized the implications. “The ones I saw were more snake-like.”
Aura’s spines twitched in agreement. “The ones on our side were bigger than that, with square heads. They fled when Stone arrived.”
Predators like this didn’t all attack at once. They would feed on each other just as they fed on grasseaters, they would never work together. Something had driven them here, and Moon was convinced it had been out there, watching the passage into the tree, waiting for its opportunity. “Whatever caused this was here. About sixty paces that way, watching. It wanted inside.”
Pearl’s spines shivered in a way that made all three warriors twitch. She said, “You three. Get the wounded inside.” She tilted her head toward Moon. “You. Wash the blood off your claws and go to Jade.”
Moon didn’t need to be told twice.
“You shouldn’t have gone out there,” Ember said, pouring tea. “Even though … I know you’re not a normal consort, but still.”
Moon took the offered cup and shrugged a little. He hadn’t had a choice, as far as he was concerned. He actually wished that Pearl had arrived a little later. If whatever had started all this had come out of concealment to attack him, she would have been just in time to catch it.
