Half Discovered Wings

by David Brookes

  The smell was awful. Rowan asked what was happening, what the others were seeing. Gabel told her no lies. She began to cry, silently.

  They came to a crossroads, intending to keep on going, but a line of strangely dressed men ran by. They wore long, thick cloaks with hoods, which were pulled up over faces wrapped in torn cloth. They had odd beak-like masks over their mouths and noses, and goggles over their eyes, gloves on their hands.

  ‘Who are these?’ Isaac cried, taken aback.

  ‘Plague doctors,’ said the magus, as the last of them hurried by. ‘Their cones are filled with protective herbs. Don’t let them worry you.’

  After crossing half the radius of the city they came across a scene. A small group of people was backed up against a wall on one side of the street; on the other side a man dressed in black struggled to lift a convulsing heavy-set male.

  ‘Help me!’ he cried. ‘He’ll die!’

  The people watching did nothing. The magus looked at Gabel, who said, ‘We keep moving.’

  As they cantered by, Gabel saw that the man in black was a priest. Gabel didn’t stop, and the others didn’t question him. They all knew that to help would only expose themselves to the sickness.

  A sudden explosion shook the city, and almost instantly thick black smoke poured up from their right. A second explosion went off to the left, and then another almost directly in front of them; fire leapt up out of the side of a building. Several other buildings began to burn. The horses all snorted, but didn’t jump or rear. They were well trained.

  ~

  Rowan was entirely blind, but she could hear: she had heard the man calling for assistance, but her horse was tied to Gabel’s, and even if she had wanted to dismount, she could not have. This talk of plague frightened her, and she wouldn’t have halted for any reason.

  Her blindness enhanced her distrust and fear of Gabel. She had heard fragments of his discussion with the magus, and all of the minor altercation with Teague. She didn’t want to be close to either of them. But what choice did she have, now that she couldn’t see?

  She tried to focus her thoughts. They were in Hermeticia, the city the people there called Shianti. They had reached their destination and soon, perhaps, she might be cured of her sickness.

  But I am not sick, she thought dismally. I am “shutting down”.

  Explosions shook her into the present. She heard Teague yell: ‘Something’s happening!’

  But the explosions stopped, and though she felt the terrifying heat of fire all around her, the commotion seemed to have added little to the chaos throughout the city.

  She felt the heat intensify, and knew that they were passing down a street lined with burning buildings. The heat lessened, and she knew that they had passed them. She heard the sound of hoof beats, and wooden wheels on cobblestones. She couldn’t tell, but a rider-less cart had been pulled by a frightened horse across another junction and had disappeared down a side road.

  To her left she could sense a presence. Knowing it instantly, she cried out before realising.

  ~

  Gabel heard her speak – had she said Caeles’ name? – but his attention had been on the runaway horse and cart. It had spilled large bundles of something, wrapped in thick carpet. They were bodies. Two of them unrolled and lifeless corpses stared up at them.

  ‘They don’t have faces!’ Isaac burst out.

  ‘No illness I know of does that,’ Teague said quietly, sick to his stomach.

  Gabel said, ‘Move on. We don’t have time for this.’

  He turned when he saw Rowan looking this way and that, her eyes open but unseeing. She was talking to herself.

  ‘Come on!’ he said. ‘Rowan, pay attention. Hold onto the horse’s reins.’

  She muttered more words to herself, and shook her head. She was crying again, and Gabel’s heart bled for her.

  ‘Joseph.’

  He turned, and saw Teague pointing ahead. Following Teague’s gestures, he saw – as he looked down into the very bottom of the crater – a huge excavation site, like a massive quarry. There was a single path, cut in jagged lines through the rock and mud. Its edges were blurred and drained of colour by the massive beam of light discharged from its centre.

  Teague yelled, but his voice was drowned the noise of more explosions. The light seemed to be pulsing, something changing in its beam that made it look like some dial had been turned, or a switch flicked. It began to dim; it faded, but didn’t disappear.

  A second carriage shot past them, this time without the horse but full of people. The man at the reins seemed to be at a loss; it was out of control. It crashed into the side of a building, caving in its wooden walls.

  Five figures piled out of it, two of whom were young women, dressed in brown and cream dresses. They had blood streaming from their scalps.

  One looked up and spotted the magus. ‘Atropos!’ she cried, and caught his attention.

  ‘Maeia!’ he said, startled. ‘And Taeia! Girls, what are you doing here?’

  The two women staggered over, drawing the attention of the others. Gabel recognised them as the pair they’d met on the path to Pirene all those months ago, the violinists. He saw their instruments in their hands. The younger of the two, Maeia, gave him a nod of recognition. What was it she had called the magus? Rowan thought. “Atropos”? How many names did the old errant go by?

  ‘Atropos,’ Taeia was saying to the magus, ‘is this what you warned us about? Alames tala mu, magis.’

  ‘I’m afraid so. However … I don’t see how to end it. What do you know?’

  ‘A man performs rites underneath the pillar of light,’ she replied. ‘He’s activated a machine. And there is bedlam on the streets: a plague threatens the people here.’

  ‘Do you know how long until he finishes his rites?’

  ‘I don’t. It was Maeia who saw him enter. I was elsewhere.’

  ‘I did see,’ Maeia said, drawing her eyes from Gabel, who she apparently found suddenly interesting. ‘He carried books and rolls of paper. He carried machines and incunabula.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Nothing that I saw. Homcana, magis, some of them were atro Vulgate.’

  The magus turned to Gabel. ‘We must stop this.’

  ‘What is Cleric planning?’ He glared at the two musicians. ‘What are they talking about?’

  ‘Forget your suspicions, Joseph. They are allies, and know much. As much as I do,’ he added. ‘They say Cleric carried religious books – occult books. He is planning something abominable and extraordinary.’

  ‘So what can we do to stop him?’

  ‘Look!’ called Isaac.

  Two hundred feet below them, the excavation site was visible through the glaring light. Converging upon it were three large groups of people; there was a sprawling group of men who looked like the residents of Shianti, carrying various weapons. Some had crude pistols, and the rest had mechanical or agrarian tools.

  There was a second group: the Caballeros de la Muerte. The legion of black-armoured knights advanced on horseback, led by a tall, square-shouldered man without a helmet, but the most ornate and elaborate of armour. He had long grey hair, and a great streak of a beard. He carried a shining sword that should have taken two men to lift.

  ‘Is this Captain Alvaros?’ Isaac yelled, looking down. He seemed terrified by the knights, as Sarai had been. People of dark skin had as much to fear from the discriminating Caballeros as they did from the Luxers.

  Teague recognised the third group. They were dressed in robes of ochre, and carried flaming torches. Many had swords, but the number of this final group was small, and they looked exhausted and not at all intimidating. They were the remainders of the H’ouando Sects that had journeyed from across the continent. Leading them, Teague saw Brother Elkin, one of the Four of the Ministrati who had governed the Goyan Sect. He seemed one of the worst injured, walking with a crooked back. Teague caught himself looking for Sister Verlaine, hoping that perhaps Brother Elkin
or one of the other Ministrati had somehow cured the lethal wounds inflicted upon her by the sanguilac at the edge of the desert. He caught himself hoping, and quelled the useless emotion as best he could.

  ‘Some of the robed ones are the people I travelled with,’ he said to Gabel. ‘They know of you, Joseph. They also know that something will happen here. They think Erebis has plans – that this was ordained.’

  ‘What would they know of the Daemon’s plans?’ Gabel asked.

  Teague shook his head; he didn’t say that he had also seen what the ruler of Hadentes had in store for the world. He had closed off that portion of his mind since his nightmare in the meditation pool in the San Bueto monastery.

  Rowan had done her best to move her horse beside Gabel’s. He took her reins and pulled her close.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘Joseph, what goes on?’

  ‘There are three groups of people converging upon the centre of the crater. This man we chase, Tan Cleric, has activated the machine you saw. These people want to shut it down before it does damage.’

  ‘Are we close to it?’

  ‘Quite close.’

  ‘Joseph … Are there any people left in this city?’

  ‘Of course. But there are fires.’

  ‘I mean is there any one left who … Are there any doctors?’

  ‘Rowan, we’ll see. Don’t worry. It would take far more than these iniquitous dealings for me to forget you.’

  The two violinists were talking hurriedly to the magus in a language Gabel couldn’t understand. Just as he looked over, the old man said, ‘Mu allakh urier, mon cheriets. Zu lacca burne riseth.’

  They nodded, and each leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. Then they hurried away, giving a short nod to Gabel as they passed.

  ‘If you wish to learn your true strength,’ one of them said to him, ‘you must listen to what your insides tell you. That is what your new friend does.’

  He looked over to Teague, who was staring back. When Gabel tried to say something in return to he was interrupted by a piercing cry from further up the street.

  Three people were dragging a woman across the stone, who managed to kick herself free of them and resumed her screaming. The others were left looking dumbly at each other as she writhed in pain on the rain-drenched cobbles. The screaming was suddenly cut short when blood spurted from the young woman’s eyes and mouth. Suddenly there was the snap of crunching bones, and her face broke open. A terrible blood-soaked creature crawled free of the fragments of skull, winged and as large as a fist. It gave a hollow shriek and took to the air, buzzing around the startled three men and then straight toward Gabel and the others, before turning toward the light, flying upward in a spiral to join the other circling black creatures.

  Isaac jumped from his horse to examine the body. Just like the bodies that had fallen from the carriage, the corpse was faceless. The hysterical men confirmed that this plague was sweeping through the city. A clairvoyant had said that the man in the excavation site had released a menace into the water. It had killed half the Shiantis and each one had given birth to one of the flying creatures upon their death. This was why Shianti was in such tumult: the authorities had allowed this man to enter the city.

  A group of Shianti citizens were moving to action. They had formed a battalion of sorts, and already fired their weapons at the flying creatures. Now a makeshift leader called them to order and set them on to the very centre of the excavation site. They moved forward into the light, their tools brandished as weapons. They were swallowed by the orange light, as the remainder anxiously waited to see what would happen.

  Nothing happened.

  The rest moved in. Almost instantly the earth began to shake. Houses creaked and groaned as the centre of the crater’s basin came alive with vibrating earth. The air went cloudy with disturbed dust. The bowl of the crater erupted into a crown of rocky pinnacles, forming a shield around itself. The earth continued to fracture, some segments rising like craggy platforms, other crumbling into dust. The rest of the Shiantis were either torn apart by the shifting earth or knocked backward, smothered in dust and soil and falling boulders.

  A terrific wind had taken up. Slates were whipped from the roofs of buildings, slicing through the air. The creatures in the sky were buffeted from side to side on the roiling currents, their diaphanous wings trembling like mirrored rainbows.

  The monks began to tackle the rocky outcroppings, attempting to find purchase on these new obstacles, but as soon as they had climbed to the top of one the wind smashed them from it. The torrential rain hammered the rest to the muddy floor. Lightning streaked across the underside of the clouds, illuminating the robed bodies that littered the site.

  Gabel pulled sharply on his reins and steadied his steed. ‘Magus,’ he said, ‘how can we get past those rocks?’

  ‘Those on the ground aren’t faring well,’ the old man pointed out.

  Gabel turned next to Teague. ‘William. What did the two musicians mean when they said you were listening to what your insides were telling you?’

  ‘They were telling me that this body’s more like my old one than I thought. There is a burning inside the very trenches of my stomach, like a flaming serpent. It’s what I thought I had left behind.’

  ‘Can you make this serpent do your bidding? You might need it. For now, take Rowan, and tie her horse to yours.’

  ‘You’re going down there? Look at the Sects!’

  ‘Just take her reins,’ he ordered, and his expression was like thunder. He jumped down off his horse and watched as the Caballero knights began their attack.

  It was fruitless. Their horses were well bred and smart and found paths up the rocky ledges, but they were soon halted by the hot gale and terrified by the lightning. The knights dismounted and persevered, scaling the top of the pinnacles as atmospheric electricity flickered over the sharp edges of their armour like St. Elmo’s fire.

  There was a surge of activity from inside. A sudden burst of hurtling black shapes spewed from within the pillar of light and pierced the wall of armour. Some of the knights fell to their deaths, battered inside the coffins of their armour. Others were torn open like paper bags in the rain. The rest seemed to disappear into the thick cloud of creatures, vanishing like mist within the living storm and rendered to rusty smoke.

  The black shapes moved outward in a wave, running over the rim of rocks and washing down through the buildings – toward Gabel and the rest.

  The magus turned to him quickly. ‘Joseph, you have to go now!’

  The hunter nodded, but hesitated, and looked back at Rowan.

  ‘Take her with you,’ said the magus. ‘That’s the safest place for her now. Hurry!’

  ~

  Gabel could barely see; his eyes were clouded by black smoke. He could make out the advancing shapes and saw them smash into the people around him like a tsunami, but he felt nothing, even when the creatures collided with him.

  They looked like people, but they were not. Their bodies were covered with hard reflective carapaces, and they were sinewy and gaunt. They had wings that shimmered like the surface of oily water. They were savage and barbarous. Gabel barely saw them. The smoke enveloped him completely, and before he even had a chance to register what his eyes were seeing, he saw no more.

  There was a bird inside him. Its wings were made of hellfire, its beak was of ashen soot, and its claws were molten metal. It flapped and coursed through his veins, growing in size and strength until it filled him entirely.

  Gabel was conscious during this second transformation. He felt his shoulder blades crack and move, the flesh on his back tear like the skin of a drum pulled too tightly. The fiery bird filled his body with magma and his head with smoke, and he knew his form was something different now, as if he had been turned inside out, his spirit on the exterior. His back shuddered, and he knew he now had great leathery wings. His skin was hard and black, and his hands were clawed and sharp, his teeth likewise.
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  It all happened in a second, and he had acknowledged everything that had happened around him: the magus had been looking at him but was now turned away, defending himself against the onslaught of the chitinous attackers.

  Isaac had been halfway from dismounting. His face couldn’t be seen for shadow, but the light accented his muscular torso and thighs, and his dark hair was frozen in a glistening arc.

  Teague was leaning forward in his saddle, and the black horse he rode was rearing and in mid-grimace, the reins tight around its neck. The spurs were dug into its sides, and its eyes were ball-like and white.

  Rowan was just behind him. Her eyebrows were faintly upturned in the centre, a single crease across her forehead. Her viciously short-cut hair had been beaten down over her skull by the rain; wisps and curls were glued to her skin. The crimson bodice given to her by Turenn was hard and wet, and Gabel saw the clumsy stitching around the hemlines, the irregularly sized buttonholes, the damp and frayed lacing. Her skirt was sodden, tied around her thighs so that she could sit on the horse. Her legs glistened. The barely substantial muscles in her arms stood out as she gripped tightly to the reins, her horse about to buck. Her feet were half-in the stirrups, and he noticed the way in which the light shone and faded around the dips and rises of her ankles. Her skin was pale against the nimbus of light that shrouded her, as if covetous of her in this frozen instant of beauty.

  Gabel saw all this at once, in less than a second, less than a nanosecond, and in this time he had transformed, and his great wings had beaten back the smoke and were taking him up into the air like a silver bullet. His clawed hands reached for Rowan and hooked under her corset. As she was lifted from her saddle her eyes widened in sightless shock, but she had been rescued from the wave of attackers and carried up and over them. In her blindness she didn’t see what Gabel saw: the torrent of insectoid men, the slow dip of the crater as they rushed toward its centre, the rough edges of the hastily-cut excavation site, and the burning rosy glow of the pillar of light, as they pierced its edge and disappeared, down toward its source.

  ~

  The dense light from the machine had cut its own way through the cave ceiling, leaving a narrow downward tunnel. Descending through that flaming pillar and then swooping outward had been like suddenly having one’s eyes torn out, when all the light in the world couldn’t restore their lost vision.