David Farland - Sons of the Oak

But for right now, his father’s simple knife felt right, and Fallion suspected that his father had given it to him for just this time in his life.

Did my father’s prescience extend this far? Fallion wondered. His mother had told him that his father sometimes sensed danger toward a person weeks or months in advance. But it only happened when his father looked long at that person, and then he would cock his head to the side, as if he were listening for something that no one else could hear.

Yes, Fallion decided, his father had recognized danger. And so Fallion claimed his knife now, believing that his father had known how right it would feel in his hand, perhaps even knowing that Fallion’s life might depend upon this blade.

Even as he drew the weapon from the wall, a strange compulsion overtook him, and Fallion found himself strapping the blade to his side.

Just to be safe, he told himself.

Indeed, everyone in the castle was trying extra hard to be safe tonight. Jaz had lit a dozen candles in the bedchamber, and the scent of precious oils filled the room along with the light. Every lamp had been lit in every hallway. It seemed that everyone was wary of what might be lurking in the shadows.

As Fallion considered whether he should hone his blade now or wait until morning, Jaz went to the window and opened it, looking out.

“Fallion,” Jaz said in wonder, “the hills are on fire!”

Fallion strode to the window, peered out. Humfrey scurried up Fallion’s pant leg and then leapt onto the windowsill. The window was too small to let a man climb through, and too small for both boys and a ferrin to all peer out of at once.

Fallion’s nostrils flared at the taste of fresh air.

There in the distance, high up in the hills above the fog-covered bottoms, an angry red star seemed to have fallen to the earth.

“They’ve set the forest on fire,” Fallion said. “Mother sent Daymorra to find the bodies of those girls-the ones that had the babies in them. But the strengi-saats must have carried them away first. So Daymorra probably set fire to the hills, to burn them out.”

“I’ll bet that the monsters carried them in their mouths,” Jaz said, “the way a mother cat will move her kittens once you’ve found them.”

“Maybe,” Fallion said.

One of the monsters snarled in the distance, across the river to the north of the castle. Jaz turned to Fallion, worried.

“Fallion, I think we’re surrounded. Do you think that Mum will have us fly out?”

In Mystarria, each castle had a few graaks, giant flying reptiles with leathery wings, to carry messages in times of distress. The graaks could not carry much weight for any distance, and so the graak riders were almost always children-orphans who had no one to mourn them if they were to take a fall. But if a castle went under siege, as a last resort the royal children would sometimes escape on the back of a graak.

Fallion felt an unexpected thrill at the thought. He had never flown before and would soon be past the age where he could ride a graak.

Why not? he wondered. But he knew that his mother would never allow it. Graak riders were given endowments of brawn and stamina, so that they could hang on tightly and endure the cold and lonely trips. His mother wouldn’t let him ride a graak without endowments.

“She won’t let us fly,” Fallion said. “She’ll send us with an escort.”

“ Let us fly?” Jaz asked. “Let us fly? I wouldn’t get on a graak for anything.”

“You would,” Fallion said, “to save your life.”

Humfrey darted under the bed and came back up with a wilted carrot. He threw it up on Fallion’s pack, and snarled, “Weapon. Weapon, Jaz.”

Fallion smiled at the ferrin’s sense of humor.

Jaz picked up the limp carrot and swished it in the air like a sword, and the ferrin cried in glee and thrust with his spear, engaging the human in mock combat.

Fallion glanced back at the fire and wondered about the strengi-saats. He didn’t always think quickly, but he thought long about things, and deeply.

When Borenson had cut Rhianna open, all that Fallion had seen were eggs-ghastly eggs with thin membranes of yellow skin, cast off from a hideous monster.

But what would the monster have seen? Her babes. Her love. And a strengi-saat would want to protect her young.

How far would she go to do it?

Fallion remembered a heroic tabby cat that he’d seen last spring, fighting off a pair of vicious dogs in an alley while she tried to carry her kitten to safety.

With a dawning sense of apprehension, Fallion got up and ran out into the hallway. Humfrey squeaked and followed. As Fallion raced out the tower door, along a wall-walk, he grabbed a torch from a sconce.

Sir Borenson and Fallion had left Rhianna in her room, to sleep off the effects of the drugs she’d taken. The healers had said that she needed rest.

Perhaps she’ll need more than that, Fallion thought. Perhaps she’ll need protection.

As he ran, Fallion tried to recall their retreat from the hills. The strengisaats had given chase, but had not attacked. Like mothers protecting their young, he thought, just trying to drive us off.

And now he realized that once they had driven off the men, they’d gone back to their children. In fact, Fallion realized now that as they had run, he had heard bell-like calls in the woods far behind them. At least one of the strengi-saats had remained to guard the young.

With rising apprehension Fallion redoubled his pace.

But when we first went up there, he wondered, why hadn’t the strengisaats stayed at the tree to guard their young? Most animals would have stayed to protect their offspring.

Then he recalled the cracking sound in the woods when he’d first found the bodies. It had been loud. Too loud for a creature that moved as silently as a strengi-saat.

The monsters had been trying to draw us away from their young, Fallion realized, the way that a peeweet will fly up and give her call to draw you from her nest. breathlessly, he raced to the lower levels of the keep, burst down the short hallway, and threw open the door to Rhianna’s room.

He found her lying quietly in bed, her face unnaturally pale, almost white, drained of blood by the healers’ opium. Someone had brushed the twigs and leaves from her hair, and washed her face, and Fallion felt astonished that he hadn’t noticed before that she was pretty, with flawless skin and a thin, dainty mouth.

The room was dark. There should have been a candle or two burning by the bed, but either the candles had gone out, or the healers had blown them out so that Rhianna could sleep more easily.

Yet as Fallion held his torch aloft, it seemed that its light grew wan, unable to penetrate the gloom. He felt a faint breeze tickle his right cheek, and glanced toward the window. Shards of glass showed where it had been broken, and other shards lay on the floor. Something had hit the window from the outside.

Humfrey came creeping into the room, hissed a warning. “Dead. Smell dead.”

Fallion inhaled deeply, caught a whiff of putrefaction. He could not see beyond the bars of the windows. It seemed that the gloom grew deeper there, so deep that even the torchlight could not penetrate it.

Humfrey hissed in terror and bolted out the door.

Fallion’s heart raced, and he held the torch aloft. He drew his dagger and held it before him. “I know you’re there,” he said weakly.

There came an answering growl, so soft, like the whisper of distant thunder rolling down from the hills. The torch sputtered and began to die.

Fallion saw the flames suddenly diminishing in size, fighting to stay lit. There was no wind to blow them out.

The strengi-saat is doing it, Fallion realized, sucking away light, the way that it had in the forest.