36
Skye
Skye washed up on the sandy beach and rolled onto his back. The sun was bright overhead, and its warmth gradually returned feeling to his numb body. He dragged his tub of possessions farther up the beach and out of the surf. His pack hadn’t escaped getting wet, but pulling out his satchel, he was pleased to find that his journal at least had stayed dry. He decided to dry his clothes, and for that, he’d need a fire.
He went looking for driftwood, which he found easily enough, but nothing small enough to act as kindling. Kala makes this look so easy, he thought. He had no knife to make wood shavings and sat stymied. In his frustration, he picked up a piece of driftwood and swung it down hard on his abortive fire. The dry branch exploded into a million pieces. Ha! Kindling. He merrily smashed several more branches and then arranged the pieces from small to large in the manner that Kala had shown him. After trying for an eternity, he finally succeeded in using his flint to start a fire. Skye felt like dancing victoriously around his fire but contented himself with merely drying his clothes and possessions. It was a process that took the remainder of the day, but at least he slept in dry clothes that night curled beside the fire.
He woke stiff and starving. He cursed himself for not having brought food from the ship’s galley given that he utterly lacked the skills to find it in the wild. Besides, Kala had made it quite clear that much that grew in the wild was poisonous and he had no idea how to differentiate what was from what wasn’t. He didn’t how far away Bayre was and despaired of reaching it before he wasted away from hunger. He got up, dusted the sand off his clothes, and decided that he might as well at least try not to die.
He walked along the coast, but unfortunately, the beach didn’t last very long, and he began to have to scramble over rocks and wind his way through woods. It was slow going. He did manage to stumble across a tidal pool containing starfish that were trapped by the low tide. He collected a few and roasted them over a fire. They didn’t taste like much, but at least his stomach stopped rumbling.
He found himself walking through the ruins of an ancient city. Fallen buildings jutted upwards at unnatural angles that made the scene appear otherworldly. The ruins seemed to stretch on forever. He came across a dark amphitheater formed by the collapse of three tall buildings, and he considered sheltering there for the night but was overcome with a feeling of dread. Malevolent spirits haunted this place, and he’d be wise not to push his luck.
It took so long to get clear of the ruins that it was dark before he curled up in a hollow with no time to build a fire. He slept cold that night, though more chilled by his dreams of the ruins than from the night air.
He followed the coast for days, surviving on whatever he could scrounge from tidal pools. He eventually rounded a point and caught his first glimpse of the city of Bayre in the distance. It dwarfed all the settlements he’d ever seen. Its towers thrust skyward over a high wall that ringed the city. The city was majestic. If there’s a way home, he thought, I’ll find it here.
As he got closer to the looming city, he began to wander through wide swaths of agricultural fields, which he raided for an assortment of vegetables. He reveled in the feeling of strength returning to his body. He lay low in one of the fields and examined the city. It had a massive iron gate through which farmers exited the city to tend to the fields. Through the gate, he saw more people moving about than he’d ever seen before. Whoever had been stalking him on the sailing ship must certainly have arrived here before him, and if the man was patient, he could be watching for Skye to arrive at the city’s gate right now. It wasn’t safe to enter that way.
If the ship had offloaded the cargo it carried, there must be a sea gate, he thought. He walked closer until he could get a better look at the seaward side of the city. There was indeed a long jetty jutting out to sea, but it was empty of vessels, Skye’s ship having come and gone. The sea gate was firmly closed and offered no entry from that direction. He did, however, spy grated drainage tunnels. Perhaps there was a grate that was worn and provided a way in.
Skye clambered over the rocks from grate to grate, testing the strength of each. Each was immovable, and he’d begun to despair that he’d need a new idea when he stumbled across one with a single broken bar. The opening it created was small but sufficient, he reckoned. The drainage tunnel was dry at the moment, and Skye thanked the gods for his good luck. He pushed his pack through and wriggled in after it. The tunnel was large enough to stand in if he stooped, so he rose as best he could and resecured his pack. The tunnel grew dark quickly as he moved away from the grate, but he kept going by feel with ‘upwards’ and ‘onwards’ as his guiding principles.
The tunnel joined others, and he alternated between turning left and right so as not to find himself walking in a circle. He finally came across light filtering down from a grate set high above. A ladder was set in the wall that led up to it. The ladder was rusty, but he trusted it to hold his weight and climbed it to peek through the grate. It opened into a market in which hundreds of people were bustling about. Not the best place to crawl out of the ground, he thought. He descended and continued hunting for other options. After a few similar scenarios, he finally found a grate that opened into a deserted alley. He pushed upward on it, but it didn’t budge. He braced his feet on a rung of the ladder, hoping to the gods that it would hold, and put his back to the grate. He pushed against it with all his strength and was rewarded by the grate’s lifting enough that he could then slide it open.
He climbed out of the hole and move the grate back into place. He looked around at the foreign world he found himself in. He did his best to make himself look presentable and headed back to the market, where he stole some fruit and slipped it into his pack. He noticed a pair of armed monks watching him, so he moved quickly away and melted into the crowd.
He spent the night in an alley, wedged between two garbage bins. It smelled terrible, but at least he felt a modicum of safety. Come daylight, he explored the city, dodging armed guards and monks as best he could. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched, and he knew it went beyond mere paranoia. He came to find that he slept more soundly on the rooftops. He also felt more at home under the stars. He noticed that airships drifted into the city fairly regularly and landed in a large space that served as a landing port.
He spent the next day looking for a building near the airfield that would give him a view of the goings-on there. He was walking across an open area when two monks rounded a corner into the same plaza. They spotted him, looked at each other, and started moving toward him. He ducked into an alley and took off at a sprint. He weaved up and down streets in an attempt to lose them and finally hid in an alcove to catch his breath. Waiting, panting, he listened for the sound of being followed but didn’t hear any. He waited a while longer for good measure and then tried to find his way back to the airfield from a different direction.
He found a building that wasn’t immediately adjacent to the airfield but was tall enough to provide a view of it over top of the squatter warehouses that ringed it. It was late in the day by the time he found a way up to the roof, so he just ate some stolen bread as it grew darker, then slept.
The next day, he was able to scout the operations at the airfield. Airships would drift in and be secured by a crew of strong men. Sometime soon after, armed guards would inspect it. Occasionally, they would extract a bewildered youth and escort him or her to an official-looking building bordering the port. At some point, a work party would arrive and remove goods from the ship and take them to an adjacent warehouse. Then they would repack it with other stores from another warehouse. Guards would occasionally escort a dejected-looking youth out to a ship and walk back without them. Lastly, a crew that was slightly smaller than the one that wrestled the ship to the ground would return to it, release it, and it would float up and away. It was well-organized and they processed a steady stream of arriving and departing airships.
Skye watched for several days, c
ommitting to memory the movements of the various crews. The observation struck him that all the airships that carried away a youth floated south. All of the ships that floated east over the ocean didn’t contain anyone. He watched specifically for a break in the pattern, but it held constant. Perhaps he could sneak onboard a ship that would cross the ocean to its far coast and place him west of his home village. Before he attempted this, however, he needed to figure out why they didn’t carry passengers in that direction.
The next day, he set out to find the city’s library. Perhaps he’d find a book that would give him more insight into the airships. Walking toward what he thought was the main library, he quickly discovered his error. Monks had been lying in wait. When they spotted him, several of them poured out of the entrance. Skye bolted, but there were many of them. He raced down alleyways. Missile weapons struck the ground and walls around him.
He cut left into another alley and almost ran over a grate before recognizing it for what it was. He slid to a halt and his panic gave him the strength to lift it open. He quickly climbed in and slid it back into place just before he heard footsteps enter the alley. From his hiding spot below the grate, he saw several monks run past. When they didn’t spot him around the next corner, they’d surely return and find his hiding place, so he descended the ladder that supported him. He wandered the tunnels looking for another grate to exit from.
At dusk, he re-emerged into a quiet alley and climbed up to a random rooftop. He felt exposed and vulnerable and got little sleep that night. He rose at first light with the conviction that, first and foremost, he needed to be able to defend himself. He’d sort out the riddle of the airships later and hopefully leave the city onboard one of them. Other than the guards and monks, none of the citizens seemed to carry weapons, and in all of his explorations of the city, he’d never seen a market or shop from which he could steal one. The only thing he could think of was that sometimes villages would send weapons in airships, so perhaps he could find one at the airfield.
He snuck back there and found an opening under the fence that he could crawl through. The warehouses were his best bet, but there were always people going in and out of them. He didn’t fancy his chances of remaining uncaught if he entered one. There was, however, a window of time between when a ship would land and when it would be emptied of its contents. That was his best chance.
Two recent arrivals sat tethered to the ground. Skye timed the patrols of guards to sneak into the first one. It had already been emptied. Cursing his luck, he exited it and snuck up to the second one. He had to cover open ground to get to it and prayed he wouldn’t be seen. He ducked inside and found that it hadn’t been unloaded yet, but when he rifled through the goods on board, he couldn’t find anything that would serve as a weapon, just textiles and an assortment of preserves in jars. He gave up and left it. He’d just managed to duck behind a crate when guards entered it.
Looking around, he spied a new ship arriving and being hauled to the ground. He prayed that this one would contain weapons. He crept closer behind whatever cover he could find and waited until the men who secured it left. When they did, he hurriedly crept closer and looked around to see how much time he’d have before the guards arrived. “Please let there be a weapon in there for me,” he prayed.
“You have no idea,” Kala replied.
Read on for a preview of
Death’s Angel
Second book in
The Goddess’s Scythe Series
Prologue
Soren leaned forward. “I won’t insult you by offering you a chance to switch sides, but I have a proposition for you.” He paused to let this register. “I will negotiate the terms of your survival – if you can best my champion.”
Kala looked at her loved ones and made the decision that any chance of their surviving was worth more than her pride. “I accept.”
Soren looked pleased and turned to Trax. “Do you think you can handle this little girl?” he asked.
Trax was infuriated by the insult but had to accept the challenge, framed as it was. He swallowed his curses and turned to face Kala. “Let’s get this over with,” he said, drawing an enormous broadsword and swinging it around him to loosen his muscles. Kala, beyond exhaustion, simply watched him. He approached her slowly like a predator playing with its prey. Without warning, he swung, blindingly fast for a man his size, and she barely managed to dive to the ground to avoid being cleft in two. She looked up at him, uncertain whether she had the strength to rise.
“Get up and die with some dignity,” he spat.
Raven's Wings Page 31