by Bruce Blake
Teryk watched his sister fidgeting on her stool, eyes wide and lips pressed tight together. She may not have heard the sounds he heard, but he saw in her expression that she sensed what he sensed.
Trenan reached out, touched the scroll with his thumb and first two fingers, then jerked them away as if he’d brushed the skin of a sea eel. He scowled and rubbed his fingertips against the pad of his thumb, then turned his frown toward the princess and prince. They both observed him expectantly until he wiped his palm on his thigh and extended his hand toward the parchment a second time.
He hesitated before touching the sheet. Teryk licked his lips, waiting for the master swordsman to unroll it, wanting to find out if Trenan perceived the sound, too, or if he’d see something neither of the siblings had. The knight’s fingers hovered for what seemed to the prince like a long moment before they contacted the parchment.
The knight sucked a stiff breath through his teeth, as though the paper’s surface burned his flesh, but he didn’t move away. Instead, he pedaled his fingers, unrolling the scroll across the top of the table. The prince glanced across the table at his sister and found her staring back at him with no trace of a smile on her lips or excitement in her mien. She appeared as nervous as he felt. A shared moment passed between them, then they directed their gazes back toward the master swordsman.
With the scroll open, Trenan stared at its blank surface, eyes wide and lips parted. Time stretched on, oozing past like syrup on a winter day. Twice, the prince opened his mouth to speak, unsure what he might say, and both times he closed it, leaving words and questions unspoken.
A drop of sweat appeared at Trenan’s temple, rolled down the side of his face. Teryk watched it leave a wet trail along his cheek and down to his jaw line. The knight made no move to wipe it away. The prince looked to his sister again and saw her nervousness had become concern. She lifted a questioning eyebrow at her brother and he nodded once.
Danya raised her hand, brushed her fingers against the knight’s shoulder. “Trenan—?”
The master swordsman gasped a harsh breath and jumped back from the table, spilling the stool onto its side with a clatter. His feet tangled and he stumbled, reached out and grasped Teryk’s arm painfully to keep from falling. When he steadied himself, he looked from the princess to the prince, eyes wide and shining with a look Teryk had never seen a hint of in them before: fear.
“What is the meaning of this?” He gazed at the scroll again, moved away a step as though it wasn’t paper but a snake that might strike out and bite. “Where did you get this?”
Teryk swallowed hard, wishing he’d listened to his sister, as was often the case. He didn’t let his gaze stray to her for fear she’d be wearing the smug expression she favored when it played out she was right and he wrong.
“We...we found it,” he said.
Trenan turned his hard gaze on the prince. “Found it where?”
Teryk couldn’t remember ever having seen the master swordsman angry in this manner before. His mouth opened and closed to answer, but no words came forth. Trenan’s glare burned into him, frightening the words out of his throat.
“In a secret chamber,” Danya said. She’d risen from her stool and stood beside Trenan, hand on his shoulder where an arm had once been. He shifted his scowling countenance to her.
“What chamber?”
“Beneath the palace.” The princess averted her gaze to the smudge of dirt on the hem of her dress. “While we were swimming in the river.”
Teryk saw the muscles in Trenan’s jaw bulge and flex as he ground his teeth; without meaning to, the prince mimicked the master swordsman. He stopped when he realized he was doing it, his teeth hurting.
“It’s just an old piece of paper,” the prince said. He reached out to pick it up off the table, but Trenan caught him by the wrist.
“Do not lay your hand upon it,” he said, voice hissing through his teeth. “It’s been touched by magic.”
The master swordsman glared at Teryk, then at Danya, who stared at the rolled parchment, her head shaking side to side minutely. Trenan backed away a step from the table, his grip still on the prince’s wrist.
“You two are coming with me.”
The prince’s heart felt as though it slipped out of his chest and into his stomach.
VII Thorn and Stormbird
The branch bounced gently under the stormbird’s weight, but the bird itself sat still as stone. Though it couldn’t see him, Thorn understood the feathered animal sensed his presence; birds knew things, and there was nothing to be done about it.
He shifted his loose grip on the spear. He wouldn’t use the weapon, intended no harm to this bird or any other living thing. The necessary traps were set and the bird would soon be his; he simply liked the feel of the smooth shaft in his hand, it comforted him. He’d never thrown a spear, except in practice, but he preferred having it with him nonetheless.
Thorn took another step, moving from the leafy cover of a merry bush to stand in front of the wide trunk of a cedar. His skin shifted smoothly from green to striated brown, the color flowing across his flesh the way a liquid might flow across a flat surface, the change keeping him invisible in his surroundings. The bird’s head tilted and Thorn held his ground.
The stormbird’s eye fell on him and, though he appeared to the bird as no more than a tree trunk, he tensed, readying to spring if need be. A breeze ruffled the bird’s feathers and touched Thorn’s cheek, wafting the scent of magic along with it. He inhaled quietly, examining this odor in case another of his tribe might be near, but concluded that which he scented to be merely the magic which kept the bird from flying high enough to clear the veil.
With a cluck, the black, red and yellow bird returned to feeding on tender buds, and Thorn took another step. The loam beneath his bare foot sprang up to meet his sole, cushioning it, quieting it. Three lengths of his spear separated him from the stormbird, and he sensed the power contained within its feathers, its beak, its talons. Energy danced through the air.
Two more silent steps and Thorn had himself in position. He crouched, eyes narrowing and a satisfied smile creeping across his lips; the muscles in his slender legs tensed, coiled beneath him in preparation to pounce. The bird hopped forward; Thorn sprang.
“Awawawah!” he yelled, waving his arms and dragging his feet through the creepers and moss, stirring fallen leaves and sticks.
The bird squawked at the noise and flapped its wings, the gust of wind buffeting Thorn’s face as it rose into the air, out of his reach. It looked back, as though to taunt the creature who startled it from its lunch, and then flew into the net.
“Ha!” Thorn exclaimed leaping over the log on which the bird had perched before attempting to flee. “Thorn got you.”
The open end of the trap cinched closed, the stormbird struggling and grousing within, and the gusts of wind stirred by its flapping wings diminished as the net limited its movements. The bird’s gaze flickered across the forest floor, searching out its captor, and Thorn allowed his flesh to fade from the greens and browns of the forest around him to its normal shade of gray.
He reached over his shoulder and stowed the spear in the sling on his back, then leapt for the tree, his fingers and toes grasping the rough bark as he hauled himself up to perch on the first branch. Dangling from the branch above his head, the stormbird writhed inside the net, twisting itself to regard him.
“Thorn didn’t hurt you, did he, my friend?”
“Grawwkk!”
“Didn’t think so.”
Thorn jumped up and caught the higher branch, swung himself around to sit on it and peer down at his captive.
“Thorn won’t hurt you, pretty bird. Thorn will free you.”
He grasped the woven vine rope securing the trap to the branch and pulled. The bird weighed more than he guessed it would, so he waved his hand, calling on the fibers to aid him. The net’s weight eased in his grip and he pulled the bird up onto the branch beside him; it swiped a
t him with a taloned foot, missing his ribs by less than the length of its beak.
“Oh, you are a playful one.” He sprang up to perch on his toes, not a leaf shaking with the movement, and crouched so his eyes found the same level as the bird’s.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Thorn said, unwrapping the thin leather strap from around his wrist as he spoke. “Thorn will free you from the binding and in return, you will carry Thorn.”
“Grawwkk!”
He leaned close, lowered his voice. “Thorn is going to fly with you.”
The bird blinked once and stared at him. Thorn grinned, white teeth flashing behind his gray lips. The first attempt he’d made to capture the bird, he hadn’t so much as put a finger on it. The third time, it escaped the instant he loosened the net—a mistake he’d taken steps to correct. This time, he’d fashioned the snare to open on both ends, allowing him to expose the bird’s feet and tether himself in place before it took wing.
“Okay,” he said, shifting on the limb. It didn’t bounce under his weight. “First, the binding.”
Eyes closed, he held his hand over the stormbird’s head, a finger’s-breadth out of reach if it stretched its neck and snapped its beak—something he’d learned the second time he caught the bird. It ruffled its feathers and a breeze played across Thorn’s face, cooling him. He loosed his breath through his broad nose, pictured the sky and clouds sliding by, the rush of wind in his ears, the heat of sun on his back.
The stormbird chirped. When Thorn opened his eyes again, the bird had calmed.
“That will make it so,” he said and reached for the cord securing the bottom of the net closed.
With a flick of his wrist, he pulled the string free and the trap fell open. The bird craned its head, eyeing its captor’s activities. It shuffled, attempting to free a foot through the opening, but its talons tangled in the strands of the net.
“Here. Let Thorn help.”
Thorn put the rope he held under one foot and reached out with both hands to maneuver the stormbird’s foot out of the trap. As he did, he slid the cord he’d unwound from his wrist around the bird’s leg. It let out a questioning cheap.
“This is how you’ll carry Thorn.”
He cinched a knot, carefully tying it tight enough not to slip, but not so tight to hurt, then settled back to inspect his work.
“No bites,” he said to himself, ticking things off in his fingers. “Bird still here. Spell cast. Thorn in place. Ready to go.”
With his free hand, Thorn guided the net around the bird’s body, careful of its powerful wings and curved beak, and lifted the woven ropes over its head. They sat together in the tree for a moment, staring at one another. Thorn gripped the short length of cord running between his wrist and the stormbird’s leg, tensing the muscles in his arm and readying himself. The bird continued glaring at him and, for a length of three beats of his heart, Thorn thought maybe it didn’t understand what he required it to do. He opened his mouth to explain again, but the bird interrupted him by leaping into the air.
It flapped its wings, sending a burst of mist-laced wind fanning across Thorn’s face. He had an instant to enjoy the dampness on his cheeks, cooling him on such a warm day, then the tether tightened. The bird pulled him off the branch with a jerk that wrenched his shoulder, but Thorn smiled despite the discomfort.
He was flying!
The bird’s wings rose and fell sending wind and spray out behind with a faint rumble of thunder that rang in Thorn’s ears. A thick branch slapped his leg, twisting him on the end of the cord, transforming the forest into a whirling carousel spinning around him. He laughed, the sound burbling out of his throat to be lost in the stormbird’s squawking.
Thorn titled his face to the sky, peering up through the lattice work of leaves and branches, the sun shining through in patches. He awaited the forest falling away around him as the bird’s mighty wings bore them up and up. He laughed again until he realized the canopy overhead grew no closer.
Thorn turned his attention to the bird, saw it laboring under his weight. Broad leaves slapped at his face, twisted branches grasped at his legs, tore at his flesh. The bird squawked again, a sound full of hard work and distress.
Thorn is too heavy.
He struggled to stop spinning at the end of the tether, to get his bearing, and accomplished it by reaching up with his free hand to grasp the stormbird’s foot. They were higher off the ground than the bird had likely ever flown, but not so high as Thorn had climbed in the trees. Not high enough.
“Grawwkk!”
Thorn reached over his shoulder, plucked his spear from its sling. The shaft slid through his fingers, smooth wood whispering across his skin, until he gripped it right below the head. With a deft flick of his wrist, he severed the taut cord tethering his wrist to the bird’s foot.
The bird rose higher as Thorn fell. He tucked his head in, somersaulted between two thick branches, and landed lightly on his feet, running before he ever touched the ground.
High above, the stormbird stroked powerful wings, pulling itself through the air, a roll of thunder spreading in its wake. Thorn danced through the forest, leaping roots and ducking branches, his feet unerring in finding the perfect spot to land when he jumped, then leaving again the instant after they’d touched. He watched the bird, rising higher and higher, breaking through the branch-and-leaf latticework forest ceiling.
Thorn leapt a ditch and his bare feet landed on soft grass. Ahead, he glimpsed a shimmering mass of green looming, rising out of the ground and reaching for the sky.
He slowed his approach, the veil’s energy prickling the hair on the back of his neck, sending a flutter along his skin. The length of his spear away, he stopped and leaned back, peering skyward along glittering wall. He held his hand over his brow, blocking the sun from his eyes and beheld the stormbird high above, soaring higher than it had ever flown, higher than any bird behind the veil had flown since they were banished.
Thorn’s heart swelled. How it must feel to be that bird, winging above the earth, sharing the view reserved for the clouds, gazing down on creatures, trees, rocks and rivers. Thorn ached for his eyes to see what the bird saw.
And then the stormbird crossed the veil.
Thorn’s eyes went wide and his spear fell from his grasp, rattling against a stray rock as it hit the ground. He rotated slowly, watching the bird drift across the open air, a plume of cloud spreading behind it, rain falling, coloring the landscape gray like Thorn’s skin.
He took a step closer to the veil, close enough his nose nearly brushed its surface. The pulse of its power excited his flesh, but he ignored it, distracted by another excitement as other thoughts came to his mind.
Nothing has ever crossed the veil.
The grass around him bent under the weight of his emotions, caressed his legs and feet the way a mother might comfort her child. He watched the stormbird until it became nothing but a dot in the sky at the head of the trail of storm clouds left in its wake. Thorn raised his hand, touched his palm against the veil.
Green lightning flickered across its surface, giving it the appearance of verdant ice. Energy flowed through Thorn’s fingers, up his arm. He inhaled a breath flavored with magic and grass and rain, then spun around and trod back toward the forest. Behind him, the lightning cracks in the icy veil faded, returning it to a dim green haze as another thought ran through Thorn’s mind.
Thorn needs a bigger bird.
VIII Punishment
Ten tall steps led to the throne sitting atop the high dais.
Danya held pleasant memories of being a small child and gaping up at their father’s seat of power, marveling at how high above the floor it seemed to her youthful eyes, how difficult the climb on the occasions the attendants left her alone long enough to try it.
Later, she realized the stairs had been designed to be forbidding, both to remind the regent of the responsibilities of his station and to emphasize the king’s importance to his people.
The dais was built to hold the king highest above everyone. As she stood beside her brother in front of these steps, awaiting their parents’ arrival, they intimidated her in a way they never had before, instilling fear as they were meant to do.
Teryk shifted one foot to the other and she wondered what thoughts went through his mind. The princess wanted to fault him for this, to chastise him for not listening to her, first when she told him not to take the scroll from the chamber, then when she doubted the wisdom of showing Trenan. But she’d been at his side and had no one to blame but herself. The times in their lives she’d talked her brother into and out of things were nigh uncountable; if she’d wanted this to be another of those instead of a new adventure, she’d have made it so.
Danya glanced sideways at the prince, saw his lower lip sucked into his mouth, chewing away with his nervous habit. Beyond him, Trenan stood on the far side, to her brother’s right, as if he expected he might have to use his one hand to grab the prince should he attempt to flee. But Teryk wouldn’t flee, nor would she. They’d been punished by their father before, and more occasions lay in the future. One lesson they’d both learned: accept what you deserve, for better or worse.
A door creaked open behind them and Danya faced the dais, resisting the urge to look back. Seconds later, footsteps echoed up to the ceiling high above, reverberating in the room meant to hold hundreds but now only occupied by the princess, the prince, Trenan, and the new arrivals—the king, the queen, and their attendants. No reason for a scribe, or magistrate, or the multitude of others who attended the kingdom’s business—this was a family affair, not a matter of the realm.
The way the footfalls bounced against the high walls, echoing and multiplying, made it seem as though a thousand people entered but, a moment later, the king passed them without a sideways glance. Marn, his squire, followed the requisite three steps behind and one to his right; the queen and her two attendants came after. She surveyed Danya on the way by, a wan smile on her lips as she shook her head at her daughter. The princess’ gaze fell away to the soiled hem of her dress.
