Song of the Sword

by C. R. Grey

  Bailey turned his attention back to Gwen. “Your bond will come back,” he said, wanting to make it all right. “It lives inside us. Viviana can’t change that.”

  “I want to believe that,” Gwen said. “But right now I feel like there’s a hole in my chest that used to be full of feeling. You’ve only just Awakened—can’t you imagine how you would feel if suddenly your bond with Taleth was taken away?”

  Bailey could, and the thought made him shudder.

  All day, Bailey carried the worry of what Gwen had told him. He watched his fellow Allies carefully during a communal dinner of thistle-and-root stew, looking for the same sadness in their eyes that he’d seen in Gwen’s. But he couldn’t tell whether the fighters in the tunnel were suffering from a weakened bond, or simply from their cramped and anxious habitat. He knew that if Gwen was right, defeating Viviana and the Dominae would be even harder. Without their bonds, the Allies would need more than just Tremelo’s tinkered amulets.

  He left the hushed whispers and flickering firelight of the tunnels and walked out into the twilight for some air. He wasn’t alone: Eneas Fourclaw sat on the wide, flat rock that the Allies used to keep watch over the tunnel entrance. Eneas pointed over Bailey’s shoulder.

  “Your shadow’s looking well,” he said.

  Bailey turned. Taleth stood behind him. Her whiskers shook as she sniffed the night air.

  “She’s happy to be outside,” said Bailey.

  “I believe that,” Eneas said. “She’s handling the tunnels well, though.” Bailey heard the unspoken thought behind Eneas’s words: Taleth was remaining calm, unlike some others.

  “That woman whose kin was killed today—will she be all right?” Bailey asked.

  Eneas swept a crawling beetling off of his thigh.

  “Kin die all the time,” he said. “You’re not used to how it works yet, are you?”

  “How what works?” Bailey asked.

  “Being a predator,” Eneas answered. He nodded to his kin, the mountain lion Elspeth, who lay on her side next to him on the rock. “Lions, bears, wolves—they have to hunt and kill to survive. Can be hard to wrap your mind around it, once you become one.”

  “I’m not a predator,” said Bailey.

  Eneas smiled. His blue eyes were kind, even though his skin was rough from many years living in the elements of the Peaks.

  “But she is,” he said, gesturing to Taleth. “And that means you’ve got something of that in you too. Only natural.”

  Bailey felt a little ill. He remembered the Jackal’s cry as his own dog had attacked him at the Progress Fair, and the limp body of Joan Sucrette. But Bailey hadn’t been the one to kill them.

  “Don’t look so frightened at the thought,” Eneas said. “As Velyn, we know that our kin will do one another harm—we acknowledge it as best we can. Doesn’t make you any less human. More, maybe.”

  Eneas rose from the rock; Elspeth stretched and stood as well.

  “My watch is over,” he said. “You wouldn’t mind going in to find my replacement, would you?”

  “I’ll take the watch,” Bailey said. He wasn’t quite ready to trade the peacefulness of the dusky forest for the stifling air in the tunnels. “If that’s all right with you.”

  Eneas tugged at his blond beard. He looked from Bailey to Taleth, who flicked her whiskers eagerly.

  “I suppose you’re ready,” he said. “Besides, your beast Taleth is the best protection any watchman could hope for. I’ll let Tremelo know.”

  Eneas ducked into the tunnel, but Bailey was aware of the large green eyes of Elspeth the mountain lion, watching over him from the entrance.

  “Not quite ready to do it alone, I guess.” Bailey sighed. He pushed himself up onto the rock and took a deep, invigorating breath of the fresh night air. From here, he could see the bank of the pine-covered hillside, dipping down toward the edge of a cliff that overlooked the river. If anyone were to try and enter the tunnels from here, they’d be spotted nearly half a mile away.

  As he always did when he looked north toward the Lowlands, he thought of his mom and dad. They were down there somewhere, past the dark ribbon of the river, on the other side of the wide stretch of trees whose shadowy branches could hide any number of threats. He wished he could make the journey to see them, but Tremelo had forbidden it. Ever since they’d arrived at the tunnels, and Bailey realized how close they were to the Lowlands, he’d found himself missing his mom and dad more than ever. He wanted to sit at the dinner table over thick, crusty bread and a bowl of corn porridge and tell them everything—about his Awakening, about the prophecy that had entangled him with the fate of the kingdom, about his friends.

  Somewhere in the silent pines, a twig snapped.

  Taleth jumped to her feet, her whiskers and tail twitching. The skin on Bailey’s arms prickled under his sweater and coat. He was sure that someone was watching them.

  A crackle; a rustle—something moved in the trees just downhill from them. Bailey peered into the dark and saw a figure moving away from them quickly. His heart pounded. He leapt up. For a frenzied moment, he was unsure what to do. He looked back at Elspeth, but she was gone. He knew he couldn’t let the stranger get away. Together, he and Taleth left their post and rushed down the hill. Just ahead, he saw the silhouette of the running spy. They darted between trees and into deeper shadows until it was nearly impossible for Bailey to see what it was he was following. Taleth rushed ahead, and Bailey relied on her vision and smell to lead him.

  They sped around trees and over rocks. Ahead, Bailey could barely make out the running figure. Then the person—a man, Bailey guessed—made a sharp turn, nearly slipping on some moss. He skidded down a small hill. Just ahead, a beam of light shone from behind an outcrop of rocks, and Bailey froze. The man was not alone. Bailey’s heart had already been beating loudly from the pursuit, but now it pulsed in his chest like the tightly drawn skin of a drum.

  Taleth lunged ahead, growling, and disappeared behind the rocks.

  “Quindley! Quindley!” shouted a voice quavering with fear. Taleth reappeared, dragging a man by his coat. “Oh, dear merciful Nature!” the man cried.

  “Coming!” called a second voice, and the light beam shifted. A portly figure followed Taleth out from behind the rocks, holding a dynamo lamp. The lamplight hit Bailey right in the eyes, and he put up his hands to shield them from the glow.

  “Good grief, it’s Bailey,” said the portly figure. “Miller, you fool, get up!”

  The light swung away, and Bailey moved his hands. The rotund man standing before him, in a long brown coat with many bulging pockets, was none other than Hal’s uncle, Roger Quindley.

  “Preserve me!” shouted the man whom Taleth now had pinned to the mossy ground. “Save me!”

  “Bailey, call her off, will you?” Roger asked. “He’s a friend.”

  “Taleth, stop,” Bailey said, but Taleth had already read his thoughts. She backed away from the man and sat down on her haunches.

  The man pulled himself up from the ground. He had a patchy reddish-brown beard and wore a traveling cloak with a wide collar, and a leather satchel swung over his shoulder—this was no fighter. The beady eyes of two frightened weasels peered out from inside the cloak.

  “Ants alive, boy, you ought to know better than to frighten people like that,” said Roger.

  “What in Nature?!” exclaimed the stranger. He stared at Taleth. “I had heard, but I didn’t believe—it’s true. A white tiger, after all these years!”

  “Her name is Taleth,” said Bailey warily.

  “I saw her through the trees, and at first glance I thought she was a ghost!” the man said. “Roger, you could have warned me!”

  “Bailey, you look very unwell. When was the last time you slept?” Roger asked.

  “Who is this?” Bailey asked, ignoring Roger’s question.

  “Ah, yes,” said Roger. “This is Mr. Miller, and he’s come a long way to meet with Tremelo. This,” he continued, pointing t
o Bailey, “is Bailey Walker.”

  Mr. Miller ran a hand through his mussed hair. One of the weasels that had been hiding in his coat emerged onto the ground and skittered onto a rock. “So you must be the same young man who challenged Viviana in the Gray City? You must be—your Animas is unmistakable!”

  “You’ve heard of me?” asked Bailey.

  “I come from a small town in the northwestern peaks,” said the man. “But even there, word has spread. You and that man who was with you—the one claiming to be Trent Melore—you’re the most wanted persons in Aldermere. Every village between the Gray and the Lowlands is filled with Dominae officers, trying to find you! It’s an honor, I must say, and a relief, to see you still safe.”

  Roger frowned. At his feet, a bulky, round badger waddled about, sniffing at the ground. The badger, Dillweed, seemed completely unimpressed by Taleth, who watched his every movement.

  “You’re not alone, are you, Bailey?” asked Roger. “You have protection, aside from your kin?”

  Bailey opened his mouth to answer, but he didn’t have to.

  “Bailey!”

  He heard Tremelo’s voice behind him in the distance. Suddenly, they were surrounded—Tremelo, Eneas, Elspeth, Digby Barnes, and Hal burst through the trees, followed by a handful of RAT and Velyn fighters. Tremelo grabbed Bailey’s shoulder.

  “You and Taleth were supposed to be keeping watch,” he said.

  “We were,” said Bailey. “We saw someone sneaking around, and followed them here—”

  “You shouldn’t have left the tunnel!” Tremelo argued. “You should have woken someone else. Instead, by leaving no one at the watch, you left us open to attack!”

  Bailey felt his stomach drop. It was clear Tremelo didn’t think him ready for the responsibility. He looked to Eneas for support, but Eneas frowned, his eyes stony.

  “Think before you run off, boy,” Tremelo said. He shook his head. “You never think. If Elspeth hadn’t come to fetch us—”

  “Of course I think!” yelled Bailey. “I was the one who found Taleth when she was kidnapped, and who stood up to Viviana at the Fair. I sent you the Clamoribus, or you’d have never raised an army to fight! You’ve barely done—”

  “Everything you’ve done has been the direct result of leading with your instincts, which are practically wild,” said Tremelo, his voice calm but still steely. “You run away from safety and rush into battle, ignoring obvious danger. The entire kingdom is on the brink of war. Now is the time for calculation, not rashness!”

  “Please, please,” said Roger, stepping between Tremelo and Bailey. He puffed up his chest and jerked his shoulders back, causing a sprig of fresh herbs to fall out of his front coat pocket. “There’s no harm done—he made a very intimidating watchman, I must say! Scared poor Mr. Miller out of his skin.”

  “And who is ‘Mr. Miller’?” asked Eneas. “I’ve warned you before about exposing us, Quindley….”

  “Please, calm down!” Roger huffed. “Of course you can trust me! This man has some information, and if he hadn’t come to me, he’d have been wandering the Dark Woods for days looking for you all. And then where would you be?”

  “You could have been followed!” Eneas shouted.

  Digby Barnes stepped between them.

  “Eneas, my friend,” he said. “Roger means well. And without his help—”

  “We don’t need some meddling worm-head marking the path straight to our door,” Eneas said.

  Tremelo addressed Mr. Miller. “What information do you bring?” he asked.

  Miller looked from Tremelo to Eneas and Digby, and back to Roger.

  “Tell them what you told me, Miller,” said Roger.

  Mr. Miller nodded, swallowed, then began his report.

  “I come with news from Everglen, near the Seers’ Valley,” he said. “It’s a peaceful place—we’d heard of the Dominae there, but hadn’t had any dealings with them until a few weeks ago.”

  The fighters had created a circle around the man; his two weasels stood alert and wary of the many eyes that watched their human kin.

  “My fellow townsfolk and I began to notice more Dominae soldiers in the village, and many of us sensed from our kin that a disturbance was growing in the forest. We sent a party to investigate, and found a Dominae camp in the peaks just west of Seers’ Valley. They’ve been busy carving into the mountain, creating some sort of mine. I had to tell someone, so I journeyed to the city to find the resistance groups. Their trail led me to a small group of loyalists living in the sewers underneath the Gudgeons. They told me to come here. I met Roger in the village just north of here, and he agreed to bring me.”

  “Just like that, eh?” Eneas said to Roger. “No thought to the consequences of bringing a stranger into these woods?”

  “Can you tell us what the Dominae is mining?” asked Tremelo.

  “I can’t rightly say what it’s called,” said Miller. “But the stone is black and smooth as coal and sends up a powerful ash. It’s covering half the valley—and their hammering away at it rings over the peaks.”

  Bailey watched as Eneas’s face turned to stone. He stepped back and looked out at the trees, as though expecting something menacing to come charging out from the shadows.

  “They’re building something with this material?” Tremelo asked.

  Miller nodded his head.

  “I didn’t get a very good look at these contraptions,” he said. “But they’re larger than men, and there are a great many of them.”

  A frightened hush settled over the gathered Allies. Bailey reached out to Taleth, to feel the comfort of her soft fur. He knew all too well how crafty Viviana and her tinkerers could be.

  “Thank you,” said Tremelo. He shook Mr. Miller’s hand. “Do you need lodging? Conditions in the tunnels aren’t spectacular, but we could find a spot for you.”

  Miller waved his hand to decline.

  “I have cousins in the Dust Plains,” he said. “I’m headed northeast to warn them. Dark times, sir. Dark times.”

  Miller nodded a curt good-bye to Eneas and Digby, and, to Bailey’s surprise, stopped to cautiously pet Taleth before heading into the trees. As soon as Miller’s back was to them, Eneas called to a young Velyn fighter.

  “Follow him,” he told the man. “Just to make sure he won’t run straight to the Dominae.”

  “Is that necessary?” asked Roger, annoyed.

  “We can’t be too careful,” said Eneas.

  “If you insist,” huffed Roger. “But if you trust me, you can trust Miller.”

  “I don’t trust you,” Eneas replied.

  “All right,” said Tremelo, interrupting them. “Roger, will you escort Mr. Miller to the nearest village? And keep watch on him.”

  “Fine, fine,” Roger said.

  Tremelo pulled Eneas toward the trees, where they began to speak together in the low voices that Bailey understood to be heavy laden with war talk. Roger approached him and Hal.

  “And how are my boys?” Roger asked. He placed an arm around Hal’s shoulders and gave him a comforting squeeze. “My nephew, the revolutionary! Never been prouder.” Dillweed the badger looked up at Taleth and sneezed unappreciatively.

  “We’re all right,” said Bailey. “Sorry I scared your friend earlier.”

  “Do you believe Mr. Miller about the mines, Uncle Roger?” Hal asked.

  “No reason not to,” he replied. “There’s plenty of mischief that’s been going on out there since Viviana’s ‘Fair.’ Wouldn’t surprise me a bit.” Roger patted Taleth’s head. “You boys have everything you need here, don’t you? You let me know if there’s anything I can do.” He gave Hal a squeeze on the shoulder before leaving, then immediately came back and hugged his nephew so hard Hal’s eyes looked like they might pop out of his head. “Be careful,” he added. Then he patted all of his bulging coat pockets to make sure everything was in order before he left a second time. He turned to follow Miller down the path. Bailey hastened after him.


  “There is something you can do for me,” Bailey said, catching up.

  “Ah, of course!” said Roger. He stopped. “I almost forgot—they’re well and safe.” He meant Herman and Emily Walker, Bailey’s mom and dad. “There’s been a great deal of Dominae soldiers passing through the village,” Roger continued. “And I did worry when I saw they were no longer at their farm….”

  “What?” Bailey interrupted. “Where are they?”

  “With a neighbor,” said Roger. “Apparently, the Dominae came to question them. They got scared to be in the house with just the two of them. Too exposed.”

  Bailey’s chest ached at the thought of his mom and dad frightened out of their once-peaceful home. Worse, they didn’t even know why.

  “Don’t worry, Bailey,” Roger said. “They’re safe for now, and I haven’t told them a thing about your Awakening or where you are. When the Dominae ask, they won’t be lying by saying they know nothing. They’re right worried, though. Sometimes I wish I didn’t know, either; it breaks my heart to see them hurting so.”

  “Thanks,” said Bailey, his own heart even heavier than it had been just a few moments before.

  “Better catch up with Miller,” said Roger. “Be safe!” He set off into the trees. Dillweed waddled after him.

  Near the tunnel, Tremelo and Eneas’s low-voiced talk had grown into an argument.

  “We need more than just tinkering on our side!” Eneas was saying. “We need a real army!”

  “I agree,” said Tremelo. “I’ve always agreed, but how are we to protect that army once we’ve acquired it? I can’t abandon this experiment. Not when you yourself have admitted that there’s been a change in the bond!”

  “I’ve told you where to look—”

  “Eneas, I won’t risk the safety of this camp on a fairy story!” said Tremelo. “We need to find another way….Digby!” He called to Digby Barnes, the red-faced leader of the Gray City RATS. “Surely we can reach out to those RATS who are still in hiding.”