The Cradle of Ice, page 52
part #2 of Moonfall Series
The seven giants thrashed and writhed in the air, as if burning in that storm. Other raash’ke dashed in panicked flights in all directions. One great beast crinkled its huge wing, neck twisted, squeezing out a cry of anguish, of guilt, of horror—knowing all the misery the raash’ke had inflicted. It could not hold that much grief. It tumbled through the air, struck the churning lake, and was swept down into the maelstrom’s darkness.
“Help them,” Daal begged.
Nyx swallowed, at a loss. Bashaliia trembled before the desolation and panic raging above him.
Daal drew next to her. “They are rudderless and lost. I can feel it. Madness threatens.”
She nodded. “They need a new anchor.”
She stared up, knowing what she must do.
I must be their new spider.
At least for now.
She turned to Daal and Shiya. “I will need everything.”
Daal held out a hand, so did Shiya.
Nyx took them both.
“We will need to create a beacon of pure bridle-song,” she said. “One strong enough to draw the tattering flock and its shredded mind together, to anchor them until they can find their center again.”
Daal gripped her hand. “Take what you need.”
She nodded and drew his fire. She knew if she took too much it would kill him—and he did not have much left. He was still weak, his flames more smoldering than blazing.
With the two merged together, she let Daal see her fear, his danger.
He stared into her eyes, his words filling her without speaking.
Take all of it.
She knew there was no other choice. She opened herself fully, no longer denying the dark well at her core. She used its hunger as a force, pulling everything from Daal.
He cried out.
With the two of them merged together, it felt as if she weren’t just sucking the marrow out of him, but his bones, too. He slumped to his knees, but he still gripped her hand. She felt the pound of his heartbeat as if it were her own. Its rhythm grew erratic, his energy too weak to work that fist of muscle in his chest.
I can’t do this to you.
His answer was weak, one word, shining with the hope for that harmony to be restored—between his people and the panicked and grief-stricken above.
Must.
His grip slipped from hers. She tightened her fingers to hold him, while knowing it would kill him. The last of his energy swept into her, swirling down the dark well inside her, joining all the fire she had already drawn.
She pictured the watery churn of the nearby lake—and despaired.
I am that maelstrom.
Shiya shifted in her other grip. “Share this burden.”
Nyx knew, to create a strong enough beacon, the bronze woman would need Daal’s fire, too. She passed a stream of power through her palm to Shiya.
As Nyx gazed into that well inside her, watching the swirl of flames—spinning around and around—she realized a new truth, a possible hope.
For all of them.
We don’t need a beacon in the sky—we need a maelstrom.
And she knew how to create it.
Shiya’s earlier words inspired it.
Share this burden.
Nyx pulled the bronze woman closer. “Grab Daal’s hand, too. Like you’re holding mine.”
Shiya cocked a brow, curious, but she reached down to Daal’s slack arm and took his hand. He did not respond. His head hung low. His breathing was spasms.
With them all linked together, Nyx turned the sucking force of her dark well into an untapped power source. As Daal’s flame spun inside that vortex, she used that speed to cast fire into Shiya. Still, Nyx refused to let it linger there. She forced the fire through all that bronze and back to Daal’s other hand, returning it to him, enough to sustain him.
Around and around, Nyx flung that fire, whipping it faster, creating a maelstrom. She added her voice, humming it all stronger. Shiya carried it higher, stoking it with each pass. All their lifeforces and bridling energy swirled through all three of them.
Daal lifted his face, breathing stronger, his heart finding its rhythm again.
Still, Nyx drove that song, that energy, that force, until it could no longer be contained. She thrust it high, her voice sending it up, bolstered by Shiya. The golden, fiery maelstrom whipped into the sky. The strength of its pull was undeniable, powered by the gravity of that dark well inside her.
From across the skies, the insatiable pull of the maelstrom drew the shreds of the dark storm, gathering them back into some semblance of a whole. The maelstrom’s golden brilliance shed light into those desolate shadows.
Below, Nyx sang a promise to the sky—that grief could be healed, that horrors could be forgiven, that blame was not theirs.
She repeated Daal’s earlier words.
You are not corrupt.
She filled the skies with the memories of a harmonious past, showing them again, over and over, whipping it through the maelstrom, refusing to let them look away.
Throughout it all, she made another promise, knowing that the raash’ke would need more than memories of the past. They needed an anchor, something to hold them together long enough for that healing to happen. She sang that assurance into the sky, merging her voice with her dah’s once again.
I am here, right beside you.
So, close your eyes and know it true.
I am here, right beside you …
She let them know that they were not alone. She did not intend to control them, to wield them, only to be there for them.
Overhead, the dark storm calmed, clearing somewhat, revealing the spatter of stars, twinkling bright. Still, the view was marred by shreds of tortured clouds. It was not over. True healing, true forgiveness, would take time.
This was only the start.
Six giant wings circled high, silhouetted against the spangle of stars. Smaller raash’ke made wider orbits.
Nyx cast herself into the fiery maelstrom and spread herself out to them, offering herself, singing softly of harmony. As she did, her view splintered, seeing the landscape below through scores of eyes. She remembered this from before, back with the Mýr bats of Bashaliia’s colony.
In turn, she was watched. She felt the weight and ancientness of that horde-mind staring at her, wary, suspicious, wounded—but also hopeful.
For a moment, her gaze flickered, catching fractured glimpses through eyes far off. She saw the Crèche. Iskar glowed fiery through smoke. A wreckage of a large ship burned on the water. Another sat in the shallows of the village. Other pyres lit the beach. And bodies. So many bodies.
Panic jarred her. She dropped swiftly, shedding free of those eyes, and fell back into her body.
She gasped as she did so.
Daal was still on his knees, but he stared up at her.
“What’s wrong?” he asked hoarsely.
“The Crèche … it’s under attack.”
She turned to Graylin, knowing where those ships must have come from.
She told him, told them all.
“The kingdom has found us.”
78
DAAL STRUGGLED OFF the boulder, still weak, feeling a century older. He was the last to get down, but Shiya waited below and helped him. To the side, Nyx spoke animatedly with Graylin and Vikas.
Despite his exhaustion, fear pounded his heart.
Moments ago, he had shared some of Nyx’s journey among the raash’ke, but he had faded in and out, spent and drained. He had caught only glimpses through those other eyes, but he had been too weak to follow her all the way to the Crèche.
Still, Nyx had been clear about the threat. They all knew the urgency, the imperative.
We must get home.
He stared up at the sky, where giant wings still circled, gliding under those sparkling stars. Clusters of smaller raash’ke sped in ragged groups, still agitated, expressing their edginess. Nyx had warned them how fragile they were and would likely remain so for some time.
As he gazed above, he wondered if this was the Dreamers’ purpose in sharing the Crèche’s memories, why they had instilled that harmonious past into the two of them.
Was this the Oshkapeers’ intent all along? To preserve those memories until a time when they could be used to break the raash’ke free?
Daal had no way of knowing.
Jace called out, “I’ll start unloading the skiff.”
Daal returned his attention to the others as Jace headed down the rocky slope toward the river. It reminded Daal of who else was down there.
He followed Jace, anxious to check on Neffa and Mattis. The two orksos had a hard haul back to the Crèche. He wanted to check their harnesses for chafing and examine their burns from those fiery worms. But more than anything, he wanted to comfort them.
From the top of the slope, he recognized their nervousness. They had noted the circling raash’ke, too. The pair kept close to the shelter of the skiff, father and daughter, their horns knocking together, reassuring each other.
He glanced to the skiff’s fish pen and its icy storage of eels and minwins. A small meal would help return the orksos’ good natures. But he knew he shouldn’t overfeed them before—
“What’s that?” Jace asked, stopping ahead.
The thunderous blast threw Jace into Daal. They both rolled in a tangle. A flash of flames and a wave of blistering heat swept over them. Then parts of the skiff rained and crashed all around them.
Daal shoved away from Jace, panic returning his strength.
No, no …
He crawled through the burning wreckage, over broken crates. Once close enough, he denied what his eyes were seeing. He shook his head, trying to wish it away.
Mattis lay on the rocky slope, thrown out of the river by the blast. One wing fluttered. His horn had snapped off near its base. Blood pooled under his bulk.
Deafened by the blast, choked by his heart, Daal slid down the slope to reach the orkso. He ran a palm over his slick flank. Mattis’s nostrils heaved with misty exhalation. An eye swiveled to look at Daal, then over to the river, expressing his worry.
Neffa …
Daal scooted through the blood. Out in the water, Neffa rolled amidst the wreckage, piping in distress for her father. She struggled to claw and hump her way onto shore. The water around her was dark with the blood flowing into it.
Daal slid into the river, shying past her horn.
“I’ve got you,” he said, reaching for her.
She rolled, showing him why she struggled, why she couldn’t reach her father. Blood sprayed from where her foreleg and wing had been ripped away. Each beat of her huge hearts pumped the life out of her.
No, no, no …
He cried out in a wracking sob and hugged her huge head. Still, she beat her tail, fighting to push out of the river, to get to her father.
The others crowded behind him, unsure what to do, but Daal knew there was nothing. Her wound was fatal. From the bank, Mattis tried to lift his head with a whistling wail, calling to his daughter.
Daal recognized the one thing he could do.
He shoved out of the water and crawled, stumbling and shaking, up to Mattis. “Help me,” he cried out.
He shifted to Mattis’s head and tried to shoulder the orkso’s bulk back into the river, to his dying daughter. The others closed to help. They would’ve failed if not for Shiya’s strength. They slid Mattis through his own blood and into the river.
Daal slipped in with them, between them, hugging both. Neffa rubbed her father, nuzzled Daal, whistling as she bled away, flowing her life down the river. Mattis rolled and lifted a comforting wing over his daughter’s flank, but Mattis was weakening, too.
Daal sat waist-deep in the cold water. He sobbed and leaned his brow to each, inhaling their fishy musk, the salt of their last exhalation. Their piping and whistling faded into the air. He didn’t know who died first, but he stayed with them both to the end and beyond.
He hung over them, running a palm along the spiral of Neffa’s horn. The others tried to coax him out of the river, but he refused.
Nyx whispered to Graylin, “What happened?”
His answer was dull with despair. “The crate of armaments in the stern. One of the hand-bombs must have exploded.”
Vikas stepped into view, looking out at the wreckage, gesturing in her language.
Nyx’s reaction was sharp. “Sabotage? Like back on the Hawk? Why?”
Daal tried to block them out, closing his eyes.
“They wanted to make sure we never returned,” Graylin said dourly. “They must have used a long-wicked stykler. Like the one planted in the Hawk’s forge. Delayed to explode until we were far enough away, leaving us dead or stranded.”
“Who put it there?” Nyx asked.
Jace spoke up, his voice small and shocked. “The bomb. It wasn’t in the armament crate at the stern. When I was headed back to the skiff, I saw a curl of smoke rising at the bow, from under the bench. Where I was seated.”
“What was under there?” Graylin asked.
Jace gulped, trying to get his next words out. “It was Fenn’s pack, the one with the compass and the navigational tools.”
Despite Daal’s grief, he turned to face Jace. His voice was hoarse, fueled by fury. “Are you certain?”
Jace backed a step from whatever showed on Daal’s face. “Y … Yes.”
Daal shoved around, slid deeper into the water, and rounded the bulk of Neffa.
“What are you doing?” Nyx asked softly.
Through clenched jaws, he answered, “We need to get back to the Crèche.”
Nyx stepped closer. “How—?”
“You know as well as I do. We’ve done it before.”
Daal removed Neffa’s harness—and freed the saddle from her back.
79
NYX WATCHED DAAL undo Neffa’s rigging with great tenderness. His shoulders shook, but she didn’t know if it was from grief or fury.
He climbed out of the water and handed her the saddle. It was draped by a tangle of cinches. It looked complicated, but she knew each piece, drawing the knowledge from a blur of memories—both Daal’s and those of the ancient riders of the raash’ke.
The two saddles were not dissimilar.
Daal collected a second one from Mattis, then joined her.
His eyes were pained, pleading. “Ask them.”
She wanted to argue, but she knew there was no other way for them to return to the Crèche. And Daal was right about one thing.
We have done this before.
The knowledge of those ancient riders was buried inside her, inside Daal.
Graylin suspected what Daal was requesting her to do. “You mean to attempt to saddle and mount a pair of raash’ke? To fly back to the Crèche?”
“We must get back somehow. The blistering heat, the lack of fresh water, the sulfur in the air. We won’t last more than a day or two.”
“There could be a chance. Darant had promised to search for us with the Sparrowhawk if we didn’t return.”
Nyx shook her head, remembering her fiery view of the Crèche. “It may already be too late for the Sparrowhawk.”
Vikas gestured her mute support, “While we’re stuck here, we might as well attempt it.”
Jace stood with his arms crossed. “There are only two saddles.” He unfolded his arms and waved to the others. “What about us?”
Daal answered. “The raash’ke are very good at carrying live prey back to their roosts.”
His words did not sit well with Jace—not Daal’s choice of description, not what he was suggesting.
Graylin looked undecided, but it was not his choice.
Nyx turned to Shiya. “Can you help me reach out to them?”
The bronze woman nodded.
Before joining her, Nyx ran a palm over Bashaliia’s crown. Her fingers brushed his ear, his soft cheek, borrowing some of his warmth, his love, knowing she would need both.
Once done, she stepped alongside Shiya. “I’m ready.”
Together, they stoked up a glow, letting it warm over skin and bronze. Nyx started first with a quiet melody, infused with the memories of raash’ke sharing the air with their bonded riders. She folded in a harmony of her own hopes, refining each note to make her need clear, her desire.
She let those golden threads rise out of her—from both lips and heart. She reached to Shiya, who was ready for her. The bronze woman sang brightly, the music heartbreaking, expressing what was lost, what was longed to be regained.
Nyx knew Shiya had no memory of those past flights, those ancient bonds between riders and winged companions. Still, each note rang poignant and true, rising out of Shiya’s own loss. Her loneliness and need for connection flowed through Nyx’s threads, adding a depth of pathos that could not be ignored.
The threads and tendrils rose high, like golden smoke from an ancient fire.
One of the giants wafted down. Its wingspan was so wide that there was no need for them to flap. Movement and guidance were but ripples in those great sails. It soared high, still hanging back, but it brushed through those golden threads.
As it did, Nyx felt the immensity of its intelligence. It wasn’t just this lone raash’ke, but all of them. Nyx shivered with awe, a mote before a god. It then glided off, riding in a slow spiral up a column of hot air.
There was no answer, no response.
She knew she could do no more and let her song fade. Above, the golden threads dissolved into a sparkle that scattered off, like embers from a dying fire.
“What happened?” Jace asked as she stepped away from Shiya.
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “We wait, I guess.”
She had barely taken a few steps, lost in contemplation, when Graylin grabbed her arm, his grip like iron. Vikas stared up with an exhalation of surprise. Jace drew closer to them all.
Daal nodded, satisfied. “They come.”
From the skies, six raash’ke separated from the others. Each was only a tenth the size of the giants, but they were still huge. They swept up the river, one leading, then another. They were followed by a clutch of smaller wings, forming an escort.
