by Fran Wilde
Rya blinked, her tattoos patterning her dark skin like shadows. She tilted her head, birdlike, inquisitive. “Tell me more.”
“There’s at least two kites’ worth of supplies missing. And we still have people above the clouds who we’ll need to get down. We can’t lose any more supplies.”
Macal had sent word he’d be heading down today, but we hadn’t seen him yet.
The wind picked up and rain began to spit in our faces. The pulley operators lowering a nearby kite worked carefully. I could see it descending, the lighter-than-air buoying it as it bounced down the tower.
When the big kite, packed with remaining citizens, had moved beyond the clouds, Rya returned to the cave and I followed.
Only a few remained in the midcloud. The cave echoed, empty. A blackwing stood in the meadow, coiling lines.
“Where are you taking those?” I asked, thinking of the missing supplies.
He drew a knife, preparing to defend his find.
Rya emerged from the cave but was not close enough. I was. “Nat, stop him.”
Resources. Lifelines. The community needed those. I grabbed the ropes back from him, and as we struggled, the city rumbled.
The blackwing let go and ran to the ridgeline. He began to climb it as he unfurled his wings. Below us, the meadow jolted. The holes in the platform began to tear, spilling lichen and ferns. The blackwing fell to his knees.
What I’d give to know I’d see my family again. I’d promised I would.
“Get to the kites!” Rya yelled.
I vowed I’d make it back to the ground.
I grabbed the lines the blackwing had dropped and ran through the cave. At one of the few towers that still had hang-sacks strung from it, I shouted to see if anyone needed aid. A young man with a small child came out, and I grabbed them and flew them to the nearest kite.
When I went back to the meadow again, it was empty. The jolting ceased. For a moment, the city was still. Then for several moments more.
Rya stood in the cave mouth, looking over the meadow. “What just happened? The city lurched. We should fly.” She seemed calm, but she was right. We had to go. The last kites were on their pulleys and already several were being lowered much faster than we’d ever tried before.
Macal was still missing.
Rya ordered the remaining artifexes to bring out all their lighter-than-air: a jumbled collection of enormous husks and smaller balloons. We took those to the city’s edges. But instead of the organized process we’d executed so far, the balloons were tied everywhere too fast. There were too many on one kite, not enough on another, or one level of a kite had too many. They began to descend anyway, filled with panicked citizens and blackwings.
The city shook again. Nothing as vigorous as a rumble. Just a shudder. “Hurry!” I shouted. I grabbed a pulley rope and began to help lower another kite through the cloud.
When a rope began to fray, I doubled it with one of my reserve lines. I saw others, including Rya and Moc, doing the same.
When the last kite on our stretch of pulleys had been lowered past the cloud, I prepared to follow them. The crew made room for me and held out a net in case I fell.
As I prepared to fly, one last flier approached. Macal?
But the farthest kite was having trouble with its pulleys. Their lines were fouled, twisted, and they lurched sideways, spilling contents, panicking. I lost sight of the flier.
I climbed back up the pulley line, hoping to reach them, but my crew began to panic too.
Returning to my kite, I hung on as the wind faded, then surged again. We slowly inched towards the base of the cloud. Were the lines long enough? They had been, but with the new jolt, had the city shifted for the worse? Was the lighter-than-air enough?
Around the city’s edge, our last kites descended out of the clouds.
Before we ran out of line, when the wind was still ours, we unfurled the windscoops. They expanded with a snap and ballooned out, catching as much wind as they could.
We did not fall.
Instead we floated, slowly moving away from the city on our borrowed wind from above.
The ground became clearer, the city below, enormous. The horizon a thin line against the red.
Among my crew, a young blackwing passed out from fear. “Easy,” I said. “We will be all right.”
A child nearby stopped crying and huddled near the bottom of the basket instead.
When the kite jerked and swayed as it lost wind, the lighter-than-air supported it. We drifted down slowly. We were so close.
But with a final rush of air and movement, the city rolled. Where it had been braced on Nimru’s towers, it now hung in the air. Then with us still attached, it rolled farther. The towers began to crack loudly.
Only two kites on nearby pulleys were close enough to hear shouting. “Let your chute go!”
The nearest kite tilted. Its crew slid, one person dangled, their wings open, useless. Then the crew deployed their windscoop and drifted free of the pulleys. I cried out with relief.
From our vantage below it, the kite seemed to drift away from the city.
In fact, the city was tilting away from the kite.
Our own ropes began to pull taut.
“Cut the lines!” I shouted. I reached out with my knife to the one closest to me and began sawing at it. Crew on the kite’s other side did the same.
We floated away, descending a little too quickly, as the city continued to tilt from us.
More people ran across the ground far below, fleeing the shadow overhead. “Hurry!” I yelled as though they could hear me.
When our city finally fell, we watched from the air as it crashed in on itself, spraying bone shards and undergrowth everywhere.
Birds scattered and—high above—the air roiled as a skymouth tried to fly free of the wreckage. Its long, invisible arms inscribed the clouds to tatters, as if it were trying to hold everything together and failing.
28
KIRIT, BELOW
On dangerous ground, the Skyshouter searched for home.
“Why are we going to the ridge and not home?” Dix asked, half asleep.
Because there is no home yet. Because there are no cities on the ridge.
“Because smoke sometimes means people,” I said. How far could it be? It had been seven, maybe eight days since we left our city.
“It looked, from the Varat map, like at least two days’ walk, maybe another half day after that. If you didn’t stop for the hot parts of the day,” Dix cautioned. “The ridge might be worth looking into, but what if our people can’t make it that far on foot?”
What if we don’t make it that far? Especially with Dix going so slow.
I lifted Maalik from his resting place in my robe. Fed him a small bit of the food I had left. The whipperling had begun losing feathers after the devices went off. He shook when I held him.
He looked like he’d been through quite a fight. We both did. My resolve grew.
If Dix stole Maalik again? I would get him back. If he couldn’t fly when I needed him to? He would have to.
Before I’d made Wik begin the long walk back towards our city, I hadn’t worried as much. Now, almost alone with Dix and Liope, I worried all the time.
The healer cast anxious glances at the ridge, but stayed with us.
I spent my time echoing, keeping Dix from the grasp of groundmouths. Nodding encouragingly as Liope tried to echo too. When it grew too hot, we set up Dix’s wings as sunbreaks. We tried to sleep in their minimal shade. When it cooled, we began walking again.
“I have a worry too,” Dix said close by my ear one morning. “What if your healer is with us for a purpose?”
“They can come or go whenever they like.” I didn’t like her tone.
“They could also be trying to infiltrate our city. It’s what I might have done.”
I shivered. “It was what you did. But why would they do it?”
“To seek out our artifexes. To gain our wingmaker
s. To kill our city.”
“Our city is already dead, Dix.” You helped kill it. So did I.
“True. But the people are not. We still have some knowledge Liope’s city wants.”
Until I knew what game Dix was playing, I couldn’t trust her words. Nor could I trust Liope. “Then we are well matched,” I finally said. “Three citykillers, together. Far from any city.”
One foot before the other. Each step, progress.
The earth beneath my feet, so different from the bone tiers.
The healer caught up with us as we stopped to rest.
While Dix dozed, Liope gestured to my satchel. Hoping to distract them from the map, I drew out one of the brass plates from the midcloud.
They stared, tracing a finger along the etchings of the cities, the markings that looked like stars upside down. “Serrahun,” they said, pointing at a creature on the plate, then back the way we’d come, towards Varat. They sketched Varat in the sand with a finger. Then drew several figures dressed like themselves beside it.
“Serra,” they said, putting their hand on the city. Then they put their other hand on the figures at the same time as the city. “Serrahun.” I perched on the edge of understanding.
Then Liope touched my shoulder, pointed at Dix, and tapped their own chest. “Hun.”
I pointed at another city on the brass plate. “Serrahun.” The healer shook their head. No.
I took in the rolling hills and watched the distant sky, hoping to find safety as we walked towards the ridge. The healer’s word whispered in my ears. Serrahun could be a word for community. For home. For safety.
For too long now, our city hadn’t served as a safe place, and we needed one badly.
We began walking again, Liope whispering strange words to us as we drew closer to the ridge. Me trying to learn, hoping to keep my people safe, determined to find a home.
* * *
Through one long night, then another. When I could, I carried Dix. When I couldn’t, she fell far behind and we had to wait for her to catch up.
I tired of her whispering, “Kirit,” in my ear.
Liope walked beside us, silent. Once, they offered to carry Dix, shifting their pack to the front. They dropped the blackwing on the ground, muttering angrily when she whispered too much.
We’d made no further headway on trying to understand each other, and the healer was growing more restless as we came closer to the coast.
As the first sunrise lifted above the horizon, the light shifted.
The morning was clear and, for the first time, slightly cooler even in the sun. A breeze—an actual breeze—came from somewhere ahead. The ragged silk of my robe fluttered in it. A flock of unfamiliar birds spilled from the ridgeline and fanned into the sky.
“Might be wind up ahead,” Dix said.
We were halfway to the ridge when an enormous crack sounded across the plain, followed by a roar that did not cease. A cloud of dust billowed.
From the direction Wik had gone. The direction of our city, our towers.
No. Not yet. The city couldn’t collapse yet.
But we turned and saw the dust billow as the distant city rolled to its side.
Our time had run out.
I dropped Dix. She fell hard to the ground and cried out in pain, but said nothing.
The dust rose higher still until it blocked out the sun. It rose to the cloud. Joined the cloud and the ground in a wall of gray.
The healer stood and watched. “Serra-nar,” they murmured quietly. They sliced the air with their fingers. Then they silently reached out to Dix and lifted her to her feet.
Even I could figure out what that gesture and the word “nar” meant.
I scrambled up the ridge until I could see bone tiers splayed broken across the ground. Large kites bigger than any plinth or wing, drifting away on the spare breeze, buoyed by lighter-than-air.
More tiers and bridges fell through the cloud above. The rumbling did not stop, and the ground beneath us started to shake.
The kites descended around the city, into the dust. They were too far away. I could not reach them.
But two kites careened towards the ridge, one drifting low, the other high and erratic. Those I thought I could reach, maybe help.
Leaving Dix and Liope behind, I stumbled, then ran.
29
MACAL, BELOW
A sudden, unexpected flock of whipperlings and kaviks sped through the midcloud as I circled down. Flying too fast to avoid me, they swirled around me screeching. A cloud of black and gray feathers caught me up. The beat of wing against air filled my ears.
Then the flock passed, diving straight through the clouds and disappearing. Mist pulled along in their wake and stretched into thin, grasping curls, as if it, too, wanted to cling to me, then flee.
Concerned, I began a fast dive towards the meadow. When the city jerked and shook, there were no birds left to screech an alarm. The only sounds were the crack of bone and heavy objects falling.
Several pairs of silk wings, tiny at this distance, flew out from the meadow and the cave beyond.
I followed them, whistling my windsigns: Magister. I got no answer, nor had I expected any. I pursued the fliers anyway.
The city jerked again before I reached the closest set of pulleys. I wasn’t surprised to see the kite descending, its pulley crews already sliding down the tethers behind them.
I flew to the next tower and found a last kite. Empty, save for two blackwings—one older, one much younger—frantically trying to untangle a twisted pulley line.
“I can help,” I shouted.
They made room, and I landed on the kite’s box frame. When the city shook this time, I held on to the lines, as the blackwings did.
“We should cut the lines,” the older blackwing said, fear pitching his voice higher.
“Don’t! It’s not safe.” I saw only five goosebladders of lighter-than-air tied to the kite. Not enough by far, especially if the kite dropped precipitously. “We can lower ourselves. Let me show you.”
I reached for one of the sacks of lighter-than-air and the younger blackwing drew his knife. “What are you doing? We need those.”
“I’m going up to untangle the lines. I’m taking this as a safety precaution.” I tied a tether line to the kite as well. Then reached for the goosebladder. They let me take it. “It will only be a moment.” I spoke calmly to try to soothe them, but they were so afraid. Anything could spook them.
I climbed up the left pulley line, the thick fiber rough on my palms. My legs shook from exhaustion with every rope span I raised myself, but I kept going. Let my momentum be driven by the remaining lighter-than-air. When I reached the spot where the right pulley had snarled, I used my bone hook to tug loose the fiber that had hooked around its sister line, yanking it into a half-slipknot. A few shakes, and the line came loose. I looked down at my companions in triumph, just as the pulley blocks above my head and the lines they were attached to swung violently away from the tower trunk.
The air dragged at my robes. The tower loomed over me.
“Cut the lines!” the older blackwing yelled again. The rope I clung to began to vibrate as they sawed at it.
My safety tether stretched and tightened at my waist when the kite dropped away.
From below, gravity and the tether dragged at me, but my hands were locked around the line above.
Then a crack ran through the tower, a sharp edge where smooth bone had been a moment before, a jagged line that oozed where the blocks had been secured.
The pulley block broke loose with a shriek, hitting me hard on the chin. It smashed into the goosebladder. I fell backward towards the kite.
I smelled gas. And smoke.
My wings wouldn’t open.
Oh, Sidra.
My city, I couldn’t hold you.
I fell into the shattered air.
PART THREE
THE RISE
30
NAT, BELOW
The kites
float and crash, all down so fast
In the billowing dust and wind, three kites already on the ground broke from their tethers. They began to drift.
Our own kite swung lower in the sky as the crews on the ground fought for control.
Another kite crew dropped fiber ladders, like trailing seams in the air. Several citizens shimmied down. When they reached ground, they tethered the ladders to anything heavy they could find: enormous bones and crushed ore that projected from the ground. Anything immobile.
Two more kites bucked their anchors and rose through the dust. One was sucked into the whirlwind and smashed to the earth.
I leaned out of my kite and scanned the ground, looking for three figures: Ceetcee, Beliak, Ciel. I couldn’t find them.
“Nat, can you see what’s happening?” My crew stayed calm, but only barely.
“Some, but not enough,” I answered.
More kite crews slid down the lines of their surviving craft, two to a line. Using their heft to anchor the silk and bone rafts, these crews leaned groundward, desperate to make contact in the blowing dust. They disappeared and reappeared in the debris. Desperate shouts and more came running to help. Two kites were finally caught and re-anchored.
When the large wave of dust washed over the third, tilting, kite, it disappeared.
The cloud of bone and earth rose around us. It rolled over people on the ground and hid them. In the air, we covered our faces with silk and closed our eyes against it for as long as we could. We shielded our mouths and tried not to breathe too deeply. Still, the dust abraded our eyes. Caught in our teeth.
With a roar that made the air tremble, the impact rolled over us.
We fought for control of the kite. Steering, altitude, direction.
I pointed and yelled commands to the kite crew, adjusting tension in the foils, trying to keep us from tipping over in the blast. My ears reverberated with wind, and also with fear for those I loved. Fear for me.
We rolled in the maelstrom. In the sand light I couldn’t know who else was trapped with us.
The kite rattled. Dipped. I pulled two more crew onto the cams that controlled the wind scoops, and we adjusted tension and ballast until our pitching craft calmed.