The Unfinished Song (Book 5): Wing

by Tara Maya

  Boothead pushed past Potfoot to confront Dindi.

  “Halt, Cornborn!” commanded Boothead. He waved his spoon at Dindi like a dangerous weapon. “You bring an ill wind to our hold! What do you want with us?”

  Potfoot smacked him on the head. “Humans can’t see fae. She can’t hear a word you say, fool!”

  “We are just passing through, uncle,” Dindi said politely.

  “There! She sees us and hears us well enough,” Boothead said.

  “Hooray! She sees us!” cheered the crowd. Turtleback made another squelching sound on his upside down ram’s horn.

  “Hrmf.” Potfoot crossed her arms.

  “Who’s ‘we’? Have you more humans with you, girl?” asked Boothead.

  “Just the two of us.”

  “I see but one! Where’s your friend, then?”

  “He’s right…”

  “They can’t see or hear me, Dindi,” Umbral said. “Just as ordinary humans cannot see or hear fae, though they can sense when fae are near, so fae cannot see or hear Deathsworn, though they can sense when we are near. Tell him you are alone. If you tell him you travel with a Deathsworn, they will try to kill you. Then I’ll have to kill them and it will be unpleasant all around.”

  “Oh,” said Dindi. “I, uh, forgot. I left my friend behind. I’m traveling alone.”

  Humans would never have accepted such a flustered lie, but the hobgoblins took her at her word without blinking. They were far more interested in the question of who would host her for the night.

  “We’re not really going to spend the night in a fae clanhold are we?” Dindi whispered to Umbral.

  “Why not? It’s a bit early to stop, but it’s worth it to have a roof over your head, especially if the rain keeps up. Find yourself a cozy bed for the night.”

  “What about you?”

  “My presence would discomfit them. I’ll camp on the edge of town.” He pressed a bag of roots into her hands. “Eat only our own food. Remember, they are fae: eat nothing they give you, wear nothing they give you and don’t dance with them.” He lowered his voice. “Hobgoblins have a taste for human flesh, so just watch yourself.”

  Umbral walked away in the rain, which was falling harder now. He disappeared in the fog.

  Meanwhile, the hobgoblins were still debating where to house Dindi.

  “Give her the Big House!”

  “Yes, yes, the Big House!”

  “No, my house!”

  “No, mine!”

  “I saw her first!” cried Turtleback. “She ought to come to my house!”

  “True, true, he saw her first, that he did!”

  “True, true!”

  This argument swayed the crowd. Turtleback blubbered into his ram’s horn triumphantly. The hobgoblins hustled Dindi to one of the houses carved out of the peat wall. There was no flap or apron over the door, just a hole in the dirt. Turtleback slithered in easily, but the hole was so small Dindi wasn’t sure she would fit. With some wriggling, she crawled inside after Turtleback. She wondered if she wouldn’t have been better off camping with Umbral.

  Inside, however, she found a larger space than she expected, though the ceiling was too low for her to stand straight. The furnishings resembled those in a human hut. There was a hearth in the center, an eating mat on one side and a cot with blankets on the other. Pots and baskets lined the wall. There were no windows but the hole in the door let in the last light of day and the hearth glowed orange.

  Yet much was bizarre. The hearth did not shine with the light of a fire, but with the eldritch shimmer of a pile of slithering fae frogs. Their bright orange skin glistened with poison and glowed with magic. The baskets and pots were filled with odd things, like spiders, fish heads and still-wriggling lizard tails. The whole place smelled like funny: dank, musky and much too cloying. She sneezed.

  Turtleback looked up at her anxiously.

  “Your house is beautiful,” Dindi said.

  He beamed.

  The frogs emitted heat, just as a fire would have. In fact, it was uncomfortably warm inside. Dindi took off her parka and outer legwals, which she folded neatly at the foot of the cot.

  “I will feed you,” he said. “Yes?”

  He clapped. A peccary trotted into the house. The small, pig-like creature snorted cheerily at Turtleback, and lay on its back before the hearth. Turtleback slit the peccary from the neck to the belly. He butchered it neatly and put the meat on sticks, which he roasted over the heat of the glowing frogs. Surprisingly, this worked. The perfectly braised pork made her mouth water, especially considering that she’d eaten nothing but starchy roots for the last several days.

  Turtleback piled up the meat and handed the platter to Dindi. “Please share my meal.”

  “Thank you,” said Dindi. She gazed longingly at the roast pork. The savory aroma made her tummy growl. She held up one of the unappetizing roots from the bag Umbral had slipped her. “But I already have my evening-meal.”

  Turtleback looked so disappointed she almost relented. The meat smelled so good. One little bite…. She forced a smile of apology and handed back the platter.

  “If I’d known you weren’t going to eat any, I wouldn’t have ruined it with heat,” Turtleback complained. “I hate cooked meat.”

  The hobgoblin moped a while, until a new idea occurred to him.

  “Let me give you a guest gift!” he exclaimed.

  He jumped up and rummaged in his pots. He stood up with a necklace of crusty green beads, which he let her touch. The beads were harder than wood or bone, even harder than gold, but did not seem to be ordinary stone.

  “It will look lovely on you, human girl!”

  Turtleback started to wrap the necklace around her neck.

  Dindi stopped him. “Thank you, but I already have a necklace.”

  She pulled out the corncob doll, which she always wore on a leather string around her neck.

  Turtleback fell back when he saw it. His eyes bugged. “You wear that?”

  “Have you seen this before?” Her breath caught in her throat. “Do you know what it is?”

  “I’ve seen it once before, when the Aelfae and humans fought near here. It was an Aelfae thing at first, but then the Deathsworn took it and twisted it. Now it is an evil thing.” He glared at her. “The Deathsworn are the enemies of all fae! Are you a Deathsworn?”

  “No,” said Dindi. “I am a friend of the Aelfae. The Deathsworn are my enemies too.”

  Turtleback looked unconvinced. He sulked in the corner of his house, as far from Dindi as he could scuttle. She had the idea he regretted hosting her.

  “Turtleback,” she said softly. “Are your people going to ask me to dance with you?”

  “We would have,” he said, “We have asked many humans to join our circle, though they always fall asleep too soon. After that, they never wake up to play with us anymore, and we have to wait for new playmates. But I will not ask you unless you take off that necklace.”

  “What would you do if a Deathsworn did come to your clanhold?” she asked.

  The hobgoblin barred his teeth. Each one was pointed, like a shark’s.

  “Kill it,” he hissed.

  Her heart beat faster. Excitement burned like fire in her blood. Deliberately, she pulled her stone dagger and put it to her arm. She grit her teeth, then, as fast as she could, sliced a piece of skin and meat off her own arm.

  It hurt like crazy. She choked down a sob, and ground her teeth even harder, but forced herself to hand the bit of flesh to Turtleback.

  No hobgoblin could resist raw human flesh. He gobbled it up at once.

  Next, Dindi ripped the hem of her white blouse. She tore the piece into two strips. One she used to bandage her cut arm. The other she held in reserve until Turtleback finished eating. Then she leaned forward and tied the white ribbon around his forehead like a headband. His orange pointed ears poked out.

  He patted the ribbon in delight. “Human clothing!”

  “A gift for
you,” Dindi said.

  “That’s two gifts you’ve given me,” said Turtleback.

  “Is it? I hadn’t noticed. I’m feeling a bit cramped in here, I’m afraid. I think I would like to dance a little before I go to bed.”

  His eyes shone iridescent, like a predators. “That will make three gifts. Why are you trying to put us in your debt, human girl?”

  Dindi smiled coyly. “Watch my dance and perhaps you will guess.”

  Hadi

  Every forest looked pretty much the same as every other forest to Hadi, so it took him by surprise when Tamio asked him one morning, as they broke camp to travel, “This must be a sad day for you.”

  Any day that involved walking from dawn to noon was a sad day as far as Hadi was concerned, but he furrowed his brow.

  “Don’t you recognize this ridge? The fork in the trail?”

  “Of course! More or less. Not really.”

  Tamio gestured toward Jensi and Paro. As usual, Paro hovered near her without actually speaking to her, and she, in turn, pretended not to notice him.

  “Today those who are going back to the Corn Hills part ways with those of us going to extract retribution,” said Tamio.

  Hadi looked over at Jensi, who, as if drawn by his concern, looked up and met his eyes at just that moment. Deep sadness shone from her face. She already knew.

  I’ll never see her again. He felt it in his bones. He would die stupidly trying to kill sheep muckers. She would probably have a dozen children who spent half the year as wolves. He wasn’t sure which fate was worse.

  Dindi

  The organization of the hobgoblin clanhold was simple in the extreme. Two rows of raised sod ledges faced each other, and with homes dug out in a line down each hillside. There was a larger hill at the far end, also with a hole at the base. The long corridor of packed earth in between the two rows was empty except for milling hobgoblins, of whom there were perhaps seven septs worth—forty-nine or fifty.

  The rain had stopped, but the fog was still heavy. In the distance, she saw the silhouette of a man in black half shrouded by the mist.

  Umbral.

  The sun had set, but the hobgoblins were not asleep. They cheered when Dindi followed Turtleback out into the center of the clanhold.

  “Hooray! She will dance with us!” cried Potfoot.

  The hobgoblins formed a ring and began to skip and tumble drum on bowls.

  Turtleneck slobbered into the wrong end of his ram’s horn. How any of them could hear the sound over the din, Dindi did not know, but the hobgoblins paused.

  “The human girl isn’t going to join our circle,” he said in disgust.

  “Well, she can’t flee,” Boothead told Turtleback. “Not if she’s wearing the bloodgold necklace with our hex on it!”

  All the hobgoblins laughed.

  “And she still owes us a dinner!” cried Potfoot. More laughter.

  Potfoot pinched Dindi. “Pity she’ll make such a skinny peccary!”

  Turtleneck bopped Potfoot on the head with his horn. “We can’t eat her. She didn’t eat our food. She didn’t put on our necklace. She gave me food. And she gave me a pretty headdress. And now she says she’ll do her own dance for us.”

  Boothead scratched his nose. “Well, that’s strange. But it could be fun. Let’s see your dance, then, human!”

  Dindi had not had time to put her warm outer garments back on, so she wore only a thin layer of wool. The lighter clothes did allow her more freedom of movement than the feather parka.

  She picked up a spoon and a pot, which she tapped like a hand drum. When with hobgoblins, do as hobgoblins did.

  “Hear my history, all you ears gathered here!” she chanted. “Watch my colors weave, all you eyes!”

  She leaped and kicked and tapped her pot of a drum. “Once upon a time, there was a little white swan.”

  She tucked at her feet and swept her arms out like wings. She performed a series of side aerials and back handsprings, ending in an arabesque standing with one foot on the pot. She dipped into a handstand and popped back up tapping the pot again.

  “But alas! A hungry black wolf stalked and captured the swan.”

  She imitated the stalking crawl of a wolf.

  Clang, clang, clang, on the pot. “’Wait!’ cried the swan. ‘Why eat me alone, when you could eat me and my sister both! Let me lead you to her and a doubly tasty meal you shall have!’ ‘Very well,’ said the wolf, ‘You may lead me to your sister, but I will only release your throat if you give me your word you will not fly away.’ So the swan gave her word to the wolf. The swan did not fly.”

  She waddled to indicate the downed swan.

  “The swan and wolf walked under a nest of eagles. ‘Ah if only those eagles would slay the wolf,’ thought the swan. ‘But I have given my word, so I cannot fly to tell them of my plight, nor can they see the wolf, who is as black as night.’”

  Potfoot nudged Boothead. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

  “Yeah,” grunted Boothead. “This isn’t much of a dance. There’s too little magic and too much talking!”

  It was true that Dindi was trying hard to hold in the flow of her Chromas. She had given Umbral her word she would not use her magic. Also she did not want to alert him, though she might have failed at that.

  He was walking toward the clanhold.

  Dindi spun around again. Clang, clang, clang, on the pot. “The swan wept for the eagles did not understand her silent cry. She had no voice to scream, ’If only those foolish eagles would realize the wolf is WALKING RIGHT TOWARDS THEIR NEST!”

  She landed in another pose, this time pointing right at Umbral.

  “Don’t you get it?” shouted Turtleback. “Can’t you feel the Shadow? There is a Deathsworn coming right at us!”

  All pandemonium broke loose as fifty hobgoblins roared and raised spears and axes that appeared from nowhere. As one mob, they rushed to attack Umbral.

  Umbral

  Umbral had suspected someone was following him for some time. Ash and the other Deathsworn of his sept were trailing behind him by a few days, but this was someone else. A hunter.

  No physical sign gave away the second stalker, but Umbral caught a whiff of magic on an eddy of wind. He recognized the thread of brilliant green magic.

  Finnadro the Wolf Hunter.

  Annoyingly still alive, for which Umbral had no one to blame but himself.

  Whom was Finnadro hunting? Dindi? Did Finnadro know who she was? Had the Green Lady sent him after Dindi? But Finnadro had seemed ignorant of Dindi’s identity when she lived in his tribehold beneath his nose. Perhaps he hunted the White Lady. Or was Finnadro’s motivation more personal?

  He’s seen my real face.

  He’s hunting me.

  That thought made Umbral’s muscles tighten with the urge to punch the bastard. He cursed to himself for a full minute before he found an elegant solution. It would take care of two unwanted interlopers at once.

  He knew Ash would catch up with him tonight, so while the hobgoblins entertained Dindi, Umbral retraced the trail back across the peat. He saw Ash and the other Deathsworn, still climbing the hill he and the girl had ascended earlier in the day.

  “Umbral!” Ash laughed when she saw him alone. “Finally tire of your bed puppet and cut her strings?”

  “Of course not,” he said. “She’s waiting for me.”

  “Oh, you tied her up.”

  “There was no need. She gave me her word she would not leave.”

  “And you trusted her, you fool?”

  “Let me worry about the girl. I have a task I need you to do.”

  He explained and as he expected, Ash began to curse and complain. “Finnadro! He shouldn’t even be alive! He should be wrapped in his own intestines, wearing his lungs as a hat!”

  “And yet, sadly, he missed that fashion tip. Here. This is for his dogs.”

  Umbral handed her a rag. She looked at it dubiously.

  “Rub it around, on
the ground, against brambles and branches. It’s got our scent. The dogs will pick up your scent too, but that can’t be helped, and probably doesn’t matter, as long as they think I’m there, and the girl too. Take this too.” He handed her a few hairs. Dindi had lost them on his raven cloak, which he gave to her to sleep on at night, and he had saved them. “If Finnadro knows I have the girl, and knowing Finnadro, I’m sure he does, he’ll notice those. Don’t be clumsy. I don’t want him to suspect a trap.”

  “What if he misses the hairs?” Ash asked dubiously.

  “He won’t. He may be an arrow in the ass, but he’s sharp.”

  “Ha. You’re funny. I’m laughing—inside. Bashing his head was obviously not good enough. Next time, separate his head from his body, that’s a surefire way to discourage further meddling—”

  “Ash,” he said, “Just create the false trail. As for killing him… I presume I can trust you.”

  She smiled too sweetly. “I won’t disappoint you, Umbral.”

  Ash trotted back the way she came. One troublemaker gone, and hopefully she would lead Finnadro away from his trail. Two troublemakers gone.

  Pleased with his own cleverness, Umbral returned to the edge of the hobgoblin ‘clanhold.’ It wasn’t really their clanhold, of course. If he did not miss his mark, the original peat houses had been dug by Aelfae. The Aelfae had probably been slaughtered by humans and the settlement had been abandoned. The hobgoblins played there when it suited them.

  The drizzle stopped and the night air smelled clear and clean. Umbral took a deep breath and enjoyed the quiet moment. For once he did not have worry about draining Dindi, so he allowed his Penumbra to seep energy from the bog, the sky, the mist, the night.

  Clang, clang, clang.

  Shouting and banging drew his attention back to the hobgoblin clanhold. The hobgoblins made quite a ruckus with their dancing, but they were fae. That was expected. He assumed Dindi had better sense than to join them in their circle and dance herself to death.

  Nonetheless, just to be safe, he strolled closer.

  A wave of roaring hobgoblins rushed toward him.