by Shae Ford
“What happened to him?” Finks thrust his whip under Brend’s chin. “If you know something, you’d better speak.”
“I don’t know anything in particular —”
“What do you know, then?”
Kael thought Brend was playing a dangerous game. Finks looked angry enough to beat the skin off his back — or worse, turn him over to Dred. He was trying to think of a way to get Brend out of trouble when Declan spoke:
“No man is safe, once Scalybones comes to visit,” he said, as if it were as clear a fact as the color of the sky. “When we were children, men used to disappear from the fields all the time. They’d be swept away without any explanation — naught but a splatter of blood left behind. Things had gotten so bad that our mums wouldn’t dare let us out after dark. When strange things start to happen, sometimes ole Scaly is the only explanation,” he shrugged, “whether you believe in him or not. That’s all Brend’s trying to say, master.”
“That is a ridiculous tale,” Finks hissed through his teeth. “I know what you all are up to — you’re just trying to find some excuse to laze about. And I won’t have it! Now move!”
They sprinted away as the spells lashed them. But once their backs were turned, the giants were all grins. Kael glanced over his shoulder as he ran and saw Finks standing alone where they’d left him, his head still swiveling through the grass. His pace seemed to quicken as the giants outdistanced him, growing until he followed at an all-out run.
He may not have believed in Scalybones, but he obviously wasn’t keen to be left on his own.
Chapter 24
A Warning
Time pressed them from all sides. With every passing hour, Kyleigh’s heart was turned constantly towards the plains.
She worried for her friends day and night; she would’ve given anything to hear from them, to know for certain that they were alive. But for all of her worry, she had a feeling that everything was going to be all right. She sensed it — the feeling hung in her heart like the muggy promise of an afternoon storm.
And that promise was the only thing that kept her from doing something completely irrational.
Jake couldn’t travel with his injuries, and so they would be forced to wait with the mots until he healed. Kyleigh filled the long hours of the day however she could — starting with finding someway to repay Nadine.
The mots didn’t trade with coin: food was the only thing of any value to them. She quickly realized that the only way to restore Nadine’s fortunes would be to fill her paddock and fields. So Silas spent several afternoons scouring the rocky crags around the mountain, tracking the wild goats.
When he finally discovered where they were hiding, Kyleigh followed him to their grazing grounds. Together, they managed to carry six of the squirming, bleating creatures up the side of the mountain to Nadine’s farm.
It took them all night. They were both still weakened from their journey through the desert and by morning, they were completely exhausted. But when Nadine saw the goats, it made every cut and bruise worth the trip.
“I … I do not know how to thank you,” she whispered. She sat her spear down and clutched the rails of her little paddock, staring in open-mouthed wonder at the goats.
“They’re scraggly little things,” Kyleigh admitted. “We couldn’t catch any of the fatter ones. I think that fellow over there might actually be missing a horn — oof!”
Nadine collided with her, jarring the end of her sentence. She squeezed Kyleigh tightly around the middle and thanked her several times. Then she pounced on Silas.
He spun, and she tackled him from behind. He yowled and tried to get away from her, but she stuck to him like a barnacle on the underside of a boat: wrapping her arms about his shoulders and her legs about his middle. He stumbled all around the plateau, trying desperately to shake her free.
“Dragoness — help me!”
“Absolutely not,” Kyleigh said, laughing as he squirmed “You aren’t in any danger, you silly cat.”
“But what is this?” He shook madly, trying to throw Nadine off his back. “What does this mean?”
“It is an embrace — I am giving you my thanks,” Nadine said. Soon she was laughing so hard that she lost her grip, and Silas was able to wriggle free.
“Well, next time you may thank me from a distance,” he said haughtily. He took a sniff behind him and rolled his eyes. “Now I’m going to reek like human for the rest of the day!”
The small mountain the mots called home was perched atop a large source of underground water. A river flowed beneath it, and a spring trickled out from its top and drenched the mountain’s steep sides in moisture.
The mots made good use of this: they cut their farms out of the mountain’s sides, creating hundreds of little plateaus upon which to plant their food. The farms were stacked like shelves and covered the whole outside of the mountain. From a distance, Kyleigh thought they must look like the scales of a large, open-mouthed fish rising from the waves of sand.
Spice rice was the main staple of the mots’ diets. Dangerous-looking red tufts sprouted from the ground in all directions, covering most of the fields. Kyleigh and Silas watched as Nadine traded one of her goats for a bag of seed rice, which she immediately passed off to a nearby farmer.
“He will plant it for me,” Nadine explained, when she saw the curious looks on their faces.
“You don’t work your own lands?” Kyleigh wondered.
Nadine shook her head. She pulled at the front of her red dress. “I am a warrior, remember? It is my task to protect our people from harm. That is my gift.” She gestured to the many green-robed mots trekking through the plateaus above them. “Farming is their gift — and so I will gladly put my seedlings in their hands.”
Silas looked down at his own garment. “And what does white mean?”
“Gift-less,” Nadine said with a sigh. “Those who become slaves are thought to have lost their gifts … otherwise, they would still be working freely.”
Nadine wanted to check in on her goats before they left, and so they wound their way back up the slope to her paddock. When they arrived, Kyleigh was surprised to see that the goats were already being watched: the Grandmot stood at the paddock’s gate, flanked by a handful of stern-looking female guards.
“What is the meaning of this?” The silver bangles on her wrist clattered together as the Grandmot thrust an arm at the paddock. “You were to surrender all of your animals to me, in payment for the a’calla. Have you cheated me?”
“No, Grandmot,” Nadine said with a slight bow. “These are new goats, taken from the wilds —”
“Impossible! The wild goats are unreachable,” the Grandmot said. She looked back at the soldiers — who fixed their icy gazes on Nadine.
“Not to the a’calla. I sent my slaves to gather them.”
All eyes turned to Kyleigh and Silas.
The Grandmot’s chin flicked back to the paddock. Slowly, her glare gave way to a sly smile. “This is not impossible, then. We have all heard tales of the a’calla’s dark lust for flesh,” she said to the guards. “They will have used their black magic to hunt the goats down.” Then she raised her voice: “There is nothing in our laws against this. A mot has a right to grow her fortune from honest means. This is good for you,” she added, wrapping her long fingers around Nadine’s shoulders. “You are free to carry on.”
The Grandmot strode off after that, and the guards followed dutifully behind her. When she waved her arms to the farmers, Kyleigh caught a glint of white at her belt — and she had to look away quickly.
It took all of her human reason to keep from grabbing Harbinger and flinging the Grandmot off the side of the nearest cliff.
*******
At some completely ridiculous hour of the morning, Kyleigh woke to Silas’s hot breath blasting across her ear:
“Dragoness!”
She rolled away from him and into Nadine — who yelped and punched her in the shoulder. “It’s only me,” Kylei
gh said, pinning Nadine’s arms down before she could strike a second time. Her eyes were so heavy with sleep that she could only hold them half open, but Silas wouldn’t leave her alone. He shoved on her back, rocking her so violently that she finally snapped: “What? What in blazes is so —?”
“The goats!” he hissed.
It was the horrified look on his face that drew Kyleigh to her feet.
She followed him up the winding staircase to the top of the mountain. A wide lip encircled its top, forming something like a natural rampart above the valley. The guards patrolling the rampart looked to be well into their watch: several of them blinked and tried to quickly wipe the sleep from their eyes as Kyleigh passed.
From one side of the lip, they could see the mots’ farms stretched down the mountainside. Silas pointed to Nadine’s, and Kyleigh gasped when she saw there were only two sleepy creatures left inside. The rest of her goats were missing.
“But where …?”
Without a word, Silas led her to the other side of the lip — where they could see clearly into the valley. Nadine had told them once that all of the lands in the valley belonged to the Grandmot, because it had the best soil. Silas seemed to be burning too furiously for words. He thrust a finger down at the valley’s pens.
Kyleigh scanned over the Grandmot’s herd and spotted a familiar, one-horned goat grazing among them. She couldn’t believe it.
“She stole them,” Silas hissed, his eyes bright with fury. “She crept into our territory and stole our goats with her shriveled little fingers! We should steal them back — and then eat one of her goats in warning,” he added.
Kyleigh thought that was a pretty brilliant idea, and she wanted very much to do it. But eating one of the Grandmot’s goats would probably just bring more trouble on Nadine. So she convinced Silas to sheath his claws and instead led him back to the room.
They woke Nadine, and her eyes were downcast as she listened. “There is nothing we can do,” she said when they’d finished.
“There’s plenty we can do,” Silas growled. He leaned out the window, scowling down at the valley below. “My mind is already filled with ideas.”
Nadine shook her head. “If you try to take them back, you will be breaking our law. And I will be punished for it. No one tends the Grandmot’s soil,” she explained. “Everything that grows on her land is a blessing from Fate. Her rice seeds are carried in by the wind, her fruit grows up on its own, and any animal that wanders into her pens is hers by right. If my goats have crossed to her lands,” Nadine straightened up, “then it is because Fate willed it.”
“Your Grandmot is a feathered thief,” Silas hissed at her, his eyes bright with fury. “Can’t you see how she’s cheating you —?”
“She does not cheat me,” Nadine snarled back, leaping to her feet. “My Grandmot was chosen for her lot, just as I was chosen for mine. Not all of us wish to live Fateless lives, a’calla. Some of us are brave enough to meet our fates, and to bear the dagger’s biting edge … whether it swings for our flesh, or in our favor.”
Her look faltered for a moment. A strange light crossed her eyes, and Kyleigh thought she could almost smell the tears trapped behind them.
“If anything was taken from me,” Nadine said roughly, “then it was because I deserved it. Now, I must see to my watch. Keep your heads far from trouble, a’calla.”
Then she gathered her spear and went to take her turn on the ramparts, leaving Kyleigh alone to deal with Silas.
He blazed and roared for several minutes: crowing about how foolish Nadine was, how all of his hard work had been wasted — and he called the Grandmot all sorts of unmentionable things.
When he finally wore himself hoarse, he stalked towards the door.
“Where are you going?” Kyleigh called after him.
“To find more goats,” he snapped without turning.
Even if Silas managed to cram the paddock full of the little creatures, the Grandmot would just keep stealing them. No, they needed to do something a little cleverer. The Grandmot needed to be warned. She needed to know that they were on to her — and that they wouldn’t let her take advantage of Nadine.
They needed to stir up a little … mischief. And so Kyleigh went out in search of inspiration.
She found Jake in the mots’ hospital, and was pleased to see that his head was mending up nicely. A mixture of herbs and a pinkish, gooey salve had been plastered across his wound, tied down by a thick white bandage that wrapped around his entire head — leaving only his face exposed.
With his bushy beard stuck out in all directions, she thought he looked a bit like a wounded lion.
The healers refused to let Jake wander out of the hospital unattended. But it looked as if he was managing rather well. “Hand me that little knife over there, will you?” he said, holding his hand out blindly. A nearby mot rushed to slap it into his palm.
For whatever reason, the mots seemed to have taken a real liking to Jake. They followed him around in small herds, gasping excitedly when he cast even the most basic of spells. The healer-mots found him especially interesting, and they were always eager to help with his experiments.
At the moment, Jake was hard at work. He leaned over one of the tables, picking his way through a minceworm carcass. The poor creature had been split directly down the middle and opened like a book. Its separate halves were held flat against the table by a number of tiny nails — which made the whole thing look like a leaf of parchment covered in pointy teeth.
Jake appeared to be trying to coax a tiny, greenish-looking pebble from the pit of the minceworm’s stomach. “There we are … almost — ah!”
A squirt of foul liquid burst from the pebble and splattered onto the front of Jake’s robes. Kyleigh watched in alarm as the liquid began to sizzle. A tiny wisp of smoke trailed up as it ate through the fabric.
One of the healer-mots stood nearby, a bucket clutched in his hand. He reached inside and threw a clump of black mud at the stain, snuffing it out.
“Blast it all and again!” Jake moaned, slumping down into his chair.
Kyleigh slipped up to him, frightening the healer-mots to a corner of the room. They may have taken a liking to Jake, but they certainly wanted nothing to do with an a’calla. “Trouble with the experiments?”
“Yes,” Jake sighed. He leaned forward and pointed at the greenish pebbles. There was a whole clump of them, hanging together in the bottom of the worm’s gullet like a bunch of grapes. “I can’t figure out why the minceworms have such combustible properties — why they explode when they swallow fire,” he translated, when Kyleigh raised an eyebrow. “I think it might have something to do with these glands. They’re obviously for digestive purposes. The liquid inside of them is quite … corrosive.”
He brushed the mud from his chest, and Kyleigh saw that his robes were peppered with tiny, ragged holes. “Have you tried putting them to flame?”
“That’s the first thing I did,” Jake said with a nod. “And they certainly shrivel up rather quickly, but they don’t explode …”
He leaned over, wielding a pair of tweezers, and Kyleigh stepped behind him to watch over his back. “Perhaps you shouldn’t get your eyes so close —”
“Your breath!”
“Is it that bad? I did have cave fish for breakfast.”
“No, it’s not that,” he said distractedly. Then he turned back. “All though … yes. Anyways, I think you’ve helped me figure this out.” He spun in his chair, and Kyleigh had to move quickly to keep his long legs from clipping her. “The liquid in a minceworm’s glands must obviously be released prior to digestion — but it doesn’t stay in liquid form. The worm’s breath must act as a heating agent, producing enough warmth to vaporize it into a combustible gas.” He sighed at the blank look on her face. “Like how the mist rises up from a pond.”
“Ah, I see,” Kyleigh said. “How are you going to prove it?”
Jake made a few hasty notes in his journal before he looked up. “We
ll, I suppose I’ll need a live one.” He turned to the healer-mots, who’d been listening curiously from the other side of the room. “Can we visit the silk farm again? I need a fresh worm — and some mint.”
“Of course, spellweaver,” one of the mots said. He scuttled over to a nearby shelf and selected a bowl from its top, which he presented to Jake with a bow.
He plucked a clump of small, green leaves from the tangle of stems and held them out to Kyleigh. She took them cautiously. “What’s this for?”
“A dragon’s breath should be deadly — a lady’s breath should not,” Jake said with a grin.
Kyleigh supposed he had a point. She chewed on the mint as she followed him out of the hospital, but she certainly didn’t enjoy it.
The mots’ entire city had been built around the great, underground bell chamber. It sat at the center, and all of the other chambers branched from it like the spokes of a wagon wheel. The farm mountain was just one spoke of the wheel — and fortunately for the mots, the northern passageway was the only path into it.
Guards stood outside its entrance day and night. If the soldiers camped in the hallway failed, they would hold the trolls back for as long as they could, giving the mots a chance to escape into the desert.
The guards’ faces were every bit as cold and stony as the rocks around them. Kyleigh tried not to meet their eyes as she passed, but she could almost hear their lips curling up behind her.
They followed the healer-mots down a different tunnel. This one was so tight that Kyleigh felt the ceiling brush the top of her head, in places. Poor Jake had to stay hunched over much of the way. The tunnel curved and spilled out into a small chamber, one that was hardly the size of a respectable kitchen.
The only light came from the dim glow of the many braziers set up about the room. Hundreds of fist-sized holes peppered the walls and ceiling, making the whole thing look a bit like the inside of a giant sponge.
One of the mots waved them over to a brazier. Sitting next to it was a miniature silver shovel and a bucket of black pebbles. When Kyleigh bent down for a better look, she caught the musky smell of fence animal.
