Honor and Blood

by James Galloway

  Well, the easiest way, he saw, was to simply change form and stand on a rooftop for a moment, then hide again. If Ariana herself didn't see her, he didn't doubt that word of him would spread through the city like wildfire. Somehow, he got the idea that visitors up here weren't exactly commonplace, seeing as how the spire's architecture went to such lengths to discourage visitation. The bad side of that idea was that it could possibly spawn an intense hunt for the intruder, and he may get caught in cat form by some zealous crossbow-wielding sentry.

  Another idea was to let himself be seen by only a few. They would spread the rumors, and that would bring Ariana to him. The good side of that was that since only a few would see him, it probably wouldn't spawn a frenzied hunt for the invader. The bad side was that it would most likely take Ariana a long time to hear the rumor and then come to investigate. And he couldn't hang around and wait for her to get wind of the rumor.

  Those seemed to be the only two options available to him. One would bring Ariana immediately, but it was very dangerous. The other may bring her in days, maybe rides, but it was much safer. Neither seemed very palatable to him, because his reaction to crossbow-wielding strangers would probably be violent. He wanted to avoid putting himself in the position where he may have to kill. The only way to do that was to get stuck up here for days on end, when he didn't have the time to waste.

  There is always another option, a voice echoed in his mind, and what got his tail twisted was that it was not the Goddess. It was female, but the voice was heavier, huskier, more rugged. It contained the same power as the voice of the Goddess, but it wasn't as strong.

  "Who's there?" he demanded in the manner of the Cat. For a second, he thought that the voice had come from outside of him.

  You know who I am, koshida, the voice called. It took him a second to realize that the voice was speaking Selani. And it called him koshida, which loosely translated to dear family friend, such as one would address the best friend of a child.

  It was Fara'Nae!

  Holy Mother! he thought in his mind, then he bowed his head. He had no idea how he was supposed to act towards Fara'Nae. He was used to the very informal ways in which his Goddess demanded he act towards her. "Please forgive my outburst, Holy Mother," he said contritely in the manner of the Cat. "Allia never taught me the proper way to address you."

  I'll have to speak to her about that, the voice echoed within him, slightly amused. You have done well, my son. I am proud of you.

  "What do you mean?"

  I have sent the trials of the desert against you, to try to break you, and you have stood strong. You have even conquered the demons within you that seek to make you heartless. When you healed the enspelled Cloudracer, for no reason other than you felt it wrong to leave him unwhole, you proved yourself to me. Gladly I now call you my son, my child, and deserving of my love and guidance.

  Tarrin didn't know what to say to that. He simply closed his eyes and bowed his head.

  Your humility becomes you, my son. You are one of the most powerful beings in this world, and yet you see yourself as nothing more than any other. That is a very healthy view on life. My brands are honored that you wear them.

  That made him feel even more foolish.

  Fara'Nae chuckled within his mind. You have done well, my son, and it is time you reaped the rewards of your labor. Stand up. Follow my words, and I will guide you to the one you seek. There will be no danger or waiting for you today.

  "As you command, Holy Mother," he said immediately, displacing Sarraya as he stood.

  "Mmmph," Sarraya groaned. "Tarrin, what's wrong? Where are you going?"

  "To find Ariana," he told her. "Come along."

  Sarraya caught up with him as he followed the voice of Fara'Nae, who guided him along the twisted alleyways, telling in when to turn and which fork to take. It felt, odd, taking commands from another god than his own, but he had accepted long ago that the brands on his shoulders meant that he had vowed to obey Fara'Nae. Tarrin didn't take vows lightly. He had vowed to obey her, and he would do exactly that, no matter that she was not his goddess. He walked among Aeradalla who walked along the streets rather than flew, and they didn't seem to pay him very much attention. The encounter with the drake had showed him that the Aeradalla kept pets, and the black metal collar on his neck probably made him look like a pet someone had flown up to the city. He picked his way through them carefully, trying not to attract attention to himself, but that didn't seem to matter. It seemed that he wasn't worth their attention...and that suited him just fine.

  The voice of the Holy Mother of the Selani led him to the edge of one of the tiers that were such a common feature in the city, and he looked down on an area that was much different from the small, rather ramshackle stone houses which occupied the tier upon which he stood. It was a tier of large warehouses and large buildings, the highest of the tiers that marked the district of merchants. It was a major boundary, so the tier wall was one of the high ones that marked those boundaries.

  "Uh oh," Sarraya said from her invisible position. "Are we going down?"

  "We are," he said after the voice of Fara'Nae confirmed it.

  "How do you know where we're going? You figured out a weave to find her?"

  "Something like that," he hedged. He wasn't sure if he should tell Sarraya that he was getting outside assistance. Not that it boosted his ego for her to think he could find Ariana, but that he didn't want her to get loud. He'd tell her after they were safely under a roof.

  "Alright then, flawless guide, how do you get down?" Sarraya asked. "That's a forty span drop."

  The answer to that seemed rather simple. He reached out with his senses and attuned himself to the Weave, then subdued it into doing his bidding. After he had the flows to heel, he wove together a small weave of pure Air, then jumped off the ledge.

  "Tarrin!" Sarraya said in a strangled tone, and then he heard her wings buzz angrily as she sought to follow him. The weave of Air formed below him, forming a gentle net of pure air that slowed his descent without making it too obvious to any watching Aeradalla that the little black cat was doing something unnatural. He landed on the ground with respectable force, but nowhere near as hard a landing as it would have been had he not cushioned his fall with air.

  "Tarrin, are you nuts?" Sarraya demanded in a harsh whisper. "You almost gave me a heart attack!"

  "Sorry," he said dismissively. "We go this way."

  "Warn me next time! I can't feel anything when you use magic that way, so I had no idea you magicked yourself!"

  "You can't feel anything?" he asked curiously.

  "Nothing!" she snapped.

  "Just like how I couldn't feel anything from the Sha'Kar," he noted clinically. "Curious. Neither Sorcery nor Druidic magic can detect Weavespinner magic."

  "Save the analysis until after I finish yelling at you!" she said furiously.

  Loud, isn't she? the voice of Fara'Nae remarked dryly in his mind.

  "You have no idea," he grunted under his breath in the manner of the Cat.

  "Did you just say something?" Sarraya demanded hotly.

  "Not to you," he said pointedly, then he walked away from her. Sarraya stuck her tongue out at him, which he couldn't see because she was invisible, then flitted along behind.

  He moved along those scruffy paved streets, between warehouses and large buildings, wondering idly how they managed to get any large items up to the city, large enough to require warehouses. It was something of a puzzle, but the voice of Fara'Nae interrupted his thoughts whenever she intruded herself on his thoughts to give him directions. She led him far out onto the tier, very nearly to the next tier wall, then told him calmly that he was at his destination. It was a large building that had a sign of a winged lion outside of it, and the sounds and smells that came from within were of food and drink. It was a tavern!

  A tavern? Why would Ariana be in a tavern?

  He padded in through the open door and took in the room. It was a rather dirty
place, with scraps and other refuse strewn about the floor. There were six Aeradalla sitting in backless chairs, pulled up to worn tables in the large common room, dominated by a massive hearth on the right wall and a wooden bar across the back wall, a bar made of bone-white wood. Another Aeradalla stood behind that bar, which was built out from the wall to accomadate his wings, wearing a spotted apron.

  It looked just like any number of taverns he had seen in his life. But where was Ariana?

  It did look just like any number of taverns. Strange that the Aeradalla would adopt something that was so commonplace among humankind. Why build in the human ways when they had their own ideas? Or was this place here before they arrived, and they had simply adapted the existing buildings to serve their own ends?

  A door beside the bar opened, and he saw Ariana. She wore the very same clothes that he had seen on her so long ago, and they showed their wear. They were torn and dirty, and her lustrous deep blue hair was matted and unkempt. She was unnaturally thin, and her eyes had sunk into her skull in a frightening manner. The hints of her beauty were still there, but only just. What had happened to her? She looked so frail! She was carrying a heavy tray carrying bowls of something, and it was obvious that she was straining under the weight of it.

  Ariana, a serving wench? She said before that she was a trader, caught by the Arakites in Saranam. Why was she now doing such menial labor?

  He watched from the doorway as Ariana came up to a table and set down the bowls for the four Aeradalla men that were pulled up to it. She bowed and gave them a weak smile, then turned to go back to the kitchen. One of them laughed and reached out and pinched her on her backside, and that made her squeak and whirl on the man with hot eyes. She looked as he remembered her for that fleeting moment, her eyes burning at the man in righteous indignation. She reared back and slammed the brass serving tray directly into his face, and she didn't hold anything back. The man cried out and was toppled backwards out of his backless chair, blood flying in an arc. The man behind the bar screamed out something in the Aeradalla's language, thrusting his wings to vault him over the bar immediately as Ariana held the tray like a club over the fallen Aeradalla, who now had a broken nose. The barkeeper grabbed Ariana by her wing, then yanked her around to face him, screaming at her at the top of his lungs. Tarrin watched in mild interest as the man berated her, but when he raised his hand and struck her across the face, he crossed the line that he should not have crossed. Ariana was a stranger, but he needed her help, and he wouldn't allow her to be abused like that. Not when he had need of her.

  Ariana stumbled back into the table behind her, the back of her hand against her face as she stared up at the taller male in both anger and fear, then flinched away when he raised his hand to her once again.

  Tarrin's paw closed around the man's wrist even before the first startled shout emanated from the five spectators. Tarrin hauled him up off the ground by his wrist, crushing it in his powerful grip, making the man cry out in pain, then hurled him bodily halfway across the tavern's common room. He crashed into the top of a table on his back, his wings taking the brunt of it, then slid off the table to the floor behind it.

  "Stop!" Tarrin snapped in a powerful voice, in Arakite, to the two Aeradalla that had scrambled to their feet and were rushing towards the door. They froze in their tracks, staring back at him in absolute terror, at the monstrously tall, unimaginably huge creature that had seemingly come out of nowhere and attacked the barkeeper. "Anyone who sets a foot out that door won't live to put his other foot down," Tarrin warned in an ugly voice, glaring at the two of them.

  He didn't know if they could understand him, but he was pretty sure they understood the threat of immediate violent death that rippled through his voice as he spoke.

  Ariana had just opened her eyes, her face wincing as if expecting a blow, but her expression turned to surprise when she looked up at him in amazement. "You!" she gasped in Sulasian. "What are you doing here?"

  "You said you owed me a debt," he told her with a neutral expression. "I'm here to collect on it."

  "You--how--when--why are you so tall?" she finally managed to ask.

  Tarrin looked down at her, and he laughed in spite of himself. "You look awful," he told her conversationally as the rest of the patrons watched in shock, and as the barkeeper and the one who Ariana had floored groaned from time to time. "What happened to you?"

  "It's a long story," she told him with a laugh. "I'm surprised to see you! How did you get up here?"

  Tarrin showed her his claws. "They're not just for show," he told her with a smile. "I had to come here to check something out. Now that I'm done, I need an easy way down."

  "I can't believe you got up here!" she said. "They've always said that nobody could ever get up here that couldn't fly!"

  "I have certain advantages," he said mildly. "Why are you so thin?"

  "I've had a run of bad luck since returning home," she sighed, leaning against the table behind her and looking up at him, shivering her wings. "Very bad," she grunted, dropping the bloody tray. Tarrin noticed that it was bent. Ariana may look thin, but she was still much stronger than she looked.

  A movement behind him alerted him to one of the Aeradalla sliding towards the door. "Didn't I tell you to stop?" Tarrin said without looking over his shoulder. "If you move again, you'll be hanging off the wall by your broken neck. Do you understand me?"

  The mover ceased his activity immediately, so Tarrin turned his attention back to Ariana. "I'm sorry to ask this, but I really don't want to climb back down."

  "You saved my life," she said simply. "I owe you alot more than a simple ride." She looked up at him. "If you're still alive, then I guess you made peace with Fae-da'Nar. Are you here on their behalf?"

  "No," he told her. "I've joined with them, that's true enough, but I came for another reason. Don't worry, I didn't come to break anything or steal anything. I just had to see something. I've seen it, so now I can go."

  "I'm not worried. Well, at least not now. I'm sure they'll ask me alot of questions after I come back over this, but that's alright. It's the least I can do for you, after what you did for me."

  "Sorry," he said, a little sheepishly. "When that one over there hit you, I kinda lost my composure."

  "You probably saved his life," she said, a bit flintily, but he knew that it was bravado.

  The two Aeradalla that had been edging towards the door suddenly burst into motion, seeming to sense that no matter how fast Tarrin was, he couldn't stop them from getting out the door before he reached them. He let them go without much thought, since there really wasn't much he could have done about them. "What about them?" Ariana asked.

  "Let them go," he shrugged. "I just didn't want them to run out there screaming."

  "They'll go straight to the sentries."

  "Let them. Feel like flying a little?"

  "Uh, furry one, I can't carry you," she said hesitantly. "At least not if I'm trying to climb. I could glide with your weight, but I'll need to climb, or at least hold my altitude, to get clear of the city."

  "Tarrin," he said calmly. "My name is Tarrin."

  "You never told me."

  "I have now, and I'll be very easy to carry. Sarraya!"

  The Faerie appeared, hovering sedately in the air near him. "I can create what you want, so don't bother to ask," she grinned.

  "A Faerie!" Ariana gasped. "I never thought to see one in my lifetime!"

  "I never thought to see a Winged Folk either," Sarraya grinned at her. She raised her hands, and he felt her touch her Druidic power. A basket with a strap appeared on the table behind her, a basket large enough for him to fit inside. "There you are. One carrying basket."

  "This will help me carry you?" she asked in confusion.

  "What am I, Ariana?" he asked pointedly.

  "A Were--oh!" she said, her eyes lighting up. "I'm so silly! Of course! Uh, what about them?" she asked, looking at the other Aeradalla.

  "What about them?" he
asked dismissively. "I doubt they'll bother us. At least not now."

  She laughed. "I guess not. Ready to go? Where do you want to be let go?"

  "Some distance from the Selani, to the northwest," Tarrin replied, as Ariana picked up the basket Sarraya had conjured and put it around her slight waist. She buckled the basket on, and then Tarrin shifted into his cat form and looked up at her patiently. She reached down and picked him up, then set him into the large basket. Tarrin wriggled a bit to get comfortable, his head popping out of the top of it, as Sarraya crawled down into the basket herself.

  "Now, Tarrin, you're in for a treat," Sarraya said in an excited tone as Ariana left the inn, as the patrons and the recovering innkeeper stared at her in amazement. She spread her wings out, beat them once or twice, and then pulled herself into the air.

  Tarrin watched in awe as the ground pulled away from them, the buildings getting smaller and smaller. The wind pulled at his fur, and the city's circular layout became apparent to him as they rose above it. The tiers formed black circles that emanated out from the green central tier, giving the place a rhythmic look from the air. Other Aeradalla flew around them, but not close enough to be a danger.

  Tarrin had flown before in the arms of Anayi, and he found that flying with Ariana was just as exhilerating. The feel of being so high, of looking down at the world from that lofty perch, it was one of the most incredible feelings in the world. He looked down in wonder as they reached the edge of the city, as the ground yielded to the misty cloud, which itself yielded to an amazing view of the desert from two longspans above it. In an instant, his gaze travelled further than he could run in two rides. The brown and tan desert looked like the surface of a quilt from so high up, the features of the land lost to his detail-lacking eyesight, looking like a vast tan-brown sea. The Selani carpeted the shaded area under the cloud, invisible to his cat's eyes, but knowing that they were there. He could see some of the larger rock spires as little dark blots in the endless tan, and he thought that he could make out some of the flocks of sukk. It was breathtaking, regardless of how little his eyes could make out, and the sensation of being so high above the land grabbed hold of his soul and refused to let go. He found he had no fear of having so much empty air under him, for Ariana's wings were still strong, and for once, he found he had faith in a stranger. He was safe with her.