Cry of the Falcon (Falcons Saga Book 4)

by Court Ellyn

  “I mean to go to Azhdyria with him, if that’s what you mean.”

  Thorn huffed.

  “And if he’ll not consent to take me, I’ll stow myself away below decks.”

  “Ha, you’ve just given away your secret, love. Now I’ll know where to find you and toss you overboard.”

  A sharp gasp from Lyrienn ended their banter. “Now I remember! I knew I had heard your voice before. It was a few nights ago. I dreamed of a tall silver gate. You stood on one side and a dragon stood on the other. The dragon unfolded its wings as you approached and asked, “Where is the key?’ You said, ‘I am here.’

  Carah dropped her soup spoon. It had been a vision then. She shook her head vehemently, desperate to deny it. The last vision she had shared with others heralded only disaster.

  Lyrienn cocked her head. She did not seem alarmed. “I think you will undergo this journey, Kharah. I see its mark on you, yet you will be older in mind and spirit.” Her piercing gaze leveled on Thorn. “And it will take place when this dynasty of kings is at an end.”

  He surged from his chair, nearly upsetting the glasses on the table, and stared at Lyrienn in unveiled horror. Carah reached out to him, but he veered away as if her touch would sting him. Without a word he fled the suite. His footsteps receded fast down the winding ramps.

  “Lyrienn, what…?”

  The Elari fiddled with her spoon. “I should not have told him. Azhdyria was one of the few things he still hoped for. You’d think, after a century of being the Lady’s companion, I would have learned discretion.”

  Carah looked to Rhian for answers, but he frowned, just as confounded.

  “What shouldn’t you have told him?” To Carah, this prophesy of gates and kings made no sense.

  “Before you were born, Thorn spoke with the Mother-Father. She told him of his death.”

  ~~~~

  Thorn had to hurry. No man knew how much time he had, but he suspected the Black Falcon’s life was in danger, and the White Falcon was hardly secure inside Ilswythe’s walls. I will come for you when this dynasty of kings is at an end… Ana-Forah hadn’t specified how long Thorn would outlive Tallon’s line or Bhodryn’s. Days or decades, and either sounded too brief. He didn’t have time to die. Too much to do, and no one else to do it.

  Curse every ray of the Mother’s light to the Abyss. She intended to cheat him of everything he wanted most. Even Azhdyria. What harm was a bit of travel, an adventure into the unknown? Could she not grant him that much? “Cruel bitch,” he muttered, pounding down one stairwell after another.

  The library lay beneath the palace, in vast caverns cut deep into the island. He knew the shelves intimately. They filled apses and corridors and locked vaults. Tomes whose covers were encrusted with precious gems lay under glass. Rows upon rows of bookcases and scroll bins receded into the echoing dark. Tall rolling ladders reached the loftiest shelves. Thorn knew where to find the book he needed. Years ago, when he realized ogres were involved in the disappearance of the avedrin, curiosity prompted him to seek a deeper understanding of his foe.

  The ladder slid silently on a well-oiled track. He had to climb only a couple of feet; for that he was grateful. Dan Ora’as: Early Accounts, Cantas 1,103-7,400 surely weighed thirty pounds. The tome detailed the long centuries of peace between human and Elari. Thorn thumped it down upon his favorite reading table and lit the oil lamp with a thought. The wick flared brighter than he intended. His emotions ran high, and no wonder.

  He bowed his head, splayed his hands on the tabletop, and breathed deeply to calm himself. The lamp dimmed to a comfortable light. Frayed leather binding crackled as he flopped the book open; pages whispered and breathed out a musty odor. The last time he had researched the ogres he marked the place with a scrap of paper. The note he’d scribbled taunted him cruelly: “Bastards of the earth—corruptions of avë—Zellel’s words. Do they remember an avedra created them?”

  He crumpled the note in his fist, tossed it on the floor. Who gave a damn what the ogres remembered? The important question was how. How had Uthaya created them?

  The text read:

  Canta 2,171—In which the armies of Dan Ora’as march against the naenion:

  It came about, in the vicinity of the rainforests of southern Mahkah, that villages were discovered emptied of inhabitants; men, women, children, and livestock slaughtered, their bodies consumed, their bones left to molder; and the perpetrators discovered to be a creature never before seen under the moons.

  On the corpse of a merchant was found the testimony of the avedra woman Uthaya, who claimed to be the progenitor of these naenion, as they have been termed. The avedra wrote that it was her hope that these naenion become a plague upon the land. Whether by nature or by design, the naenion bred quickly. In a short sum of years, Elaran merchants reported bands of the creatures migrating north along the River Talu toward the snowy summits of the Drakhan mountains, and eastward across the savannah toward the upper Badruu. They laid waste entire settlements, broke open tombs of the dead, and plundered battlefields for provender. That naenion understood the ways of avë worsened the slaughter, as the creatures advanced cloaked inside the veil. Humanity had no defense against them.

  Therefore, in the autumn of the second hundred and sixty-sixth year after the Landing, Dorelia ordered the Elaran Regular Army to march north from Dan Ora’as. Under Captain Tíryus rode seven brigades of cavalry, fifteen thousand infantry, among whom were clans of humans, gathered under the chieftains of the Great Sands. Together they marched north and west toward Mahkah, rallying warriors as they went.

  Entering the rainforests, the allied host sought to root out this pestilence and its vile mother. Teams raided vast limestone caverns, putting hundreds of naenion to the sword, but always Uthaya eluded capture.

  Thirty years after Captain Tíryus first led troops against the naenion, a new den was uncovered near the slopes of Mount Veraenikos, a mere eighty miles from the halls of Dan Ora’as. Inside the cavern, warriors discovered the bodies of missing locals, many more unidentifiable remains, and a rough stone altar, upon which lay the desiccated corpse of a woman in tattered robes. Plaits of long white hair lay splayed across the stone, surrounding her face in carefully placed sunray patterns. Despite the deference shown in the display, the woman’s throat had been torn open, her fingers and toes bitten off, as well as portions of her lower legs. The reason for her death at the hands of her children and the mutilation of her body have never been discovered.

  The woman’s head was returned to Dan Ora’as, where Lady Dorelia identified it as that of the avedra woman.

  Uthaya’s legacy did not die with her. Hunts for na’in dens occupied the majority of the Elaran Regular Army’s activity across Dwinovia for the next two thousand years.

  Thus it continued until hostilities arose between human and Elari, whereupon their alliance crumbled and the threat posed by the naenion became a secondary concern…

  Thorn knew better than to hope that new information might spring from the Cantas. He was too familiar with the text. But in the margin, in tiny, precise script, someone had written, “Theories of Inexplicable Phenomena, ref.” Thorn had once thumbed through the volume but disregarded it as an irritating collection of half-formed arguments by scholars who liked the sounds of their own voices. However, some of the arguments involved naenion, and Thorn was desperate. He fetched the book from the philosophy shelves.

  A moralist who called himself merely The Gray asked, “Do naenion possess faculties resembling a conscience? Do they experience higher-level emotions such as love or compassion or humor?” Among the tiresome debates arose the more practical question, “How are naenion able to manipulate avë?”

  This might hold something useful. “Being descended of amphibians and reptiles,” Thorn read, “none of which demonstrate an awareness of, or the ability to, manipulate avë, it is unlikely therefore that a creature spawned from these species would demonstrate a higher understanding or ability concerning the
magical energies. Yet it is so.”

  A scholar loftily addressed as Erudite Aan theorized that “all creatures may well possess an instinctual understanding of their origin, their Maker, and the energies in the world around them, but merely lack the utilities to express their awareness.”

  Thorn rolled his eyes and flipped to the next page. The scholar identified merely as This One argued with more sense: “The process which Uthaya used to create the naenion likely caused them to be so entwined with the substance that we know as avë that manipulating it to their advantage may be as instinctual as breathing. This One proposes that Uthaya had merely to point out the existence of avë for that first brood to understand its use.”

  Thorn thumbed through the following pages, hoping for theories about how Uthaya might have used avë to mold one organism into another, but these wise scholars never so much as hinted at the question. He growled in frustration and slammed the book shut.

  “Are you looking for something in particular, Dathiel?” One of the library’s keepers happened to be passing his table, her arms stacked with books. She smiled down at him from over the high collar of her simple gray robe.

  “Allyshien, yes. Was anything more written about Uthaya?”

  “The avedra woman?”

  What scorn that designation carried. Thorn nodded wearily. “Yes, the avedra woman.”

  Allyshien surveyed the volumes lying on the table and said, “There’s a segment or three in Dorelia’s journals. Have you read those?”

  “Is there? No, I haven’t. Please!” He’d rarely had the chance to handle those sacred texts, and usually only in Aerdria’s presence. Dorelia’s insights were often quoted elsewhere, so there was rarely need to turn to the original documents.

  The keeper set her stack of books on the table, freed a ring of keys from her pocket, and bustled off toward a row of apses near the library’s entrance. Thorn appreciated the chance to stretch his legs and accompanied her up the aisle. Wrought iron gates blocked one of the apses. Keys rattled. Allyshien muscled aside one of the gates, slid on a pair of silk gloves, and handed Thorn another pair. He worked them on while delighting in the beauty of the journals. They were laid out in display cases. He suspected that the pearls and rubies, vibrant silk and silver leaf had been added to the covers centuries after Dorelia’s passing.

  The keeper rifled through the index files and chirped, “Here we are. Uthaya.”

  Referencing the card, Allyshien unlocked the first of the four cases. She lifted out a book ornamented in burgundy silk and seed pearls, and another in emerald green and gold filigree, and set them in Thorn’s hands. He was too excited to return to his isolated table but sank down at the first writing desk at hand.

  Lifting one delicate page at a time, he turned to the first entry designated on the index card. Dorelia’s handwriting was bold and elegant. Black ink had faded to blood-brown.

  33rd day, Fourth Moon, Year of the Landing 213:

  We do not understand the vast power that has manifested in the girl and in others like her. Uthaya is able to move earth and hasten the sprouting of seed. With mine own eye, I saw a fig tree sprout—from tiny seed to weedy sprig—in moments. Uthaya’s hands cupped the seed, and she breathed upon it, and yes, a sapling sprouted before my eyes. She is proud of her tree and boasts that by next year it will produce fruit. The girl is eight years old.

  As remarkable as they are, these children give rise to unexpected tension. Uthaya’s father, a scout of the 17th Company, adores her, but her mother, a superstitious nomad of the Harenian people, is terrified of her. She claims the girl is possessed of the Abyss and no longer permits her inside her own house. We cannot let the child be destitute. At the behest of the father, I have made Uthaya my ward.

  Six others like her live within Dan Ora’as, all half-Elaran. It appears there are no half-Elaran children who lack an innate ability to move the forces of avë. Because of their gifts, we have termed these children ‘avedrin.’ The explorations of our scouts have extended well into the desert to the north and the jungles to the east, which leads me to suspect there may be countless others. What are we to do with these strange offspring?

  Until we have made a thorough study of the avedrin, I have forbidden further intermarriage between Elari and duínovë. I do not expect the measure to be received well, but I fear it is necessary…

  18th day, Seventh Moon, YL 222

  The twelfth avedra was admitted to the school today, an Ixakan child. His skin, eyes, and hair are the color of cloves. He is stunning and intelligent and frightened. If only these children understood that they are brought here for their safety and for the safety of those they love, perhaps their fears would be alleviated.

  Tomorrow I hope to see him move fire. He tells me he burned down a village by accident. Many people and goats were killed. His instructors will be able to use this confession to convince him that coming to the school is for the best.

  Instructors, schools. Laughable. It is we who learn from the avedrin. They have taught us more about the ways of avë in the last few years than we ever knew before we arrived on these shores.

  Uthaya continues to be our most gifted avedra. She demonstrates more focus, more willpower than the others. She seems to relish the sensation of becoming a vessel for the energies. She opens her arms, throws back her head, and lets avë have its way with her. The mountains tremble, and my people are afraid. While I too fear, I admire and envy her.

  As a daughter of the nomadic Uum tribe who navigate the Drakhan river, she is fiercely independent. Her instructors often chide her for defiance. More than once she has gone missing from the school, only to be found wandering the streets or the mountainsides, flirting with soldiers outside the barracks or with shepherds who forget about their flocks. When she is brought back to the school, she cloaks herself in shrouds of blue fire so that none may approach her. She mopes for days.

  Are we right to keep these avedrin locked beneath the mountain? I must remind myself that my primary purpose is to safeguard the wellbeing of my people. If that means the freedom of a few must be sacrificed, I cannot shrink from that altar. It is my burden to wield the sacrificial blade and carry the weight of conscience. The instructors, however, assure me that they have made strides, and that the avedrin understand more each day how to exercise control over their gifts.

  But for free-spirits like Uthaya, I fear liberation cannot come soon enough…

  9th day, Second Moon, YL 241

  Ana, help me! Give me to understand! Why have you allowed these avedrin to flourish? To exist at all? Tell me our efforts haven’t been wasted.

  In the middle of the night, an alarm sounded. Fire filled the streets, raced along rooftops, devoured gardens and houses and my people, my people. Lines of them with hoses from the aqueduct labored to put out the fires and traced the source of the inferno all the way to the doors of the school. The side of the mountain had been blasted to dust, the bronze doors melted to slag. We heard instructors and avedrin screaming for help on the other side of the cave-in.

  Half the city gathered to dig them out. When they came staggering into the morning light, the instructors said the disaster was neither natural nor an accident. One instructor has been murdered, his blood boiled to ash in his veins. Two more instructors and several avedrin died when the ceiling crashed down on them. Only three Elarion and twenty-two avedrin survived. And only Uthaya is unaccounted for…

  28th day, Ninth Moon, YL 247

  The search for the renegade avedra continues. Envoys sent to treat with tribes of duinóvion keep an eye out for her. Inquiries turn up little. In the trading settlement of Jazarin, my scouts heard rumors that a “witch” passed through, bartering for food in exchange for tasks like lighting hearth fires and raising water into wells. The people grew afraid of her, so she fled west, they said, toward the rainforests of Mahkah.

  A darkness lingers within those tangled trees. An ancient darkness that I cannot name. My scouts have long refused to venture in
to those jungles. And so I fear I must give up hope for justice—or restoration…

  3rd day, First Moon, YL 262

  I hardly know what to make of the latest report. Kalaesien and his team of merchants had traveled far into the plains of northern Mahkah, a land wide and rich, not in coin, but in space and fertile soil, there to strengthen trade with the Mahkah-pi. These duinóvion want little to do with us. Kalaesien said the journey was unremarkable until they started homeward. Thriving villages along the River Talu, through which they had passed weeks before, lay in ruins. I asked him if he suspected rival tribes, and he replied in horror, “Not unless rival tribes have taken to cannibalism.”

  The people there had been feasted upon, their bones gnawed and cast into piles.

  Kalaesien’s scouts tracked footprints unlike any they had seen before. The trail led them south and south again to the rainforests…

  17th day, Tenth Moon, YL 266

  My heart breaks. The attacks by these monstrous creatures have reached a crescendo, and we are at war. Jazarin, the settlement on the River Badruu, has fallen to bloody ruin, and my traders slain. All but three of the twelve. They staggered home to tell me that Kalaesien’s body was found with a cut of untanned hide staked to his chest. On the pelt was written the following:

  Lady Dorelia, do you like my children?

  I never got the chance to tell you that your precious instructor, the one who died at my hands, had tormented me for years. Ask some of the others, if they still live. It was you who held us prisoner by day and he by night. Yet I’d wager my right arm that you wept bitter tears over his corpse. You have hunted me as though I were the criminal, and I knew you would never relent. Where else could I go but the armpit of the world?