When Shadows Fall

by Bruce Blake

  “I see you, little one,” the bird said without looking at his stalker. “If you think to poke me with your pathetic stick, I’ll peck out both your eyes.”

  Thorn laughed and allowed his skin to return to gray. “Thorn means you no harm, Father Raven. He has a deal for you.”

  The bird spun abruptly, flapped its wings once and leapt across the clearing to land in front of Thorn. The raven loomed over him, taller than two stormbirds stacked atop one another. No doubt Father Raven’s size and powerful wings could carry him to the sky, given the chance.

  “What deal do you have for me?” the raven squawked. “I don’t need food, unless you’re offering yourself. You do look tasty.”

  Thorn beamed. He knew the bird wouldn’t eat him, he was merely trying to throw a playful scare into him, as when he threatened to peck his eyes. The bird might be large and strong, but they both understood his size and power were no match for one like Thorn.

  “Thorn is too small to make a meal for Father Raven. Stringy and bitter. Blechh! Worms taste better than Thorn.”

  “Then why do you disturb my hunt?”

  “A deal!”

  Thorn bounded to the side, danced and whirled a circle around the huge bird. Father Raven watched, first with one eye, then the other. Thorn sensed his dubiousness, but once he’d listened to the proposition, his doubt would metamorphose to gratitude.

  “Quit your prancing, little one. It will soon be time for my nap, so if you have a bargain to discuss, out with it before my interest wanes.”

  Thorn made one more circuit around the bird before skidding to a halt in front of him. The bird tilted its head, fixed the small gray man in the gaze of one black eye.

  “Thorn can help you fly.” He spoke it as though he told a secret, but the raven’s reaction held no secrecy.

  “Ha!” he guffawed. “I can already fly. You waste my time.”

  Father Raven made one short hop, but Thorn leapt up and grabbed a chest feather, tugging it and stopping him. The bird dislodged him with a firm shake.

  “Don’t pull my feathers.”

  Thorn ignored him. “How high can you fly, Father Raven?”

  “To the tops of the trees,” he said, his chest puffing with pride. “Higher than any other bird can fly.”

  “Hmm. Not so bad, I guess.”

  “Not so bad? What bird flies higher?”

  “Thorn helped a stormbird fly higher not four sunrises past. Higher than the tops of the trees.” He leaned in, held his hand up beside his mouth and lowered his voice. “Higher than the veil.”

  Father Raven’s sooty eye glared at him. His beak opened and closed with a click. A moment passed and Thorn waited for the bird to agree to hear his proposition, waiting for the Father of Ravens to proclaim what an amazing feat Thorn had performed. He did neither.

  “Impossible.” Anger rumbled in its voice. Anger and a hint of interest. “No bird flies higher than Father Raven. How is this possible?”

  Thorn jumped back and spread his arms, a wide smile on his lips. “Thorn did it.”

  The raven shook its head. “Your kind’s magic keeps birds from flying higher, to keep us from crossing the veil and taking magic out where it doesn’t belong.”

  “The stormbird crossed the veil.”

  Father Raven cocked his head, then tilted it back toward the bright sky hanging over his clearing. Thorn waited, patient. He’d dealt with the bird enough times in the past to know his pride. After a few seconds, the raven returned its dark gaze to Thorn.

  “No one can release the binding.”

  “Thorn can. Thorn did.”

  “You did?”

  He nodded.

  “You’d do it for me?”

  Thorn’s grin spread wider.

  Father Raven’s head tilted. “And what do you ask in return?”

  “Take Thorn with you.”

  Insects the raven normally would have snatched out of the air with his hungry beak buzzed around them as the two stared at each other, the bird’s head canted to one side, the gray man’s smile sparkling in the sun. Wind rustled the leaves, stirred the grass around Thorn’s bare legs, tickling his thighs. He kept his gaze and his grin on the bird. After a long while, the bird finally spoke.

  “We have an agreement.”

  Thorn whooped and danced, spun in circles until his head threatened to spill him to the ground. The raven watched with its unreadable face, its beak set in the same expression it always kept, its eyes staring one at Thorn the other at the sky. When the man’s jubilation died away, the raven leaned in close, laid its beak on Thorn’s shoulder, clicked it together once in his ear.

  “Do not embarrass me, little one. I do not like to be embarrassed.”

  “Neither does Thorn.”

  The bird settled back. “What do we do?”

  “Crouch, Father Raven. Thorn will ride on your back.”

  “No one rides on the back of the Father of Ravens,” the bird snorted.

  Thorn’s smile sagged. “Thorn thought we struck a deal.”

  “Well, yes, but—”

  “But...?”

  The raven stared at him for a moment, then puffed up its feathers, shook them out, and settled on the ground as low as he could go. Thorn grabbed a handful of feathers and catapulted himself onto the bird’s back.

  “I told you not to pull my feathers.”

  Thorn laughed and shimmied himself into the spot where the bird’s head met its back, gripping with his legs. He wiggled around until he found comfort, then closed his eyes.

  “Do I fly now?” Father Raven asked.

  “Sshhh. Thorn will say when it is time.”

  He leaned forward and extended his hand over the bird’s head. Breaking the binds holding Father Raven close to the ground needed more energy than he’d expended for the stormbird. A bird as mighty as this one required powerful binding, and powerful magic to break them.

  Thorn pictured the top of the forest, the sky beyond. He imagined touching the clouds with the tips of his fingers, looking down at towering trees reduced to splinters, vast pastures shrunken to patches of color. Wind moved his hair, sun warmed his skin, the scent of trees and grass, dirt and water fell away, replaced by fresh, clear, odorless air. While his mind conjured these things, his body directed its energy into the raven, passing his power to the bird. A portion of it he’d never get back, a cost he willingly paid for the chance to soar.

  The Father of Ravens shuffled beneath him, feeling the power passed between them, and Thorn knew the time had come. He opened his eyes and lowered his hand, leaned forward to whisper in the bird’s ear.

  “Now.”

  Father Raven climbed to his feet and spread his wings. He hopped three times, then, with a powerful downstroke that flattened the grass in the clearing and momentarily stole the breath from Thorn’s lungs, they took to the air.

  Thorn held on to the feathers of the great bird’s neck, tight enough to keep from slipping off, but not so tight as to cause his ride discomfort. He willed his skin black to match the raven’s feathers lest eyes watched them from below.

  Father Raven’s mighty strokes powered them up into the air. He tilted his wings, steering their course, his body flexing beneath Thorn as each feather answered the bird’s commands. They banked, circling the clearing. Thorn stretched his neck to peer down at where they’d stood a moment before and found they were already half the height of the tallest tree above it.

  “Go higher,” he shouted, the wind throwing his voice back over his shoulder, but the great bird heard his words and listened to his plea.

  Father Raven’s wide wings stroked them higher and higher. Thorn flexed his legs, gripping with his thighs and feet, and released his fingers from the neck feathers. He sat upright, the wind buffeting his chest, doing its best to rip him off the raven’s back. A smile spread across his face; he laughed and laughed, the sound lost to the sky.

  The raven’s body flexed, flattening out their path, its wings holding firm
as the feathers along the tip and trailing edge moved to keep them flying straight, gliding high above the ground.

  “We are higher than the trees,” Father Raven said, a joy in his voice Thorn had never heard from him before. “Higher than I’ve ever flown before.”

  “The stormbird flew higher. High enough to cross the veil.”

  “Then we shall fly higher still.”

  The raven stroked again, the movement threatening to unseat Thorn. He leaned in, wrapping his arms around the bird’s neck, digging his fingers into its feathers as they angled toward the heavens, climbing, climbing.

  Thorn peered past the bird’s wing at the trees receding to the size of slivers beneath them, the clearing reduced to a spot of green. Amongst the forest, he spied the settlement he shared with the others, the single plume of smoke sketching a trail skyward from the fire at its center and dissipating long before reaching their altitude.

  Father Raven leveled off again, cried out his joy to the sky.

  “Ha, ha! None have flown higher than the Father of Ravens.”

  With an effort, Thorn straightened himself, but found the wind too much. He concentrated his energy, focusing on holding his seat, and the bird’s feathers gripped him. When he sat upright, he saw the shimmering green of the veil fast approaching and realized they were soaring higher than its top.

  “We should turn around, Father Raven,” he yelled, struggling to make his voice rise above the howl of wind in his ears. The bird didn’t respond.

  They moved faster than he thought, closing the distance to the veil rapidly. If they didn’t turn soon, they’d cross over to the other side. Thorn gathered a handful of feathers in his fingers and tugged to get the bird’s attention.

  “Do not pull my feathers or I’ll throw you off.”

  “Turn around, Father of Ravens, or we will cross the veil.”

  “Did you not say the stormbird crossed the veil, Thorn?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Do you want him to be the only creature ever to view the veil’s top? The other side? You and I could be the first in more generations than any can count to cross and come back.”

  Thorn opened his mouth, intending to protest. In his mind, he told Father Raven it was a dangerous idea, that they didn’t know what might happen when they crossed to the other side. He doubted the bird would listen to reason and, so high in the sky, he could do nothing to stop him. Neither mattered, because his mind and mouth did not agree on the matter.

  “Let’s go!”

  The raven took them higher, ensuring ample height to clear the top of the veil. They soared on his outstretched wings, cutting through the sky like a black knife slicing through lard. Unhindered, unfettered, unbound.

  Thorn leaned forward again, not because he feared falling off, but because he wanted to see the top of the veil, to glimpse what none had seen before.

  It surprised Thorn to find it no thicker than a blade of grass. The barrier holding back his kind, and the majesty of the beasts living behind the veil with them, was no more substantial than the stuff that provided sustenance for many of those animals.

  It flashed past in an instant, and then they breathed the air on the other side.

  The other side of the veil.

  Thorn shifted to glance back over his shoulder and discover how the magical wall appeared from the other side, but it wasn’t there. No shimmering green, no splinters of dancing lightning where animals or birds tested it. Nothing.

  A spark of panic lit in Thorn’s chest, bringing with it the certainty something was wrong. He squeezed his legs and sat upright. The wind grabbed him, tossed him backward toward the raven’s wing, and he threw himself flat on the bird’s back, heart pounding in his chest—the first time in his life he’d ever been afraid.

  “Turn around,” he screamed, battling the wind.

  Father Raven didn’t respond. Thorn dug his fingers in, tugged hard and yelled again. The feathers didn’t grip him.

  “Go back.”

  “Crawk!”

  The bird call grating from the raven’s beak froze the blood in Thorn’s veins. As long as he’d known the Father of Ravens—all their lives—he’d never uttered a sound that wasn’t a word.

  “No time for jokes,” he said. “You need to take Thorn home now.”

  “Crawk. Cluck. Cluck. Crawk.”

  Thorn clacked his teeth together over and over, making them chatter as though with cold. Somehow, crossing the veil had stolen the bird’s ability to speak and left him unable to communicate with Father Raven.

  What else has it taken?

  He gripped the bird’s neck tight, focusing his energy, concentrating on making him change their course to take them back. It had no effect. Thorn closed his eyes, pictured green fields, tall trees, soil under his soles and squeezing between his toes, thinking that if he recast the binding and return them to a safe altitude, he’d have a better chance to keep his wits and get them home safely.

  Nothing happened.

  Desperate, Thorn grabbed the raven’s wing, manipulated the feathers in an attempt to force the bird to turn. It squawked, pecked at him over its shoulder, but he ducked away, his legs slipping from around its neck. He grabbed it, reseated himself, and tried the wing again.

  The bird tilted its wings and banked, turning back the way they came, and Thorn took a relieved breath. Then the world lurched and the bird spun into a tight pirouette, spiraling down toward the ground.

  It threw Thorn to the side, the force of the spin tossing him away from the bird’s body. His grip slipped from its wing and he clasped tight with his feet, desperate to hold on as the ground spun and spun, still so far below him.

  The spiral stopped abruptly, and the raven threw itself into a dive. Wind filled Thorn’s face, pushing itself into his lungs, choking him. He struggled to close his mouth, his eyes, but the wind’s power kept him from doing so, forcing him to watch the trees approach as they flew toward them at an incredible pace.

  “Ahhhhhhhhhhh!”

  His scream trailed out behind him, lost to the world, but too small to reach the heavens. Color drained from his skin as he diverted his energy to staying on the bird, though not convinced doing so was the best choice.

  The bird lurched once more, pulling out of the dive and jerking back toward the sky. The move dislodged Thorn from his seat, sent him tumbling off Father Raven’s back.

  He rolled over and over, falling, nothing but air separating him from the trees rushing up at him from below.

  Thorn closed his eyes.

  XIX Betrayed

  Crouching hidden in the cover provided by the wide trunk of a Bunyon tree, Danya shifted from one foot to the other, the soles of her bare feet squelching on the muddy ground beside the river. She looked up at the sky fading from afternoon cobalt to washed-out blue tinted pink by the sun disappearing behind the castle wall.

  Water gurgled through the grate, and hearing its sound added to the anger churning in her gut. Teryk’s lesson had ended and dinner had been eaten, though she didn’t attend. Mother and father likely missed her at the meal, but her absence wasn’t altogether unusual, especially during the warm seasons. And still she waited, every moment ticking past piling on to the surety her brother had lied and left her behind.

  “Teryk,” she said.

  Danya had lost the guard assigned to her long before entering the gardens. He’d surely be searching for her, but she expected he’d continue searching on his own for a while before telling anyone he’d misplaced the princess. Doing so might prove worse for him than for her. If she hadn’t checked in by bedtime, then he’d sacrifice his own well-being for hers, but she doubted he’d do it before.

  She stared at the river, stewing. How long should she wait? How long before she deserved to name herself a fool?

  Perhaps he lost his nerve.

  Possible, but unlikely. His entire life, Teryk had been difficult to prod into something new, starting an adventure, but once he decided, the king’s decr
ee barely stood a chance of changing his mind. No, he’d gone, and he’d left her behind.

  Danya stood, slung her pack over one shoulder, and slapped her hand against the trunk of the Bunyon tree. Leaves shuddered overhead and her palm stung with the impact. Neither changed the empty feeling of being abandoned pulsing in her gut.

  Heedless of the noise she created, the princess stalked out of the tangle of trees and shrubs and into the north courtyard with its trimmed hedges and flowering bushes. The paths and lawns lay deserted at this time of day, but she didn’t care if anyone noticed her, not even if the guard charged with keeping her from doing exactly the sort of thing she’d been planning found her. Indignation seethed within her as she stomped her bare feet on the flagstone path to knock the riverbank’s mud from her soles. Dirty footprints followed her, each one fainter than the last, but she didn’t look back, didn’t return her longing gaze to the river, the grate, the promise of adventure beyond.

  Instead, she stared straight ahead, brows drawn in a frown, determined to either find her brother or someone to help her stop him.

  ***

  Danya found Trenan sitting on a hay bale at the edge of the practice arena, sword laid across his lap as he drew a whetstone along its edge. As a friend of the king and the most respected knight in the kingdom, a score of squires awaited the master swordsman’s command to tend to his weapon, yet here he sat, a man with one arm fashioning a sharper edge than any but the armorer himself.

  “Sir Trenan,” Danya called, entering the practice facility. The knight tilted his head in greeting.

  “Your highness,” he said, returning to his sword. “To what do I owe the pleasure? Shall I light some torches so you can embarrass me?”

  She ignored his barbs. Neither of them doubted he was tenfold the swordsman she was, but they both enjoyed the teasing.

  “Not tonight, sir. Your embarrassment shall have to wait in favor of mine. I need your help.”

  Danya strode across the practice circle, loose straw and stray stones pressing against her bare feet. Trenan halted his nightly sharpening ritual and eyed her choice of shirt and breeches, the pack slung over her shoulder. He stowed the chunk of whetstone in a pocket on his belt then stood and sheathed his sword.