A Flight of Marewings

by Kristen S. Walker

  “Yes, sir,” Ameyron said, and disappeared back inside.

  Varranor shoved his hands into his pockets and walked down the stairs.

  When he was finished dealing with the mage in the city Varranor visited Fort Ropytos. He heard rumors about something big happening at the New Year’s festival, and with Kyratia growing full of disgruntled pilgrims over the change in religion, he didn’t want to stick around to watch it.

  He needed to observe Korinna and the other new recruits from a distance. Their training sergeant, Yoren, had asked him not to interfere with their early development, so he had hung back out of respect. He always had plenty of his own work to attend to: drilling his unit, caring for his marewing Skyfire, leading patrols around the fort and the city, and the endless administrative paperwork that the company generated. But when he got a free moment, he looked at the recruits’ table in the mess hall or watched the exercises in the training fields, and he was satisfied that Korinna appeared to be working hard and keeping up with the others.

  But he noticed a difference in how the other recruits were behaving around Korinna. She had fit in well enough from the start, and Yoren explained how she had managed to get by as the unit leader during her first week, but now that the rotation of leaders had moved on, he still saw how the others subtly looked to her for approval and guidance. Even Mkumba, the big gruff Khazeem boy with a chip on his shoulder, asked her for advice in earnest.

  Yoren had also noticed the shift and mentioned it to Varranor over breakfast. “I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen a natural leader emerge from the group so quickly,” he said around a mouthful of potato and onion omelet. “I’ll keep the rotation for now so the others have a chance to try, but I already know she’s going to be the permanent unit leader for the rest of their training. They all just like her, and it’s not for her looks, either.”

  Varranor considered his own omelet as if it could show him signs and portents of the future. “One of the requirements to be considered for rider training is leading a unit.”

  Yoren swallowed his food and nodded. “I’ve brought up enough rider hopefuls that you know I’ve an eye for talent, and making friends easily isn’t enough to make a rider. I think she could make a fine officer, but I can’t see her as more.”

  “It’s still early,” Varranor said with a smile.

  Varranor still wanted more detailed information, and for that he needed to talk to Herokha. He passed a note to her through a subordinate, and by the afternoon she sent a message back arranging a meeting in the infirmary under the pretense that a physician would be examining some training injury.

  Varranor went to the infirmary in the afternoon and the physician left Herokha alone in a private room. When he saw her up close, he had to marvel how deft her disguise as Herokha the farm girl was: her hair was dyed a shade of dirty brown, subtle markings on her face made it appear rounder with wide, innocent eyes, and she slouched like an uncultured peasant. She even had a fresh bruise on one cheek that he could not believe was make up.

  When he closed the door, her head snapped up to look at him with the fire back in her eyes. “It’s a waste of my time and talents to be going through basic training all over again.”

  Varranor folded his arms and leaned against the wall. “You volunteered yourself for this assignment.”

  The anger flared higher—he could always tell because she widened her eyes and breathed a little faster—but she kept her voice low. “I could tell you all you could possibly want to know about that girl right now: she’s not worth all this trouble. She won’t open up and give me her deepest secrets yet, but I don’t think you need them. There are dozens of high-bred, overeducated girls like her in every city, and if Galenos is so set on marrying one of them, he could pick another one with a rich, influential father who’s still alive enough to do some good.”

  He smirked. “You sound jealous.”

  Herokha took a step back in surprise. “Of a politician’s future decorative wife? Hardly.”

  “Of a girl who would marry Galenos and share his bed.”

  She turned away so he couldn’t see her face. “No, though I can’t see why he is so obsessed with her. This whole charade about letting her join the company and pretending she could become a marewing rider, waiting for her to decide to quit. Galenos could just kick her out and send her back to her little farm.”

  Varranor smiled when she couldn’t see, awarding himself a point for getting a reaction out of her. Korinna must have really gotten under her skin somehow. “Sergeant Yoren thinks that she has a lot of leadership potential, and she could become an officer. Why would we give up a good soldier?”

  Herokha snorted. “An officer behind a desk, maybe. She’s too small to do anything in the field.”

  “If you’re not jealous, then why do you hate her so much?”

  The spy took a deep breath, and he could feel her usual mask of calm settling down around her. She turned around to face him and stood at attention. “My report, sir, is that the girl has some minor charm, mostly with the male recruits, but there is no real warmth or kindness. She can’t lie to save her life, she’s too proud and stubborn, and there’s an ambition that runs deep in her—one that will make her fight for power at every step of the way and never give up. If the warlord gives her an opening, like marrying her or making her an officer, then she’ll constantly be trying to grab for more. She’s a liability, not an asset. Dump her now before she can do any real damage.”

  12

  The Council II

  Pelagia adjusted her kattar and gestured for the attendants to be more vigorous with their fans. The day was unusually hot for the start of the summer, and the heavy embroidery and beading on her elaborate festival clothing was only weighing her down. She wished once again that public appearances did not call for such pomp and circumstance.

  But the head temple priest, Varula Soma, had advised that changing too many of Kyratia’s traditions at once would only foster more resentment among the people. Part of calming the protesters who had lined the streets for the past week was promising them that the New Year’s Festival would honor both the old god, Deyos, and the new one, Varula. The new Republic had also given expensive gifts to the Temple of Deyos to placate the priests, and in return their leader, Father Borus, had finally emerged from his private chambers and given a public sermon about honoring a new era in Kyratia.

  So the Council put on a good face and brought their families to watch the dances and rituals that would welcome the New Year in the temple courtyard, and later that evening, the Temple of Varula would have its own celebration. From there, the festivities would spread throughout the Temple District, honoring a different deity on each day for the next week, until all the gods had been given their due.

  Children sang hymns to Deyos and scattered flower petals on the ground. A full orchestra of the city’s best musicians played to accompany dancers who acted out the major stories of Deyos’s exploits, from the fateful battle where he drove away the last of the Kaldonian invaders to his seduction of the moon goddess, Usa. In a gracious touch by the Deyonists, there was an elaborately choreographed number to depict the birth of Varula, the second child of Deyos and the goddess of love, Lygeia. Pelagia recognized some of the neophytes from the Varulan temple participating in the celebration of their lord’s arrival.

  The event carried a heavy bill with it, but the Council would not worry about the budget until after the holidays were over. Right now, they needed the good will of the people more than anything else, and Pelagia would call it money well spent if the pilgrims exhausted themselves in their celebrations and then returned to their farms in the country without any more complaints.

  She looked around the canopied dais and wished that her fellow Councilors would show as much graciousness. Although they mouthed the words to the prayers and feigned an interest in the ritual, most of them had already begun honoring Varula in their favorite way: drinking wine. Some of them, like Eutychon
, had already drunk more than appropriate for their public appearance.

  Pelagia watched as Eutychon’s wife pleaded with him to slow his drinking. He denied that he’d had too much, but his speech was slurred. She privately hoped that he would pass out in the afternoon heat and miss the festivities at the Temple of Varula. That party would be wild enough without the drunken Councilor’s attendance.

  But she knew that others were watching now. Better not to leave it up to chance. She smiled and waved forward one of her attendants to come forward with a pitcher of blackberry lemonade, chilled with costly ice. “Share a glass with me. A toast to the New Year.”

  Eutychon gave her a cold look, but he accepted the glass. “To the New Year,” he repeated, raising it high.

  “May it bring prosperity to you and yours.” Pelagia sipped the juice, keeping her eyes locked on him over the rim of the glass.

  Eutychon drained the glass in a single swallow. He made a face at the sweet lemonade and called for more wine.

  Pelagia looked back at the ritual with a smile. In less than an hour, he was guaranteed to black out. Now she wouldn’t have to see a repeat of his naked dancing at the Temple of Varula.

  His wife saw the smile and approached Pelagia. “You haven’t poisoned him, have you?” she whispered into her ear.

  Pelagia shook his head. “No, all members of the Council have taken an oath that they cannot injure one another, however indirectly. He will sleep off the rest of the day and have a bad headache tomorrow, but I do not think that will be far off from his normal behavior, yes?”

  The wife breathed a sigh of relief and nodded. “Thank you. I’ll have our manservant be ready to take him home in the litter.”

  Pelagia patted the woman’s arm reassuringly and made a mental note to learn her name. “It is better for all of us if we do not let him make a fool of himself before the common people. If you would like, I could send you the name of the apothecary who made it for me.”

  The wife smiled and moved back to Eutychon’s side.

  When the sun began to set and the heat of the day finally dissipated, the crowd became more exuberant in their celebrations. Families took their children home to sleep, but the rest of the populace stayed in the streets.

  Now Varula Soma, the head priest who embodied his god in the flesh, brought out the presentation by his temple. Young men and women, clad in nothing but loose-fitting animal skins, circulated through the crowd to distribute cheap wine. Better wine was served to the noble families on the dais and nearby.

  Pelagia accepted a small glass, making sure that it was heavily watered down. She would not risk making a fool of herself in public, and she wanted to be alert for what was coming next.

  Large men replaced the skilled musicians, each one carrying a large, empty wine barrel that they beat like drums. They went around the outside of the courtyard with a primal drumbeat, whipping the crowd into a frenzy.

  Neophytes lit torches, illuminating the courtyard. Dancers leapt out from the shadows into the center, each one disguised by a mask made from the head of an animal. They cavorted and pantomimed the animals’ wild behaviors: a stag rutting with a doe, only to be torn down by a pride of lions; a bear stalked the audience, rising up on his hind legs to tower over them; a pack of wolves threw back their heads and howled. Each time they came closer to the crowd around them, drummers and torchbearers were there to drive them back into the middle space.

  In the climax, Varula Soma suddenly appeared in the center of the dance. He raised his hands with a single cry, and the dancers collapsed onto the ground. He cried out a second time, calling on the power of the god Varula. Now the dancers cast off their animal masks and rose to their feet, human once again.

  The crowd cheered eagerly for the performance. The show had been new and different from the traditional, elaborate Deyonist dances, and they responded to the energetic dancers with their own exuberance.

  Pelagia smiled to herself, watching. There was more to come that would surprise the rabble even more.

  Varula Soma waited for the cheering to die down, then raised his hands again. “People of Kyratia,” he raised his voice to address them all. A simple charm around his throat projected his voice magically so that it would carry throughout the courtyard and the nearby streets, where an even greater crowd had gathered to hang out of buildings and stand in the avenues to glimpse the festivities. “We have given thanks this day for our bountiful harvest and the beginning of a new year of prosperity for our fair city. The gods and their representatives have been given their due.

  “But my people!” Now the priest’s face turned angry. “Have you been thanked for your hard labor and the sacrifices you have made to achieve this prosperity? When you made the long journey through the dangerous wyld, facing monsters and the hazards of the road, to bring us the fruits of your work and pay tribute to the gods, did you receive anything more than a pat on the head and a blessing from a priest?”

  The crowd fell silent, unsure how to answer. To decry the Deyonist temple would be blasphemy, and in previous years could have seen them arrested and punished by the city guard. Yet here was another priest speaking openly, with the full approval of the ruling Council.

  Pelagia leaned forward and watched them. Although she could not see them talking, she heard the undercurrent of whispers in the crowd as people began to question the validity of the priest’s statements. Maybe the Deyonist priests had been a little dismissive when receiving their tithes this year. Would it be so bad if they showed a little more gratitude?

  Varula Soma turned and pointed to the Temple of Deyos. “You have been told that without the Allfather, we are nothing. We rely on his priests to bless our fields for planting—just enough fields for you to scratch out a living, but not enough to prosper. We are told that we must find a balance with the wyld, for taking too much would anger the destructive forces of chaos, and we would lose everything. We live our lives in fear, with only one acre out of every ten growing food for our families.”

  The murmurs in the crowd grew louder. A few people shouted out their agreement, raising their fists to show support. At first, Pelagia only identified the dissidents planted by the Council, paid to rouse the rabble. But when they spoke out without retaliation, others began to follow suit.

  Varula Soma pointed out at the crowd now. “It is all of you who have the true power! You, who fight against the wyld to feed your families, who maintain the roads through the wilderness to connect the far flung villages of our territory. Varula is the son of Deyos, but he is not afraid to speak the truth, and he sees the power in all of you. The power to conquer the wyld!”

  The crowd roared in agreement.

  Varula Soma spread his hands wide and turned his face up to the sky. “Demonstrate your power tonight, and never fear the wyld again!”

  From behind the dais, neophytes pulled a wagon bearing an enormous cage. A terrifying roar split the air, silencing the crowd. People stepped back out of the way, pressing into their neighbors to get as far as they could from the monster.

  Pelagia smiled and permitted the attendant to pour her a second glass of wine.

  Inside the cage was an ogre, a terrifying creature that resembled a gigantic man with protruding fangs and brutishly large arms. In a satirical twist, the neophytes had painted its skin black; around the hairy waist hung a dark blue leather loincloth, mocking the uniform of the Storm Petrels. Its beady blue eyes darted back and forth over the crowd and it licked its bulbous lips eagerly, eliciting cries of terror from a few close by—ogres loved the taste of human flesh.

  Varula Soma gestured for the creature to be brought into the very center of the courtyard and allowed the neophytes to step back. “I know you fear this monster, but we are greater than it. Trust me when I say that all we have to do is exercise our own power.”

  He pulled a key out of his fur skin robe, and ignoring the cries of protest, unlocked the door to the cage.

  The cage door swung open and the ogre burst
out into the open with a growl. He turned on the head priest, snatching him around the waist and lifting him into the air.

  “Show no fear!” Varula Soma cried out, and smacked the ogre on his forehead so hard that the sound reverberated through the courtyard.

  Although she knew what to expect, Pelagia could not help but gasp with the others as the ogre froze, stunned. She’d never seen the priest subdue such a large monster before.

  A grin spread across Varula Soma’s face. “Do you see?” With a wave of his hand, he ordered the ogre to place him back down on the ground. “We have nothing to fear from this beast!”

  The crowd stopped pushing each other to get out of the ogre’s way and stopped to stare. They were still wary, but now they wanted to see what the priest would do next.

  “Not only that, but we can use the power of the wyld for our own purposes!” Varula Soma spun the ogre around with a touch and pushed it toward the Temple of Deyos.

  Guards were already on hand to part the crowd and keep people out of the ogre’s path, and the audience was all too happy to oblige. They stared as the ogre mounted the stairs.

  The front of the new temple was a massive edifice of carved white marble, with tall pillars supporting an awning over the broad steps. Each pillar was shaped like a twisting icicle and the tops were decorated with delicate snowflakes, the symbol of Deyos.

  The ogre went up to one of the central pillars—chosen ahead of time by an architect, who swore that the roof would continue to stand without it—and grasped it with both arms. At a shout from Varula Soma, it strained against the pillar.

  With a loud, cracking boom, the pillar wrenched free of the building. Pieces of marble broke off and showered down into the crowd, raising a few cries of pain where it struck hapless watchers. Pelagia waved at a city captain to send her guards in and escort the wounded to physicians. She had known that this stunt carried the risk of injury, especially with so many people in one spot and ready to panic.