A Flight of Marewings

by Kristen S. Walker

  But now all was chaos, covered by the stranglevine. In the center of the clearing, a group of people danced around some kind of altar and a wooden staff driven into the ground. A man clad in nothing but a leopard skin seemed to lead them. Behind the altar, more Councilors sat in a circle of chairs. They were arguing loudly, but they stopped in mid-sentence and turned to stare at them.

  In the middle of the dancers, the man in the leopard skin stopped and pointed at them. “There they are!” he said with a gleeful cackle. “The fools who would defy Varula’s powers!” He swayed on his feet.

  Galenos lifted his sword. “We have this temple surrounded. I am here to accept your surrender.”

  The man laughed again. “Surrender! Such hubris, the gods shall surely punish you. It’s already too late, you see. The wyld will take over the city, and Kyratia will fall!”

  He leapt forward and gripped the staff, yanking it up out of the ground. The whole building shuddered with some invisible force.

  Ameyron took a step back, shrinking against the wall. “Be careful! He’s the head priest, and that staff is what he uses to cast his spells!”

  Korinna stepped up next to Galenos, gripping her own sword. “Then we should take it from him.”

  But Galenos shook his head and held up an arm to block her. “I’ll face Varula Soma alone. You stay out of danger.” He brandished his sword again and darted forward to attack the priest.

  The priest cackled and lifted his staff. It began to glow with a green light. He swung it against Galenos’s sword, and although it was only wood, it blocked the blow. The temple shook again with the force. The priest danced back out of the way.

  Galenos swung his sword around a second time, trying to knock the staff out of the priest’s hands, but Varula Soma parried with such strength that the warlord staggered back. The two opponents began to circle each other in the middle of the room, looking for an opening.

  As they fought, Korinna crept around the outer edge, heading for the Councilors on the far side. Maybe she could grab one of them and force a surrender.

  Varula Soma muttered and waved his staff, and the vines followed his gesture, reaching out to grab Galenos. He stepped back and hacked at them before they could ensnare him.

  Korinna kept one eye on the fight and one eye on where she was going. The Councilors were mostly watching the duel, but she feared that one of them would notice her and react in some way.

  “You’re all mad,” Galenos called out, drawing more attention to himself between exchanging blows. “You’re destroying your own city, killing your own people, and for what? A little extra profit?”

  Eutychon jumped to his feet at the suggestion. “How dare you? You’re the traitor attacking us!” He shook his fist. Beside him, other Councilors began to raise their own voices in agreement.

  Korinna got close enough to use the vine-wrapped trees as cover at the edge of the room. She moved more quickly now, but careful not to make any aggressive movements that would trigger the vines.

  She could hear the sounds of Galenos’s fight continuing, grunting when his blows were blocked by the priest’s staff. “Cowards,” he spat at them, panting with effort. “Weak. Not even able to—uff—fight your own—battles.”

  At last, Korinna had circled around to the back of the temple. She peered around the edge of a tree, trying to gauge which one was the best to grab. Eutychon seemed to be the one that the others were listening to. Would the priest stop if she threatened his life?

  But then she saw Pelagia reaching into her dress, and something in her hand glinted faintly in the light.

  “Look out!” Korinna rushed forward and grabbed for the old woman’s wrist just as she threw the knife at Galenos.

  The knife flew wide. Instead of hitting Galenos, it grazed Eutychon’s shoulder.

  Eutychon cried out and collapsed to the ground.

  Varula Soma turned his head. Galenos took advantage of the opening and dove forward, driving his blade through the priest’s chest. He grunted and staggered.

  Ameyron tried to rush forward, his hand outstretched. “The staff—!”

  Galenos reached for the staff, but it fell from the priest’s hand. It hit the ground and shattered.

  The vines around the room suddenly went limp. The dancers collapsed to the ground, and Korinna noticed that they all had blood trickling out of their ears. “Oh, no,” she gasped, but it was too late.

  Pelagia tried to rise from her chair, but Korinna grabbed her arms and pinned her down. “You’re not going anywhere,” she growled in the old woman’s ear. “It’s all over now.”

  Varranor stumbled in the front door, panting but looking unharmed. “The ogre just collapsed in the courtyard,” he announced, looking around. “What happened?”

  “We won,” Galenos said, pulling his sword out of the dead priest and grimly wiping it clean. “Now all that’s left is to arrest these traitors.” He gestured to the Councilors, who shrank back in fear and lifted their hands in surrender.

  When all of the Councilors had been dealt with, Galenos and Korinna went outside the temple and looked out at their city with grim faces. Vines still covered everything, and the crowd of people who had been dancing in the temple square all lay dead.

  Korinna looked at their crumpled forms with a heavy heart. She had barely taken the city, and already she felt responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent people. She had tried to save them, to win without a bloody fight, and yet the loss of life had been so much greater than the battle at Fort Aelyzoai.

  Galenos seemed to read her thoughts, because he said nothing, just put his arm around her shoulders. She sighed and rest her head against his chest. Together, they would have a lot to rebuild.

  46

  Aristia II

  Aristia looked up at the ramshackle building with a heavy heart. After the mage had helped her get better, her mother had found a new home for their family with the money she’d been given by the warlord. At first, even the tiny apartment had seemed like a luxury after years of living on the streets. But during the strange night when everything went wrong in the city, stranglevine had grown up over them, and now the old building was threatening to come down around their ears.

  “The landlord says we gotta get out while he fixes it,” Mother said with a sigh. She handed a bundle of clothes to Aristia. “I’m sorry, children, but we’ll have to go somewhere else.”

  Aristia’s older brother looked up at the cloudy sky. “Where are we gonna go? It looks like it’s we’re in for some rain.”

  Mother shook her head. “I’ve tried asking around, but there’s so many folks put out of their homes that there’s just no space to be had, not for twice what we paid for this place.” She nodded down the street. “We’ll walk until we find someplace dry enough. Maybe start by the docks, where we were before.” She started off and the rest of the family shouldered their belongings to follow her.

  Aristia set her shoulders with grim determination and grabbed the hand of her youngest brother. The toddler whined and tried to pull away, pointing back at the building which had sheltered them for a few months, but she shook her head. “We can’t go back there. C’mon, follow Mama.”

  Maybe it would be better to sleep out of doors again, even in the rain. Aristia had liked their new home, but once the vines covered it, she was too unsettled to sleep there anymore. They’d stopped growing after the first night, but they rustled strangely in any breeze. In the darkness, it seemed as if the rustling leaves were whispering to her in her left ear. That had to be her imagination, because the physician said she was deaf in her left ear after the bug was gone. Just another problem caused by wyld magic.

  Still, she should count her blessings, Mother told her every night. She’d been cured of the dancing madness by the mage early on, one of the few to be saved. The people who got infested by the crystalbell bugs after her all danced themselves to death. Having only one ear to hear out of was better than being dead, especially now that she wasn’
t quite so hungry all the time. Mother stretched out the money to make sure they could afford food every night.

  Her brother was still pulling at her hand, fighting her at every step. Then suddenly he stopped in the middle of the street and pointed back. “Man!” he shrieked with excitement. “Nice man! Mama, look!”

  Aristia glanced up. There was a tall, dark-skinned man, over-dressed for the neighborhood in an embroidered kattar, but no one she recognized. “Shh, don’t cause a fuss. We don’t know that man.”

  The toddler yanked his hand out of hers and went running down the street toward the stranger. “Hi, nice man!”

  Mother turned around to glare at Aristia. “If you can’t keep hold of your brother, then let your sister take care of him.” Then she saw the little boy run up and lift his arms to the stranger. “Oh, may the gods preserve us.” She dropped her bags and rushed after her son.

  Aristia stared as her mother ran up to the strange man and knelt on the ground before him.

  “I’m so sorry, Warlord—I mean, Your Grace,” Mother said with exaggerated reverence. “He recognized you from when you helped us before. He didn’t mean to disturb you.”

  Aristia glanced at her two other brothers and older sister, but they all looked just as puzzled as her. The four of them picked up the things their mother had dropped and walked back to join her.

  “It’s alright, Egina,” the strange man said with a smile. “I actually came here to find you and your family. Are you going somewhere?”

  Mother looked around at her children and hissed, “Get on your knees and show some respect. This is the new duke.”

  Aristia gaped up at Duke Galenos in surprise. She’d heard her mother’s story that the warlord had brought her to the mage to be cured of the dancing madness, but it was hard to believe that story until he was standing before her. Then she realized she was staring and knelt on the street beside her mother.

  Galenos gave her a warm smile. “It’s good to see you looking better, Aristia. I wanted to check on you and your family, but I didn’t have the chance to find out where you were living until now.” He looked up at the apartment building covered in vines. “But this place looks like it’s about to fall down. Are you moving somewhere better?”

  Mother bowed her head, hiding her embarrassment. “I’m still looking, Your Grace.”

  Galenos held his hand out to her. “Please, you don’t need to be so formal. I actually came to find you because there’s a house I need help fixing up, and a housekeeper to take care of it.” He looked around at the whole family. “Would you and your family be interested in permanent positions?”

  Mother’s eyes widened. “Oh, you’re much too kind, m’lord!” She took the duke’s hand and he helped her to her feet. “But I’m not trained—none of us have ever worked in a nice household before…” She looked around at her children helplessly.

  “Well, I’ve never had hired help before, so I suppose it would be a new experience for all of us,” Galenos said with a gentle laugh. “But if you’re willing to learn, then so am I.”

  Aristia looked back and forth between the duke and her mother, who was crying into her apron at the news. Could this really be happening? Her family was going to get a new home and they’d all have jobs working for the duke? It seemed like a crazy dream.

  “What job would I have?” she asked, cocking her head to one side. Sometimes she heard things wrong, so she made sure her good ear was pointed right at the duke for the best chance of understanding him. “I don’t know how to do anything.”

  Galenos frowned. “The most important thing you should be doing is going to school, then so you can learn how to do lots of things.”

  She clapped her hands together. School? She hadn’t had time to go to school in years!

  Her mother was crying even harder. “Bless you, Your Grace! You’ve done so much for my family already when you saved my little girl. How can I ever repay you?”

  The duke smiled and looked around at the city. “Your thanks are enough. I want to help all of my people, and I have to start somewhere.”

  He was the duke, and a warlord before that, not to mention the biggest man that Aristia had ever seen. She was a little afraid of him, but he seemed so kind, she got over her shyness and threw her arms around him in a warm hug. “Thank you, m’lord!”

  47

  Korinna XV

  Under the guidance of Korinna and Galenos, Kyratia slowly began to recover. The rest of the Storm Petrels arrived at dawn and came to help with the restoration effort. The treasonous Councilors and priests were arrested and taken to prison to await trial. The soldiers gathered the bodies of the fallen for a proper cremation outside the city, and helped to cut away the stranglevine that had covered everything.

  When the vines were removed, most of the roads and buildings only had superficial damage. But the monstrous plant had warped the Temple of Varula so much that civil engineers declared it structurally unsound, and Korinna was glad to order its demolition. With their leaders dead or in prison and the temple destroyed, the Varulan religion lost its power, and most of its remaining clergy left the city quietly. Loranos performed a mass public ritual to welcome all of Kyratia’s citizens back into the protections of Deyos and cleanse them of their temporary allegiance to the false cult.

  With the old Council in prison, the Mauve Dragons’ contract was lost. The rival mercenaries, led by Warlord Syntyche, were forced to leave the state in disgrace.

  The mages, Ameyron and Omalia, used their dragonlings to check every corner of the city and declared that all of the crystalbell bug infestation had been killed when the spell was broken. With the Deyonist priests, they cleared the city and re-fortified it against wyld magic.

  With Kyratia stable, Galenos and Korinna announced their official engagement. They set a date for the wedding only a few months away: long enough for representatives from other cities to arrive and preparations to be made. In the absence of a ruling council, the legal courts declared Galenos and Korinna joint rulers of the city, to be sealed with their union.

  No longer a mercenary, Galenos officially handed over the leadership of the company to Varranor, finally making good on his promise. Together they signed a new contract between Kyratia and the Storm Petrels for the city’s defense.

  Galenos told her that she could choose any house in the city for their new home. Korinna, viewing the city from the air, pointed out the old ruins of a palace in the east, between the Temple and the Market Districts. “Why is that empty?”

  “That’s ancient history,” he said. “Abandoned since before the Votsis family came into power. It would take a long time to rebuild, maybe years.”

  She smiled at him. “Then find us something small for the meantime.”

  The other exiles returned and were reinstated to the new Council, including her father’s best advisor, Diokles. He headed a new team that screened the loyalties of all the new councilors elected to represent the Guilds and helped create the new structure that would change the number of votes given to each political faction. The merchants were still powerful, but the agricultural guilds would help keep their power in check.

  More problems continued to emerge. Galenos discovered that the city’s coffers were depleted and the government had run into debt, borrowing from the Moneylenders Guild to keep running. The Republic had barely lasted nine months, but the damage they had done to Kyratia’s economy could take years to repair. Many of their plans to develop the city had to be delayed.

  Korinna, having regained ownership of her father’s old estates, funneled many of her personal funds into the city’s treasury. She also insisted on paying for the wedding, which would have to be a modest affair.

  Galenos offered to delay their marriage until they could afford to have a more lavish ceremony. “Spending money is a show of power. I don’t want to have our neighboring lords and dukes think that we’re weak because we can’t afford to entertain them in style.”

  “We’ve put it off
long enough, so we may as well get it over with now,” Korinna said with a shake of her head. “They can have all the wine they want to drink and that will have to satisfy them.”

  The wine had been seized as part of the assets from the Temple of Varula. Some had also come from the personal cellars of some of the recently deceased councilors, including Eutychon. Not all of it was good quality, but the quantity was enough to drown two or three wedding parties.

  Galenos took a step closer and put his arm around Korinna. “And you’re sure that you still want to marry me?”

  She turned her face away. “Why not? We’re finally working as partners.”

  He backed off again. “Right. Partners.”

  She left the study before he could see her blushing.

  Korinna adjusted the folds of her kattar and shook her head at the offer of more wine. There was, as she had predicted, more than enough wine to go around. The modest wedding feast hadn’t had the turn-out Galenos had anticipated, barely filling the festival hall after Father Loranos performed the ceremony in the Temple of Deyos. Only Lord Seivon from Petropouli had come with his household. A few other cities’ rulers, including the duke of Sympaia, had sent dignitaries to attend the wedding and express their regrets, but others had simply declined with the weakest of excuses. Things did not bode well for the future of Kyratia’s foreign relations.

  But happily, her friends were there. Orivan, Douhyos, and Itychia were there in black and blue velvet doublets with gold braid, the formal uniform of the Storm Petrels’ marewing riders; Sergeant Navera came with Itychia in a brilliant blue silk dress. Mkumba, Yulina, Zinoviya, and Zephyros all came from their different postings to wish her well.

  Many other people came to wish her well from around the city, some she knew from working with them to rebuild Kyratia, others were strangers who hoped to gain her favor. Diokles, her father’s advisor, hugged her and told her that her father would be happy. Ameyron and Omalia, the mages, took time away from their research for the celebrations, bringing their loud flocks of dragonlings to fly around the hall and steal food from the other guests.