Sarah Driver - Storm

The old man snorts rudely. Heat creeps up my neck to sting my cheeks. I remember the Wilder-King’s letter. Surrender any chatterers dwelling amongst you. ‘If it wasn’t for me you’d have landed unawares!’ I spit, hurling the old man’s gift of shame back to him.

Coati’s face darkens. But then the draggles begin to scream, borrowing the words of the terrodyl. Life-stink! Lung-stink! Troubletroubletroubleflee!

The chatter is like a punch in the brain. Before I can breathe it smacks into me again.

U h h h h h m u r k w o r l d r e a c h r e a c h S T R E T C H s e i z e c a t c h s l i t h e r g u l p b o n e s s m a s h s m a s h d e p t h s c r aw l i n g c r e e p i n g d a r k d a r k p u s h d a r k a b o v e d a r k b e l o w r e a c h r e a c h STRETCH grabuhhhhhhhh . . .

‘Mouse?’ The Protector’s voice breaks through the chaos as she guides her draggle towards mine and touches my shoulder. As I return from the beast-world I taste blood and realise I’ve clamped my teeth onto my tongue. I gulp a breath, glancing at the faces of the Spearwarriors.

They’re gifting me a look of fear. They’re frighted of what I am .

We’ve drifted closer to the Stone Circle.

While I’m grappling to stay mounted and catch my breath, a sight emerges below that almost makes me plummet to my doom.

Lying across the standing stones is a dead terrodyl.

When the tips of the stones pierce the drifting fog, some are bloodied. Others are dripping with black rain.

A ragged figure darts out from beneath the dead beast’s wing, wielding a longbow. An arrow pierces the fog.

‘Go!’ shrieks Leopard.

As we’re wheeling our draggles around to flee, the sight of the blood-splashed Sea gateway stone clangs into my brain and the chatter of the draggles rises to a storm inside my chest.

The world blinks and melts into a frenzy.

Deathridesclosedrowningredsoakedgetawaypointawaygogogofly strongwingfightridersgogogoBOLTgogogoDODGEgogogoRUN gogogoNO!

Dizziness swarms my head. Faces slip in and out of focus.

Noise. Swelled. Everything. Everywhere. Sick bursts up my throat and blurts from my lips. My foot slips from the stirrup.

‘Tooth-and-bone storms!’ yelps Lunda, pointing.

Great cyclones sweep from gaps in the ice out to sea, packed with shark and whale teeth that tear bites from whatever they touch.

Chatter. Stealing breath. Stealingthoughtsthoughtsthoughts.

Stealingbreathbodymindgrowingcuttingsqueezingweare panickingflutteringbreathingironbloodstinkdeathlurksheregreed squatsherenosafetynohome—

I push away the chatter but it presses close again, suffocating like lungfuls of damp fur.

GETAWAY—

Lash of whips—

‘Is she breathing ?’

Falling backwards ice nipping ears blood in nostrils chatter in head.

Everything hurts.

‘Who are you?’ bellows a deep voice from the ground. ‘Are you Sky-Tribe?’

The world fades in and out.

‘Show yourselves!’ booms Leo.

Black emptiness swarms close.

‘We need help!’ The voice snips at my memory. My draggle stays close to the others, her muscles squirming with horror and wanting to get back to her cave. We drop lower in the sky, towards the ground.

Chatter squiggles in my blood, setting it alight.

FrightfrightfrightSPARKrawbloodbeatboomboomBOOM!

A tall man garbed in salt-stained boiled leather steps out from behind a blood-splattered standing stone. His face is swamped in a wild tangle of icicled beard.

Then I’m flung into a dream-world of beasts. Getawaygetawaygetawayspeartipshadowspressingbreathstopping helphelphelpwrongnessnomoonnosunclamouringbuzzingrunning runningnowheretorun. Nowheretohide.

I’m flying so fast, so far. I’m diving into the shallows, spearing a fish on my claws. Heavy wingbeats slice the air, carrying me so fast the wind slips past me like water.

Paws and hooves drum the snowy plains. Starlight writhes under us, locked in ancient graves. Bellies sore, bloated-not-with-cubs. Wind-spirits lick our fur. We move. We fight! We hunt. We roar! We face dark burrows, endless night. But we shudder secretly, blood roiling. Our bones click with ice. Life starves, withers. Storms boil.

A shiver brushes my belly as my fur drags in the snow but then a brown-and-white blur streaks into my room and I’m waking up, straining against iron-heavy dreams that drag at the edges of my brain.

My eyes crack open. I’m in my featherbed in my chamber at Hackles, sweating buckets. The room thumps into being around me, full of fuzzy outlines in the half-dark. In the hearth, a fire devours kindling in a spit-crackle frenzy.

Thaw-Wielder soars across the chamber to the messy nest of twigs she’s built atop one of my bedposts. My sea-hawk’s been thieving kindling from all the hearths in the stronghold to build it, much to the vexation of the cooks. I hear the thud as she drops a fish onto the twigs, and the scratching as it thrashes. Fillpipesfillboots , she chatters, jostling her feathers. She squints down at me, stirring a love-pang in the pit of my belly.

A bright droplet of blood falls from her wing onto my pillow. Reckon she must’ve got scraped flying through the arrow-slit again, cos at just the same moment the skin on my arm burnt and the muscles throbbed. Sometimes when she hurts herself, it’s as though I feel it with her.

Thaw gurgles at me, low in her throat, and then the beast-world presses closer to me again, its rich stink clogging my mouth and nose. My skull thuds. I know the hunt Thaw flew. I can taste the fish she speared. I can feel the ice carried by the wind, wrapping around my claws.

A wave of sickness rolls over me. I blink filmy eyes and suddenly I’m looking down into the nest and my own huge talons, one of my claws still hooked through the flesh of the dying fish. I gasp, shaking my head, grabbing fistfuls of bedding. What’s happening to me? For a beat, I’d swear I was peering through my hawk’s eyes. It feels like something inside me is tearing.

There’s a movement to my left. I roll blearily towards it. Da sits in a chair by my bed, rubbing his jaw. The stubby hairs make a scratching sound.

‘Da,’ I croak stupidly. My skull pounds, and a foul, rusty taste clogs my mouth.

I can only see one side of his face, lit by the pale glow of a moon-lamp he’s wedged onto a table next to him. He’s garbed in a midnight-blue tunic with pearls for buttons and a shaggy black goatskin cloak. His yellow hair is bundled into a messy knot on his head. Behind a tangle of reddish beard, his face is the pale grey of a skimming stone.

‘ Bloodshed! ’ I blurt, lifting my head from the pillow. The room spins wildly. ‘At the Stone Circle!’

‘Peace, Mouse,’ says Da softly.

I stare at him through great matted clumps of black hair. He’s full-vexed at me, so I make ready to charm my way off trouble’s hook. ‘You know the sea is calling me but still you come in here dressed like her, in blue and pearls and gold like the sun on the waves, eh?’

He stares at me evenly. ‘A hailstorm broke the skulls of three draggles and two riders. Leo—’

‘She’s alright, ent she? Is she?’

‘Let me finish. Leo told us that the rest of the flock spooked, and badly. She managed to shoot a message into a ghostway and called some of the Wilderwitches to her aid. They used weather-magyk to help get the party home. But before they arrived, you passed out.’ He clears his throat and looks away.