Maggie Furey - Sword of Flames

Eliizar sighed. He had known that this was going to be difficult. “They have other powers that will more than compensate,” he insisted, “and other companions who can help them far better than we, on their northward journey. Hear me out, Nereni—please. It is not our business to involve ourselves in this unnatural sorcery, and this is our last chance to leave before we become hopelessly embroiled in their fight against these other Magefolk.”

Eliizar was talking quickly, not giving his wife a chance to interrupt. “We cannot pass through the mountains alone, without aid,” he went on urgently. “We either leave now, with our own folk—our own kind, Nereni—or embark on a road that has no turning back. And what will the future hold for us, as strangers in a foreign land—a land beset by blackest sorcery?”

There was a new coldness, unnerving and unfamiliar, in Nereni’s eyes. “You’re afraid,” she said softly.

Shamefaced, unable to meet her gaze, the swordmaster dropped his face into his hands. “Yes,” he whispered. “In the face of this sorcery, I am afraid—afraid as I have never been before.”

“And so you ask me to choose now between you and Aurian—Aurian who became our friend and forgave us for putting her through the ordeal of the Arena, who freed us from the power of the tyrant Xiang—”

“Nereni, stop! This is more than I can bear!” Her words pierced Eliizar’s heart like a spear of ice, turning him cold with horror. Nereni thought he was asking her to choose? The notion had never occurred to him—it was not the way of the Khazalim. It was a man’s place to decide the comings and goings, and a woman’s place to go—or stay—as he dictated. For the first time in all their wanderings, he truly realized how greatly matters had changed between himself and Nereni. And yet…

Eliizar looked at his once timid, placid, unadventurous little wife, and saw the newfound spark and spirit in her eyes. He suddenly realized that her courage and common sense had become more pronounced—and appreciated by the other companions—as their journey had progressed. Why had he been so blind for so long? Indeed, Nereni had coped far better with many of the shocks and surprises of their adventures than had Eliizar, swordmaster and seasoned warrior!

Even as these thoughts were racing through Eliizar’s mind, he was aware that Nereni’s unrelenting gaze was fixed upon his face as she awaited an answer. He had been humbled and outdone by the courage of his wife—and it was not a pleasant feeling. The swordmaster felt his face grow hot with anger. “No, wife,” he growled. “I am not asking you to choose. I have decided that we will return to the forest with our people, and I am telling you that you are coming with me.” With that, he turned on his heel and strode away up the hill in search of Jharav, the veteran officer who was now in charge of the Khazalim contingent. Eliizar did not look back—and it was his own misfortune that he did not. The expression of anger and disgust on Nereni’s face might well have persuaded him to reconsider.

In the moonlight, the lichened gray stones of the Tower of Incondor looked as though they had been dipped in silver. On the slope between the ancient, crumbling pile of stone and the reaching shadow-fingers of the thicket, every blade of the blossom-starred turf was sharply outlined in a chiaroscuro of sharp-cut shadow and frosty light, almost as though winter had stolen back again on stealthy feet. But the air was alive with the tingling fragrance of spring, and it was somehow reassuring: a promise that the days of endless cold were gone at last, though the night breeze was still cool enough and the two winged couriers were grateful for the warmth of their close-wrapped wings.

Finch and Petrel, the two Skyfolk messengers stationed here at the behest of Queen Raven and the groundling Mages, sat perched like a pair of gargoyles on a high projection of worn stonework at the rear of the tower, as far away as possible from the presence of the wingless aliens with whom they had been forced to associate. Following their refusal to sleep with the foreigners inside the tower, they had been allotted a place on the roof in a crude lean-to shelter constructed against the warm stones of the chimney; but the constant circuits of the rooftop sentry had disturbed their slumbers, and the brilliance of the night—for the dazzling moon was just past its full—had made them restless. Eventually they had been driven to this dizzy perch between sky and ground where they could think in peace and talk softly and privately about the momentous changes that had taken place in their city over the previous two days.

Apart from the monotonous footfalls of the sentry as he made his rounds on the rooftop above the Winged Folk, nothing stirred in the moondrenched stillness. After a time the quiet speech of the couriers grew fitful, and faltered into silence. Then, breaking into the profound peace of the night, came the tiniest of sounds: a faint, high-pitched creak as the tower door eased open.

The two Skyfolk stiffened, instantly alert, and glanced at one another in wide-eyed alarm. They did not completely trust these groundling strangers, and anyone skulking about in the middle of the night must surely be up to no good! An unspoken signal flashed between the two winged figures. Silently, stealthily, long knives were eased from sheaths, and the couriers tensed their wings for flight. Soft footfalls could be heard… Someone was creeping around the side of the tower!

It was fortunate for the prowler that the moonlight was so bright. As soon as Finch and Petrel saw the silhouetted figure of their stalker, they sheathed their weapons and relaxed their combative stance, their expressions changing from alarm to amused astonishment. Why, it was that little woman who seemed to feel the need to mother everyone in the encampment—the one who kept plying them with such delicious food! The one groundling among the lot of them that the Skyfolk trusted to pose them no threat.

“What in the name of Yinze can she be doing?” Petrel hissed to his companion. At the sound of his whisper the groundling looked up, placed a finger to her lips to signal silence, and beckoned them down. “Aerillia, Aerillia,” she whispered urgently, tugging at the arm of the nearest Skyman and pointing first to herself and then to the dark heap of meshes that was their cargo net, left safely at the foot of the tower wall.

For a few moments, the winged couriers had difficulty believing what they thought she meant by her urgent gestures. At last, however, Finch turned to Petrel in dismay. “She wants us to fetch the net and take her to Aerillia? Tell me it’s not true!”

His companion shrugged. “She can mean nothing else.” Finch, by far the smaller of the pair, looked ruefully at Nereni’s plump form and flexed his wiry arms. “Why her?” he sighed. “Couldn’t they have sent one of the others, for Yinze’s sake?”

Aurian, narrowing her eyes in concentration, peered into the deceptive, shadowed gloom of the cramped tunnel, and blessed the gods once again for the gift of her Mage’s night-vision. “Shift that torch a little, would you, please?” she muttered over her shoulder to Cygnus. “I’m working in my own shadow here.”

Beside her the Mage felt Anvar’s shoulder brush her own as he wormed his way forward to take a closer look into the narrow gap between the fallen stones. “That’s the place we want,” he said. “There—can you see it? Where that big slab of rock has slipped at an angle. If we can just wedge it upright somehow, it should prop the others…”

“Look out!” Aurian’s sharp cry was all but drowned by the ominous grinding overhead. As her soulmate leaned forward to point, even that small movement had disturbed the delicate balance of the stones. As one, the two Magefolk flung their magical shields outward and upward, extending the fields of force to support the shifting slabs. After an endless moment the grating rasp of stone on stone wore down into silence, leaving only the liquid patter of a stream of grit and dust that sifted through the cracks.