“I came to admire your territory and your trees,” Wick said, going for compliments first. Better to get on the Crowned Head's good side before asking for a favor he wasn't owed.
The Crowned Head, still tilted forward, nodded his approval without smiling. “The trees grew well this year. Better even than the year before.”
The only thing in their territory that the manghar prided in as much as their gemstones were their great evergreens. Since the manghar were located between the mountain range on the border of human territory and the mountain range that made up most of centaur territory, the manghar had many strong forests. All the runoff from the mountains made for good tree soil. And since it was one of the colder territories, what grew the most were evergreens and firs.
“They're beautiful.” Wick saw Archer adjust his pose out of the corner of his eye and willed him not to say anything either of them would regret. Or anything at all. That would be much better.
The Crowned Head smiled this time. But it wasn't a warm smile. It was a cold and alert smile, like a cobra in a corner waiting to strike at the snake charmer. “But what do you want?”
Wick raised his head a little higher, taking a more defensive stance. As a diplomat, his defensive stance did not look like most. It didn't look ready to run or ready to strike. Just stronger, looser, more confident. Confident of success. Confident that requests would be granted.
Or at least that's what Wick hoped the stance was.
“To ask for a favor.”
He felt like he was facing down the Crowned Head. The way the bat king sat, his pointed ears alert, flame-colored eyes not moving from Wick's face, posture just tense enough to almost look natural, suggested that he saw the conversation the same way.
“But let me explain first,” Wick said, knowing that if he asked the favor first, he would not get to explain himself afterward. Not before being thrown into the dungeon, out of the manghar kingdom, or downward with a noose around his neck. “My companion has reason to believe that the Scorch is coming back to Aro.”
The Crowned Head rested a fist under his chin, his eyes still bright and fastened on Wick. “It isn't.” He paused. “But tell me why he thinks so.”
Wick saw Archer's eyes tighten in satisfaction, but Wick knew the Crowned Head better. He was asking for Wick to tell him everything not because he was afraid that the Scorch really was coming back, but because he thought Wick's talking was amusing.
This was Wick's least favorite thing about visiting the manghar kingdom. He didn't like being amusing when he was trying to discuss something serious. He didn't like being amusing at all.
But somehow or another, he had to explain to someone what was going on, so he told the Crowned Head all the same. He described what Archer had seen happening with the birds leaving and the dark rain. He convinced Archer to give him the unfillable bag and showed the Crowned Head the symbol on the inside of the top flap, telling him how the bag had suddenly ceased to be unfillable. He told the Crowned Head everything he could and as persuasively as he could. And then he got to the difficult part.
“And it's because of all this that we had to come to you to ask for–”
“You came to ask if you might take our piece of the Heather Stone.” The Crowned Head blinked once, lazily, and then leaned back in his chair. The piece of the Heather Stone glinted above the tips of his ears. Slowly, thoughtfully, he stretched his great wings out to the sides. The orange membrane in between the bones looked almost sheer in the light of the sun pouring in through the windows of the throne room.
Wick knew the Crowned Head was not just stretching cramped muscles. With his wings extended, he looked bigger, stronger, more terrifying.
It was a show of power.
Drawing his wings back in, the Crowned Head asked, “How many pieces of the stone do you already have?”
Wick was already in too deep to be uncomfortable with the information he was about to give. “Five.”
“More than half the stones in all of Aro combined.” The leader of the manghar continued without hesitation. “Let me just ask you one more thing: do you really believe any of this foolishness about the Scorch returning?”
Wick's heart skipped a beat. “Excuse me?”
The Crowned Head's gaze did nothing but intensify. “Truly, I never thought your people were very intelligent, but I never thought you could be this stupid. Do you think any of what he has said is true?”
Archer chose this moment to turn an expectant look in Wick's direction.
The sunshine suddenly felt too hot. The walls of the manghar throne room were too close.
He tried to collect his wits. “I believe that if it is a genuine concern, that we should be ready.”
Archer sighed.
“So you don't think it's true,” said the Crowned Head.
Wick tried to find his words. “Well, I– Well, I'm sure–“
The Crowned Head slammed his fist down onto the arm of his throne, and the crash hit Wick like an unexpected splash of cold water to the face. “Do you think I don't know who your companion is?” the manghar king shouted. “He's banned from crossing our borders! And do you know for what? Thievery! Vandalism! Unashamed, lawless impropriety! He has broken every sacred rule that the manghar ever laid down for outsiders who enter as guests! He is beyond ill repute! He is an abomination to even have wings. And while he is with you, do you think for a moment that I believe you obtained any piece of the Heather Stone through good means? No.”
Wick could almost physically see everything spiraling out of his control, like it was all caught in a spinning whirlpool. And he would be pulled in too if he didn't do something right now. “Give me a chance to explain,” he began in a voice forced into an even cadence.
“Your chance has expired.”
The guards lunged toward them.
Wick could almost see Eland's warning manifesting in front of his eyes.
Wick was not entirely unprepared for an attack, but as the guards threw themselves at Wick and Archer, weapons out, arms reaching, wings snapped open, it was obvious that Archer was more than prepared.
Wick fell back, trying to jump out of the way of the spears and claws. But Archer didn't go back. He leaped forward, head-on and unarmed, toward the manghar guards.
Just as he and the nearest guard were about to collide, he pushed off the manghar's spear pole with both hands, using the momentum to leap up over manghar's head. His feathered wings shot out for balance for the briefest moment before he lighted down on the other side. Before anyone had a chance to turn around or even to react, Archer was running. He tore doggedly toward the throne, where the Crowned Head sat without weapons or guards. The Crowned Head leaped up to meet Archer. His claws shot out to defend himself. But Archer was airborne. He took another great flying leap up over the grabbing claws of the manghar king and dunked the opening of the unfillable bag down over the top of the throne.
In less than the time it took Wick to get cornered, Archer had successfully stolen the entire manghar throne. And then, instead of making any move to rescue Wick, Archer leaped out of a window.
The Crowned Head raced to the window and leaned out. “He's gone!” he screamed in outrage. He spun to face the guards. “It only takes one of you to put the tree messenger in prison where he belongs. The rest of you, get all the palace sentinels and find the seraph boy before he gets to the border!”
A manghar guard grabbed Wick by both arms and shoved him out of the throne room and down the hallway. Wick's stomach twisted. Everything he had tried to avoid had all happened at once. Everything had fallen apart, just as he should have known it would. He would be thrown into a dungeon and inevitably executed for everything he had done and everything he hadn't stopped Archer from doing.
He lowered his head.
Pale sunlight hit his face as he and the guard passed a window, and something came flying in through the window and slammed into the side of the guard's face.
> The guard tumbled against the wall, bringing Wick with him, and they slammed to the floor. The guard's grip loosened, and Wick pulled free, shuffling away from the bat man as fast as he could. Archer was the only one still standing. He hopped up and down on one foot, clutching the heel of the other foot, the one that had slammed into the manghar's face. Muttering under his breath, Archer lowered his foot long enough to kick the manghar's motionless body and beckoned quickly to Wick.
“Come on! Let's get out of here!”
Wick picked himself up, checked to make sure he still had his messenger's bag, and the two of them took off down the hallway.
“Why did you leave me to get arrested?” Wick demanded as they ran. “I wasn't even the one that stole the entire throne.”
“I created a distraction!” Archer exclaimed, sounding almost offended. “Now they're out there somewhere looking for me, and we have no one chasing us. Anyway, I came back for you, didn't I?”
He had come back.
The pair of them came skidding to a halt as they came to the stairs. Or rather, where stair should have been. The throne room level of the manghar palace ended in a terrifying plunge down the twenty feet to the level below.
“This is why I think the Door in the Wall would be handy,” Archer said, gesturing to the drop.
“You said it was lost, so it doesn't matter,” Wick snapped.
Fortunately, the manghar couldn't build without involving columns. With some difficulty, they grabbed onto the columns below the throne room level and slid down to the second floor. Wick remembered something. “You probably just came back for the Oak Leaf.”
“You say that like I wouldn't come back for just you,” Archer said. They started racing down a long stone gallery. The sound of flapping wings surrounded them, in the walls, outside the palace, down other hallways. Any second now someone was going to spot them. They had to move fast if they were going to get out of the palace without being captured.
“Granted,” Archer continued, “catching that guard when he least expected it would also have been the time when your stupid Oak Leaf was under the least amount of security if I did just want to steal it. But I would have come back for you if you didn't have it.”
It was difficult to tell how to get down to the next level of the palace. From where they stood, they could see the huge round room ahead of them, from which, looking up, one could see every level of the manghar palace. But at least ten dark hallways branched out from the gallery, and none of them looked like an obvious way down to the ground level.
Archer spun around and picked a hallway at random. “That way! I think I see a window down there. Maybe there'll be something we can jump to outside the window.”
The flapping of wings grew louder by the second, and Wick tried to block the sound out of his mind as he and Archer raced down the random hallway.
It seemed Archer's eyes were better than Wick's, or at any rate, he had guessed correctly, because sure enough, a huge glass window appeared at the end of the hallway. Wick and Archer skidded to a stop next to it and Archer jumped up onto the sill to figure out how it opened. The sound of wingbeats became suddenly more defined.
They had been found.
“Got it!” Archer jumped down from the sill and pushed the window outward. Both of them leaned out to look.
The drop was significant. The sill of the window was at least two body lengths from the ground, and even then, there were bushes at the bottom. Outside the window, just too far to jump to, were the branches of an evergreen tree. And a glance over his shoulder at the shadows swarming in the gallery they had come from was enough to tell Wick that they couldn't possibly go back. Their options seemed to be few.
Wick looked back out the window as Archer leaned back in. “How far do you think you could fall without breaking your legs?”
“Not that far.” Archer ran a hand down his face, looking genuinely flustered for the first time since Wick had met him.
Wick stared at the ground, speculating. “I think I could survive the fall. Probably walk away from it, too.”
“Maybe you could, twig, but I couldn't.” Archer stepped back from the window and started pacing back and forth, across the window and back again. “I couldn't make it without breaking my legs or worse.”
“How about the trees? Could you jump to the trees?” Wick asked.
Archer didn't even pause. “It's too far. I'd never make it.”
“Then use your wings,” Wick said.
Archer finally stopped pacing long enough to flare out his mangled wing and give Wick a hard look. “Is this funny to you? Does this look like something I could use to you?”
Wick gestured back the way they had come. “You used them in the throne room! I saw! That was one step short of flying.”
“That was jumping,” Archer said.
“But it was almost flying! You could make it from here to the tree!”
“I couldn't.” Archer held out a hand flat in a 'that's that' gesture. “The distance I jumped in the throne room was much smaller and more manageable. I do things like that all the time. I'm used to it. This is from a window into a tree. The branch could break the second I grab it.”
“Like I said, use your wings,” Wick repeated. “I know how wings work. Use them to catch the air. They don't have to be perfect to do that.”
“I know that,” Archer said shortly. “But I still couldn't make it. I've never practiced. I don't even know if I could make it that far.”
A shout came from the atrium, and something huge and black came flying down the long hallway.
They were out of time. And Archer had gone back to pacing.
“I don't see what the problem is!” Wick cried. “It's either we escape or we don't! Either you fly or you don't! I don't know why you're hesitating!”
“Because I told you I can't make it that far!” Archer shouted.
“But you could fly before!” Wick shouted back. “It's just different now. You could still do it if you wanted–”
“I could never fly!” Archer spun around, his face inches from Wick's. The fire was back behind his eyes, burning brighter now than Wick had ever seen it before.
Wick searched Archer's face, looking for the joke, for the lie born out of cowardice, for something that would tell him that Archer wasn't serious. He didn't find it. He opened his mouth to say something back.
But he had forgotten to keep an eye on the hallway.
Something slammed into them from behind. Both they and the attacker fell toward the open window. Archer managed to catch himself against the window frame, but Wick went straight through the opening. His hands grabbed at empty air, grabbing for anything that could prevent him from falling. He caught the strap of Archer's bag, but Archer wasn't holding on, and Wick's weight just ripped the bag off Archer's shoulder.
Wick tumbled out the window, flailing. He fell headfirst toward the ground.
Chapter eleven
Not a Twig
Wick was drowning.
He didn't know how, but he was drowning.
How was he drowning? There hadn't been any streams or ponds or anything of the sort below the window. There hadn't been any water in sight. What was happening? In his desperation, he couldn't think.
At last, his head broke the surface, and Wick flailed at the water in confusion for a moment before he realized something else was wrong.
It was dark. Dark as midnight without the moon. He couldn't find any light at all.
Wick kept thrashing, trying to keep his head above water. He couldn't feel the bottom. He couldn't see the shore. He couldn't feel a current and yet he smelled river water.
This didn't make any sense. There had to be a current of some kind, didn't there? He could barely feel waves.
Something moved in the water next to him, and Wick jolted. He beat at the water, kicking harder to get away from whatever behemoth was with him in the water.
A good-natured
whinny came from the behemoth, and then the sound of hooves hitting something solid. A horse?
And suddenly everything fell into place.
“Sasha?” Wick spluttered in confusion.
The horse whinnied again, confirming all of Wick's worst suspicions.
Archer kept Sasha in the bag. Archer kept a river in the bag.
Wick had fallen in the unfillable bag.
But could he get out? Sasha had climbed up on something to get out of the water. Wick felt for it. After groping a moment, his fingers met a wet, rough surface: a boulder, jutting half out of the water. So that was how Sasha had survived in the water this long.
Wick clung to the rock with one hand. With the other hand, he reached up into the darkness above his head. Only a foot or so up, his hand hit something thick and firm that gave under his hand. Hoping it was the flap of the bag, he pushed. The leather ceiling moved just enough to let in a small beam of light that bounced across the water. In the flash of light, Wick saw a honey blonde horse peering down at him from the boulder.
“We'll have to get you out of here soon and dry you off,” he told Sasha, and, grabbing onto the edge of the bag's opening, pulled himself out.
He almost didn't make it out. The opening was much smaller than he thought, almost too small for him to squeeze through. He nearly got stuck. But eventually, he got high enough to balance on straight arms, and it was easy to pull his legs out of the opening.
He fell onto the sharp branches of a cluster of bushes. It took him a moment to get his bearings. Looking up, Wick realized he was under the same window he had fallen out of. He glanced back at the bag, and everything fell into place. The bag must have been under him as he fell. Since it had become nearly invisible once it landed in the bushes, he had made it out of the manghar palace without being found.
Archer hadn't been so lucky. Wick tried to form a plan, but he was cold, wet, confused, and starving for sunlight. The sun was starting to go down. Wick had no doubt that the manghar had captured Archer to execute him for everything he had done in their kingdom. In the morning, Archer would be hung.
Robbing Centaurs and Other Bad Ideas Page 12