by Fran Wilde
The clouds thickened and we began to whistle in order to stay together. “Retrieve,” for Aliati. “Defend” for me. Wik caught on and whistled four short notes. “Protect.” The clouds swelled and darkened ahead of us.
“Cloudburst,” shouted Aliati, breaking our small chevron formation. “We have to go up or down.”
“Down,” I said. The wind began to swirl. We dove as fast as we could, trying to get beneath the squall.
As we descended, rain and ice pelted us, sharp as spears. I could barely see Wik off my right wingtip. Weather rumbled around us, and white-hot light arced between thick clouds to our left.
“In there!” Aliati shouted and turned hard against the battering wind. Wik struggled for control and I, trying to make the turn in the turbulence of their wings, was blown up and nearly away. I tucked my wings tight, making as small a foil as possible, and fell. When I was low enough, I fought them open again and followed Wik and Aliati below the storm, into the shadow of a stunted tower trunk.
The tower’s bone overgrowth reached out to its neighbors, forming a wall. Thick knobs of bone slabs and bulges obscured what could still, in some places, be seen as tier divisions. Gaps along the outgrowth might allow us shelter, but we saw few places to land away from the hail and lightning.
Finally, Aliati pointed, “There! Two caves! One above, one below.” I could barely hear her voice over the wind’s roar now, but I followed her tack. In our rush to descend, we’d been blown off course. We’d overflown the cave and worked our way back around to it. We were nearly at the end of the tether’s length when we landed.
We clawed our way down the overgrowth, hands finding purchase in the soft green moss and lichen that grew on the tower trunk.
The higher cave was tiny and narrow. We climbed past it. The one below looked better for our needs.
* * *
As Aliati had said, the old bone pile in front of the lower cave was undisturbed. No fresh feathers. No bone eater stench.
The overhang provided more shelter than the ledge we’d left the others on, and the cave stretched back into the darkness. Light flashed behind us and something glittered within.
“I’ll guard the cave mouth if you want to scout,” Aliati said. She anchored the tether—our only connection to the ledge through the mist—with a looping hitch around the largest bone in the cairn.
Scouting was dry. I stepped farther inside, into darkness. Behind me, the opening framed the cloudscape, dim except in comparison to the cave.
My skin prickled. “No chance you have a lantern and a flint?” Djonn had both with him, but he was on the ledge. We’d lost much from the ghost tower’s caches, and we hadn’t much to lose to start with.
Aliati laughed. “No flint. Better you than me.”
We could use any light. Even luminescence. Kirit had been able to wake the littlemouths. So had Ciel. Something in their voices, in their Singer training. Wik had been trained to hunt skymouths and control them. Could it work on littlemouths?
“Hum something?” I asked him. If there were any littlemouths on the tower trunk, we might get some light. I hoped the storm hadn’t driven them into hiding. Wik looked at me strangely, but obliged. He began humming The Rise.
The area outside the cave stayed dark. Birdcrap. I stared into the rain, not looking forward to exploring the cave by bone hook.
“Look!” Aliati pointed, but not towards the outer tower. She gestured into the cave, where a single littlemouth glowed softly blue-green against the cave wall.
For a moment, all Wik could do was stare. “I didn’t know they could do that.”
The small creature didn’t generate a lot of light, but even a little was comforting. I felt my way forward until I stood next to the cave’s back wall. My fingers touched its dry hide. A loop of tentacle wrapped my wrist. Then it pulled away and the light faded. Wik had stopped humming.
“They like your voice. And Kirit’s too,” I said, hoping he would hum again without me needing to ask.
Aliati, silhouetted in the cave mouth, spoke through the dark. “Djonn thinks they luminesce so they can find each other in the clouds.”
I nodded, remembering the conversation, “Like our windsigns.” Wik had grasped those easily.
Wik tried again, louder. Slowly, in waves moving away from me, the cave glowed. Wik’s skymouth-ink tattoos reflected the light in response.
“That’s amazing,” Aliati said. The luminescence revealed a medium cave, with three alcoves. I gasped when I saw what had glittered in the lightning. Metal poles ringed in the walls, the alcoves. I walked to the nearest one, letting the littlemouths light the way. The tower core split around each pole, creating gaps that eventually joined to form the cave. Like the ridge wall near the council fall, this cave had been shaped deliberately, but with much more skill.
Metal was so scarce in the city, so valuable. Poles this size would be wealth beyond belief in the city—an upper tier’s worth, maybe, if we could pry them loose. Or ever go back home.
More metal glinted on the alcove walls.
“All right in there?” Aliati called. Behind me, Wik had already turned back, prepared to get the others. I ached to explore, but that could wait until everyone was safe. This cave was a much better stopping place than the ledge above.
We’d seen no evidence of recent bone eaters, but as I left the middle alcove, my foot brushed something that rustled dryly. Glass sparkled in the littlemouths’ glow. I bent closer and touched teeth nestled in an ancient skymouth hide. The whole husk was rimed with dust. A young skymouth must have once stumbled in here; the hide and teeth were all that remained.
Cupping my hand, I scooped the teeth into my satchel. They clattered against brass. Maalik squawked at me, awakened. “Sorry, friend.” The littlemouths on the walls slowly faded.
“Nat, there’s another squall coming,” Aliati shouted over the building wind. I hurried to the cave mouth, one hand tracing the wall. The bone was warm. Still alive down here. Alive, and trained long ago to shelter people within the expanding bone, rather than forcing them to climb higher, like our city.
A stretch of lightning reached across the clouds and lit up the cave.
“Look how long the boom takes after the light.” Aliati stared into the gray. Wik counted silently until a muffled boom sounded upwind of us.
“We might only have time for one run.”
More lightning flashed. Illuminated, the cave looked smaller, but we could see now that nothing lurked in its walls. There were no scavenger caches, but it felt safe enough. We could recover here and try to hunt for food. As long as we all survived the storm.
“Here’s where we’ll stay.” I reached in my bag and handed Aliati and Wik a glass tooth each. Aliati’s was the length of her hand, Wik’s slightly smaller. “Some good luck for our journey.” And for our survival. Those teeth would make good knives, eventually. My companions stowed them away.
“Can you carry Djonn, Nat?” Aliati asked. “I need to manage the tether.”
Djonn was lighter than Beliak, but his brace made him awkward to carry. I thought for a moment, then remembered the sling. Could I fly him solo? “I think so.”
“We’ll have to fight our way back to the ledge against that headwind,” she said. “Wind’s shifting.”
The clouds spun slowly in a great circle, the distant thunder much closer now.
* * *
To rise as high as we could before leaping into the wind, we climbed the tower trunk above the cave mouth and used the moss along its ridges as handholds, sinking our grips only when we needed to. We worked up and around the tower, reeling in the tether, until we were closer to the direction of the ledge. The plants were spongy and slick between our fingers. Some looked like old men’s beards, but clung to the tower side with the strength of spidersilk. Every surface cupped water from the storm, and our hands, knees, and feet grew wet. I shivered. I slipped, then regained my footing as I cursed the clouds.
Faster.
; The clouds hung gossamer thin between our tower and the ledge, though nearby, darker bands of cloud gathered. I hoped we were high enough. Wik leapt first, and we followed.
When we launched, battered by the headwinds, Wik flew zigs and zags to reach the ledge. First we swept towards the ghost tower, far in the distance. Then we made switchback turns, flying synchronized, like Nightwings of old in the dark city skies. Aliati echoed now and then to help Wik, and the littlemouth began to luminesce on my shoulder.
“They can hear you too!” I laughed. She sounded delighted, but focused on coiling the tether as it grew slack. The ledge came into view as we hit the rain line.
On the ledge, Wik and I helped Ceetcee into her wings. She looked green, nauseated. “It’s normal,” she said, a hand on her belly. “Just harder than usual down here. I can still fly.” She winked at me while I tightened Ciel’s wingstraps, but I caught her looking nervously over the cloudscape. She knelt by Beliak, and I joined her at his side as she whispered, “Everything will be all right.”
“It will.” I touched her cheek. I hoped she was right. “Fly safe.” She pressed my hand close to her skin, warming it.
When they were ready, Ciel and Ceetcee jumped from the ledge and circled in the dark gray sky, waiting for us. Wik hooked Beliak, I lifted Djonn in the sling, and Doran followed with Moc.
Aliati and Kirit flew behind us with Hiroli.
We crossed between the towers on a storm gust, the most direct, most dangerous way. It was rough going, but with the wind behind us, we neared the cave quickly. At the very end, a spill of wind hit Ceetcee and she spun wildly and fought to right herself. I dove behind her, trying to help her and carry Djonn at the same time, until she evened out on her own.
The edge of rain began to splat the cave as we landed. Lichen and fern fronds clinging to the incline below the cave dipped and rebounded as each drop struck. The wide tower trunk’s overgrowths shuffled the wind into new patterns around the cave mouth. I set Djonn down as Ceetcee landed, then banked away until they moved inside the shelter, making room for me to land.
From the cave mouth, Ceetcee watched the sky, shivering. By the time the others came into sight, the rain fell in sheets and thunder had begun to boom again. Kirit and Aliati trailed behind, and Hiroli struggled.
I yelled out to them and at the gusts that bore them. “Hurry!” I leaned into the storm, reaching, trying to pull them closer with my voice. We were few enough, and too far lost already.
26
CLOUDBOUND
Aliati and Kirit shepherded Hiroli towards the cave while storm winds surged.
The junior councilor’s eyes grew wider with each bolt of lightning. Storm-panicked, she flew erratically, paying little attention to the changing wind currents. Only with the others’ whistled encouragement did she make it to the cave.
When Hiroli landed in a shivering sprawl on the ledge, we pulled her inside. Ciel helped her out of her wings. The other two spiraled close again, but the wind blew them off course at dangerous angles. On her next approach, Aliati crashed into the tower wall above us, then slid down its side. She dangled feet-first over the cave edge, wings dripping.
We caught her and helped lower her into the cave.
“That must have hurt,” Wik whispered.
Shards of light broke around us, and thunder crashed repeatedly, drowning out Aliati’s curses to the tower, Hiroli, and the wind.
Meantime, Kirit fought hard to avoid getting blown away from the tower. Finally, she tucked her wings and crashed deliberately below the cave. She landed with a thump in the undergrowth, her wings snagging on the clinging nettles there.
In the city, “cloudbound” meant to disappear. No songs marked the lost, no Remembrances.
In our storm-struck cave, “cloudbound” meant that the city had disappeared. No one would help us. We were all we had left.
Doran anchored a spidersilk tether for me, and I handed him my satchel with Maalik safe inside before descending the tower’s overgrown wall to reach Kirit.
“All right?” I shouted in the lashing rain. I laced my fingers into broadleaf ferns growing on the towerside to avoid skidding down the slope. Kirit did the same as she crept towards me, grimacing. Her replacement wings dragged behind her, the yellow silk streaked with dirt and leaves.
“I’ll live,” she said, shivering hard enough to make her teeth chatter.
Her footwraps torn and filthy, Kirit began to climb. Rain soaked her gray robe, the hem dragging damp against the tower. Finally, she pulled herself over the ledge and disappeared into the cave.
Lightning cracked, filling my nose with burnt air. Unwilling to be singed next, I scaled the tether quickly. Kirit and Wik reached over the edge and caught my arms.
When they dragged me back into the cave, I stripped my soaked wings from my shoulders, then peeled off my outer robe. I wrung that out by the cave mouth. Four useless tower marks spilled from a pocket. I leaned my wings on the wall, next to the others’ frames.
We’d led our group of Lawsbreakers to safety without losing anyone, but safety felt wet, dark, and tremendously cold.
I paced, trying to warm up. Ceetcee beckoned me over to where she huddled with Beliak, Ciel, and Moc, but I didn’t want to drain their warmth. Besides, I couldn’t sit still.
My pale under-robe wrapped damp around my shoulders, a mildew taint strong in my nose. There was no getting warm here, no being dry.
Aliati, her palms and the left side of her face scraped raw, watched Hiroli jump at each new roll of thunder and shook her head. Then she helped Djonn settle, exhausted, against a wall and began searching through their satchels for anything dry.
“We left so much in the ghost tower that we’ll need down here. Flint, lanterns, oil. Food.”
“I have flint,” Djonn said. “I lost only my toolbox, not the important things.” He reached his hand to a pocket and fished out a chunk of ancient flint and a striking stone.
Aliati pulled a dry robe from her satchel and gave it to Hiroli. She took the flint from Djonn. “Now all we need here is dry fuel.” She laughed hollowly. “And to figure out where we are.”
Where was here? My eyes met Aliati’s, and I didn’t have to speak the question aloud. Bigger than the ghost tower cave, this one was also colder and darker. After being buffeted by the storm, I wasn’t really sure where we were, either.
Aliati finally said, “No scavengers have ever come this far. We’re running on rumors and myth.” “The Horror of the Clouds.” “The Bone Forest.” Those were the myths. They got us here. But there aren’t any songs about how to survive here.
I’d gone into the clouds seeking answers, hoping to undo the damage I’d helped create on the council. Now I’d stranded us farther from the city than even scavengers were willing to go.
“We’ll make do,” Ceetcee said from where she sat. She huddled, wrapping her arms around herself and the twins. She began to hum The Rise, then thought better of it, switching to “Corwin and the Nest of Thieves.” Very slowly, Ciel joined her, weaving the new verse in. The littlemouth clinging a nearby wall glowed softly when the girl sang.
As the two began to make up more verses and rename songs, Kirit joined them, and even Doran, once he picked up on the words. The cave echoed with Ciel’s and Ceetcee’s high notes, Kirit’s rough ones, and Doran’s, cautious and deep.
We waited for the rain to stop, singing, and even laughing. The others sat, but I could not stay still, instead I paced a damp circuit of the cave.
Kirit watched me from where she sat huddled miserably in Wik’s robe. “We need to go back. To finish this.”
“Maybe,” Doran said teasingly, “if we’d waited to confront Dix together, we’d be above the city right now.” The words hung in the air; though they’d sounded playful, he hadn’t been teasing at all.
“That’s enough,” I said, though I, too, wished she’d waited, or that I’d moved faster to stop her. Doran shrugged and got up to search for fuel.
“We
’re hungry, cold, and out of sorts,” Aliati said, glaring at all of us. “No need to make it worse.”
Wik shifted uncomfortably, unable to lean against the wall thanks to the lashes on his back. Djonn watched pain cross his face. “Dix didn’t give you anything for the pain?” he asked, a tinge of jealousy in his voice.
Wik grimaced. “You’re the artifex Dix was looking for. Where were you?” He sounded like a Singer of old, demanding answers.
Djonn waved his hand and reached into his satchel. Hummed Ciel’s verse from “The Nest of Thieves.” “Into the clouds. And I took Dix’s precious lighter-than-air plans with me.” He held it up so that it reflected the next lightning strike, shining light around the cave.
The wind filled our silence with hollow sounds as we took in Djonn’s theft—both the brazenness of it and the danger.
Hiroli roused from where she’d been half asleep near Doran. “She’s going to want that back.”
“I think you’re right,” Djonn said, nodding. “Though she can’t read it. No one knows how to but me.”
Doran watched Djonn wave the plate in the cool air. “We should put that someplace safe.”
Without another word, Djonn tucked the plate back in his robe. “Done.” The two stared at each other for a long moment. The cave suddenly felt much smaller and more uncomfortable.
The rain kept falling, and cold gusts whistled through the cave. I knelt by Ceetcee and Beliak. He’d closed his eyes, and his skin was hot to the touch. I pulled a half-empty water sack from my satchel and set it near him. Clinging to the damp side of the sack were the broken pieces of my father’s message chip. I pressed them between my fingers, wishing Naton could help us now.
In the quiet, Wik asked Moc about Laria. The boy shook his head, refusing to answer. Wik turned to Hiroli next. “They didn’t hurt you?”
Hiroli looked at the bone floor near Djonn’s feet. “They couldn’t. I’m council, and they knew I didn’t know where Nat had gone, or anything about the plates. They kept me in a foul alcove anyway, filled with webs. Dix didn’t want me telling anyone that she had Moc.” She swallowed. “When they fed me just before Allmoons and I got woozy, I started to worry.” She turned to us and smiled. “But then you found me.”