“What? Where?” The oldest of the councilors stared about in confusion until he saw where Valerian was looking. The stooped councilor took a shaky step back. “Dom Rux, what is the meaning of this?”
Torren surveyed them, not at all surprised by their reaction.
“Please, gentlemen, calm down,” Rux pleaded. “He’s the one who brought the Vassal to us. Without him she wouldn’t be here. And it was on Aen’s request he remained until the council’s acceptance of her identity.” The ambassador’s wings quivered with agitation. “Surely, this makes his presence acceptable.”
The two older councilors reluctantly conceded the point, though they wouldn’t make direct eye contact with Torren. He wondered if they’d ever even seen a Lander up close before.
“And what, exactly, would make a Lander give the Chosen such uncharacteristic charity?” Valerian’s question was aimed directly at him. “Could it be you’re expecting monetary compensation, knowing the high worth we place on the Vassal?”
His sarcasm was heavy.
“Valerian!” Rux stared from the councilor to his unusual guest and back again.
Torren clenched his jaw, his gaze not leaving the councilor’s face.
“Speak up,” Valerian taunted. “Have you nothing to say, Lander? Is the truth too obvious to be said?”
“Stop it!”
All turned in amazement to stare at Larana as she interposed herself between the two men. “You…you shouldn’t do this. He’s not one of them. He’s one of you!”
Rux spun to look at him, but Torren only stared at the floor, his heart pounding. Was she guessing, or did she actually believe? Though he’d not said anything about it to her, he realized the evidence had been there for her to draw her own conclusions. He hadn’t counted on this.
“My dear,” Valerian said, stepping forward to sweep Larana into his arm and pull her away from Torren as if she were a silly child. “It’s true he has our coloring, but he has no wings. Only the Vassal grows no wings amongst the Chosen.” His hard gaze returned to Torren. “At most, he might be a half-breed, begotten by foul means. And as such, and having been raised amongst them, he is one of them.”
Larana seemed to almost wilt beside the councilor as he held her, half-covered by a wing, as if he were claiming her for his own. With a shiver, she forcibly pulled away, shaking her head.
“You don’t understand,” she insisted, looking at the others. “He is one of you.” She turned to him. “Torren, tell them. Make them understand.”
He shook his head slowly. Let them think whatever they wanted. It was time for him to leave.
“Torren?” Rux was studying him with sudden intensity. “As in the son of Lar?”
His skin went cold. Yes, it was high time he took his leave.
“I should go.” He stepped out of the stairwell, his pack in tow, not looking at any of them. As he stepped out into the light, Rux moved in front of him, his scrutiny sharp.
“El be praised, it is you.” He shook his head wonderingly. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.” Before he could stop him, the ambassador grasped him in a fierce embrace. “It’s a miracle.”
“Rux, explain this! Why are you further soiling yourself with this grub?” The stooped councilor tapped his cane against the floor, making a ringing sound on the marble tiles.
Feeling incredibly tense and awkward, Torren was only moderately relieved when Rux finally let go of him. This man—this man had known him?
“Look at his face, Tel Icos,” Rux demanded. “Don’t you see? This is Torren, Tel Lar’s son. He accompanied his father when he went in search of the Vassal after her disappearance.”
Torren forcibly refrained from taking a step back as the three councilors stared at one another in confusion then seemed to move forward as one to take a closer look at him.
“By He who guides us, there is a resemblance.” The oldest of the three men peered at him, wings drooping behind him.
“But, Mides—”
“Hold, fellow councilors,” Valerian interjected, holding up his hands. “Let the fellow speak for himself. Let him explain how it is things have come to be as they are.”
Torren threw Valerian a look from the corner of his eye, not sure from the Flyer’s expression whether he truly wanted an explanation or was just trying to give him enough rope with which to hang himself. When he said nothing, Valerian’s face acquired a knowing smile.
“Torren, please tell them.” Larana stared at him from where she stood slightly off to the side, her eyes troubled. “They need to know.”
He glanced over at her, at her earnest face. Explain? He didn’t want to explain. What was there to explain? Wasn’t the fact the Vassal had been returned all they should care about? Why not leave other things alone?
He almost jumped as a hand fell on his shoulder.
“Please, do us this favor,” Rux said with deep emotion. “Your father was my friend, some of those who went with him my relatives. We need to know what became of them.”
His hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, his eyes locked to the floor. After several moments, he gave a long sigh and nodded. He could feel Larana standing by him, worried; but he didn’t look at her, instead crossing to stand before a brazier on the right.
“I doubt I’ll be able to tell you much.”
“Whatever you can will be fine.” Rux’s voice was kind.
He hesitated a moment longer, not having thought he’d ever have to do this. He forced himself to start.
“When the Vassal disappeared, my father, as many of the other councilors with experience below did, gathered a group of men together and set off in hopes of picking up the trail of whoever took her. We’d been traveling for many days, questioning every Lander we met. No one seemed to know anything, but the group was determined.”
There’d been fifteen of them—his father, some aides, cousins, friends and Torren himself. His father had served as an ambassador in one of the other countries for a time and had dealt with Landers, unlike so many of the Chosen. It was logical he would be one of those who went looking for the missing child.
He had been so proud when his father allowed him to come along. So pleased he could do his part to help El and also get a look at those who lived below—the barbarian Landers. He’d even been given the duty of carrying El’s standard, and he’d done it with pride. He’d been such a fool.
“Eventually, we came across a farmer who told us of a group of strangers he’d seen in the early morning, six days or more before. We went where he instructed us, into a small ravine with rock overhangs, straight into an ambush. It was close to dusk, and before we realized what was happening, nets came down on us from above, trapping everyone.
“Though we tried to fight and escape, we couldn’t get free. The attackers came and cut us down.” Torren closed his eyes, the memory of his companions’ agonized screams echoing inside his head. His father turning to him, trying to push him as far from the attackers as he could, and getting a sword in his back for the trouble. And they’d died for what? For what?
A soft touch on his hand made him open his eyes. Larana stood beside him, her eyes reflecting his anguish.
“They massacred everyone.”
Silence permeated the room. Then Valerian spoke.
“Yes. Well, I don’t mean to sound insensitive, but how is it you managed to survive?”
Torren felt his whole body stiffen. He didn’t like what the arrogant councilor’s tone implied. “It was only due to luck, fate—whatever you want to believe in. I’d been pinned beneath my father’s body. When they thought we were all dead and started removing the bodies to a pit they’d dug nearby, they discovered me. They decided they wanted to have some fun.”
His back twinged, his face clouding with the memory of the pain. “After they were done, they threw me on top of the others and half-buried us. They left me for dead, but I was able to make my way out of the loose dirt.” His voice grew quiet. “A farmer and his wife fo
und me on the road near dawn. They carried me away with them. They treated my wounds, and it’s only because of them I survived.”
His throat was dry, the hatred and gratitude he felt over their kind act still clashing inside him after all this time.
“So, that was how you…” Micca’s face was pale, his eyes wide. His wings were folded around his body as if to protect him from his own thoughts.
Torren said nothing.
“Can you tell us anything about who attacked you?” Rux asked.
He shook his head. “Not really. They were Landers, but they wore no identifying marks or insignia. They knew what they were doing and were thorough about it. The attack hadn’t been random; they weren’t bandits. They’d been waiting for us and knew how to incapacitate us to take away our air advantage.”
“In other words, your father got too close,” Valerian mused.
Torren looked up surprised.
“None of the other groups sent out to search for the Vassal were harmed but yours,” explained Tel Icos.
He frowned, not having ever made that connection. Could they truly have been so close? For the first time, he realized the area where Larana spent her youth was only a day or so from where the attack occurred. He’d been so close all this time and not known it? His nails bit into his hand.
“So, we’ve gotten Aen safely back, but still have no idea as to how or who took her in the first place.” Icos dropped into a chair. “It might happen again.”
“It won’t!”
Everyone turned to look at Micca. The young Flyer moved to stand by Larana.
“We’ve searched too long for her. Too many lives have been lost. Too many have suffered. I for one will not allow anything to happen to the Vassal again. I swear it.”
One of his wings unfolded partway to hover protectively behind her.
“You’re right,” said Valerian. “Aen will not leave us again.” The councilor’s face was hard.
Torren stepped away from them. “My time here is finished, so if you’ll excuse me.”
He started toward the double doors leading out into the hallway.
“But—” Rux took a step after him as if to try and intervene but didn’t.
He had almost reached the doors when a familiar voice did bring him to a stop.
“Wait!” Larana deftly dodged past Valerian and the others and ran to stand behind him. “Torren.”
Though it should have been simple, he couldn’t bring himself to turn around and look at her. He knew what she wanted, knew what she’d try to do; but he couldn’t—wouldn’t. His old life was gone. She couldn’t possibly expect him to live it again, not as a cripple.
“Yes?”
She said nothing, instead reaching out and taking his hand. Apprehension and loss flooded through him, and though a little of it was his, most of it belonged to her. But why should she feel this way? They hadn’t known each other long. And she had nothing to be apprehensive about—she had a new life, comfort and safety in her future.
Torren half-turned at last. She looked over her shoulder at the others as if to assure herself none would come near. When she turned back to him, he realized she was afraid. And it wasn’t fear of losing him but something deeper.
“Larana?”
“I just…I just wanted to thank you again,” she told him quietly. She put something in his hand. “And to give you this. It’s the only thing I have that’s my own.”
He was tempted to look down to see what it was she’d given him but didn’t. Couldn’t. He was trapped by her eyes as tears formed in them but didn’t fall. He said the first thing he could think of, though he didn’t understand all the connotations of it himself.
“It’s been an honor to know you.”
Larana’s eyes brightened, the fear momentarily gone. “Please be happy.”
He gave her a half-smile and a nod. “You, too.”
The next thing he knew, he’d turned around, opened the door and left her.
As he stepped out of the building into the morning sunlight, Torren felt certain he was leaving his old life behind finally and forever.
Chapter Fourteen
Seven days. It had been seven days since he’d left her, and they felt like the longest days of his life.
Torren drank the rest of his ale, not tasting it. His eyes locked again on the blue hair clip Larana had given him as he slammed the cup down on the table with a dissatisfied sigh. He barely noticed the curious looks it earned him and even less the worried ones coming from across the bar.
What was he still doing here? What was he waiting for?
After he left the ambassador’s home, he had ended up at Sal’s door rather than on his way out of the city as he’d planned. Sal had been only too happy to see him and had wined and dined him as he told his merry tale about how the expected attackers had come, and how, just as they’d started banging on his door, the watch had shown up. The guards had driven the assailants off in a rout, smashing many heads while they were at it. Sal laughed as he told Torren how his customers had gotten a little more for their money than usual.
He then asked about Larana, but after Torren’s halfhearted, incoherent reply, he’d not asked again. Torren went to bed that first night, his head ringing from mead and wine, planning to leave the next day to pursue his original plan of going north.
He never did, for that same night he dreamed his old dream of horror and pain, reliving the day his father and the others were killed, the occasion during which he had lost his life as a Chosen—the day on which everything he was and believed in was destroyed.
But this time—this time the nightmare was different. This time he was not the one carrying the standard, not the one watching helplessly as others were mercilessly butchered. It was not he who was dragged from the nets, poked and shoved and, finally, filled with agony as his wings were sawed from his body before he was dumped to die like an animal. This time, it was Larana who suffered all this and more in his stead.
Torren awakened feeling cold and weak. In the darkness, all he was able to think about was the apprehension he’d felt from her, the fear he thought he’d seen in her eyes as he turned to leave her. But what did one have to do with the other?
Yet, though he possessed no answer to this question, the dead certainty the two happenings were related wouldn’t leave him.
When the sun had risen and light once more intruded into his world, he found the floating city of the Chosen gone. He’d wanted nothing more than for this to be so, but now it brought him no satisfaction, only dread. All he could think about was his transformed dream and the reasons it might have changed in such a strange and horrifying way.
That first day he had sat where he sat now, pondering the question and coming up with no answers, worried over he knew not what. Later, he had the new dream again, and this time he saw it was his name on her lips as she screamed in agony.
Again, he’d not been able to sleep after the nightmare, and so dawn and Sal had found him back at the corner table. Sal asked him what was wrong, but Torren only stared at him and said nothing until his friend finally went away. How could he even attempt to explain something he himself didn’t understand?
He thought of leaving, of running away. Perhaps a change of scenery would make the nightmare disappear. But he didn’t—he couldn’t. Something inside told him he was where he needed to be. If he hadn’t known better, he would have thought he was acting like a lovesick pup mourning the loss of the object of his affection.
In a different way, though, he felt almost driven to stay, as if someone were trying to tell him something through his dreams and all he had to do was figure out what. It was ludicrous; but as infuriated as doing nothing made him feel, he trusted his instincts. So, he sat and waited, staring at Larana’s gift as day after day the dream returned and he grew more and more isolated from everyone and everything around him.
Chapter Fifteen
"By the gods, Torren, hasn’t this gone on long enough?” Sal whis
pered harshly as he set a food-filled plate before him. “Talk to me, you stubborn fool.”
Torren only stared at the hair clip.
“You hardly eat, I doubt you sleep. You only sit here brooding, scaring off my customers.” Sal stared at him anxiously, rubbing at his scar, his words falling on deaf ears. “Torren.”
His friend grabbed his arm and shook him, looking for some kind of reaction.
Torren finally gave him an angry glare. “Would you prefer it if I left?”
“Dammit, no!” Sal waved his arms in frustration. “It’s just that I’ve never seen you act this way. Not even when I first met you, and you were such a disagreeable and angry young man. I only want to help.”
He shook his head. “There’s nothing to help me with.”
“But, Torren, surely…does this have anything to do with the lass?”
He tensed, his hands curling into fists on the table. He suddenly turned to look at Sal, his eyes intent. “Do you believe in the gods—I mean, truly believe in them?”
Sal stared back, caught off-guard by the question, then gave his friend a half-shrug, not sure where he was going with this but happy to have him talking. “I don’t honestly know if I do or not. They’ve always been a part of my life, one way or another, and I’ve never been one to take unnecessary chances. Why?”
Torren only shook his head, unable to explain. He could see Sal was about to press him when they were interrupted.
“By all that’s sacred, I’d hoped you’d be here.”
Torren turned, startled by the familiar voice, and spotted Micca hurrying toward him from the inn’s door. He frowned deeply, not at the Flyer’s unexpected yet somehow unsurprising arrival but at how he was dressed.
Micca wasn’t wearing either the long or short robes that were the Flyers’ customary garb. Instead, he was wearing pants and a loose shirt similar to Torren’s own, as well as a large cloak and a backpack. While wearing Lander clothing was highly unusual, what was more so was that he was using the backpack and cloak to disguise the fact he had wings.
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