“Be careful, Hawkness,” Sym said. “You do have the Takhran’s price on your head.”
“Aye.” Amos threw on a woolen cloak and belted it around his body, then bound a headscarf over his forehead and hair. Now he truly looked a Waveryder. Birdie had no doubt he’d melt seamlessly into the crowd of sailors. “We were fools t’ come here at all, but it can’t be helped now. Be back in a bit. Stay put ’til I am.”
He dropped over the side, and Birdie watched him assume a very convincing limp as he made his way up the quay to a heavily whiskered barrel of a man seated beneath an awning, hand over a coin pouch, and then disappear into the sea of buildings beyond.
“Fishing and trading vessels mostly.” Sym observed, pulling Birdie’s focus from the quay to the ramshackle shipping filling the harbor. “Tauros smiles upon us. The Takhran’s armies may have the best of it on land, but we can thank our stars he has no fleet to speak of.”
Along the far northern curve of the wharf, a series of sleek ships with iron prongs at the prow rested at anchor. The sight brought a tremor back to Birdie’s hands and the tang of fear, sweat, and sickness below deck to her nostrils. She hugged the rail to steady herself. “Langorians . . . here?”
It took Sym a moment to locate the ships, but once she did her dark eyes took on an even darker aspect. She spat over the rail and muttered something in the desert tongue. “It does not surprise me, little Songkeeper. Would that I could sink a spear into all of their throats. The slavers and the Takhran are almost worthy of one another.”
Without another word, she turned and slipped below deck, but Birdie couldn’t take her eyes off the ships. Were there poor souls chained and despairing in the darkness of their holds even now? Or had they already been given in tribute to the Takhran for his slave camps, as Carhartan and Rhudashka had hinted months ago on the beach at Bryllhyn? The ships were too far away for her to truly hear snatches of the captives’ melodies, but she imagined she could hear them even so, their voices blending into a slow, sad humming that hung over her as the hours slipped past and Tauros drifted across the sky.
Night had fallen before Amos returned with a cart drawn by a pair of shaggy Westmark oxen. Rather than sinking into slumber, the wharf seemed to come to life at the setting of the sun. Firepots blazed from iron poles at intervals along the quay and beside the doors of the buildings beyond. Tipsy sailors and peasants, bellowing merchants and vendors, and stern-voiced Khelari all contributing to the hubbub.
Somehow Gundhrold managed to disembark and conceal his bulk beneath the canvas covering of the cart without drawing any attention. The griffin moved with a stealth Birdie would never have thought possible for a creature his size. Amos insisted she ride inside as well, so she squeezed between the griffin’s right wing—which had finally begun to heal after a month of inactivity since leaving the Soudlands—and the side of the cart and tried not to breathe in the stifling mustiness of his feathers and coat.
They rattled off. Peeking through the gap between the canvas and the cart revealed Amos and Sym walking on either side to guide the oxen, while Inali slumped on the raised seat, still weak enough to warrant a ride. Birdie caught little more than glimpses of the city as they went. Once beyond the realm of wharfside taverns and curio shops, the streets widened, bordered by tall, respectable houses. But only a few twists and turns later, the streets narrowed again, storied buildings overshadowing the road until the peaked roofs were nearly touching.
Birdie’s ears hummed with the nervous throbbing of her pulse. The streets were full of the noise of passing people, hundreds of footsteps and conversations creating a cacophony of sound the like of which she had never heard.
Compared to Hardale, Kerby seemed large.
But Kerby couldn’t hold a candle to the vastness that was Serrin Vroi.
The cart took a sharp turn to the right, and the dark melody hit her so suddenly she gasped. A cluster of dark soldiers stood within the gateway of a high wall. Amos exchanged a word or two of bland pleasantries, and they let the cart pass unhindered, but it was a full minute before Birdie managed to breathe again.
Once she did, she realized that the thrumming that had been growing in her ears wasn’t just the pulse of her hammering heart. It was the muted sound of voices—many voices—singing.
“We’ve just entered Serrin Vroi proper.”
She started at the griffin’s harsh whisper in her ear and pulled back from the gap long enough to glance at his stern face and fierce golden eyes and that sharp beak so close within the confines of the cart. “Then . . . what was that back there?”
“Just the outskirts. We entered the true city once we passed beneath the wall. Here the Takhran’s hand is felt much more heavily.”
She felt the truth of his words within her as she turned back. The city noise was overpowering in and of itself, but now she could hear the layer of music lurking beneath each and every voice. Generally, what she heard seemed to be limited by distance, barriers to sound like walls and enclosed spaces, and her own attention.
But now, the broken five-noted melodies swept over her, like the River Adayn at flood. So much hurt and sorrow expressed in musical form. Oh, there was joy too, and peace, but both seemed small and utterly insignificant in comparison. Engulfed by the tide of despair. Tainted by the strains of the discordant melody. And beneath it all, the ponderous, deep humming of a sad, old song. The noise swallowed her, stopping up her ears, squeezing her throat, and filling her lungs until she felt herself drowning in it.
Gundhrold’s wingtip brushed her cheek. “Peace, little one. Focus on my voice. Do not try to listen to it all at once.”
Shivering, she closed her eyes, shoved her palms against her eyelids, and strained her ears until she could pick out the griffin’s familiar soaring melody. The voice arced and wheeled and raced higher and higher into the great blue expanse above, lifting her soul with it. The pressure in her ears faded into the background.
“It worked,” she whispered.
“Of course, little one.” The griffin dipped his head. “This is a burden you cannot take upon yourself. The Songkeeper is not meant to right all the pains and sorrows of this world.”
She released her hold on his voice and turned her focus to Amos next, honing in on his melody sung in a baritone that somehow managed to drag with melancholy and yet have a spring to its step at the same time. From there, she selected strangers at random in the crowd, plucking at each melody as one might a harp string. An old man on crutches, a child in rags with sad eyes, an auburn-haired woman in a blue robe.
The woman met her gaze.
At least, it seemed like she did, though there was no way she could have seen Birdie beneath the covering of the cart. But knowing that did nothing to dispel the certainty that the woman’s eyes were nevertheless fixed upon her.
Stranger still, the woman had no melody.
None that she could hear, no matter how much she tried to focus or strain her ears. There was nothing beyond the roar of the crowd and the broken songs of a thousand hearts. Then the woman too was gone, faded into the night like a ghost.
It seemed an age had passed when the cart at last came to a stop long enough for a door to creak open, then rolled forward one more time before coming to a final halt. The peddler’s heavy footsteps approached, then a corner of the canvas jerked back to reveal his grim face.
“Bail out. Stairs in the back corner lead t’ a pair o’ rooms. Ye lot can wait for me there. Got t’ return the cart before it’s missed.”
He waited while they disembarked, then backed the oxen and cart out, allowing Birdie to get a glimpse of their new lodgings. It was a stable of sorts, judging from the musty straw underfoot, and the bits and pieces of mildewed leather harnesses dangling from hooks on the sagging rough plank walls. A firepot hissed and guttered beside a rickety spiral staircase in the far left corner.
Sym swung the door sh
ut and bolted it in place, then tugged the cloak from her shoulders, bundled it over one arm, and adjusted the spear quiver strapped to her back. “Come. Best we move upstairs. Better vantage point there in case we were followed.” She offered Inali her shoulder, but he mumbled a refusal and pushed on up the stairs, leaning heavily on the banister. The treads creaked and groaned at every step. Shaking her head, Sym followed.
The griffin cocked his head at the rickety staircase and motioned for Birdie to pass him. “I think I had best come last.”
Scarce a quarter of an hour into Amos’s trip to return the cart, winter broke loose upon the city. The snow fell in delicate gasps at first but quickly whipped up into the sort of storm that leaves one blinded and winded. By the time he abandoned the cart a street or two from where he’d picked it up, he was chilled to the core and bone weary.
The return trip took even longer. He progressed by back ways and side alleys, doubling back and cutting left and right to avoid pursuit, but marched right past the safe house he’d procured—not that much was safe in this cursed city, but it beat camping in the middle of the streets with three of the Takhran’s most wanted—before realizing it and retracing his steps.
Amos stomped up the stairs and burst into the front room where his companions were seated on a set of wobbly-legged chairs around an even more wobbly-legged table topped by a sputtering candle. The griffin stood sentry at the shuttered window. Four pairs of eyes shifted to him. He could feel the tension in the air, prickling against his skin like the precursor to a storm.
“You look a mess,” Inali observed. He alone seemed relaxed, or perhaps merely indifferent, slumped in his chair, head tipped back, good hand fiddling with a piece of charcoal and a scrap of parchment.
Amos held his tongue until he had shucked off his snow-soaked cloak and head scarf and retrieved his overcoat and feathered cap from the pile of belongings at the top of the staircase. Blowing on his hands, he eased into the lone remaining chair between Birdie and Inali and fought against its treacherous wobble. He released a blunt laugh. “That storm—who’d have thought it? Here we are, sitting pretty at the bitter end o’ a fairly mild winter, Spring Turning scarce a week hence, and Fallandine refuses t’ go quietly—curse her icy breath!”
No one smiled.
“What took so long, Amos?” Birdie’s head sagged against his shoulder. “You were gone for hours.”
Was that what this was about? And here Amos had thought something had gone seriously wrong. Their concern was touching, if wholly unnecessary. “Ye lot could have slept. No cause for alarm. I had a long way t’ go, an’ I had t’ be careful an’ make sure I wasn’t followed. No chancin’ it in this city, not if we hope t’ survive.”
“And how exactly do we plan to do that, Hawkness?” Sym’s shrewd expression met his over the quivering candle flame. She was well trained, that one—positioned strategically with one eye to the stairs and the other to the window, quiver leaning casually against one knee so the spears were practically in hand. She would be an asset to this mission.
“I agree,” Gundhrold said. “It is past time we discussed our plans.”
The griffin, on the other hand, would not.
Merely having him in the city was a liability Amos should never have risked. The last of the griffins, known to have been in the company of the Songkeeper. If he were spotted, it would not take the Takhran long to put two and two together.
Amos had been hoping for a bit of grub and maybe a few hours of shuteye before delving into the messy process of hashing out the who’s, what’s, and how-to’s of the plan. But mayhap it was best to get it out of the way now in the wee hours of morning, then sleep the rest of the day away and head out scouting come nightfall.
He took a deep breath. “First off, Gundhrold, ye can’t come in with us, ye know that right?” The griffin’s beak parted, but Amos forged ahead before he could speak. “No room for argument. Any plan we dream up t’ get inside that fortress will be a thousand times more dangerous if we have t’ sneak ye in too. I’ve no doubt that ye would give yer life t’ save the lass, but can ye stay behind for her?”
A murderous glare was the only answer he received.
It would have to suffice.
“Right.” Amos shoved to his feet and scattered the dust on the tabletop with a sweep of his hand. “Charcoal, if ye please, lad.” Before Inali could object, he seized it and began sketching out a rough approximation of the city of Serrin Vroi, explaining as he went. “It’s been thirty years since last I set foot in this city, but near as I can recall, the main layout hasn’t changed much. We can fill in details later after we’ve done a bit o’ reconnoitering. This here’s the outer wall o’ Serrin Vroi where we entered this evenin’, and this is the main road leadin’ through the Silent Fountains t’ the—”
“That’s wrong.” Inali muttered.
“Since when did ye become the resident expert on Serrin Vroi?” Amos cleared his throat with a tad more emphasis than was really necessary and went back to sketching. “As I was sayin’, this road leads through the Silent Fountains t’ the main gate o’ the Takhran’s fortress, and beyond it, the Keep and Mount Eiphyr—”
“It is wrong, I tell you.” Standing now, Inali swept his hands over the tabletop, erasing Amos’s crude map with swift, jerky movements, almost like a puppet on a string. “It is all wrong. The proportions are just not right. You crammed the area within the outer wall into a circle half its size. Your main road runs straight like a spear, but it should meander like the River Adayn. And I am not sure what that is, but it is certainly not Mount Eiphyr.”
Bilgewater! Amos bit his lip before he could release the thunderous word. “Fine.” He dropped the charcoal. “Ye think ye can do better. I’d like t’ see ye try.” He plopped into the chair and started to tip it back to set his feet on the table, but thought better when the legs threatened to give way.
Inali set to work at a feverish pace, scattering a web of lines across the tabletop. His eyes were bright and practically glowed in the candlelight. It was the first real sign of life he had shown since his injury, and Amos’s anger faded a mite at the transformation. Weeks of fever and pain had drained the strength from Inali’s limbs and left hollows beneath his eyes that made him appear more corpse than man. Even now, Sym insisted he keep his left arm bound to his chest until the bone, muscle, and sinew had time to knit together again. Whether they did or nor, Amos doubted the lad would ever regain the full use of his arm.
“Mount Eiphyr’s the goal, isn’t it, Amos?” Birdie spoke beside him, though her voice was so soft he almost didn’t hear it over the clamor of his own thoughts. The lass slouched with her chin and forearms resting on the table, dark hair spilling like a loosed fireflower over her shoulders and back. “Or beneath it, rather?”
“Aye, that’s the goal.”
“So we just need to find a way in . . . Inali knows where to go and what to do after that. How did you manage it last time, Amos?”
Amos winced. He’d been expecting the question—really he had. Given the mad endeavor they’d embarked upon, such questions were unavoidable. But if the lass only knew what she was asking …
“Bit o’ a lark, really.” He forced a note of humor into his voice. To his own ears, it sounded almost as painful as it felt, and from the looks he was getting, no one else was buying it. “The casualties weren’t only on our side in the slaughter at Drengreth. We felled a few Khelari before the end. Once Artair was captured, I borrowed a suit o’ armor an’ marched in as one o’ their own. Straight through the main gate, past the barracks, into the Keep, and down the secret passages until I reached the depths beneath Mount Eiphyr.”
“Sounds simple enough.” But there was no expression in Sym’s tone and still less in her face to enable him to judge what she was thinking. The cliffs of Nar-Kog were easier to read than she.
“Anythin’ but.” Amos dropped the light t
one. “Sure I survived, but that way’s not likely t’ work again, an’ it’s too blatherin’ risky. No, we’ll just have t’ come up with somethin’ else.”
“As you wish.” Inali straightened from his work and flicked an unsteady hand at the tabletop. “Behold something else, as requested, Hawkness.”
Amos shoved to his feet, and resting both fists on the table, cast an appraising eye over Inali’s attempt to “do better.” It was good work, he had to admit that. The lad had skill. Somehow, in a matter of minutes, he had managed to translate the key elements of the vast city of Serrin Vroi into simple blocks and lines that matched Amos’s somewhat hazy recollection of the city, even improved on it a bit.
“Well, lad, I’m impressed, an’ not afraid t’ admit it.” After all, no one had ever claimed that Amos McElhenny didn’t give credit where credit was due . . . given grudgingly, sometimes, but given nonetheless.
The lad’s good shoulder lifted in a shrug. “You might say I have a gift.”
Amos bent closer to inspect the layout of the Takhran’s fortress. Whether by design or a slip of the hand, Inali’s charcoal had darkened a circle on the seaward side where the outer wall of the fortress struck the base of the mountain and began to climb. “That right there, what is it?”
“Our way in.” A rare smile flashed across the lad’s face. “It’s a secret way, not much traveled. Less direct than marching through the front gate, I’ll grant you, but we run less risk of drawing unwanted attention.”
“There are no secret ways into the heart o’ Serrin Vroi.”
Inali sank back into his seat, removed his spectacles, and buffed the lenses against his sling. “So says the great Hawkness . . . so it must be. But if I recall correctly, it has been some thirty odd years since you were last here. You claim to have plumbed the depths below Mount Eiphyr, but do you honestly believe you know all the secrets held in the darkness?”
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