by John Marco
Korace waved him away as he sat back on his throne, much more interested in Merceron than another human. Artaios stooped down to face Moth, his wings enfolding them both like a blanket.
“You’ll be safe, Egg,” he said. His voice was surprisingly sad. “Alisaundra will take you both to the flying machine.” He turned to Skyhigh, adding, “Protect him, human. Take him through the Reach. If you don’t, you’ll face me in Pandera.”
Skyhigh smiled mockingly. “Then we’ll see each other again.”
He took Moth’s hand. Alisaundra bowed to her Masters, then urged Moth and Skyhigh out of the chamber. Moth lingered, unable to leave.
“Merceron,” he gasped. “I’m sorry . . .”
Skyhigh urged him toward the exit. “We have to go.”
“I’m sorry!” cried Moth.
Alis took his arm. “Hurry, hurry. . . .”
Merceron gave Moth one last wink. “I’m not afraid, Moth. Fiona’s trick, remember?”
For a second Moth paused, bewildered. Then he remembered, and with a touch of comfort, he nodded.
“Good-bye, Merceron,” he choked. “My friend.”
ALLIES
MOTH MOVED IN A FOG, following Alisaundra and Skyhigh to the place where the dragonfly waited, a huge platform jutting out from the cliff of Korace’s tower. True to Artaios’ word, no one had followed or tried to stop them. The platform was eerily quiet, as if all the Skylords in the city had gathered to watch Merceron’s death. The dragonfly stood poised at the edge, ready to take flight. Skyhigh hurried to the craft, running his hands over the wings, inspecting it with his critical eye.
“She looks okay,” he said, as though he’d expected some sort of sabotage. He popped the canopy and inspected the inside, too. Alisaundra waited, rocking impatiently on her clawed feet. Skyhigh was still talking, but Moth was a million miles away, his thoughts all on Merceron.
They’d left him to die. After Merceron had come all this way to save him, Moth had run away. He realized he was shaking. He hadn’t stopped crying, either. He wiped at his cheeks, unable to make sense of things.
“What did he mean?” he asked. “Blood for blood and all that. What did he mean?”
Alisaundra said, “A sacrifice. It takes life to work the changing magic.”
“What?” exclaimed Moth. “You mean someone died to change you into what you are?”
“I died,” said Alis. “But to change me back would take another life.”
“Merceron’s life, you mean,” said Moth. “For Esme. Skyhigh, did you know this?”
Skyhigh pushed him toward the dragonfly. “Moth, we don’t have time. Merceron made his choice. Hurry up. . . .”
“Wait.” Alisaundra spun Moth around. “I will come with you.”
“Alis?”
“I can help you,” said the Redeemer eagerly. “I know the way to Pandera. We can make it quickly.”
“Alis, why?” asked Moth. “You’re sworn to Artaios.”
“Because . . .” Alis searched for an answer. “You need me.”
“No way!” Skyhigh jumped in. “I don’t even have room for her!”
“Skyhigh, she’s right. She can help us,” said Moth.
“Are you crazy? She’s the one who kidnapped you! Now you want to take this thing with us?”
“She’s not a thing, she’s a person,” argued Moth. He looked at Alis, sure of himself. “She’s human.”
Skyhigh gave a miserable curse. “Fine,” he snapped, “but she needs to keep up with us. We’re going full throttle, and there’s no room in the dragonfly.”
“I can fly faster than your machine,” said Alis. “Have you forgotten?”
“Alis, you can come,” Moth decided. “But we can’t leave yet. Skyhigh, get the dragonfly going. Alis, come with me.”
Moth bolted from the platform, back toward the tower. Skyhigh called after him.
“Moth! Where you going?”
Moth shouted back, “Get in the air and wait for us! I’m going back for Comet!”
INTO THE SUN
HIGH ABOVE MERCERON, the Skylords of the palace looked down from the ancient trees and galleries, waiting for his death. The young ones blinked in wonderment, while the veterans of the dragon wars watched, quietly satisfied. Merceron looked back silently at their luminous faces. The sun burned brightly in the sky, warming him. Weary, he succumbed to it.
At last, he would sleep.
He’d done everything right. He tried to remember some regrets, but he had none suddenly, and his clear conscience surprised him. True, Dreojen blamed him, but he no longer blamed himself. And though the Skylords might yet win the Starfinder, Merceron had at least saved Moth.
“Now it’s your turn,” he told Esme softly. He ran a finger lightly over her feathered back, hoping for one last glimpse of her the way she’d been. In his mind he’d held a picture of her all these years, the most beautiful Skylord he had ever seen. “Soon you’ll be whole again, my friend. You’ll forgive me for doing this.”
Esme’s eyes glowed with understanding.
“Dragon,” said Artaios. “You give your life for a Skylord. Be proud. Not every dragon is so noble.”
“I give my life for a friend,” said Merceron, “and not for any of your kind.”
Korace reached out from his throne, touching the sword at Artaios’ belt. As his fingers brushed the strange metal, the sword began to sing, its vibrations sending an odd light across the floor.
“If you have words, speak them,” Artaios told Merceron. He freed the sword from his belt “Be heard now. When I’m done, there will be nothing left of you.”
Merceron studied Artaios, then his wizened father, then the arena packed with beautiful, vengeful faces. Did he have words? Should he curse them?
“Just this, then,” said Merceron. He raised his voice so that all could hear him. “The sky belongs to everyone. It belongs to the dragons like it does to the clouds. It belongs to any race that can reach it. Even humans.”
Korace gave a hiss of contempt. The galleries filled with shouts.
“Clip their wings, but they’ll grow back!” Merceron went on. “And if you keep the sky from them—as you’ve kept it from my own race—they will destroy you for it!”
The hall erupted. Merceron basked in their anger. Artaios slowly raised his sword, his face joyless.
“No pain,” he promised. “Close your eyes.”
“No,” defied Merceron. “I want to see.”
With Esme in his upturned palm, he raised her above his head, remembering Fiona’s trick . . .
His fear vanished in an instant, replaced by a memory of Elaniel. Once, he had raised Elaniel over his head as well, when his son was just a wyrmling. The thought played like a dream in Merceron’s mind.
Fly Elaniel!
And Elaniel had flown.
Artaios touched the sword to Merceron’s belly. Along the blade danced the dragon’s life force.
A bird she had been, unable to speak with words or to think an entire, complex thought.
Small she had been, for nearly fifty years.
In her tiny, hollow bones, Esme felt the burning. A dazzling, blinding light engulfed her. She felt herself stretching skyward, felt Merceron collapsing. Her wings struggled madly for air. In a maelstrom of fire, an unseen force pulled her apart, raking her flesh. She was unable to fly, and the floor rose up to meet her. Instinctively she stretched her talons as she hit the ground.
Instead, her fingers scratched the stones. All around her swirled the mist, searing her skin. Weak, she lifted her head, about to scream. Her white wings draped her naked body. As the storm subsided, she remembered what she’d been.
And what she was again.
Next to her lay Merceron, lifeless on the floor. All around her stared her people. Esme trembled as she tried to push herself upright with her unused limbs. Her huge, snowy wings were moving with newborn life. She tried to speak but made no sound.
Artaios towered before her. She reme
mbered him and his feeble father. The sword dangled in his hand. He bent to look at her, his eyes wide at what he’d done.
“Can you hear me?”
His voice was like an echo, gradually reaching her foggy mind.
“You’re home now,” he said. “You are welcome here, if you have learned from your punishment.”
Past him sat Korace on his silver throne, watching her, waiting for her answer. All that had happened in fifty years came flooding into Esme’s mind, giving her a bitter strength. With one mighty effort, she lifted herself.
“Speak,” Artaios commanded. “Has your penance made you wiser?”
Esme tilted her face toward the sun. Its kiss fortified her. She stretched her wings, letting the warmth caress her feathers.
“Esme,” Artaios warned, “if you leave here, you can never come back.”
Esme wasted none of her strength, not even to answer him. Confident, she leaped for the sky, letting her wings beat the air.
“You’ll be an outcast forever!” cried Artaios. “Forever, do you hear?”
Esme climbed ever higher, wrapped by the sun’s yellow arms. Below her, her people watched in silence. For fifty years she hadn’t spoken, her voice magically imprisoned. Now, in a great, exalting song, she released her unbound cry.
CLOSER
FIONA BENT LOW OVER HER grandfather’s toolbox, careful not to bang her head in the small control room. A bank of levers covered the nearest wall, webbed with wires and steam conduits. Metal struts hung low across the ceiling—the airship’s exposed, riveted skeleton. Fiona rummaged through the wooden box, shunting aside spools of string and discarded hardware.
“Is this it?” she asked, pulling out a small, box-headed wrench. She placed the wrench in Rendor’s hand, who knew it instantly by touch.
“That’s it,” he replied, and the wrench disappeared beneath the console. With only his legs and torso exposed, he began tightening the newly repaired speaking tube.
Fiona sat back, eager to give the tube a try. She had worked on it with her grandfather the entire morning, first removing it, then hammering it back into shape, and now trying to maneuver it back into position. The metal tube rose up from under the console like a hooded cobra, its bendable joints shining and newly oiled. A tulip-shaped mouthpiece covered its other end. Underneath the console, Fiona could hear her grandfather tightening bolts. There wasn’t much she understood about the Avatar, but she was learning quickly.
“Ready?” she asked.
“Not yet.”
Fiona stifled a sigh. If she sounded bored, even a little, he might send her away. There were others who could better help her grandfather. Since recovering from his altitude sickness, he had spent nearly every waking hour with her. They ate together, made inspections of the Avatar, sat with the centaurs around their fires at night, and—on brief occasions—even talked.
Mostly, though, they made ready for war. Each day, scouts like Tyrin returned from the mountains with tales of fiery chariots and Redeemers hung with silver chains, of monsters called cloud horses and other, balloonlike beings the centaurs called “ogilorns.” These huge, bulbous jellyfish things were as big as the Avatar, Jorian claimed, and when he sketched one in the dirt for them, Fiona nearly fainted.
“Purple they are,” Jorian had said. “With hanging tentacles twice as long as the rest of them.”
Ogilorns were rare, Jorian had told them, from a part of the world no centaur had ever seen. No one knew why they did the Skylords’ bidding either, though the Chieftain took a guess.
“Slaves now,” he concluded. “Conquered like the dragons.”
Fiona thought hard about this as her grandfather finished with the speaking tube.
“Grandfather?”
“Yeah?”
“If an ogilorn is like a jellyfish, then a gun should be able to kill it, right? Like popping a balloon, right?”
“Hope so. Hang on now. Almost done . . .”
“What happens if the Avatar gets hit like that? Will it pop like a balloon?”
“You know what happens if an airship gets a hole in it?”
“What?”
“Not much. That’s why the envelope’s kept at low pressure. Slow leaks only. And the lifting gas is stored in different places. That’s all those bladders you see tucked between the stringers. When we’re done here I’ll show you.”
Fiona noticed the way her grandfather’s voice changed whenever he spoke about airships. She still didn’t have much interest in them—not like Moth, at least—but she loved how excited her grandfather sounded, like a little kid.
“What made you invent the airships?” she asked. “Why’d you want to fly so bad?”
He laughed. “What?”
“Was it your brother and the wings?”
Rendor pushed himself out from beneath the console. He sat up, frowning. “Did I tell you that story?”
“My mom did,” Fiona answered.
“Huh. I told that story to Moth before he was captured. Funny you should bring it up.”
“Whatever happened to Uncle Conrad?”
Her grandfather smiled sadly. “He died a long time ago, before your mother was born. Bastard never did make me those wings!”
Fiona tried to laugh. She wanted more from her grandfather, about her uncle, about everything, but every time she pushed, the old man made a joke. She flicked a fingernail against the speaking tube.
“Ready now?”
Rendor wiped his oily hands on his pants. “Run down to the bridge. Give it a try.”
Fiona crawled out of the control room, then hurried through the narrow corridor toward the bridge, squeezing past others on the way. The Avatar was a maze to her, but she managed to find the bridge simply by pointing her nose in the right direction. The space was empty, except for Commander Donnar, who busied himself with a bank of gauges and a note pad. The tarp that covered the broken bridge had been temporarily pulled away, revealing the sun-splashed village and its centaurs, most going about their daily routines, others gathered around Jorian, training for the coming battle. Donnar gave Fiona a cursory nod as she headed for the speaking tube near the navigation deck.
“Hello?” she said, putting her lips to the mouthpiece. “Can you hear me?”
After a moment came her grandfather’s reply.
“It works! I can hear you perfectly, Fiona! How do I sound?”
“Fine,” said Fiona. “A little echoey.”
“That’s normal. Keep talking. Tell me what you see.”
“Uhm . . .” Fiona looked out the open space where the glass windshield once had been. “I see the village. Jorian’s outside with his warriors. They’re charging each other, training for the fight.”
“Okay. That’s good, Fiona.”
“Oh, and I see young ones too,” Fiona noted. She smiled as she watched a team of little centaurs running along the field beside the older ones. “They’re kicking a ball. Huh.”
“What?”
“They’re just having a good time, is all.” Fiona couldn’t pull her eyes away. “It’s like they don’t even know about the trouble coming.”
There was a long pause at the other end of the tube. Fiona tapped the mouthpiece.
“Can you still hear me?”
“Yes.” The voice was softer now, cautious. “Are you alone on the bridge?”
Fiona glanced at Donnar. The grizzled commander overheard Rendor’s question. He nodded at Fiona, okaying her lie.
“Yes,” she told her grandfather.
“Move closer to the tube.”
Fiona put her face very close. “I am.”
Another pause, this one longer than the first. Fiona waited, saying nothing.
“I’m sorry you’re stuck here,” he said suddenly. “You shouldn’t be. I shouldn’t have taken you to Calio.” He took a shaking breath. “I’m sorry, Fiona. All right?”
Fiona swallowed. “Yes,” she answered. She put her ear against the tube and closed her eyes.
&n
bsp; “When your mother died . . . you think I didn’t want you, but that’s not true. I just wanted to be Governor more. My ambition . . .” Rendor struggled with his words. “I was right about the Skylords though. You see that now, don’t you, Fiona?”
Fiona nodded. “I do.”
He answered with a sigh. Fiona looked at Donnar. The old commander tinkered with his gauges, pretending not to hear.
“Why are you telling me all this?” asked Fiona into the mouthpiece. “Why now?”
“Because you need to know it. You’ve always needed to know it. Now because . . .” He stopped himself. “Fiona, before, when you asked about the Avatar . . .”
“Uh-huh?”
“It wasn’t all true. If we pump the envelope too full . . .”
Donnar turned from his work, looking grimly at Fiona.
“Hidrenium changes when its over-pressured,” continued Rendor. “If it’s shocked by a charge, it explodes.”
“Huh?”
“It could make the Avatar a flying bomb.”
Fiona understood perfectly. “That’s crazy! You can’t—”
“Skyhigh can get you out of here in his dragonfly, Fiona. The Starfinder too. If it comes to that . . . I’ll do what I have to do.”
“Skyhigh’s gone! And what about you? What about the crew?” Fiona turned to Donnar, who was suddenly rushing toward the broken window. Outside she heard a commotion. “Hold on,” she told her grandfather.
All around the village the centaurs were staring skyward. Fiona went to Donnar’s side and leaned out over the bridge. A small winged creature hovered high over the village.
“A Redeemer!”
But before Fiona could rush back to the speaking tube, she heard another sound rushing forward, a loud, familiar clanging sound. She turned toward it, stunned to see a dragonfly. Out on the field, Jorian tilted his bow skyward.
“Wait!” cried Fiona. “That’s Skyhigh!”
Jorian heard her shout and held his glowing arrow. The Redeemer turned toward the speeding dragonfly. Rendor crashed onto the bridge.
“What’s happening?” he asked as he maneuvered for a look.