To Wield the Wind (Enclave World Book 1)

by Remi Black

  Wispy fingers clung to a tree trunk, digging those elongated claws into the bark to slow its ascent.

  “Not a ghost.” Grim’s hand again swept down her back, ensuring nothing else clung to her. “A wight. Ghosts don’t have tangible form. A wight does. Give it enough emotional energy, and it grows claws and teeth that can draw blood. Give it blood, and it becomes bones and flesh with an insatiable need for more blood.”

  The misty head turned toward them. It watched. It wanted fear. It waited for her fear so it could flow back to her, wrap its arms around her, cover its mouth with her own, and suck in her screams, dig in its claws, piercing her flesh as easily as last night’s gobber had punctured the thick hide of her food bag.

  How do I know that?

  Emotional energy. Orielle groped for Grim’s hand. He twined their fingers, reassuring warmth and solidity after the cold that had blanketed her on the mountaintop and ridden her back down that steep slope, when only his sure-footed passage kept her upright. Fear and hate. Feeding like a wraith.

  “A wight is a wraith,” he said, although she didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud. “What exactly do they teach you in that Enclave?”

  “Apparently not what I needed to learn. Did my magic draw it?”

  “Cairns seal graves for a reason.”

  “I freed it then. And it wanted my fear. I am very glad there are no wyre here.”

  “Me, too. Give it terror, and it will take shape. Link it to your power, and it will never leave you, tapping into your emotions by taking the form of your dead bloodkin.”

  Her heart hammered at her close escape. She retreated to flippancy. “The only dead kin that I would fear would be my cousin Raigeis.”

  “Hsst. Don’t give it name.”

  “It can hear me?” She peered through the deepening twilight, but the wight’s misty form had vanished. She shouldn’t have taken her eyes off it.

  “It’s touched you. Clung to you. The connection will linger until sunrise.”

  He pulled her after him, toward the rushing water ahead.

  But not before she tried one last time to find the wight.

  ~ 4 ~

  Orielle didn’t think she fell asleep. This fraught day wearied her with its pre-dawn beginning with the gobber, leading to her encounter with a wyre, and ending with a wight on her back. How could one sleep standing up? But she must dream, for bone-white horses threaded through the straight trees. Snow-white riders, still and erect, wore cloaks of ice blue and storm purple, flowing around them, drifted by a gentle wind.

  Only the metal bits of the night-black bridles jingled as the horses circled the camp. No snorts or huffs of ice-fogged breath broke the silence. The hooves were muted thuds. The saddle leather didn’t creak.

  Nor did the riders speak. In their frozen marble faces, their black eyes spoke for them. Who? From where? From when? Why? Deep questions, rolling like distant thunder.

  First to cross the wards around the camp was a woman, her features carved as sharply as ice shards, a smile greeting Orielle while her black eyes lacked any warmth. Her arms were long and thin, the joints of wrist and elbow prominent. Her gown, glacial blue, flowed behind her like wings. She was beautiful and eldritch strange. Orielle knew Fae without their glamour. The Fae had an unfading beauty equal to this woman. They shared the longer limbs, the slow-swift drifting movements, the ever-present golden aura of magic. This woman was not Fae. She was like to them, but stilly silent, frozen life, without the golden warmth of power, as far from Fae as the Fae were from human, even the wizards who wielded the same power.

  The woman’s dark eyes flickered. Long icy-white lashes swept down then up. Her close-mouthed smile revealed her satisfaction at Orielle’s awe. She looked pure as ice—the purity that cleaved coldly sharp decisions that lacked the human leaning toward mercy.

  A man followed, then a second. Knights, guarding their queen. Carved of the same frozen ice, similar yet different, harder than the hard woman. One had a drawn sword, the flat blade leaned against his shoulder. The metal glowed with the blue of glacial ice.

  The other didn’t draw his sword. Icy violet gleamed dully through a scabbard worked from silver and ice filaments. The snow-white fingers of his left hand curved around something. A shadowy tendril left his hand but vanished into the darkness, inches from rider and steed.

  Those pale fingers tightened.

  Orielle’s upward glance snared the knights. She felt the ice of a deep Mont Nourian winter, the frozen wind from the mountain heights whipped to a frenzy by a storm, the shaking chill that only a blazing fire could dispel.

  Their camp had no leaping flames to offer warmth, just smoldering coals that held more ash than heat.

  She shivered. The knight smiled. Had he sent the ruthless cold she had endured? When his lips parted, she saw his teeth, sharpened to fangs. He stopped his horse beside the woman. He released his reins, the black leather straps sliding against the bone-white horse. He stretched his free hand toward her, and she sensed a cold deeper than winter.

  Orielle thought she dreamed until Grim appeared. His hand grazed hers as he bowed deeply. The touch broke her sleepy stupefaction. She curtsied as deeply as she would have to the ArchClans of the Enclave or the king of Mont Nouris. She watched the woman, stranger than all the others, for she had led the men across the wards. Orielle’s magic hadn’t stopped them nor alerted her.

  She feared these creatures more than the gobber, more than the wyre.

  “Who comes through my Wilding?” The woman’s voice had rich tones that rang deep to her bones.

  Grim bowed again. “I am Rhoghieri, Lady.”

  “Havener.” The black eyes glittered with a strange inner light. “I know you. We keep the pax. This one, woman who is not-wizard, name her.”

  At the command, the second knight’s smile increased.

  Orielle had skipped many lessons, but she knew the power of names. Cringing inside, she lifted her chin, striving to balance bravery and respect. Fear and insolence would feed icy cruelty.

  Grim had edged closer. She clasped his hand as she sank into another curtsey. Then she tossed back her hood.

  The sword knight lifted his sword. Extending his arm high, he brandished the steely blue blade. “Aiwaz Solsken,” he shouted.

  Orielle fell back from his thunder.

  Grim caught her, dragged her against his side. “Steady,” he warned, for the sword knight had dismounted without moving, slipping between one blink of her fluttering lashes and the next.

  Sword held in both hands, he approached. The eerie blade lit his snow-white skin, giving it the glacial tones of the Lady’s gown. Sigils writhed the length of the blade, as tall as she was, with a brightly glowing gem pommel. She crowded into Grim as the knight held the sword aloft. She had to tear her gaze from him to focus on the woman.

  The sword knight stopped his advance.

  Orielle dared not look at him. Despising her cowardly instinct, she straightened away from Grim and managed a step away.

  The knight shifted with her, keeping the blade between her and the Lady.

  A third curtsey would seem mockery. Orielle bent her hand then dared the Lady’s gaze. “I am as you called me, Great One. I am a not-wizard of the Enclave in Mont Nouris.”

  “That is not a name.”

  “I have learned to be wary of names, Lady.”

  “Not so, for this wight knows a name.”

  The Lady’s words were a signal, for the leash knight jerked the black rope he held. His right hand snatched the air. When his hand lifted, a ghostly form appeared. Wispy tendrils coalesced into a thick fog—wearing the face of her dead cousin Raigeis.

  Orielle winced. Grim, behind her, ground his teeth.

  She forced herself to survey the wight’s guise. He had Magister Raigeis’ arrogance, the flared nostrils and lofted chin, the swept-back grey hair, the stiff carriage of a man who understood his importance.

  But ghosts didn’t walk the earth, not as tangible beings
. The wight had taken her cousin’s form to terrify. Emotional energy, Grim had said.

  She looked at the creature masked as Raigeis, once second in command of all the wizards in the Enclave, dead now and another in his place.

  “A foolishness that I regret, Lady.” Once again she dared that cold stare. “I wished to impress the Rhoghieri.”

  “The wight did not frighten you when it tried to attach itself to you?”

  “No, Lady,” she lied. She looked again at Raigeis. His features were blurring. Did the wight lose energy when it had no emotions to sustain its guise?

  “You are arrogant, Lady Aiwaz Solsken.”

  “The Rhoghieri says that I am foolish. I have never before ventured into the Wilding. I have much to learn. For example, I cannot discover, Great Lady, how you and your knights cross my wards.”

  The Lady’s laugh was a sharp tinkling sound that could have broken glass. The leash knight permitted another smile. Orielle dared not look at the sword knight. He had advanced when their gazes met. Would he advance more if that against happened? She would not peek to see if his grin matched all the others encircling their camp.

  Behind her, Grim hissed, displeased with her once again.

  “A bargain we will strike, Not-Wizard.”

  “No,” Grim whispered.

  Not feeling reckless, Orielle wished to offer his word as her own. How did she refuse this powerful Crygy? Should she even attempt to wiggle out of the proposed bargain? “I have nothing to offer,” she tried. Grim’s groan told that she’d said the wrong thing.

  “We will find an appropriate offer at the appointed time. Cyning honorel. Wight, na strincte. The name returns to Neothera. Take it. It offends my sight.”

  The darkness that had cloaked the wight descended over him. Her last look saw her cousin Raigeis dissipating like vapor. A muffled howl rose. The knight jerked the leash, cutting the howl into a whimper. Another jerk stopped that tiny sound.

  “What will happen to this wight?”

  “You have care for a creature that would suck away your magic?”

  “No,” she hastened to say. “I would not want another traveler to fall into its trap.”

  “Have care to yourself, not for the next traveler this wight meets.”

  “It returns to its place, on the crest at the cairn?”

  The Lady’s smile widened. Sharp fangs glinted, as sharp as her knights and just as deadly.

  And the wight whimpered.

  “Eventually. It will pay a tithe for its lie.” She spoke again in that strange language, like Faeron but not, the words harsh but with an enthralling undertone that could trap the unsuspecting.

  The knight shifted the glowing sword to his left hand. Once again he extended it to the sky. The storm-purple cloak fell back. His snow-white forearm had lightning-jagged scars. Muscles bunched at the sword’s heft, but he held it aloft, his strength making the steel weightless. Orielle stared at the glittering tip of the sword. She watched for lightning, but nothing struck. His right hand extended. Elongated fingers cupped her face.

  They froze her skin. Her gaze dropped from the sword, and his black eyes caught hers.

  “Lady—,” Grim called.

  “She is safe, Rho. For now.” Again her tingling laugh jangled the silence.

  The knight loomed before her, inches from her, but that snow-cold frame emitted no heat. Black eyes bored into hers as his cold, bony fingers pressed hard into her flesh. A faint pulse beat in his temple, the only sign that blood pulsed within him, pumped by a heart, making him mortal as the long-lived Fae, mortal as Orielle.

  Is the Lady mortal?

  His fingers moved, and her thoughts scattered, driven away before the blizzard of icy shards penetrating her mind. His black eyes seized hers as he learned the bone structure of her face, his touch as intimate as a lover’s first exploration yet colder than deep winter, crueler than quick death.

  Her breath fogged the chilling air.

  “Do you fear me, Aiwaz Solsken?”

  “I fear what you do.”

  Her breathy words caused a flicker in those black eyes. “It is good that the wight lost its grip before it felt your fear.”

  She shuddered.

  His hand lifted away only for his index finger to return, to trace a symbol in the center of her forehead. She tried to follow the shape. He obliged by redrawing it, three, four, five times.

  His teeth weren’t fanged. They looked slightly pointed with only the eye teeth sharpened. An odd puzzle to snag her mind rather than the eerie tingling of his finger on her brow, writing a symbol over and over.

  Then he whispered, imparting the secret, “Once for each tenet.”

  “Thank you.”

  “The Lady gives it. I am hers as you are the Rho’s.” He stepped back. He slowly lowered the sword, steadily sheathed it until only the blue gem above the cross-guard gave its light to the moon-cold night. Without a flicker of his black eyes, he turned, walked back to his horse, and vaulted into the saddle.

  With his leaving, devastation whorled through her, scoured with blizzard-sharp ice.

  “Would you steal my knight, Not-Wizard? He seems to court you.”

  The words jarred her frozen mind. “Oh, no, Great Lady. He is yours, none of mine.”

  That fang-toothed smile returned. “Well answered, though I would send him in your need. Call upon me should you need my aid.”

  Orielle bowed her head. “I am humbled by the gift, Lady.”

  The smile vanished. “Crygy deal in bargains, my offer matched to yours. Remember that, Aiwaz Solsken. You have much to learn of the Wilding. I hope you survive to complete our bargain.”

  Obedient to an unseen signal, the horses turned as one. The Lady and her two knights rode into the forest, their horses swishing their tails as they crossed the wards. Then the others followed, knights and dames, as stilly silent as before.

  As she had not seen their arrival, Orielle watched their leaving, and Grim at her shoulder watched as well. Tall figures on tall horses, their cloaks blending into the darkness. Between one blink and the next, they vanished.

  ~ 5 ~

  Grim gripped her shoulder and whirled her around. “What did the Crygy knight give you?”

  Orielle tried to shake off his grip. “Did you not see? He wrote it on my forehead.” She scrubbed at the numbed skin.

  “Whatever he gave you, don’t use it. The Lady will tally your use of it. Crygy gifts are not gifts. Use it, and you fall into her debt.”

  The Lady had stopped smiling when Orielle called the mark a gift. “A bargain she said. Who is she? What is she?”

  “A Lady of the Crygy. She rules this Wilding.” He began kicking the coals, stirring up the flames.

  “Crygy?”

  “You have no lessons of them?” He tossed dry kindling on the reddening coals. In the flare of light, he looked as grim as the name she called him. “It’s an ancient word. They are the Choosers.”

  The old tome had listed the seven septs of Faeron. She had skimmed the information, for the Fae had renewed their alliance to the Enclave. Proof of the pact, Fae warriors from the septs were bound to the clan leaders, serving as comeis. But she hadn’t tried to learn all of it. With her weak power, she knew she would never be chosen for a mission to Faeron. As she hadn’t been chosen for this mission. She had volunteered.

  At the bottom of the page with the seven septs were three brief lines about Dark Fae, who had abandoned Faeron to course the world. They chased the unwary and criminal. “The Wild Hunt,” Orielle whispered. “Their steeds are of bone, their hounds are shadows with red coals for eyes. They answer to their queen and no other.” She shivered. “But we saw no hounds. Choosers of the Dead, for those who are caught in the Hunt have a choice. Do you know more.”

  “I never heard of any hounds.”

  “But you know of the Hunt?”

  “We take care not to be caught on the nights from Saber Moon to Worm Moon, and especially not at Dragon Moon. The
Hunt always rides then.”

  “We are mid-month. Lady’s Moon has just passed.”

  “So, what we saw tonight was the Lady on a ride and the wight caught in it.”

  The Lady’s image remained as clear as when she’d been before Orielle. Silver hair falling as straight as a waterfall. Black eyes glittering like obsidian. Narrow face, slanted eyes, sharp chin. Even her smile was a narrowed vee. She was both strange and fear-filling. Nothing like the Fae comeis who guarded the Enclave’s clan leaders as part of the alliance.

  “I would not mistake her for Fae.”

  “Have you seen Fae without their glamour?” Crouched by the fire, he fed sticks gathered before they had turned in. He built a blaze of flames that would be seen for miles, if anyone remained awake. She hoped no one looked.

  “I didn’t realize they had a glamour.”

  “Makes them look more human.”

  “Then, without the glamour, they would look like the Crygy.”

  “A blend.”

  “She wanted my name. Do you know hers?”

  “I’ve heard Lady Bone.”

  The name cast shivers over her. “Why did she accuse me of stealing her knight?”

  Grim took her arm and towed her to the fire’s warmth. How did he know the knight’s touch had iced away her warmth? “He gave you a name.”

  “Aiwaz Solsken.”

  “Look what he is, Crygy that he’s become, all ice and snow. You glow like the sun, Orielle, your hair and your skin. You are a creature of life. He’s not, not any longer.”

  “Because he’s death?”

  “Not death. He rides with the Lady. The wight is death, of death, escaped from Neothera. The Crygy neither live nor die; they are. They stopped their life by giving up the sun. Because as long as they follow the Lady, they rarely see the sun. Solsken he named you, a relative of the sun. Aiwaz is. . .like living. No, not quite that. We humans, we have a life span woven for us. The four sisters weave our lives and set the length of our life. We don’t live past that.” He rolled her pallet beside his. “The Crygy riders, those chosen by the Lady or the Lord, they will outlive their appointed lives. They will live for centuries.”