Fran Wilde - Updraft

“ Many bridges ran to Lith, ” he sang, the legend clear and true. My jaw dropped. “ They traded easy and made things beautiful. ”

Now Tobiat did not skip or mumble. He sounded whole when he sang. His memory intact. I listened harder. I’d never thought to ask him to sing.

But they grew jealous of the Spire,

tried to raise their tower higher, without Singers’ help, nor Spire’s blessing.

Men found Lith who wished to fight.

They made it grow,

they made it strong.

They angered many, Lith cracked and died.

Singers helped them flee, made survivors beg shelter. Plenty perished.

No one came to sing their dead.

City punishes those who forget.

Tobiat’s song ended. Amazement washed over me, along with new appreciation for Tobiat. Then he shouted, “Roar!” as the city rumbled again.

I shuddered and sped up my search efforts. On one tier, we found a crafter’s studio, the floor broken and treacherous. A spine wall had caved in, and the bones scattered across the floor were big enough to be human.

If any of this tier’s residents had survived, they’d left everything behind when they went. Tools had blown against the central core and lay covered with dust: needles and saws and nails. Metal. Things I’d seen in Rumul’s chambers, in the wingmaker’s studio, and nowhere else. No one had risked coming back to Lith to salvage, even though the need was great. I gathered what I wanted: needles — even a metal one — awls, bone battens from a pile.

“Rise.” Tobiat held up a carved bone panel. It was gray with dust, but much lighter than the darkened tower. He cleaned it with a corner of his ruined robe.

The panel was beautiful. The carving crisp and confident. Cleaner even than the carving in the Spire. Our bone tools could not compete with the artistry. The sharp wings, the flowing hair of the fliers.

We’d lost so much.

“Oh,” I said. “The clouds.”

The swirling cuts that ridged the panel’s surface could be nothing but clouds. In every direction. Even thinking about clouds all around made me squirm. The panel must have come from the Rise. Part of our history.

At the center of the bone tablet, a woman with a marked face lifted a wingless citizen away from a hunting bird. A Singer saving someone. Not the whole city. One person.

This was almost too humble for the Singers. Most often, their carvings showed Singers lifting the towers themselves, filled with people. My hand, which had carved this very scene in the council tier as a novice, flexed at the memory.

We’d lost so much. We’d lost ourselves.

“The towers sing one version of The Rise, and the Singers know another,” I said.

Tobiat nodded. “Secrets.”

“But what if that’s wrong? What if secrets are destroying the city?” I traced the carving with a finger. Tucked it into my robe.

“Fear Singers. Sing. Fear.”

Sure. The towers refrained from fighting because they were afraid of the Singers. I could see that. But Tobiat shook his head, frustrated. That wasn’t what he’d meant. “Do you mean to say that the Singers are afraid?”

A bob of the head. A cackle.

“They’re part of the city, not something separate,” I murmured. “We have forgotten.”

“Maybe, maybe,” said Tobiat. He singsonged, “ City punishes those who forget. ”

What else had we forgotten? How much more could the city lose if Rumul remained unchecked?

We returned to the hideout, Tobiat munching on some gristle he’d pulled from a pocket. I turned over thoughts in my mind, frustrated from the search.

How many generations ago had Lith fallen? Recently enough to haunt the city. How could we keep tragedy from happening again without resorting to Singer methods? Were the stories and songs true? How would I fly away from here in time to meet Wik?

I had one good wing, a needle and awl. Battens.

I spotted Elna’s satchel on the floor and remembered how heavy it had felt. I looked inside. Under the herbs she’d carried when Wik had flown with her, and her sewing box, she’d tucked the silk and the furled, broken wings from the Spire, the ones I’d presented to her.

I began to hum The Rise, softly. Soon, Elna, Nat, and Tobiat fell asleep around me, heads nestled on arms, legs tossed by dreams. Nat snored.

I pulled the silk and wings from Elna’s bag, took a piece of dried goose from our stores, then crawled from the cell and retraced my path until I found my wing and its broken mate. Lifting them, I could see that the tear in the right wing was devastating. There was no repairing the shredded silk, unless I could summon Liras Viit to this broken tower. But I had Nat’s ceremonial wings. One was less damaged than the other.

I could patch his better wing with mine, stitch the stress points and make them whole. I ripped out the seams and dissected his broken wing, pulling the silk from the battens. My fingers lingered on the torn silk, imagining Nat’s wings as they shredded in the Gyre.

Using the tools Tobiat and I had found and Elna’s kit, I patched myself new wings with the silk of both his wings and mine.

I hid what remained, but did not throw it over the edge. Nat was not strong enough to come after me, not yet. He’d want to fly before he was ready. Too soon.

A rustle in the pile of silk and battens I’d pushed into a corner made me jump. A bulge moved. My skin prickled with fear. Perhaps I should have thrown it over.

When I peeled back the silk, I saw nothing. Carefully, I put my hand out. I heard a cheeping sound and saw my dried-goose dinner disappear into an invisible mouth.

The little skymouth. I shuddered, despite myself. A stowaway, and a thief.

No. It was a garbage eater. Perhaps these littlemouths helped the city too.

I carefully laid the silk back over the creature and let it eat undisturbed. Began to hum The Rise again.

I pressed the seams on my wings with the heel of my palm. Tugged at them. They seemed solid. Solid enough to get me to the Spire, at least.

A gust of wind caught the wing’s edge and lifted it. I pulled the straps over my shoulders, tightened them against my aching muscles. No one else to help me. My fingers brushed the lenses’ cold metal. I thought of my father, of Ezarit. Of the bargains they’d made.

I imagined them fighting in the Gyre. Imagined Civik falling, his body breaking. My mother, wounded, a knife cut to her chest. Saw again Terrin’s fall. The young woman who’d challenged Sellis. Nat. Heard the wind in the Gyre, felt the heat from the skymouth’s maw.

My humming had become a keen. I bit it back.

At a scuffling sound from the tunnel, I turned, prepared to face Tobiat. But Nat pulled himself through, lowering himself to a sitting position against the wall. Elna followed.

“You’re going,” Nat said, panting.

“Yes. Right now.” I looked at him, at the wounds I’d caused. Looked at the worry on Elna’s face. I might not have another chance to say it. “I am sorry I fought you.”

He frowned. “I fought you too. But you’re right, what you said before. I made you a Singer. It wasn’t exactly how we’d planned it.”

I could feel my face flush with anger. They’d made a plan but hadn’t figured out a way to share it with me. “I thought you died! I thought I killed you!”

Nat held his hands up. “I’m not fighting you now.” His voice was still tired, and resigned. “Besides, someone from the towers needed to try and fight. Someone needed to fight.”

I took a deep breath and blew my anger away. He was misguided, headstrong, and more than a little right.

“Someone will fight. Me. Once I find Ezarit,” I said, squeezing his hands. “You heal.”