Fran Wilde - Updraft

A girl much smaller than the rest of us said, “Aliati Mondarath.” She didn’t mention a profession. Mondarath traded herbs and beverages. Including what the Singer used to revive me after I shouted down the skymouth.

“I am sorry for your tower’s troubles, Aliati,” Beliak said.

“And I yours,” Aliati returned to him.

We were all very formal. Very cautious.

“Kirit Densira,” I said. “I will be a trader.”

My group looked at their footwraps. Especially the volunteers. Yes, they’d heard of me. Then Beliak met my eyes and smiled. “Welcome.” Aliati and Ceetcee followed suit.

The Magisters gathered to draw groups. The whispers on the plinth fell silent. Dix pulled her hand from the silk bag, looked at what she held, then turned to grin at us, at me.

My luck disappeared like a lost breeze.

Behind our group, another knot of students and volunteers erupted in laughter. Nat’s group. A third group was silent until someone screeched. Sidra.

“You can’t be serious! I won’t.”

I turned my head enough to see what she was protesting, without attracting attention from the Singers or Dix. Sidra pointed at Macal. “Not one more time.”

I expected to see the Magisters stifle her protests. Magister Florian often did so when Sidra kicked up a fuss in flight. Instead, they regrouped and conferred. Macal said something that made everyone nod except Dix. Sidra swished her wings.

In other years, someone would have been flown home, someone might have fallen by now. Sure, a few testers had washed out. But no one protested a group assignment.

The Magisters separated. Dix stalked towards Sidra, took her by the arm, and led her to another group. Nat’s.

Where we stood, I could not hear their words. Nat’s hand gestures and how he tilted his head gave him away. He wasn’t pleased with the addition to his test group, but didn’t want to offend Sidra. He bowed ever so slightly to Dix. The other students began to speak as well. Something shifted. Dix stayed with the group while Magister Viit left it and walked towards us. Somehow, Nat and Macal had turned Sidra’s outburst into a way to spare me Dix’s attention. If true, either would make a fine trader. And I would owe them both enormous favors.

At a signal from one of the Singers, Magister Calli led our group to the edge of the plinth. We looked south. We would need to beat a zigzag against the wind, retrieve a flag set on a distant tower this morning, and return. Other groups conferred, picked a first leader, and set out, going west, east, and towards the city center.

You can do this, I reminded myself. Now that I had passed my solo flight, I felt a bit better. Still, anything could happen during Group. Crosswinds, a flock of whipperlings. A wingbreak. Skymouths. Especially with student fliers stressed from wingtesting.

Nat’s group launched, with Sidra straining to get out in front. Group was all about flying with others in a tight scrum, and in close quarters. Important skills for heavily trafficked towers, and especially for traders, who sometimes need to carry heavier objects as teams.

The group had likely already decided on leader order, but Sidra’s arrival had changed that too. She was positioning herself to lead the flight. I held my breath, waiting for Dix to discipline her, but she didn’t. They disappeared, headed east.

I looked at my group. Who would take the lead among us? The city was watching.

Groups worked best when leaders alternated; that I knew from both Florian and Ezarit. Sidra’s performance notwithstanding. Perhaps that was why everyone was hanging back. Beliak smiled, awkward. Ceetcee rocked on her heels. We’d be here all day.

I stepped forward. “I’ll take first lead.” Would they follow me?

Their response was a stretch of quiet. I’d botched it already. I scrambled to fix it. “And then Beliak?”

Beliak nodded. “Then Ceetcee and then Aliati?” Both agreed. The volunteers readied themselves. Beliak and I exchanged nervous smiles.

I called the first formation, based on the direction we were headed and the prevailing wind: “Chevron.” Magister Calli smiled. I’d made a good decision. We launched, wing to wing, coordinating and signaling wind shifts with whistles and shouts.

We were a noisy crowd, all working together to find the fastest breezes on which to glide.

We were also a fast group. By cooperating, we flew high. We soon overtook Sidra and Nat’s group, which was off course and struggling to keep up with her set path.

I signaled Beliak to take lead after we’d made half the distance. He shifted our formation to dove — a raked arrow — since the wind had grown more variable. I fell back to his left point and took a moment to look around.

Ezarit’s lenses were a blessing, especially since I’d adjusted them properly. I could see far with them, was less troubled by sun glare than my companions, and my eyes weren’t tearing from the wind.

Below, small flights of patchwork wings followed us for a few towers and then turned back. I’d done the same as a younger flier. Without wingmarks, they could not follow us for long.

We passed the farthest towers I’d been to, out of the northwest quadrant. I quieted as I realized the names of the towers I’d studied all my life went with shapes, twists of bone rising from the clouds just as Densira did.

Here and there, bridges spanned the gaps between towers. As we flew closer to the Spire, more towers were connected by the long spans of sinew. Everywhere, ladders grappled tiers. On balconies and tower tops, families stood and waved. Densira families were doing the same for children of distant towers, welcoming them to the rest of the city.

From my position next to Beliak, I spotted our banner on Varu’s top tier and signaled. Beliak acknowledged me with a whistle and signaled for us to land atop the tower before the final leg of the test.

* * *

Varu was lower than Densira by at least three tiers. The tower was so crowded that hammocks and sacks had to hang anchored from balconies. They’d broken War long ago, though Magister Florian said once that they hadn’t done more than plot and make a few raids on neighbors’ water and food. In return, Singers took Varu’s council, along with their families, to the Spire. They refused Varu any opportunity to rise.

Our landing made a racket, silk wings flapping against wind curls that crossed the tower top. The bone roof was smooth and white, showing no new growth. Cleats and pulleys carved around its edge supported the nets below.

Varu had put out a dried-vine basket for the wingtesters. It held figs and a sour-tasting juice. The new tastes reminded us how far we’d come from home.

I removed my lenses to clean them and looked out from Varu to its neighbors. I saw the Spire clearly for the first time, rising from the city center. I’d studied it for the wingtest, but had never been so close.

Taller than the rest of the city’s towers, the Spire differed in other ways as well. Where our tiers rose supported by a central core, a solid wall of white bone wrapped the Spire. Ezarit told me once that the Spire’s center was a wind-filled abyss. The Spire’s market-bridges, designed by artifexes like Nat’s father, hung suspended on pulleys in a ring around its wall. Behind the wall, the Spire held the Singers’ secrets close.

From Varu’s roof, I spotted gray-robed Singers perched atop the Spire, on a flat expanse of bone that could hold hundreds. More Singers emerged from within, like smoke taken to wing.

Beliak watched them too, as he chewed a fig. “One of my brothers was taken to the Spire, five years ago.” He frowned. “His name was Lurai.” He saw my look and hurried to clarify. “As a novice. Maybe he’s up there, watching us.”