A Flight of Marewings

by Kristen S. Walker

  He nodded to Navera. “Thank you, sergeant.” He gestured to Korinna. “Let’s go for a walk. You’ll want to hear this in private.”

  She followed him into the forest, away from the training exercises with the others. She kept looking over at him, trying to guess what had brought him. He looked upset about something, or nervous, because he kept glancing around and twitching his fingers.

  “Your training is progressing well, I see,” he said. He smiled at her like a friend, and she relaxed a little. “In just a few days, we’re leaving. Do you think that you’re ready?”

  Korinna held up a hand and wobbled it back and forth. “Maybe? I wish that I knew what I was supposed to be prepared for. The sergeant hasn’t given us a lot of information.”

  Varranor nodded. “You seem pretty comfortable with heights for someone who grew up in the lowlands.”

  She looked up at the trees. “I guess I’m getting used to it. It’s very different, though, being up in a tree or on a rock wall where I have something to hold on to. Flying is totally different.”

  “I know what you mean.” He broke a branch off of a tree as he passed and began to strip the bark off. “It’s a rush like no other.”

  She didn’t think that he had come to speak with her about flying. It felt as if he were avoiding talking about the real reason for his visit. “I heard you and the Warlord went to the capital to speak with the Council, but you came back very quickly. Did something happen there?”

  He laughed nervously. “I guess rumors travel fast in a small fort, huh?” He dropped the last piece of bark on the ground and rubbed the smooth wood of the branch. “Well, yeah, something happened. My brother sent me to talk to you and apologize.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Apologize for what?”

  He let the stick fall and stopped walking. She turned to face him, and he took both of her hands in his. “Look, Korinna, when you wanted to join the company, we didn’t think that you’d really stick with it. So he wanted to make sure your other options were still open. Galenos was just trying to help you.”

  Her stomach tightened into a knot at his sudden intensity. “Help me how?”

  “He, ah, didn’t exactly sign your father’s estate over to your people like he promised.” Varranor bit his lip. “It was still technically yours. He set up your old steward, Myron, as a regent to hold it in trust for you, so that you could take it back once you quit. If you did quit.”

  Her eyes widened. She didn’t like where this was going. “Is that legal?”

  He made a noise in his throat. “Well, sort of. If you hadn’t finished your training and never become an actual mercenary, there would have been no problems. Technically you’re still in training now and not getting paid, but the wrong people found out and got the courts to rule against us.”

  She pulled her hands away from him and took a step back. “What does that mean? Am I in some kind of legal trouble now? Do you have to kick me out of the company?”

  “It’s worse.” He hesitated.

  She gripped his hands hard. “You need to stop lying to me and tell me the truth. All of it.”

  Varranor looked down at the ground and back up at her. “Galenos and Myron were, uh, using your estates as a front to funnel money into political groups. He was trying to take over the city without a fight, but they found out about it too soon. The Council has confiscated your inheritance.”

  “What!” Korinna turned away, too angry to look at him. “So they’re gone for good now? I have nothing.”

  “Well, actually, you believed all along that they were already gone.” Another nervous laugh. “So that hasn’t changed. What’s worse is that Galenos and everyone in his alliance were charged with conspiracy and exiled from Kyratia—”

  “I don’t care what his mistakes cost him.” She whirled around and glared up at him. “You both lied to me, and you used my money for your own personal gain. Now you’ve lost everything that my family built up over generations.”

  He reached out and put his hands on her shoulders, holding her still. “I told you, he was doing this for you. He didn’t want to leave you penniless if becoming a mercenary was just a whim and you quit in a week. And you both wanted to rule Kyratia. Galenos thought that he could take control of the city without a single drop of bloodshed.”

  “And what will he do now that we’re all exiled from the city? Your brother has made a ruin of everything!” She pushed his hands away and started to storm through the forest.

  “He’s gathering his forces to attack the city—” Varranor called after her, but she didn’t slow down and he didn’t pursue her, so she couldn’t hear the rest of his explanation.

  Korinna blinked tears out of her eyes and broke into a run. She didn’t care where she was going or what would happen to her next. All she thought about was getting as far away from Fort Aelyzoai and the Storm Petrels as she could.

  Korinna ran down the mountainside with her legs pumping and her lungs heaving. Branches reached out and clawed at her skin, roots and rocks leapt up from the ground to trip her She dodged the worst of them, but kept going. The pain blocked out her thoughts.

  She could only go so far. At last she stopped, gasping for breath, and bent over with her hands on her knees. Fire burned up her calves and thighs. Sweat made her feel clammy and stuck her hair to her head.

  She coughed and reached for the flask of water at her belt. She took a swig and winced at the warm, stagnant taste. The flask was light in her hand: more than half-empty.

  Korinna hunched down on the ground and wrapped her arms around her knees. Her whole body was shaking.

  How dare he—! So when Galenos had promised that she would be taken care of outside of the Storm Petrels, he’d only meant to give her back the very land that was hers by right? And to think that she had fallen for his gentle concern about her. She saw now how she had played into his hands—shaken by the death of Herokha, she’d been willing to turn anywhere for comfort.

  Well, she wouldn’t show such weakness again. An apology sent through his brother meant nothing, and she didn’t accept it. Korinna would harden her heart against Galenos, against the whole company if she had to. She wouldn’t let anyone else have control over her future again.

  There was no safety net left to her now. She would have to jump—the only choice left was which way she wanted to fall.

  Movement in the forest caught her eye. She brushed away tears to clear her vision, thinking that Varranor had somehow followed her.

  But the shadowy figure was not the Commander. Her father’s ghost stared at her with empty eyes. She hadn’t seen him in months, and had prayed that his body’s cremation would be enough to keep his soul at peace. But now he stood there like an accusation.

  “What do you want?” she yelled at him. “You wanted me to follow your warlord, and now he’s lost everything we had! How am I supposed to carry on your legacy?”

  The ghost said nothing.

  She spat on the ground and made the sign to avert evil. “Your spirit is supposed to guide me, but you never helped me when you were alive and you’re no better now. If all you’re going to do is nag, then you can just leave me alone.”

  Her father shook his head once and pointed back up the hill, the way she had come. Back to the fort.

  “Oh, just great. So your suggestion is that I go on doing the same thing I’ve been doing, even though it got me into this mess?” She let out a wild laugh. “The wisdom of the ancestors.”

  But of course her father was right, as was Varranor. Losing her lands meant nothing now. In a few days, she would attempt to catch a marewing and see the outcome of her gamble. And if the loss forced Galenos’s hand to finally attack the city instead of playing at politics, then she would see this done once and for all. She had to be there at the final battle.

  Korinna stood up and headed back up to the fort, turning her back on the ghost. “I’ll see it through, don’t worry. Not to make you happy, or him, but for myself.” She didn’t
look back to see if he followed.

  Korinna and the other candidates left the next morning on the long journey to the hidden valley where they would find the marewings. They carried their own supplies and weapons, and supplies for the other marewing riders when they got to the valley. The location of the marewings’ feeding ground was kept a secret to all except those the riders trusted: only the candidates and a blacksmith were permitted to know the way by land. The riders would fly to meet them on the day of the full moon.

  Korinna didn’t speak to her friends about what Varranor had told her, but they noticed the change in her demeanor and left her alone. She liked it better that way. She didn’t need anyone else to disappoint her.

  Itychia was also silent, lost in her own thoughts. The other candidates regarded her with a kind of awe, knowing that she had done this once before, but she brushed off their questions and kept to herself. Korinna felt an affinity for the woman, but didn’t make any overtures of friendship; the burden of pain that each of them carried was different, and to think that she would understand Itychia’s loss was hubris.

  The march was easy while they followed the road north, but two days into the march they left the main highway and cut through the forest, heading east up a steep mountain range. There were no markings to the trail, since it was traveled only once a year, and the candidates had to trust that the blacksmith guided them the right way. The going was rough, up and up with no sign of relief: and then at last they came to a hidden pass, too narrow even for cows, breaking through to the other side of the peaks.

  The blacksmith spoke a few gruff words to instruct them on the final evening. “The marewings come once a year for the ripening of the cloudfruit,” he said. “You will climb the trees to get close enough to catch them.”

  Mkumba snorted. “Climb another tree? That sounds easy enough.”

  The blacksmith glanced at Itychia, who sat apart from the campfire. “And yet most fail. If you survive, you must not speak of this place to anyone.”

  Orivan’s eyes glinted eagerly in the firelight. “Why? Wouldn’t it be more fair just to let anyone come and try? If they succeed, they can always join the company after.”

  “The marewings are our most valuable weapon,” the blacksmith said with a quelling glare. “And the cloudfruit is the source of their power. It may not be fair, but we protect what we have.”

  In the weak light of dawn, the candidates made it through the pass and looked down at their destination.

  Neusici Valley was the only place in Kyratia where cloudfruit trees grew, in a remote area of the northeastern mountains far from human habitation. Galenos and Varranor had discovered the valley in their youth and used that knowledge to catch their own marewings there and to build up the Storm Petrels’ aerial unit. Each year, they made a journey to the valley. Only other riders, and the candidates who hoped to become new riders, were permitted to come.

  From above, Korinna didn’t think it looked like much. A stream cut between the mountains to make a narrow valley, ending in a marsh directly below them. Trees grew hunched and low in the mud, with their branches extending down to trail in the water. When they got closer, she saw none of the blue fruit, only dark pods tucked between the branches.

  It was only mid-afternoon when they reached the valley floor. They made camp on the banks of the stream where the ground was dry. The blacksmith sent the candidates to catch fish and gather cattails, supplementing the supplies they had brought. The cattails roasted directly in the coals until black, while the fish went into a pot with dried vegetables and clear water from the stream.

  At sunset, the marewings and their riders of the Storm Petrels arrived. Their leather wings darkened the sky: over two hundred and fifty of them, all coming to rest along the water’s edge. None of them entered the marsh. They made their own camps up and down the valley. Different units mixed and greeted each other eagerly; since they were posted at different forts around the territory, some of them hadn’t seen each other for the whole year.

  They ate their suppers quickly, then put out the campfires. When the whole valley was void of light, candidates and riders sat together by the edge of the marsh to watch what would happen next.

  In that pure darkness, untouched by any artificial lights, Korinna saw the sky filled with a river of stars. And on that river the moon sailed above the mountaintops, brilliant and round, like a ship on the waters of the night.

  When the light of the moon touched the cloudfruit trees in the valley, the pods cracked open and splashed into the water, sending loud echoes through the valley. Then, impossibly, one of the trees seemed to move.

  “Are there monsters?” Orivan asked in a nervous whisper.

  Sergeant Navera shushed him. “Watch.”

  The tree moved again, shedding the heavy pods. Some force, like a giant hand, appeared to pull it upward. The tree’s roots slipped out of the mud, dripping, and the whole vertiginous behemoth floated up into the air.

  Korinna thought that she must have fallen asleep and dreamed. How could a tree fly? Yet more trees were pulling free of the marsh. Where the pods had been, wet cloudfruits hung glistening, and a strange liquid dripped down.

  The dark shadows of the trees drifted up into the sky, crowding the view until they blotted out most of the stars. The moonlight shined through their branches, creating a mottled pattern of silver along the ground.

  When the first tree soared above them, the riders began to sing. Korinna did not know the words to the song, so she listened and stared up in awe.

  “Goddess of the night, shine your light down on me,

  Bless me with your magic and give my mare her wings,

  On the ground I am a prisoner, only you can set me free,

  Usa, give me one more glimpse of your moon.

  “In the moonlight, a rain falls in the cloudless sky,

  In the moonlight, trees break free of their roots and fly,

  In the moonlight, take the leap of faith and fall to live where you are free

  Though you only have a moment, hold out your heart and believe

  You can catch a falling star underneath the moon.”

  Korinna looked around at the other candidates sitting near her. Sergeant Navera caught her nervous glance and smiled, her teeth glinting in the dark. “Don’t worry. We don’t make you climb at night anymore. It’s dangerous enough by the light of day.”

  Mkumba pointed upward. “Those are the trees that we have to climb?”

  She looked closer and saw that the trees hadn’t broken all of their roots. Some had slid free of the marsh and hung down to the ground, but they were slick with mud and water. It was hard to see if any of them would be strong enough to hold a person’s weight, however, and close to the bases of the trees they tangled into complex knots.

  A climb more dangerous than any tree or mountain they had scaled before.

  Wings beat overhead, and she could see the wild marewings already flying around the trees, tearing away the cloudfruit and eating them in midair. Marewings wouldn’t land except on the most inaccessible of perches atop the mountains. The only way to reach them would be to climb all the way up and wait for one to fly close enough.

  To catch one would involve just what the song said: a leap of faith.

  Korinna shook her head. “That’s suicide.”

  Sergeant Navera clucked her tongue. “The harvest lasts for three days, so we’ll split you into three groups. Too many people in the marsh at once will scare the wild marewings away. But if you’re scared, now is the time to back out.” She looked around the group of candidates, studying their faces. “Anyone want to tell me now?”

  No one said anything. Korinna felt her heart pounding in her throat, but she held her tongue. She had come too far to give up.

  “Good. Get some rest, because you’ll need it. You’re all exempt from guard duty tonight.” Sergeant Navera stood up and walked away from the group.

  They had brought no tents with them. Korinna stretched out
in her sleeping roll and looked up at the stars. Surely the brilliance of the moon, the sounds of creaking trees overhead, and the wild marewings flying among them would keep her awake. Yet she barely had any time to worry about the morning before exhaustion from the journey overcame her and she fell asleep.

  34

  The Council VIII

  Pelagia didn’t reveal her hand to the rest of the Council until she had the warlord come into the Council Hall to finalize the defense contract for Kyratia.

  She stood up and introduced the warrior woman to the rest of the Councilors. “May I present Warlord Syntyche of the Mauve Dragons,” she announced to the table with a smile. “Warlord Syntyche, thank you for coming here so quickly.”

  “It’s my pleasure.” Warlord Syntyche grinned and lifted her eye patch, revealing the scar where her left eye had once been. “I have an old score to settle with Galenos and his company of bluebirds.”

  Eutychon laughed politely at the pejorative name for the Storm Petrels. “Bluebirds. How apt. I’ll have to remember that one.”

  Beside him, Zeno rocked nervously in his seat. “Forgive me, Warlord, but looking over your personnel records, it doesn’t appear that you have any marewings in your company?”

  Warlord Syntyche shook her head. “No, I don’t hire flying demons, just warriors born and bred in Seirenia. We don’t need ‘em to beat that foreign invader.”

  Zeno began to rock faster. “But won’t his marewings just fly straight over you and attack the city?”

  Pelagia raised her hand for silence. “I am arranging other means for our aerial defenses.” She nodded to the captain of the guard. “Your guns are still in operation, are they not?”

  He bowed. “The Alchemists Guild has just given us a fresh batch of black powder, and our blacksmiths have declared the guns in good working order.”