Silverwing

by Kenneth Oppel

  He would bring them the sun.

  Storm

  There was fog as they set out the next night, blanketing the valleys, sifting through the treetops. A sharp wind whistled past Shade's ears and he shivered, his fur beaded with mist.

  But he felt strangely invigorated. By dawn he'd be at Stone Hold with the rest of the Silverwings—and the banded males who had known his father. And he had his plan: It was there when he awoke, something fine and solid, like a full stomach. He wouldn't tell his mother, it would just make her worry, and she'd worried enough about him already. Frieda he might tell later, in secret. He knew she would help him.

  This morning, before leaving the barn, she'd come to talk to him and his mother. Right in front of everyone. Shade had felt awkward and proud. Here he was, the runty bat Frieda had sacrificed Tree Haven for. He was important, in a way he wasn't entirely comfortable with. Everyone still seemed to be keeping their distance from him. But a few of the newborns said shy hellos to him, before being hurried away by their mothers. From them he got a few curt nods, better than nothing anyway. Maybe they wouldn't hate him forever. Only Bathsheba fixed him with a hard stare as they left the barn, a look that flooded his heart with anger and guilt.

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  He gazed down now at the strange, ghostly landscape. They were flying above the tree line, and through the splinters of mist, he saw new forests, meadows, streams. Human roads cut through the hills, and one of their noisy vehicles rushed along, shooting out beams of light. A harsh stinging smell rose behind it, and Shade sneezed. He'd seen some of their buildings earlier too, clustered together in clearings, smoke lifting from the roofs.

  "Cold?" his mother asked him.

  "I'm fine." He wished she'd stop asking. He was determined to prove himself. Even though he was a runt, he'd show the whole colony he wasn't a weakling. He wouldn't ever fall behind and slow everyone down. In fact, he'd do better than that. He'd stay in the front ranks the whole journey, right up there with Frieda and the other elders. He could see Chinook up ahead now, beating his strong wings.

  A brisk pungent smell, unlike anything he knew, hit Shade's nostrils. Almost at the same moment, he heard a new sound: It had a deep throbbing rhythm, like some powerful animal, slowly exhaling, breathing in, exhaling again. He looked over at Ariel.

  "I'll show you," she said.

  She angled her wings and flew higher. Shade followed, and then gasped in wonder. Through the mist he could see the forest end in a ragged line, and give way to mottled darkness, stretching out forever. It was the edge of the world.

  Instantly, he remembered his mother's sound map.

  "That's all water?" he whispered.

  "The ocean."

  "There's sure a lot of it."

  "It's not like the water in the stream. I took a drink from it once. It tastes salty."

  Closer to the land, the water heaved up in huge black and white paws, crashing against the rocks.

  "We're not flying over it, are we?"

  "No."

  Shade was relieved. Just looking at it made him feel very small, and strangely alone. There were no trees, no branches, no rocks or earth. Nothing solid. What if you had to land suddenly? He couldn't swim very well yet, and he certainly didn't want to try down there. He'd heard stories that Humans could float on the water in things called boats. But why would Humans want to do that? What was out there in the sea that could be of any interest to them?

  As they flew back down to join the rest of the colony there was a sudden flash up ahead, and Shade immediately thought: lightning. But his mother nodded to a looming shadow on the horizon, hidden behind a band of fog.

  "Recognize that?" she said.

  The fog cleared, and Shade nodded excitedly. It was the strange high tower from his mother's song, and he was amazed how well she'd described it. As if he'd been here before.

  "What's the light?"

  "Don't stare at the top," she said. "It flashes every few seconds. It's very bright."

  "I remember from your song. But what's it for?"

  "Frieda thinks Humans built it long ago to help their boats navigate. And that's how we use it too."

  Shade closed his eyes and summoned up Ariel's map. The tower, and then ... a veering away, following a bony ridge of rock.

  "We fly south along the coast, don't we!" he said, understanding. "That's what the map means, right?"

  "Good," Ariel said. "We'll always stay over land. It's too dangerous over water. The winds are different."

  Frieda led them closer to the huge tower, so that Shade could make out its tapered stone sides, and then the bat elder banked sharply to the south, and the whole colony turned with her, riding the wind above the rocky coast.

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  The rain started suddenly. Not the gentle drops Shade knew from summer showers, but icy driving needles. They dazzled Shade's echo vision, flaring in his mind's eye like shooting stars. He shook his head, trying to clear it.

  "Don't let it throw you off," Ariel told him. "Stick close to me. Feels like a storm coming."

  As if on cue, wind tore at his body. He tensed the small bundles of muscle along his wings, trying to keep them taut so he wouldn't get blown off course. Still, the wind buffeted him from side to side, knocking him higher, batting him back down.

  "Down to the trees! Down to the trees!" came Frieda's cry, and it was echoed by the other bats. "We'll wait out the storm! Down to the trees!"

  The wind screamed around them, and Shade lurched.

  "Cling to me, Shade," his mother called out. "It's too rough."

  "No!" he snapped. He could still see Chinook up ahead, looking at him over his wing. Shade would not, could not, sink his claws into his mother's fur and cling to her while she flew for both of them. Like he was just a furless pup again. He was special, Frieda had said so. He would land on his own, like Chinook, like the other newborns.

  "Shade!" his mother called to him again. "Come here!"

  But he intentionally veered away from her, rocking crazily through the rain. He angled his wings to descend.

  "I'm fine!" he shouted out.

  A savage gust of wind knocked him over onto his back, and his wings buckled.

  "Shade!"

  "Mom, help!" The wind whipped the words from his mouth. He struggled to right himself, his sodden wings plastered uselessly against his body. Tumbling, he was swallowed up in a bank of fog, unable to see. He had no idea where he was, how high he was off the ground. For

  a split second the fog opened and he caught a glimpse of his mother and the other bats—so far away, how had they gotten so far away?—and then the fog closed up and he was tumbling again.

  At last there was a lull and Shade unfurled his wings. He streamed out from a bank of fog and cried out in dismay.

  He was over the ocean.

  He wheeled, trying to catch sight of land. But it was lost in the rain and fog. Which way? The stars overhead were blotted out. Another treacherous gust of wind broad-sided him, forcing him down. He arched his wings, trying to rise, but he was so exhausted he could barely beat them.

  He saw the huge expanse of water below, churning white and black like a million hungry animal tongues. If he hit . . . Again he wrenched his shoulders up, trying to ride higher. But the wind would not let him.

  A glimmer of light caught his eye. It twinkled out, came back. Just rain? No, it was coming from something on the water, roughly riding the waves—a boat, it must be a Human's boat. Huge white sails billowed from tall masts.

  He trimmed his wings and aimed himself at the boat. The wind shunted him wildly to one side and he soared clear past. Rallying what remained of his strength, he pounded the air and made one last lurching turn back toward the boat. If he missed again he'd be too low for another try.

  The boat was dead ahead now, swinging wildly on the horizon. Closer, closer, wings tensed, he neared the tallest mast at breakneck speed, the wind at his tail. He pulled back, braking sharply, claws outstretched
.

  The sail was thicker than expected, and he almost lost his grip. He sank his claws deeper into the fabric. The sail snapped with the wind, nearly throwing him off.

  Inch by inch, Shade crawled toward the mast and into

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  a tight fold. Sheltered from the wind and rain, he wrapped his wings around his shaking body, and tried to calm the sickness in his stomach. And stop the voice in his head, which kept asking over and over: How are you going to get back? How are you ever going to find them now?

  Shade woke with a start.

  The boat's violent pitching had given way to a gentle rocking. His whole body ached. Cautiously he pushed his head out from the sail. The sky was still dark, the stars bright, and with huge relief he saw land—a small bay with a few wooden buildings on the rocky slopes.

  The boat had brought him back to land!

  Maybe his mother and the rest of the colony weren't far away. He flew from the mast, circling, trying to get his bearings. He didn't know if he'd passed this place earlier— they'd flown over a lot of small bays, but they were all veiled in fog, he didn't remember what they looked like.

  "Mom?" he cried out hopefully. "Mom?"

  His voice echoed back to him from the steep slopes.

  He flew inland, eager to get away from the water, and the overpowering briny smell, which he thought must be fish. He soared over the hill, above the tree line, hoping for landmarks. The Humans' tower, maybe he would see that. Nothing but unfamiliar forest stretched out around him.

  "Hello?" he called again, with mounting panic.

  It was eerily quiet. Maybe if he went lower. He darted down, using his sound sight to steer between silver branches. A squirrel, storing nuts in the crotch of a tree. Silent nests, and sleeping birds, their feet locked around their perches. The whistle of the wind in the dead leaves. In the distance a grunting chorus of toads. But no sign of bats.

  He landed on a branch, breathless. Think, he told himself. Think it out. The boat had taken him back to land. But where? Judging from the brightness of the sky, he

  guessed it was close to dawn. And the storm had hit around midnight. That meant he'd been on the boat for about six hours. How fast did a boat go? He didn't know. What direction was it going? As if he'd had time to notice. Maybe north, maybe south.

  He didn't know much about star mapping. Enough to know north and south. He could fly south, and try to catch up with the colony. But what if they'd changed course, gone inland, and he missed them altogether? Or what if the boat had already taken him farther south than the colony? Well, what about north then? Same problem.

  This wasn't helping.

  Should he just wait here, hoping his mother would come looking for him? But maybe they'd already looked, and just given him up for dead. They'd seen him get blown over the ocean. Well, he could try to find his way back to Tree Haven and—but with a sickening jolt he remembered the burning ruins he'd left behind. Anyway, his mother had told him it was too cold to spend the winter there. He'd freeze to death. You can't just sit here. Find a way. He was wasting time.

  Wingbeats.

  His ears flared. By the rhythm he could tell it wasn't a bird's, and definitely not an owl's. It had to be a bat.

  "Hey! Stop!" he cried out, launching himself in the direction of the wingbeats. He threw sound, thought he caught a bright flash of movement, then it disappeared in the foliage. He flew after it, senses straining.

  "Come back!" he shouted angrily.

  It was gone. He circled for another minute, and then, exhausted, hung from a branch among bright autumn leaves. It was too disappointing. Tears stung his eyes.

  "What're you doing here?"

  Shade nearly jumped out of his fur. The voice came from the bright curled leaf next to him. He scrabbled away down the branch and peered at it warily, ready to

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  fly. He could see that this talking leaf was much fatter, certainly, than the other leaves, and it actually seemed to be furry in places. He looked for the stem and saw there were actually two, each with a set of five sharp claws.

  "You're a bat!" Shade exclaimed.

  "You're a genius—of course I'm a bat," came the voice again. The bat shimmered and slowly unwrapped herself. Long wings unfurled, and gave a quick, invigorating shake. Then the wings folded back against bright luxurious fur. Shade could now see her upside-down head. She had a neat pointy nose and elegant shell-shaped ears stuck close to her head. She was young too, though not quite as young as him. Dark eyes met his.

  "A Silverwing," she said. "I thought so."

  Shade stared. He'd never seen a bat with fur that wasn't the same color as his.

  "I'm a Brightwing," she said testily. "Not all bats are the same, you know. I guess you're too little to know that."

  Shade bristled, but said nothing.

  "I'm Marina."

  "Shade."

  "So, what are you doing here?" she asked again.

  "We were heading south down the coast—"

  "You and your colony."

  "Right, and we got caught in that big storm, and I was blown out to sea."

  "You flew all the way out here in that storm?"

  "Well, no, I landed on a boat."

  "Lucky for you."

  "Yeah, it took me back to land." He frowned and looked at her. "What do you mean, 'all the way out here'? Where am I?"

  "Well, you're back on land all right, but not where you think. You're on an island."

  "A what?"

  "An island. You know, a hunk of land with water all around it."

  "I'm not back where I started?"

  "No."

  Shade swallowed. He had to see for himself. He lit from the branch and flew straight up.

  Higher and higher he spiraled into the night, and then leveled off, circling. He saw the bay where he'd arrived, and followed the coastline as it curved, around and around and back in on itself, terrifying water stretching to the horizons. All that ocean between him and the rest of his colony. And no sight of land.

  "I'll never get back," he whispered.

  "It's about a million wingbeats," Marina said cheerfully, swooping up alongside him, and nodding at a point on the horizon. "Not the easiest ride, but definitely not impossible."

  "You've done it?"

  "Once."

  "So you came from the other side too."

  She nodded.

  He looked at her strangely. "Why?"

  "I came here to live. It's not much, I know, but it's home."

  He remembered the eerie silence of the forest. Around Tree Haven, there were always hundreds of bats out hunting at night.

  "You're all alone here."

  "Until you showed up."

  "Well. . . where's the rest of your colony?"

  "Oh, they're over there somewhere," she said, nodding vaguely at the horizon.

  She said nothing more, and Shade didn't see how he could ask. Had she got lost, like him? No, that didn't make sense. She didn't seem upset. But why would you want to live away from your colony? It was unthinkable, that separation. How could you be parted from your parents and brothers and sisters and all the other bats you'd grown up with? Unless she'd been expelled from the

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  colony. He looked at her curiously. What had she done?

  "I can point you in the right direction, but it's going to have to be tomorrow night," Marina told him.

  He turned to the eastern sky and saw it was beginning to brighten. "Yes," he said. "Thank you."

  "You can spend the day in my roost. If you want," she added. "We should probably get going though. No bats on this island, but plenty of owls. Follow me."

  Marina

  She led him under the roof and into the crawl space of an old wooden shack near the bay. The roost she'd made for herself was deep inside a heap of fishing nets, old sails, oily blankets, and muddy leaves, which Shade assumed she'd carried in to stop up any drafts. It was wonderfully warm, and he felt a
delicious sense of safety, knowing there were thick soft walls around him. The smell was the only thing—that briny fishy smell.

  "You get used to it," Marina told him. "I even kind of like it now."

  "How long have you lived here?"

  "Since late spring."

  "Where will you go for the winter?"

  "Thought I'd stay here. Give it a try anyway."

  She didn't seem concerned. Shade nodded, wondering if it would be warm enough. He didn't know anything about how cold it would get. It certainly felt warm now. But the idea of her spending the winter here, alone, cold, filled him with sadness, and he thought of his mother, his colony, flying south without him. He rustled his wings impatiently.

  "Where were you headed?" Marina asked.

  "Stone Hold, to meet with the males."

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  "Oh, so you're a newborn/' she said. "First migration, huh?"

  "Yes." He didn't like being reminded of his age. It made him feel small. "How many migrations have you been on?"

  "Just two," she said. "One and a half, really."

  She shifted on her perch and metal flashed on her forearm.

  Shade gasped. How could he have missed it? Then he understood, because she quickly moved again, and he saw that she had a way of always tucking her forearm under her wing so the band didn't show.

  "You've got one too!"

  She looked at him sharply. "What d'you mean?"

  "The band! How'd you get it?"

  "You know someone else who has one?"

  "Frieda, our chief elder."

  Marina's eyes widened. "Your elder has a band, just like mine? You're sure? Like this one here?"

  She thrust her forearm toward him.

  "Well, I don't know if it's exactly the same, but—"

  "How'd she get it?" Marina demanded.

  "Humans gave it—"

  "How long ago?"

  "Well, um, she's pretty old, and she said she got it when she was young, so—"

  "Ten, twenty years?"

  "At least."

  "And she's still alive!" There was awe in her voice.

  Shade frowned. "What d'you mean?"

  "They said it kills you," she said, but she was smiling.

  "Who?"

  "The Brightwing elders."

  Shade shook his head. "But Frieda never said—"