by C. L. Wilson
“Where did it go?”
«Behind you.» She twisted in the tall saddle and saw the small, bulging pouch strapped behind her. «When you need it, I will return it to you. There are grips in the front of the saddle. Use them and hold tight. When I launch us into the air, you will feel a jolt.» She found the grips and wrapped her fingers tightly around them. «Are you ready?»
She swallowed as excitement and nervousness bubbled inside her. “Yes.”
«Then hold on.» She could practically feel the power building in him as he rocked back on his hind legs and his muscles bunched tight. His wings unfurled and spread wide. They flapped once, twice, whipping up swirls of dust from the ground. Then he sprang, a mighty leap, powered by Air that rocketed them into the sky.
Ellie screamed, more from surprise and the queer feeling in her stomach than from fright, though if not for the hand-holds and the tall saddle, she would have tumbled off Rain’s back when he took off. As it was, her body rocked hard against the back of the saddle, then snapped forward when the sudden initial surge of power ceased and the more fluid motion of true tairen flight began.
Massive wings beat the air, and Rain’s tairen body undulated in a sinuous rhythm like waves rolling in the open sea. His neck stretched out, strong and straight, his head a fixed point that speared through the sky like an arrowhead.
The wind whistled across Ellie’s face, fresh and cold and sweet. It blew her braided hair behind her, whipped at her skirts and chemise sleeves, and made her glad for the leather breeches Rain had provided. The ground below swept past, the blocks of fields and tiny villages looking more like a patterned tapestry than the world she knew. Above, infinity waited, beckoning to her with sunlit skies and the delicate puffs of white clouds she could almost reach out and touch.
“I’m flying,” she whispered. “I’m really flying.” Joy unlike any she’d ever known filled her. She flung out her arms and lifted her face to the wind, laughing with uncontainable happiness. “This is wonderful!”
«You like it, then?»
“Like it? I love it! I adore it!” If not for the waist-high front ridge of the saddle, she would have flung herself against his neck and squeezed him tight. “Oh, Rain. Thank you.”
«It pleases me to bring you joy, shei’tani.» Her happiness was contagious. No tairen could ever grow bored of the sky, but sharing it with her, feeling her joy, made Rain recall the thrill of his first flight, the laughing exaltation, the feeling of immense freedom, the knowledge that he was a master of the world and anything was possible. He wanted to give her pleasure, open the world to her, and stand by her side as she discovered its wonders. There was so much he could show her—literally an entire world. For the first time in a long, long while, Rain was glad to be alive, glad to be Fey and a Tairen Soul. «Where would you like to go, Ellysetta?»
He felt her eagerness, her excitement. “I don’t care. I just want to fly.”
«Then hold tight.»
He folded his wings, and they plummeted fast and hard, diving towards the earth. Ellysetta screamed with laughter and held tight to the saddle, fearless even as the ground rushed up to meet them. Rain’s heart swelled at her trust and complete lack of fear. His wings spread wide, and the rapid dive became a swooping ascent that left Ellysetta breathless yet still laughing.
With joy in his heart, Rain Tairen Soul soared across the sky.
Den Brodson smiled as he watched thin, gangly little Tomy Sorris scribble the last of his notes on the pages spread out before him. “You have it all, then?” The pair of them sat in the private back room at the Charging Boar. A nearly empty pint of Red Skull sat on the scarred wooden table before Den, and a half glass of well-watered ale sat before the printer’s son.
“I do. Thanks for the story, Den!” Tomy tipped his ink-stained wool cap with one hand while the other busied itself stuffing the pages into his satchel. “It’s a beaut. And I’m grateful you took time to write most of it down for me first. The less I have to write, the quicker Da can get it into print.”
“No problem at all, Tomy. Give your Da my best. And be sure he uses that one paragraph I showed you, exactly as I’ve written it.” Those words, Batay had promised him, would sway simple minds, in particular the minds of readers who rarely thought for themselves. A spell of persuasion, buried not in the ink or the paper used to write them, but tied to the very words themselves. Already, Den had met and distributed the copied pages to half a dozen pamphleteers and newspaper writers.
“I will,” the printer’s boy promised. “Exactly as it’s written.”
“And don’t use my name, remember. I don’t want to get my Da in trouble with the king.” Den pasted a sober expression on his face. “I just want to see justice for Ellie. Sold out, she was. Sold out to a murderous sorcerer for a chest of magic-cursed gold.”
“Ooh, that’s good.” Tomy paused to scratch Den’s words down on the last piece of paper before stuffing it away and carefully stowing his ink and pen. He straightened and scratched his head. “But, you know, Ellie’s always fancied the Fey. Maybe she’s happy with the way things have turned out.”
“Women fancy tigers,” Den snapped. “Doesn’t mean they want to bed down with the beasts.” He lifted his now-warm mug of Red Skull and downed the last quarter pint. “No, she’s been ensorcelled. Her whole family has. And it’s up to us—plain folk like you and me, Tomy—to save her.”
The boy squared his shoulders and nodded. “You’re right, Den. I’ll do my part. People have a right to know what the Fey are up to.”
“Indeed they do.” Den clapped a hand on the boy’s shoulder and escorted him out the Charging Boar’s back door. He waited for the boy to disappear down the alleyway before closing the door and making his way back into the main pub. “Thanks, Briggs.” He waved to the bartender as he walked past.
“No problem, Den. You off, then?”
Den nodded. “To church.”
“Church?” Briggs threw back his head and laughed. “That’s a good one, Den!”
Den grinned. “I know. Can’t hardly believe it myself. I’ll make an offering at one of the altars for you, eh?”
Briggs snickered and shook his head.
Den pushed through the pub’s brass-and-leaded-glass doors and turned left down King’s Road. He’d actually been telling Briggs the truth, though only because he knew the man would never believe it. His next destination lay about two miles down, in one of the rougher areas of town, where the Brethren of Radiance had set up a mission to minister to the poor and the godless of Celieria City. Founded more than a century ago by a zealous Church of Light priest who’d spent too many years in the north, the Brethren despised magic in all its forms.
Den patted his coat pocket and smiled at the crinkling noise of several more sheaves of folded paper. Yes, indeed, he could already feel the Bright Lord’s Radiance shining upon him.
As Den completed the tasks set to him, Kolis Manza was busy with a mission of his own a little further north in the city. The fourth golden bell of midday had just rung. Time enough to see to this task before journeying back to Eld for a meeting with his master.
The Mage smoothed back his bronze-powdered hair and straightened the fit of his well-tailored but nondescript brown jacket. He’d discarded his Captain Batay disguise after leaving Brodson earlier. A Sorrelian captain would garner too much attention wandering the more affluent residential neighborhoods of the West End, whereas a well-dressed but unremarkable merchant would slip by unnoticed. Not even Fey warriors would connect the bold dress, tattooed face, and oiled hair of Batay with the sober Goodman Black.
He approached a small, tidy home near the riverfront and slowed his pace. His watchful gaze scanned the nearby roads and rooftops, but he detected no Fey warriors, hidden or otherwise. Even so, he was careful. His brows drew together in a faint frown of concentration as he formed a weave of Azrahn and meticulously insulated it in threads of Spirit to mask its signature from keen Fey senses. Only when the familiar, cold
, sweet tang of Azrahn was suitably muffled did he direct the weave into the house. He felt the woman’s quick start of fear, her pointless struggle to resist, and the satisfying whimper of obedient subjugation. Pleased, he pushed open the front gate and walked up the gravel path bordered by tidy rows of cultivated flowers. Even before he reached the mullioned front door, he heard the lock click open, and the door swung inward.
The house was as tidy within as without. As Tuelis closed the door behind him, Kolis looked around the modest living room. A smile curved his lips as his glance fell upon the two small children playing quietly on a rug by the hearth. “Aren’t you a pretty pair,” he murmured.
“Mama? Who’s at the door?”
Kolis turned to the young woman who entered the room. She was lovely, with clear, fine skin, deep blue eyes, and an appearance as neat as the home she kept. He smiled. This would be a greater pleasure than most. “My dear, you must be Selianne. Your mother has told me so much about you.”
“Are the beaches in the Fading Lands as beautiful as this?” Ellie looked out across the vast expanse of white sand and turquoise waters of Great Bay. She and Rain had flown countless miles with astonishing speed until the tropical beauty of southern Great Bay had drawn their interest. Now they sat on a blanket on the sand beneath the shade of a copse of broad-leafed pella trees. The remains of the picnic lunch they’d purchased earlier in a tiny bayside village lay between them on the blanket they’d been forced to accept from the awed villager who’d sold them lunch. Rain’s weapons lay in a pile of steel and leather within easy reach of his hands.
“It depends where along the coast you are,” he answered. “On the southern coast, there are pella trees, white sand beaches, and crystal waters like this. In the north, where the Feyls meet the sea, the beaches are black and the waters are a deep, deep blue.”
“Tairen like the water, don’t they?”
His eyes warmed and the fierceness of his handsome features softened, making him seem more approachable and somehow even more staggeringly handsome. “Aiyah, they do indeed.”
Ellie’s heart turned somersaults inside her chest. “Tell me about the tairen.”
“What would you like to know?”
“Everything. What do they look like? Are they the same as you when you are a tairen?”
“Aiyah, though they come in many different colors. The oldest female is a deep gray, with white and black in her wings and tail. She is beautiful and very fierce. To the Fey, she is called Sybharukai, the wise one. She is very ancient, very crafty. A powerful friend and an even more powerful enemy.” His voice was filled with both pride and respect. “Her mate is Corus. He is a great warrior, with many battle scars and fur the color of twilight. And there is young Fahreeta, all golden fur and green eyes. She likes games and flirting with the other males to annoy her mate, Torasul. He is the largest of the males except for Sybharukai’s mate, and he has great patience, which is good, else Fahreeta would drive him mad.”
“You make them sound like people.”
He smiled. “They are. Just a different kind of people.”
“How many tairen are there?”
His smile dimmed. Sadness skated across her senses, then was gone so quickly she thought she must have imagined it. “That, you will have to see for yourself. When you come to the Fading Lands, I will take you to meet the Fey’Bahren pride.”
In three weeks, she would wed this man and leave behind everything she knew, everyone she loved. The reminder was an abrupt splash of reality. She drew her knees up close to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. Though half of her longed to go—longed to follow him anywhere, for that matter—the other half was terrified at the prospect. He was so confident, so at ease with himself, his power, the world. He exuded grace and elegance in everything he did, from the way his fingers ran through his hair to the way he sprawled so unselfconsciously in the grass yet lost not one shred of dignity or self-possession. Could he possibly be any different from her? And though it only made sense that she would want to follow him to the ends of the earth like the hopelessly besotted romantic she was, what could he possibly see in her?
“Has anyone ever claimed a shei’tani by mistake?”
Rain’s eyebrows flew up and nearly disappeared in his hairline. Then they came plummeting back down into a fierce, haughty frown. “I am not mistaken, if this is what you imply.” His voice was stiff, his eyes hot. Offended pride slapped at her senses.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized quickly. “I didn’t mean to insult you. I just don’t understand how you know.” She bit her lip. “How can you know? How can you be sure?”
“I am sure.” The finality of his tone signaled an end to the discussion.
Ellie subsided into silence for all of five seconds, before the question struggling inside her burst free. “How is it different from what you felt for Lady Sariel?”
Rain gave her an exasperated look. He obviously wasn’t used to people who insisted on continuing a discussion once he had indicated he was done with the subject. “Comparing the two is like comparing the Great Sun and the Mother moon. They both shine light on the world, but one is the light itself and the other is a reflection.”
“Oh.” She frowned. So which was she, the light or the reflection?
“The sun, Ellysetta. You are the sun.”
She eyed him suspiciously. “I thought you said you couldn’t read my mind.”
“And so I cannot. But I would be a foolish man indeed not to know what question would come next once I compared my feelings for you and Sariel to the sun and the moon.” His mouth twisted in a wry smile. “Women have not changed that much in a thousand years.”
Did he really expect her to believe that she, a stranger he’d only met a few days ago, was the sun while Sariel, the woman for whom he’d scorched the world, was the moon?
“Please don’t lie to flatter my vanity,” she told him in a low voice. “I’d rather have the truth, no matter how harsh the sting that comes with it.”
His anger was instant and palpable. “I do not lie, Ellysetta,” he snapped. “Especially not to you.”
She flinched but refused to back down. “I am young, My Lord Feyreisen, and ignorant—and even foolish at times—but I am not such a silly pacheeta as to believe you love me even the tiniest bit as much as you loved Lady Sariel. How could you? You barely know me.”
Rain’s face cleared and he shook his head. “We are talking at cross-purposes. You speak of love, while I speak of something far greater. You are my shei’tani, the other half of my soul. It is a bonding so deep I could never hope to deny it, even if that was my desire. Feelings of the heart are nothing compared to that.”
A few days ago, his words would have left her swooning with daydreams of love and romance. Now, however, all she could think of was not what he had said, but rather what he had left unsaid. When you wager with tairen, take care with your words. Rain Tairen Soul might not lie, but that didn’t stop him from dancing around the truth. Had he said he loved her? No. Had he said he wanted her? No. On the contrary, he said quite clearly he had to claim her even if he didn’t want her.
“Somehow, I have upset you,” he said, frowning. “This was not my intention.”
“No. You haven’t upset me.” He wasn’t the only one who could dance around words. Rain hadn’t upset her. She’d done that herself by hoping her silly fantasy of absolute love, spawned by the stirring poetry of his countrymen, might actually come true.
Ellie stared hard at her clenched hands. She’d asked the gods for someone, anyone but Den, and they’d answered by sending her Rain Tairen Soul. She hadn’t asked them for true love. She needed to learn how to be thankful for what graces she received, rather than yearning for those unbestowed. She had Rain and his devotion. She could live without his love.
She looked up into Rain’s beautiful face and smiled with determined good humor. “I’m fine, really,” she assured him. “I’m more fortunate than I ever thought possible.”
“Can we do that again?” Ellie asked as she and Rain walked home through the streets of Celieria, ringed once more by her Fey guard. “Soon?” They had flown all afternoon, would have flown longer had they not promised her parents they would return before sunset.
“Aiyah,” Rain replied. “If it is your wish.”
“I wish,” she told him fervently.
His eyes crinkled at the corners. “Then we will do it again.” He grimaced ever so slightly. “With your parents’ permission, of course.”
“Of course.” Ellie smiled. The Tairen Soul chafed at the restraint, but she was pleased that he cared enough to honor her parents and her country’s customs. “And thank you.”
His gaze was tender, as was the faint hint of a curve on his lips. “Sha vel’mei, shei’tani.”
The Baristani household, when they returned, was in chaos. Ellie couldn’t believe her eyes. Gaily wrapped packages sat on every available surface, while others lay tossed on the floor with their ribbons and paper ripped and tangled. Dress pattern books lay scattered on the settee, several of them open. Shoe boxes, with their contents spilling out, were jumbled beside a lamp table. Swatches of fabric and lace dangled from the back of a chair and made a haphazard path across the floor. The smell of something burning emanated from the kitchen.
Apprehension clutched at Ellie, and she felt Rain stiffen at her side. Drawing blades with a quiet hiss, the quintet of Fey warriors fanned out quickly and silently, like dark shadows whispering through the house. Rain gestured, and light surrounded Ellie.
“Mama?” Ellie called.
“Just a chime!” Lauriana’s voice shouted from the kitchen. There was a sound of muffled cursing, then something banged, and Ellie heard the sizzle of water hitting a hot surface.
“I’ve burned the dinner rolls.” Lauriana appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron and scowling. “What in the name of…?” The scowl darkened and her fists planted themselves on her hips as she surveyed the destruction in the room. “Lillis!” she yelled. “Lillis Angelisa Baristani, come here this instant!”