by JMD Reid
Vel’s brow furrowed. “Well, if he does, you don’t have to worry. I’ll look after you.”
She smiled. “You’re a good friend. So it’s so dumb for you two to fight. Ary doesn’t think he can tell me what to do. He just . . . spoke badly.”
For a heartbeat, tears stung the corners of his eyes as he drank in her features: her plump lips, her delicate nose, the rich hue of her skin. Please, Riasruo, she can’t love him. Not that violent brute. He’s a good friend, but he’ll hurt her. One day, she’ll say something, do something, and . . . Two Shardhin boys battered to insensibility.
“I just don’t like seeing him make you sad,” Vel said. “He’s going to enlist. I’m sure of it. You know Ary.”
“I do know Ary.” Force strengthened her words. “He’s not. We talked last night. Okay? So stop gusting those thoughts. He won’t break my heart. Your friend’s not going to leave Isfe. You two can still go fishing.”
Vel’s heart quailed. Hope set in his heart, dwindling to a small point of light and . . . He clutched it, blurting out, “And if he’s drafted?”
“Any of us can be drafted,” she said, voice tight. She looked away.
“Women are half as likely as men. And Ary’s a big guy. So if he does, I’ll be watching out for you. You don’t have to marry him and . . .”
She leaned over and planted a hot kiss on his cheek. “You’re sweet, Vel. Thanks.”
Vel’s heart almost pounded out through his chest. If he flapped his arms, he’d soar with the pegasi above. “I mean it.”
“You’ll be marrying one of those girls you’re always sneaking off with,” she said, still smiling, but it had softened, her voice verging on wistful.
Is she envious? Has she always wished I’d sneak her off somewhere? Has she been waiting for me to canoodle her in a hayloft? Ary’s never done that. He’s never worked up her skirt and plucked her flower.
Ary always claimed he didn’t want to pressure her into more than kisses. “The goodwives in the village calls her a stormin’ hussy,” Ary growled when Vel, driven by a nauseating curiosity to know what bedding Chaylene felt like, had asked. “A hussy spreads her thighs before marriage. So I’m willing to wait.” A grin spread across Ary’s face. “It’s not so bad waiting when it’s worth it.”
Maybe Ary only said that because she told him no. Was she hoping another would pry her thighs apart? Disgust soured Vel’s stomach. I could have been enjoying her and not using the other girls.
“Are you ever going to choose one?” Chaylene asked.
“There is . . .” The shark raced forward, hungry, but the net snarled it, Ary’s fists hauling it back. “There’s someone, but . . . I think I waited too long to ask her.” A breathless euphoria swept through him, a daring exhilaration as he raced along the skyland’s edge, moments from the ground crumbling away. Will she go tell Ary if I confess what I feel?
“You don’t know that,” she said, giving him such an encouraging smile. “Who is she? I can help you find your happiness.”
“The fellow she’s with. He’s . . . Dangerous. He might hurt me if I try.”
Her eyebrows furrowed. “Not Estilia. She’s married, Vel.”
“See, what am I supposed to do? She doesn’t stare at me the way I want.”
“You mean like this.” She gave him a sappy, sighing look, her eyes fluttering.
A laugh burst from his throat while his heart raced. “Exactly.” Just tell her. Stop being a Storming coward! She hasn’t united her fires to his yet. “But she doesn’t notice me.”
“Have you told her how you feel? Well, before she married Thush.”
“It’s not Estilia.” He trembled, the words on his tongue.
“Well, who?” She leaned closer, the sunlight falling on her lips, her eyes still shadowed by her bonnet. “Tell me.”
Ary’s laughter drifted down the trail.
“It doesn’t matter.” He looked over his shoulder at Ary.
She did the same, sighing. “Well, if you won’t tell me, you won’t. But you should apologize to him. He didn’t say anything to you. I don’t like seeing you two fight. You and Ary are my only friends.”
“I will.” Hesitation. “And if he’s drafted, what are you going to do? Will you marry him?”
“I don’t know.” Her gray eyes darkened. The fear he witnessed yesterday still lurked. His hope didn’t vanish.
A smile crossed his lips. “I’ll go apologize.”
~ * * ~
Vel trotted to Ary, leaving Chaylene’s thoughts puzzling who he loved. What boy in the village did Vel fear? He had Ary to back him in any fight, and Ary had thrashed three grown men at fifteen. At seventeen, a man himself, none would challenge him except . . .
“Is it me Vel loves?” Then she laughed at how ridiculous that sounded. Vel ignored her as a woman, treating her like a friend, save that one time he’d danced with her on Wedding Day several months ago. He whirled her around while Ary took a breather.
He was just being a friend and letting me dance more.
She watched the two men in her life talk, the pair relaxed, laughing, close friends. Vel couldn’t love her. He wouldn’t do that to his friend. And he knew she loved Ary. They’d marry soon, assuming nothing went wrong tomorrow.
Nothing will go wrong! Her gaze flashed up to the blinding sun. Riasruo, please let nothing go wrong.
Shame touched her cheeks. Why couldn’t her love feel so certain? Why did doubts nibble at it, weakening it? Shouldn’t it be untouchable? Like Ary’s love for her?
“She’s with your pa now, Lena,” Ary’s gentle voice whispered through her thoughts. “Look at her dance on the wind, rising up to Riasruo’s sun. She’s happy again.”
Tears burned her eyes, remembering his arm going around her shoulders a year ago, pulling her close as her ma’s ashes blew away on the wind out over the skyland’s edge. A cloud of gray growing fainter and fainter as it soared over the Storm Below. Chaylene had no ashery in which to intern her mother’s urn. Her pa’s family wouldn’t allow that “Vaarckthian trollop” he married to share theirs.
When her ma died, Ary built the pyre. He gathered the wood, working for hours while she sat in numb grief, hating the relief which filled her at being free of her mother’s drinking. Not even Vel came. She stood with Ary watching her ma burn, Zue’s spirit rising to Riasruo, to her pa.
In Ary’s arms, she cried. He held her through her storm of tears.
Her thoughts remained in turmoil until dusk fell and their group crested the hill and overlooked the city of Ahly.
The city lay on the western edge of Vesche, built around a bowl-shaped harbor guarded by two bluffs, red and yellow coral climbing their faces, that flanked the narrow inlet leading out to open sky. A fortified tower rose from both bluffs, each flying the golden pegasus of the Autonomy on a divided field of red and blue. Along the slope of the southern bluff—“That’s the Queen’s Bluff,” she declared to Ary—rose prosperous buildings. Including the magnificent Ahly Temple, quarried of crimson stone, striking amid the gray granite city, a single red daisy in a field of rocks.
That’s where we’ll receive our blessings tomorrow.
The sun disappeared behind the Queen’s Bluff until only a sliver of golden light remained.
Please, Riasruo, don’t let Ary get drafted. Let them take anyone else.
The light winked out and darkness fell, one year dying, another born. The three hundredth and ninety-ninth year of Vaarck’s Founding began.
Chapter Six
Yruoujoa 1st, 399 VF (1960 SR)
Ary and the rest of the common room of the Solar Blessing Public House quieted the moment the delicate, bird-like Luastria walked onto the small, raised stage. He moved with a grace no Human could ever achieve, his head moving in a curious, jerking fashion. Black feathers cloaked his body while gray covered his face in fine down, save for a ring of green feathers crowning his head and a tuft of verdant decorating his throat. The bright plumage identified the Luastr
ian as a male, their females possessing dun coloring. A sleeveless linen robe of bright blue and green draped his body.
The grab of a Sowerese Talesinger, the finest entertainers in the skies.
Ary’s jaw dropped at the sight of the Luastria. Gretla and Jhevon’s bickering died in an instant, his siblings’ eyes widening to the size of mugs. A broad smile replaced Chaylene’s moody contemplation of her cup of lemon water. Vel grinned as the pretty serving girl at his side clapped with joy.
A fair breeze blew through the common room that night as Ary marveled at their luck. Sowerese Talesingers never booked their performances. They drifted where the winds took them, living off the largess of those grateful to hear their tales. Ary never thought to see one in Vesche, even if tomorrow was the Summer Solstice. Surely there were more important places to perform: Grush, the capital of the Autonomy; Brelthi, the great port city where the Admiralty Board resided; the Vaarckthian Imperial capital of Qopraa; or the mother of all temples to Riasruo at Ianwoa, where the Bishriarch herself guided the faithful.
The Sowerese Talesinger bowed to the audience. “In humblest gratitude, I thank you for allowing my unworthy song to educate you this evening,” he said, his voice a sonorous chirp. “I am Hwaedril.”
Ary joined the common room in applause.
Hwaedril’s song started simple, calm, reminding Ary of the still moment before the sun crested the Storm Below, when the sky grew indistinct as night bled into day. Then a countermelody began. Somehow, the Luastria sang with two voices, and the second was dark, violent, polluting the peace of the first.
Ary sat stunned when a third voice began orating.
“In the distant past, a tyrant arose. Kaltein.” The countermelody swelled, gaining in volume on the first melody. “King of the cruel Wrackthar. Avarice dwelt in Kaltein’s heart, and what he lusted for most of all was power. And that desire was realized in the Storm Goddess.”
The countermelody crashed and roared like a howling storm. A chill passed through Ary—Dark Theisseg had sent the Stormriders to attack Vesche. Without thought, his thumb and little finger formed the sun. The countermelody built, drowning out the harmonious melody.
“Long had Theisseg languished in her prison. Since the end of the ancient Sister Wars, when the Storm Goddess, consumed by her jealousy, sought the destruction of her fairer sister, Riasruo. But Kaltein discovered the key to Theisseg’s cell—Hruvv.”
The countermelody softened, becoming almost in harmony with the main melody, like an aural octopus, blending its rubbery skin to match the riotous coral and hide from its prey.
“Beloved Hruvv, the Alabaster Ostrich, the last living of Riasruo’s five sacred beasts, was lured by Kaltein to Mount Wraiucwii, the tallest mountain in the World Below. There on the steps of the Temple of the Heights—Riasruo’s grand temple and Theisseg’s prison—did the Tyrant-King slaughter gentle Hruvv, unleashing the Storm Goddess upon the peaceful followers of Riasruo.”
Grief entered the main melody while triumph raged in the countermelody. If Ary stood outside, Hruvv’s constellation would twinkle above, placed there by Riasruo. The Alabaster Ostrich forever raced across the sky in the Circle of Stars, the thirteen constellations marking the passing of the year. The month of Hruvvoa had ended at sunset, and the new year—as well as the Summer Solstice—began with the month of Yruoujoa.
“Theisseg rewarded Kaltein’s lust. She blessed the Wrackthar with her powers. Like a frenzy of sharks upon a school of tuna, they fell upon the unsuspecting free peoples and made vicious and brutal war, subjecting all who stood in their path with the cruelty of their boots.”
The main melody dwindled, crushed beneath the loud, angry countermelody. Ary leaned forward, entranced by the song. He’d heard the tale before, but he never felt it. He could see the Wrackthar soldiers, clad in metal armor, brutalizing the Humans, Gezitziz, Luastria, and Zalg, butchering them like—
Beasts made of dark storm clouds. Manes of lightning and eyes of crackling white. Pale riders. Streaming, black hair. Hauberks of burnished metal reflecting pulsing lightning. Metal swords glinting. Arrows volleying through raging winds. Ethereal beauty amid violent clouds and arcing lightning.
“Ary,” Chaylene hissed, gripping his hand. “What’s wrong?”
“What?” he asked her. Cold sweat covered his body. Her hand was warm, gray eyes full of concern.
“You’re shaking. You look like you’ve seen a Storm spirit.”
“It’s . . .” He squeezed her hand back. “Just . . . bad memories.”
“But . . .”
“It’s nothing,” he hissed with anger that surprised him. The puckered scar throbbed poison.
Her eyes flinched.
Guilt filled his heart. “Sorry.”
She jerked her hand away and folded her arms, staring at the Talesinger.
“Chaylene.”
The vein in her throat throbbed. He sighed.
The Talesinger continued, cataloging the disasters of the past: the razing of Gkoomn, the city of bells—Ary wasn’t sure what a bell was—the rape of Weetdrin and Aeweel; the massacre at the Fords of Hyesk. Every place and tragedy named added more and more grief to the melody.
When all seemed dark and despair gripped the melody, a strain of hope entered.
“Iiwroa of the Jwauahwii gathered in secret the leaders of those people still free: the Jwauahwii and Soweral flocks of the Luastria, the Dzet clan of the Zalg, the Vaarck and Vion nations of the Humans, and the Zzuk and Ethinsk tribes of the Gezitziz. The Desperate Alliance held council, deciding the fate of all would fall upon the Hopeful Company. A champion from each tribe, nation, and flock would make the perilous journey through Wrackthar-dominated lands to Mount Wraiucwii. At the Temple of the Heights, upon the great mount’s summit, the Hopeful Company would beseech the Goddess Riasruo to save her peoples.”
Hope flared louder and louder in the main melody, driving back the anger and terror of the countermelody.
“Numerous trials beset the Hopeful Company. They suffered grievous loss. Only Iiwroa survived, but she found what they sought—the Blessings.”
Hope and love rang in the main melody, drowning out the countermelody.
“Riasruo gifted her beloved children with her Blessing. Armed with her power, the Desperate Alliance drove back the Wrackthar.”
Triumph trilled through the hall while discord and bitterness stained the dwindling countermelody. The winds had shifted. Ary trembled as he leaned forward, his heart thudding. Even Chaylene’s annoyance faded, her dark hands clutched tight.
“They drove Kaltein, the Wrackthar’s Tyrant-King, back to his dark castle, Romeich. Atop the battlements, he stood defiant as the Desperate Alliance spread out before him.”
Madness entered the countermelody, an almost cackling hysteria.
“Kaltein laughed and denounced all assembled there as fools. In bitter selfishness, the Tyrant-King called upon Theisseg one last time.
He summoned the Storm.”
The countermelody surged suddenly, roaring like—
The Cyclone roared forward, charging like a black boar—
Ary pushed back the memories, trembling.
“The Storm covered the face of the Ground Below, blotting out Riasruo’s shining love from her faithful followers. But she loved her children too much to let them languish. Since her Dark Sister covered the face of the world with her fury, Riasruo raised the skylands above the Storm.”
The melody soared, the countermelody dwindled, left behind as Riasruo lifted vast chunks of rocks into the sky. She carried the Desperate Alliance to safety, leaving behind the cruel Wrackthar and the petty selfishness of their Tyrant-King.
“And upon the westernmost Skyland of Jyuou, Riasruo sent down her own daughter. Hatching from a golden egg on the dawn of the Summer Solstice, Lanii founded the Dawn Empire and a thousand years of peace for the skies.”
The countermelody banished, no longer polluting the beauty of the Talesinger’s harmony. Ary closed
his eyes, and felt the sun’s warmth upon his face.
Then something dark entered the song—the countermelody returned.
“But the Wrackthar survived without the love of Riasruo, sustained by the violent hate of Theisseg and suckled by her wrathful lightning. They found a new way to inflict their cruelty upon us. On the Summer Solstice, the last true Dawn Empress, Xaiutwoa III, climbed the Tower of Morning to sing the yearly praise to Riasruo—the Rosy Prayer.”
The countermelody rumbled and grew, rising like a bubble from the depths of a pond or—
Clouds swirling in a circle, a bulge rising out of the Storm Below. A Cyclone.
“The Great Cyclone fell upon the heart of the Dawn Empire, dragging the greatest skyland, Swuopii, and the others in the east down into the Storm Below, leaving behind a vast, empty sky. Xaiutwoa perished, and though her youngest daughter, Yriitwao, survived and tried to sustain the Empire, its power lay shattered. Petty tyrants were its heirs.”
Sadness and loss filled the main melody. The countermelody simmered into an ominous discord in the background, always present, ready to roar back up and overpower the harmony.
“Every year, praise is sung to Riasruo, our loving Goddess, to thank her for all she has given us: succor from the Storm, and the Blessings that protect us still from the Wrackthars’ successors.”
The song ended, lingering in echoes throughout the hall. And then the applause erupted.
Chaylene stalked away. Indecision seized Ary. He craved to smooth ruffled feathers his anger caused, but . . . What if she pries at the source? His hand rubbed at his side, tracing the oblong scar’s puckered edge.
What if Theisseg really touched me? Tainted me?
~ * * ~
Vel prowled the halls of the inn, the common room still gusting with delight from the Talesinger’s performance. It wasn’t elation at the masterful song Vel felt. No, tonight a boldness set fire to his veins. He scented blood in the air. Chaylene’s commitment to Ary wavered. If he exploit this moment, then he could have her. Finally. He’d feel her beneath him, prying her thighs apart and enjoying what he longed for. What the other girls had failed to give him with their surrenders. He yearned to taste her sweet passion, to bathe in her hot fire. He’d pluck her flower, take what Ary feared to claim.
