The Swampling King (The Windwalker Legacy Book 1)

by Ben S. Dobson

  “I haven’t seen him, Your Grace. I don’t… no one has said anything, if he’s here.”

  “And Shona Falloway? Have you seen her?”

  Egard wrinkled his brow in confusion. “Why would Lady Shona be here?”

  “She wouldn’t,” Lenoden said, and he knew even as he said it that he was right. “She wouldn’t risk trying to fight her way through the wall, and she certainly wouldn’t waste time wandering through the Swamp to get where she wants to go. This is a distraction.” A chill spread through his chest. He knew where she was going; there was only one way out of Greenwall that didn’t pass below the mist. And he knew who she’d be taking with her. The way that palisade broke could only be swampling witchcraft. And they wouldn’t help her unless they knew about the boy. “Damn it to the Deep, she’s going to ruin everything.”

  “I don’t understand, Your Grace.” Egard looked absolutely lost. “Are you still talking about Lady Shona? What’s she done?”

  “She’s taking the baskets.” Lenoden leapt back astride his pony, freed the signal horn hanging from his saddle, and blew a single long note. Near a hundred knights turned to face him. “Every man who can lay his hands on a mount, with me!” he shouted, and pointed northeast, toward the massive silhouette that blocked the stars there. “We ride for the eyrie!”

  33. Airborne

  Josen

  “What in the Deep happened here?”

  Josen jabbed a finger at the corpse, swayed on his feet, and gripped Zerill’s spear again with both hands. So soon after scaling the wall, the ride to the eyrie and the long climb up the stairs had been almost more than his body could take; he could barely stand. But for the moment, his confusion was a distraction—if not a welcome one—from his weariness.

  No answer yet. He tried again. “Is that the high chastor?”

  Again no one spoke, but it had been mostly rhetorical anyway. It was hard to mistake Ulman Benedern, even lying face-down in a puddle of his own blood. The robe of eagle feathers alone would have been enough, even without his size.

  Josen didn’t know what kind of welcome he’d expected, but this wasn’t it. Shona knelt beside the dead man, blood staining her hands and clothes, bone-deep shock in her eyes; Eian stood nearby, staring at Josen in stunned silence. Eroh’s face was buried in Zerill’s stomach. Only Zerill herself seemed halfway collected, despite the extent of her injuries—she’d clearly been badly beaten. She wore a chastor’s robe and her face was colored unevenly with the same dye as Eroh’s, but none of it did much to hide her bruises, or her swollen eyelid. Still, she calmly stroked the boy’s pale hair as if nothing was wrong. Behind her, two basket-keepers stood frozen in terror, and some dozen yards back, Josen could see the aviator leaning over the edge of his basket to watch. No one said a word. In the Swamp, where he’d come to expect it, the quiet had been bearable. Here, in a place he knew, it terrified him.

  Finally, Eian found his voice. “Josen.” His entire body trembled as he said it. “How… how can you be…”

  “Here? There wasn’t anyone to stop me. You might have noticed that the Greenwall is on fire. It’s rather distracting. I had to hide from some knights coming down the stairs, but they passed right by. Is anyone going to explain—”

  Eian didn’t let him finish. He closed the rest of the distance in a stumbling rush and wrapped Josen in a desperate embrace. “I—I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, my boy. Forgive me.” His face was against Josen’s shoulder, but he sounded as if he was crying.

  Josen kept one hand on the spear—he didn’t want to fall over—and wrapped the other around Eian. “There’s nothing to forgive.” He didn’t know what he was meant to be forgiving, but it felt like the right thing to say. Over Eian’s shoulder, he glanced at Shona. “Now will someone tell me what is going on?”

  Shona looked up at him, and then back down at the body beside her; her mouth opened, but no sound came out.

  Instead, Zerill answered him, if not in the way he’d hoped. “No time for that.” She released Eroh and nodded toward the waiting basket. “We have to go. Explanations can wait.”

  “If you say so. But I’ll want one later.” Josen gently extracted himself from Eian’s arms and drew Zerill’s knife from his belt. “Verik asked me to give these to you,” he said, and held the knife and spear out for her. He started to sway again, but Eian grabbed hold of him. The old knight had lapsed into silence again, but he clearly didn’t mean to leave Josen’s side any time soon.

  Without another word, Zerill grabbed her knife and tucked it into the cord at the waist of her robe, then took up her spear in her right hand. Her left, Josen noticed, had two badly broken fingers.

  Eroh stayed near her, clinging to her chastor’s robe. He looked up at Josen, his golden eyes wide and solemn. “I’m sorry Duke Castar hurt you,” he said.

  A cold pain ran through Josen’s left side—his body remembering the knife going in—but he forced a smile for the boy. “Don’t be. He did it, not you.” He almost didn’t want to ask the question he’d been waiting to ask—he didn’t know what he’d do if he got the wrong answer. “But… maybe you can help me? In the stories, the Windwalkers could heal.”

  “I don’t know how,” Eroh said simply.

  Josen tried not to let his disappointment show. “Maybe that will come later.” He’s only a boy. He might still learn. He had to believe it was possible. Without that, he didn’t know if he could keep putting one foot ahead of the other.

  “I’m sorry,” the boy said again.

  “It’s not your fault, Eroh. Like I said, any blame is Castar’s alone.”

  Eroh seemed to consider that a moment, and then nodded. “He said he did it to help me, but Zerill told me that was a lie.” He said Zerill’s name with such admiration that Josen could almost have believed she was the one who bore the Sky God’s mark.

  “Zerill is right.” Shona’s voice, at last. She was climbing shakily to her feet. “And not just about that. We don’t have any time to waste. This…” She glanced down at her bloody hands, and swallowed. “Castar could put us all over a cliff for this, and he would probably get away with it. We can’t let him catch us here.”

  Eian stared down at the body and thrust his fingers through his white hair. “How could I have…” His voice trailed off, raw and broken. “God Above, I don’t know what I was—”

  “It doesn’t matter now,” Shona said. She set her jaw, visibly collecting her composure, and turned to the two basket-keepers. “Get ready to release the lines. We need to leave immediately.”

  “But… t—the high chastor…” stammered one of the keepers, a broad-shouldered man with a thick black beard. He took a nervous step back.

  “Was a traitor,” Shona said firmly. She took a step forward to match his; he didn’t retreat any farther. “I know this is a great deal to take in, but for Greenwall’s sake I am asking you to trust me. What is your name?”

  “H—Harol, Lady Shona,” the man answered, his eyes rising from Benedern’s body.

  “Do you know who this man is, Harol?” Shona tilted her head toward Josen. “You are looking at Prince Josen Aryllia.”

  “Prince Josen?” The man looked halfway between awe and terror. “But he’s… he’s dead.”

  “That might be putting it a bit strongly,” Josen said, and shut his mouth when Shona cast an annoyed look in his direction.

  “He survived,” she said. “He was attacked in the Swamp by Lenoden Castar and left for dead, but as you can see, his betrayers underestimated him. The high chastor was one of them. He knew what Duke Castar had done, and he kept it secret. Now they mean to take Greenwall for themselves. We need to get to the Plateaus and tell the king, before it is too late. We cannot do that without your help.” With one more step, Shona closed the distance between them, and she clasped Harol’s shoulder with one hand. “Will you help us, Harol?”

  Harol looked back down at Benedern’s body, then to Zerill’s uncovered eyes and face, and finally at Shona once more. H
e gave her a slow nod. “I—if you say it’s so, Lady Shona. Your family’s always done right by Greenwall. I won’t watch someone steal my home out from under me. I’ll… I’ll help. We will.” He glanced at the second keeper, a nervous looking bald man, who barely inclined his head. “We’ll get the gas ready. Get aboard, and Travin”—he pointed back at the aviator, who immediately started adjusting valves on his burner, bringing forth a gout of flame into the balloon’s mouth—“will fill the balloon. He’s a Greenwall man through and through, he won’t stop you. We’ll set you loose when he gives the nod.”

  There, Shona hesitated. “You should know that you’re likely putting yourselves in danger. When Castar realizes where we’ve gone… I don’t know what he’ll do.”

  “We’ll say you threatened us, or the like.” Harol’s lip quivered, but he held his chin up. “Don’t worry about us. Just… just come back and throw Duke Castar out, that’s all.”

  “Thank you, Harol,” Shona said, favoring the man with a small smile. “I will come back, I promise you that. And I won’t forget this.” With that, she moved to Josen’s side, and helped Eian support him as they started toward the basket.

  Josen felt her flinch when her fingers touched the misshapen flesh beneath his arm, and he pulled back, suddenly ashamed. “You don’t have to,” he said, looking away from the question in her eyes.

  She didn’t ask what had been done to him, or express any pity—that would only have made it worse. She just put her arm around him again, more confidently this time. “Don’t be stupid,” she said. He laughed at that, and so did she, and suddenly there were tears on her cheeks. “Josen, I… I didn’t think I would ever… By the above, I’m glad you’re here.”

  “Likewise,” said Josen, and grinned at her. “You have no idea how glad. There were times when the only thing that kept me alive down there was imagining you telling me what to do.”

  “I’m glad I could help, then,” she said with a weak smile, wiping her eyes with her free hand. Then, glancing ahead at the basket, she increased her pace. “Come on. Castar will guess where we are before long.”

  The balloon had already lifted high enough into the air to pull the basket upright beneath it, and the aviator was aboard, fiddling with the burner. Zerill moved stiffly, clearly hurt in more than just the obvious ways, but still she climbed in by herself, and lifted Eroh behind her. Josen didn’t know where she found that kind of strength. He needed Shona and Eian’s help to pull himself over the side, and even then it was painful.

  There was room for all of them, but it was close—the basket was only two yards across, with low benches at both ends to sit on during the hours-long flights between duchies. Josen lowered himself onto one of those benches, stretched out his aching legs, and heaved a sigh of relief. Eroh sat down beside him; Zerill stayed on her feet nearby, casting suspicious looks at the gas-burner in front of them and the balloon overhead. Shona and Eian were the last aboard, and they took the seats on the far side.

  The aviator—Travin, the basket-keepers had called him—was a handsome man perhaps a bit older than Josen, with wild brown hair and several days worth of stubble on his cheeks. The lack of grooming was no surprise; he’d probably slept at the launch for several days. Every aviator Josen had ever met had been the obsessive sort. And like the rest of them, Travin paid more attention to the valves on the gas-burner at the basket’s center than to his passengers as they boarded. He adjusted his instruments with something akin to fatherly affection, looking up only to glance nervously at Shona as she sat down.

  “Lady Shona,” he said, and tried without success to flatten down his messy hair with one hand. “The Plateaus, is it? Heard t’all from here, no need t’say more.” He tilted his head back, as if he could see the sky through the luminescent silk of his balloon. “S’a wind blowin’ that way, but she’s high up. Goin’ t’be cold.”

  Josen had always been fascinated by the baskets, even after he’d gotten old enough to realize he couldn’t just fly away from his life. When he was younger, he’d often snuck down to the basket-launch with Rudol in tow, and spent hours watching the aviators and keepers work. He could still picture half-remembered wind-charts for each cycle in his head.

  It has to be early Berian, so… “We’re going to have to pass through a northeastern wind first to get that high, aren’t we?” He shivered at the thought. Any eastbound wind from Greenwall would carry them out over parts of the Swamp where he’d been hunted for turns by swamplings and Deeplings both. He had absolutely no desire to go back there.

  Travin looked vaguely impressed. “S’true, we’ll go nor’east oe’r the wall ‘fore we swing west. Won’ take us far, though.” He leaned over the side of the basket to take a torso-sized glass cannister from Harol, set it down, and then did the same with a second one from the other keeper. He secured both near a third that was already connected to the burner by a tube of curved metal screwed through a wax-sealed cork.

  Josen only vaguely understood how the gas burners worked, despite all the questions he’d asked when he was young. After the King’s War, Kaleb had charged the scholars of Orim’s Tower to find a better way to travel between the mountains, and they’d come up with a design very close to what the baskets still used. Even a trickle of the gas harvested from the Swamp would produce a sizeable flame, heating the air in the balloon to provide lift. The gas-flow was controlled by the valves, and proper adjustment was essential—more gas meant more heat, more lift, but the supply wasn’t limitless, and too large a fire could be dangerous in a wicker basket suspended in mid-air. The history of basket-flight was full of tragic accidents, especially in the early days before trained aviators and flame-warding varnishes.

  Travin, at least, seemed confident in what he was doing as he fiddled with his valves. After a moment, he looked over his shoulder and shouted, “Let ‘er go!”

  The keepers released the lines, and the basket jerked under Josen’s feet and began to rise. Zerill stumbled and pitched toward him, her eyes wide.

  Josen pushed himself up and caught her with his good arm, adjusting his stance for the sway of the basket. It had been more than a wind-cycle since he’d last flown; he was surprised to find that he could still stand with some grace, despite his injuries. Not for very long, though—once Zerill was steady, he had to grip one of the ropes to stop himself from toppling.

  Zerill was still breathing quickly. “I… I didn’t expect…” She swallowed, watching the eyrie slowly recede beneath them. “It feels very strange.”

  “You’ll get used to it,” said Josen. “But you look… a bit worse for wear.” His eyes moved from her bruised face to her broken fingers. “You might want to sit.” He hoped she would—he couldn’t stand for much longer, but he’d just as soon she not know that.

  Zerill just nodded, and awkwardly shuffled along the side of the basket to sit down beside Eroh. Hiding his relief, Josen joined her. She watched him silently with her strange black eyes as he sat himself down; he didn’t look away.

  After a moment, she said, “I told you not to come for me.”

  “Verik insisted.”

  “No. He would have done as I asked. He would have hated it, but he would have done it. This was your idea.” She cocked her head. “Why?”

  Josen shrugged. “It seemed like the right thing. I don’t know why I do most of what I do. Just ask Shona.” He glanced across the basket at Shona as he said it; she didn’t say anything, but there was a look in her eye he knew. Not jealousy or judgement, but more like… disappointment. She thinks I’m falling into old habits. Playing the hero for someone new. Am I? He wasn’t sure he’d know if he was.

  “This does not make things right between us,” Zerill said. “You know this, don’t you?”

  “I do.”

  “You came too late. It was Shona who freed me.”

  “I know that too.”

  Another silence, and then, “Even so… you put yourself at risk for me. I will… remember that.”

&nbs
p; “Maybe that’s enough.” Josen couldn’t help but smile.

  It didn’t last long.

  “Benedern!” Lenoden Castar’s voice, and not from far away. “Get him up! Is he breathing?”

  Everyone in the basket was on their feet in an instant, peering down over the edge. They weren’t yet higher than the eyrie’s nest—perhaps forty feet above the basket-launch, and rising slowly. Still close enough that Josen could see Castar and his men even in the dark.

  There were near a dozen men on the launch, and every one wore Storm Knight grey save Castar in his red and gold. Several knights knelt and tried to rouse Benedern with no success. Josen saw no sign of Herol or the other keeper. They had the good sense to find cover, at least.

  Castar bent down to pick up the Crown of Eyes from where it had fallen and jabbed it toward the basket. “Murder! The high chastor is dead! Bring them down!” It felt like he was pointing right at Josen.

  He can’t see me at this distance in the dark, can he? His stomach clenched.

  Shona cursed under her breath. “They’re setting their bolts alight.”

  Josen hadn’t even noticed that they had wingbows, but she was right. Several spots of orange light flickered into life as the men set their bolts aflame. “Lord of Eagles,” he said softly. “They’re going to shoot us out of the sky.”

  Travin fiddled with the burner, and a gout of flame roared loudly upward. “Give him some trouble if we’re out of range,” he said. “Have t’get some height, fast.”

  “Should we drop ballast?” Josen asked. He’d watched the baskets fly enough to know the easiest way to speed an ascent.

  Travin just grunted and waved a hand toward the bags as he adjusted his valves.

  “Shona, get one of those.” Josen pointed to the ballast bags on the far side of the basket as he moved quickly to the nearer ones. “Best to keep the load even.”

  A flame flashed by like a shooting star, passed high over the basket, and arced back down toward the earth. “Drop it!” Josen shouted. His fingers stumbled over the simple knot—the fingernails he’d shed to the black fever hadn’t fully grown back yet—but he managed to loosen it just an instant after Shona did. Two heavy bags of sand plummeted down, and the basket surged upward. One ballast bag landed heavily on the edge of the basket-launch, and the entire platform shuddered. A man ceased readying his wingbow to check his balance, and Josen took some small satisfaction from the sight.