Pree K?
Pree K vanished briefly before reappearing over the last curve of horizon. As if the wind itself were propelling him, the young man approached at an unnatural rate of speed, his movement phantasmagorical, animalistic.
He arrived at Wing’s feet as if thrown down by a great, merciless hand.
Wing dropped to a knee and placed a hand upon Pree K’s heaving back. “Pree K, what’s wrong? What are you doing way out here?”
Pree K’s wispy body panted for air. It took him a couple of breaths before he could raise his head. When he did another flash of lightning lit the features of his face — they were pale as river-washed stone.
“What is it?” Wing asked again.
“My father, he…he needs…to see you.”
Thunder clapped off Llow Peak.
“What’s going on? Are you all right? Is Lant?” Wing returned to his feet, pulling Pree K up with him.
“The Ka’ull,” Pree K muttered. There was no strength in his legs, and he leaned against Wing’s chest as if it were a wall. “They have taken Castle Viyer.”
Wing thought he’d lost Pree K’s words in the wind. Taking him by the shoulders, Wing stood him back. “What?”
“A few hours ago. Ka’ull. They stormed the castle.”
Thunder rumbled through a nearby canyon and a silver-blue surge of snow-lighting struck home against the wooded mountainside. A section of the Mesko canopy exploded in a shower of blood-red flames that cast a resounding echo into the depths of the valley below where Wing and Pree K stood. Wing flinched, as did Pree K, both of them glancing reflexively toward the great mountain and the brilliant red flames now licking up at the darkening sky. No sooner had the lightning’s echo faded than they heard the distant cry of a shy’teh.
Wing felt Pree K’s eyes rise slowly to look at him.
“Where’s my family?” Wing said. “Is Nien with Lant? Did they get everyone out?” His voice was tight, strained, and he could see on Pree K’s face that his attention had the effect of penetrating shards of ice.
Pree K had begun to shake. “Nien’s dead, Wing. Everyone’s...dead.”
Wing felt the blood drain from his face, feeling left, his breath caught in his chest, and his stomach gave over…
He coughed convulsively and vomited into the snow and mud at his feet.
“The Ka’ull, they took the castle in the middle of the night. They, they slaughtered everyone...” Pree K’s voice broke.
Wing wiped his mouth, straightened, and staggered backward, stumbling over a row of snow and dark soil.
“Our people,” he muttered. “The castle!” The cry launched from his gut. “My family!”
Wing started to move — Pree K rushed around and stood in his way.
“You must go to my father,” Pree K said. Wing continued to move; Pree K struggled to press him back. “Please.”
Wing gulped like he was drowning. “My, my...The castle. I’ve got to go, I’ve got to…”
The next thing Wing knew was the sharp cold snap of Pree K’s hand against his face. “No!” Pree K howled at him. “Listen to me! You need to go to my father — now!”
Wing’s eyes focused. His mouth moved, but no words came out. A breath later he tried again, saying only: “The filly. Nien left her for me. That’d be faster. Faster. But she’s back in the barn.”
“Then go get her,” Pree K said. “Run.”
Wing ran.
He broke into the barn, the wind curling round his heels. He flung open the stall door; the filly was already dancing in the stall, nervous on her feet. Wing threw on the blanket, bridle, and saddle. The filly was already running by the time they hit the barn doors.
Past the edge of the house and into the stretch of wind-ripped fields, the silver filly fled.
Body pressed low over the filly’s back, Wing had already forgotten Pree K’s admonition to go to Lant. In the tangle of his mind only one thought reigned: Castle Viyer. Though galloping at such a pace through the difficult chop of the open fields, neither seemed inclined to slow.
The sun had finally peaked over the Ti Range but the sky had grown dark once more with the intensity of the storm. Pushing at his back, the roiling black clouds blotted out the sun making it distant, ineffectual — as if day had come but Rieeve had not been informed of it.
If Wing stopped over the long distance to the castle, he did not remember. The storm had caught up with him and the racing filly, rushing around them and ahead, encircling the Village before them.
Wing could see neither the village, the castle, nor the mountains behind it as the clouds and wind unleashed at last, engulfing he and the filly in a wicked rush of sleet.
Knowing he must be close to Castle Viyer though he could not see it, Wing and the filly pressed on. The snow hit his face and melted instantly, the flakes sharp and wet. For an instant, a window opened in the torrent. Wing caught sight of Castle Viyer before the storm closed over it again in a hail of grey and black. He was close.
I’m coming, he said to his family. Almost there…
The next instant he was repelled by something so impenetrable that it was as if he’d been roped from behind and drawn up short enough to be pulled off the filly’s back.
The filly reared and Wing just held on as she landed back on her front feet, snorting at the air. Grasping at the reins, and sliding his butt forward again into the saddle, Wing searched the mottled light for the thing that could have so completely blocked his path and yet be entirely invisible to his rain-swept eyes.
“Wing,” said a voice, “I ask you: Turn aside.”
It was a man’s voice, and even though Wing heard it with his ears, it seemed to enter him deep in his chest.
Whipping his head this way and that, Wing hunted the heavy grey sheets of sleet for the source of the voice.
He did not search long.
Through the storm’s dark crystalline curtain, Wing saw a man — one that seemed to stand in a space between worlds.
The wind howled terribly around them, pulling at the filly’s mane, Wing’s hair and ice-covered coat, yet the man who stood before him was completely unaffected, his dusky cloak untouched by the frozen rain, unmoved by the wind. He had long black hair and brown skin and though Wing had never seen him before, recognized him perfectly. He was Lyrik, his mother’s ancestor, the one back to whom Wing himself owed his peculiar physical attributes.
“No,” Wing muttered, “my family” — he paused — “our family. I must — ”
Lyrik lifted his hand ever so gently; still Wing shrank back as a vision burst into his mind of enormous pits sated with exanimate bodies. The sight tore through his guts. He gasped and grabbed his head.
“Go to the castle and you will die,” Lyrik said.
Cowed, Wing still managed to raise his eyes just enough to stare back at the specter with loathing and rage.
“It is not yet time, Wing. Go to Lant; he has something for you.” Lyrik’s eyes were clear but carried a fire’s flame.
Wing wanted to cry out at the man but the emotion was faint and his body was faint. He could barely think, barely feel. In place of the vision Lyrik had put into his mind had swelled an all-consuming sense of loss.
Lyrik spoke once more: “You will not be alone.” He then dissolved into the sweep of rain from whence he’d come.
Dumbly, Wing raised the reins and turned the filly away from the castle and toward the opposite end of the Village and the Cantfield hut.
At the other side of the Village was a small break in the storm and Wing swung down off the soaked filly. Unsteady on his feet, Wing moved to the hut and ducked inside. Swiping his frozen hair from his face, Wing looked into the dark of the hut and found Lant. The Commander was leaning over an old map, his head in his hands. It took a moment for him to realize Wing was there.
After all his revolutions of travels, trials, and training of Cant members, only the blazing white streaks in Lant’s thick head of hair had revealed his age — until now.
Now, Wing saw something in the Commander’s eyes he’d never seen before, something plain that had once been only shadow.
For what seemed an eternity the two gazed at each other.
“Wing, we...” Lant tried to say, but his words were slurred as if said over a very thick tongue. “We haven’t got much time.”
Wing stepped to him — the Commander was obviously in great pain. “Tell me.”
“Everyone was asleep — most were quite drunk. The Cant fought hard, but it was futile. The Ka’ull have secured the castle. They’ll now be looking for survivors; it will not take them long. You must get my son and go.” With agonizing effort, Lant began to organize the parchment maps and Mesko paper writings upon his desk. “Take these plans with you.”
“No! We have to find anyone who’s still alive before the Ka’ull do!”
“There is not time, Wing.”
“Yes, there is, I...”
“No!”
Wing could see that Lant’s shout pulled at the life in him.
“Pree K and Jhock will be at my home,” the Commander said, clutching for air like a fist on the rope of a fleeing stallion. “Go get them, and get out.”
Wing shook his head. “No, no, there has to be others…”
“If there are, the Ka’ull will find them before you do.” Lant’s voice was stripped of emotion — it was a statement of fact.
Wing went to protest again, but Lant lunged across his desk and this time his hands found not air, but Wing’s soaked coat. “You have never answered one of my calls to you. You will answer this one! Get Pree K and go while you still can.”
Wing shook. The rage in Lant’s voice slapped him as no hand could have.
Lant released him and fell back into his chair. “Take these with you.” He pushed two rolls of parchment and one of Mesko paper across the desk at Wing. “Take them to Master Monteray in Legran.”
Wing gathered up the rolls and stuffed them into his coat.
Numbed, dumb like an ill-treated beast, he stepped out of the hut into the darkness. The filly was nowhere to be seen. Wing began to run. He hadn’t gone far before a brilliant flash of light lanced across his vision. It lit up the tree line at the edge of the Village and it took Wing a beat to realize it had not been lightning. He spun about. With amorous, reaching arms, he saw fire consuming one of the Village cottages. The fire climbed up into the sky like a great wall of light, beautiful and ghostly.
No thought preceded Wing’s next action — he simply took off at a dead run back toward the Village.
Ice and wind licked at Wing’s face as he moved, the uneven ground grasping with thirsty fingers at his booted feet. Only about one and a half furlongs lay between Lant’s hut and the first row of homes in the Village. Wing stopped at the first house in that row to catch his breath and saw another home catch fire, and then another and another and another in freakish order, up a row, down a row until the first, second, and third rows of homes were ablaze.
But the snow and freezing rain was preventing the spread of fire from home to home.
In an eerie moment of comprehension, Wing realized that they were having to be lit from within.
In a crouch, he started off again, running along the outside of the first row of burning homes. The heat seared Wing on his left even as sleet pelted him from the right — flame and rain racing to battle across his skin. The sensation spun his mind and purged strength from his limbs.
Pained for breath, he was forced to stop again.
Leaning a moment, hands on his knees, he raised his shuddering head in the direction of the fires. The newest blazes were traveling back up the fifth row of homes toward the castle. Turning his face into the storm, he took another deep breath and started running again — perhaps he could intercept the arson at the top of the street.
He had made it across the Village and was closing in when he heard a rumble from the castle. Nearly losing his balance in the slick, frozen mud leading up to the castle, Wing slid to a stop and cast his eyes up toward the great dark image that was Viyer. From its front gates poured a shadowy flood.
Ka’ull.
Though he could see them, he could not hear them. A weird silence ballooned out, pushing into the foul weather before them. A snap of splitting wood cut the air. Wing jerked instinctively in the direction of the sound, glancing back only a second later to find the distance between the Ka’ull and himself closing fast.
Shaking himself, Wing turned back again — he still had a chance to catch the incendiary villain before the last few homes could be lit.
Running low, he rounded the back of the outermost row of homes, the heat from the flames evaporating the sleet from his hair and clothing in mere heartbeats. Only two homes remained that were not yet burning. Head throbbing from the heat, Wing moved away from the conflagration. The storm folded around him once more, instantly coating his hair and shoulders with ice, as he glanced back to find that the Ka’ull were racing in the same direction as he — and they were gaining.
Had they seen me? Wing wondered, but he stumbled in the mud mid-thought and fell. The flames from the closest home whipped over his head; the frozen rain in his hair kept his body from catching fire. Panic touched off inside him and he looked back again.
Black-lined, the enemy’s deep grey cloaks swirled around them like sheets of rain as they continued to flow toward him.
Wing clamored back to his feet. Another home exploded. Now there was only one house left in the main body of the Village that was not burning — the Vanc home.
Wing fought his way another few lengths but too late. Through the roof of the Vanc home spat a ball of fire.
Staggering to a stop, Wing searched wildly in every direction in hopes of seeing the saboteur; his search was hopeless. Not even the light from the flames could catch a shadow in the ensuing darkness of the trees.
Wing’s breath sounded in his ears like the pounding hoofs of a thousand horses. All about him the fires raged. The din of splitting wood and roiling flame screamed like thunder against the stormy sky.
Behind him the host of grey-black shadows were coming to a halt as well.
Senses overwhelmed by the roar of burning wood and searing heat, Wing did not hear nor see one of the shadows until it had emerged upon him.
Standing between the Vanc home and its burning neighbor, Wing leveled his gaze at the fleshy shadow. He could not see its face nor its eyes, but he could feel them.
Ka’ull.
Incredibly, Wing felt no terror, the heat and sleet, the burnt village, had stripped him of it. Ice water coursed through his veins as an unfamiliar emotion filled his chest and tightened his throat: hatred.
Gazing steadily into the void inside the blackened hood, Wing felt himself moving forward, knowing for the first time a rage that could kill…
But as he started forward a large chunk of wood, wrested in flame, fell away from the roof of the Vanc home to his right and plummeted through the space between him and the Ka’ull.
Wing jerked his shoulders aside and the burning timber fell just past him. The timber hit, sizzling as it rolled across the sleet-swept ground, and Wing drew himself around again; the Ka’ull was gone.
For a breath, Wing stood perfectly still. It felt as if he were standing in the middle of a flame and rain-soaked dream when he heard: “Get away.” Wing blinked in dismay as the ghostly voice Wing recognized as belonging to Ancestor Lyrik said again, “Get away!”
Wing obeyed.
Turning, he sprinted for the black embrace of the tree line. His boots crunched on the frozen ground as he ran. He dove inside the covering dark of the trees and took a beat to see if he were being followed. From within the tree line, he peered. He could neither see nor hear anyone or anything except for the howl of fire and smoke consuming the Village. The Vanc home was cracking and crumbling in a royal bedlam — the last home his father had built, the roof from which he’d almost fallen to his death, the day he’d come so close to being relieve
d of obligation, expectation.
Away from the snarl of heat and flame, wind and frozen rain, Wing’s mind began to clear. As the Vanc home collapsed at last, he wrenched his thoughts back to what, now, needed to be done. He would pass by the Commander’s home one more time. If Pree K had made it back, he would most likely be there. And if he was not there he may have returned to the hut and could be with the Commander even now.
Slipping inside the forest’s deep, protective border, Wing dodged to the left and ran. Even in the tangle of trees, snow, and undergrowth Wing managed to move swiftly and, glancing to his left, saw that he had already passed the last corner of the Village and was nearing Lant’s home on the outer edge.
Easing his stride, Wing jogged back to the edge of the valley and finally stopped. His racing heart stung, burning a hole in his chest. Through the trees he could see Lant’s fine home.
It was on fire. Wing gasped. Without thinking, he darted out of the trees, running pell mell for the house as if he could save it. But as he neared the flames became overpowering. Wing slid to a stop. Gazing up helplessly at the inferno, his shoulders sank. There was nothing he could do. Nothing. It felt as if the sleet and flames were stripping golden threads of life from his soul.
Into the distance, he squinted and found the dark shadow of Lant’s hut. Though Lant had told him to go, Wing could not comprehend leaving him; all he could think was: How am I going to be able to tell the Commander I couldn’t find Pree K? How can I tell him the Village is burned?
Checking the area, Wing started off toward the hut, covering the distance quickly and ducking inside. The Commander was there, his head resting on the table against his arm. A small candle still burned at one corner of the desk.
“Lant?” Wing whispered.
Lant did not reply.
“Lant?” Wing reached out and gently shook Lant’s shoulder. The Commander’s head lobbed sideways and his hand fell limp from the table. Wing lurched back and fell over a chair.
On the floor where he’d fallen the image of Lant’s face, so cold, so wholly devoid of light and life, unraveled what was left of Wing’s mind.
Wing & Nien Page 37