The Cloud Roads

Chapter Four

“We’re here.”

Moon opened bleary eyes to see Stone leaning over him. “Uh?” Stone patted his chest. “Still with me?”

“I think...” Moon was cold and sick and didn’t remember shifting to groundling. He lay on hard ground with sparse grass poking him everywhere. He winced. “Maybe.”

“I’ll get some water.” Stone retreated and Moon blinked up at a gray sky, heavy with rain clouds. Did he say we were there?

The past night and day of flying was mostly a painful blur. They had stayed at Sky Copper only long enough for Moon to hunt down one of the big grasseaters while Stone checked what was left of the colony for survivors. It was well after dark, and Moon sat at the edge of a small spring a little distance away when Stone came out again. He landed near Moon, shook the dirt off, and shifted to groundling.

“Nothing?” Moon asked, not expecting an answer. Over the scent of wet earth from the spring, Moon could still smell the stink of death radiating off Stone. He thought if there had been anybody alive in there, they would have come out by now.

“I had to dig down to the nurseries.” Stone wiped the gritty dirt off his forehead and crouched next to Moon, scooping up a double handful of water to drink. He shook the drops off his hands, looking away. “I found what was left of the Arbora clutches, but no royal Aeriat. I know they had at least one fledgling queen. They brought her out to show me the last time I was here.”

Moon felt a sick chill settle into his gut. “They took them alive.”

Stone let his breath out, weary and resigned. “I hope not.”

There wasn’t much else to say, and nothing they could do. Since the Fell would have eaten most of the dead, it was impossible to tell if any Raksura had escaped. Moon wondered if this was what had happened to the colony he had been born in, if Sorrow had been fleeing a disaster like this and had found herself with nowhere to go.

After they ate Moon’s kill and drank from the spring, they were as ready as they were going to get. Stone had told him, “If it gets too much for you, let me know.”

Trying to hide how little he wanted to do this, Moon had said mock-earnestly, “I’ll bite a hole in your chest.”

Being carried was at best uncomfortable; when he was already weary from being in his other form all day, it soon became an active torment. It helped somewhat that Moon didn’t have to expend any effort. Stone held him around the waist, tucked into his chest, so Moon didn’t even have to hook his claws into Stone’s scales to hold on, though for a while he did it anyway. About midway through the night, he finally had to shift to groundling to sleep, but he could only stand the wind so long before having to shift back. By morning he was miserable and exhausted and half-conscious. If Stone had ever stopped to rest, Moon had been unaware of it.

“Did you say we were—” Squinting, Moon rolled over and pushed himself up on his arms. “There.”

They were on a low bluff in a hilly jungle, looking out over a narrow river valley. Built across the shallow river was a huge structure, a gray stone step pyramid. It was big, bigger than the tower where they had spent the night back in the mountains. Heavy square pillars crossed the river banks, supporting the pyramid and the several levels of stone platforms at its feet. Tall trees covered the hills rising up around it, and greenery ate into the edges of the gray paving.

Some of the lower hills were terraced into gardens, with rambling rows of tall leafy plants. Unlike Sky Copper, it was occupied.

Figures moved across the platforms, standing and talking, or carrying baskets up from the gardens. Some looked like groundlings, some like Moon’s other form, but smaller, and without wings. Their scales were all different colors, warm browns and metallic blues and reds and greens, and somehow he hadn’t expected that at all. Then he saw one of the groundlings shift and fly up to an opening high in the face of the pyramid.

Moon couldn’t stop staring. Somewhere in the back of his mind he had thought he would never see this, that when they got here the place would be as dead as Sky Copper. And seeing that pitiful ruin hadn’t prepared him for this. There had to be a few hundred people in there. People like him. It was wonderful and terrifying.

And seeing it let him articulate the thought that had been plaguing him since Stone had asked him to come to a shifter settlement: If you can’t fit in here, it’s not them; it’s you.

Stone sat on his heels and handed him the waterskin. Moon took it, still overwhelmed. “Did you build this place?” he managed to ask.

Stone eyed the complex as if he thought it unsatisfactory at best. “No. Found it, a long time ago.”

It was so different from Sky Copper’s mound. “Is it a good place to live?”

Stone shrugged. “It’s all right.” He prodded Moon in the ribs. “Drink that.”

Reminded of the waterskin, Moon lifted it and drank. He didn’t realize how thirsty he was until the lukewarm water hit his dry throat. He coughed, sputtered, and tried again, keeping it down this time. It cleared his head a little, and when he lowered the skin and wiped his mouth, he asked Stone, “What’s wrong?”

Stone rubbed his face wearily. “Fell. Somewhere inside.”

Moon stared at the building, the people moving with unhurried calm along the terraces. It didn’t seem possible. And if Stone could scent Fell up here, the Raksura down there couldn’t miss it. “Are you sure—” Stone gave him a withering look, so he said instead, “Then why does everybody look so normal?”

“I don’t know. The possibilities aren’t encouraging.” Stone took the waterskin and stuffed it back into his pack. “Come on.”

Before Moon could stand, Stone shifted, grabbed him around the waist, and they were in the air, flying toward the pyramid. Tucked into Stone’s chest, Moon missed his first entrance into Indigo Cloud. He felt Stone tilt his wings to land, and then they passed into cool shadow.

Stone released him, and Moon stumbled sideways before catching his balance. They had landed in a wide high-ceiling room, easily large enough for Stone’s other form. The slanted outer wall was open to the outside and vines had crept in, curling around the blocky, rectangular designs carved into the walls. Gray and blue paving stones lined the floor, and wide square doorways with heavy, carved lintels led further into the structure. People hurried in through those doorways, some in groundling form, some not. A few had wings folded behind their backs, but most didn’t. Arbora, Moon remembered. He and the few others with wings were Aeriat.

Moon could barely take it all in, overwhelmed by scent more than anything else. The air was laden with strange people—strange Raksura—and sweet floral scents and clean sweat. But under it all was a trace of Fell taint. Stone was right, not that Moon had doubted it.

Stone shifted to groundling, and everyone in the room instantly followed suit. It belatedly dawned on Moon that it might be a courtesy, or a gesture of respect toward Stone’s age and potential threat. Moon had been doing it, most of the time, but only because it was easier to talk when they were both the same size.

Caught up in trying to absorb detail, Moon belatedly realized that everybody was staring at him. He kept his expression blank, made himself stand still when his first impulse was to dive out the doorway behind him. He had always tried to keep a low profile when he arrived at any new place; apparently that wasn’t going to be an option here. And everyone was dressed better than he was, in silky garments in dark rich colors, robes or jackets and loose trousers. Moon’s thin shirt and drawstring pants were torn and dirty after days of sleeping on grass or bare ground with no chance to wash, and he was suddenly intensely conscious of it.

Everybody looked different, too: short, tall, hair every shade between light and dark, skin all different tints, though that tended toward dark, warm colors, and there were no greens or blues like some groundling races. Not that Moon had been expecting their groundling forms to resemble him or Stone, but... All right, he had been expecting everyone to look like him or Stone.

One of the men stepped forward. He was short and stocky, with dark-tinted skin and red-brown hair.

“Stone,” he said, sounding both wary and relieved. “We thought it would take you longer to get back.” He jerked his head toward Moon. “He’s from the Star Aster Court?”

Stone didn’t reply immediately. His gaze swept the crowd, giving nothing away. He said, “No. None of them would agree to come. I found him along the way.” He fixed his attention on the group spokesman. “There are Fell here.”

An uneasy ripple traveled through the room. Most of the men dropped their gaze. One of the women said, “Pearl let them in. They were here for two days and left this morning.”

Stone cocked his head. The room seemed to grow colder, as if his anger drew the warmth out of the air. “Did they happen to mention they destroyed the Sky Copper Court no more than two days ago?”

Someone gasped, and everyone went still.

Shocked, the woman said, “They asked Pearl for a treaty.”

A treaty with Fell. Moon managed to choke back a derisive snort. The groundlings fell for that, too. The Fell rulers came in and pretended to be reasonable, and the groundlings thought they could somehow appease them with land or goods or promises.

Stone absorbed that information in a silence tinged with threat. He told Moon, “You stay down here,” and strode forward. The crowd hastily parted for him, and he vanished through the farther doorway.

What? Moon thought, startled. The others went after Stone, or hurried off in different directions. Moon followed, trailing behind. He had no idea how this place was laid out, where to go, how to behave. At least in groundling cities, he had some idea of how to act.

And from what he had seen outside, there were a lot of people here. It was impossible to take note of how many had wings, and maybe there was a shortage of warriors. But Moon found it increasingly hard to believe that one extra was going to make that big a difference. There was something Stone wasn’t telling him. Not that he was particularly surprised by that. And there’s the Fell.

He sighed and ran both hands through his hair, scratching his head. He itched all over with dirt and sweat. He needed food and a bath; he needed rest. Worry about the Fell later, he thought, and wandered into the next room, following the sound and scent of running water.

He found a wide corridor with a shallow pool running down one side, fed by water falling out of a channel in the wall and down a series of square stone blocks. The other walls were ornamented with deep carvings, bas-reliefs all showing giant groundlings in strange, square-plated armor, towering over trees and hills and other fleeing groundling tribes. The corridor led to another large room with an outer doorway, letting in a cool, rain-scented breeze. It looked out onto the jungle climbing the cliff and the river below the pyramid.

This area was more temperate than the Cordans’ river valley. The trees were taller with heavier trunks, with dark gray bark and wide spreading canopies. Many of them had to be at least a hundred paces tall. They fought for space with fern-trees nearly as large, with deceptively delicate foliage, more familiar plume and spiral trees. The river was shallow and clear enough that Moon could see the bottom, lined with flat stones and gravel. Like Stone had said, it wasn’t deep enough for good fishing.

Moon drifted back toward an interior doorway, following the sound of voices. He passed through a couple of blocky connecting passages into a big airy chamber that had to be at the center of the building. A shaft was open to the floors above and below, daylight falling through from some opening high above. Green plants hung down from the upper levels, vines heavy with small yellow fruit. A few people stood across the room in an anxious group, talking. Several children ran past, boys and girls, none taller than Moon’s elbow, all shifting apparently at random.

Moon stared after them, having a sudden, vivid memory of playing with his brothers and sister, of being able to make them shift just by startling them. None of these children seemed to have wings. Watching everyone shift was strange, too. He had forgotten how it looked, the blurring of vision, the illusion of dark mist in the instant of change. It wasn’t as impressive as when Stone did it, but it still took some getting used to again.

“What do you think you’re doing here?”

Moon turned slowly. Confronting him were two young men, both shorter than him, but heavyset and powerfully muscled. The leather vests and pants they wore were scratched and stained from hard use. Long machete-like blades with carved bone handles hung from their belts. Both men looked hostile and cocky. Since Moon wasn’t going to say I don’t know what I’m doing here, he said nothing, just studied them with narrowed eyes.

When Moon failed to respond, one man said to the other, “He’s the feral solitary Stone brought.”

“Solitary” might be accurate, but “feral” just wasn’t fair. Moon said, “So?”

The second one bared his teeth. “You need to leave.”

Moon let out an annoyed breath. He needed a fight right now like he needed a kick to the head. Then another man strode in through the archway behind them. He was taller than the first two, though not quite Moon’s height. He had dark bronze skin, fluffy brown hair, and a belligerent jaw. With an irritated glare, he said, “Leave him alone.”

Being defended by a stranger was new and diverting for Moon, but the two men didn’t seem impressed. The first one made his voice deliberately bored, saying, “This isn’t your concern, Chime.”

Chime didn’t back down. “I think it is. Who told you to do this?”

The second one shot him a sideways glance, growling, “No one told us to do anything.”

“Really?” Chime’s mouth set in a skeptical line. “Because you two have never had a thought in your heads that someone else didn’t put there.”

Both men shifted. They were both Arbora, and while one had copper scales, the other was a dark green. Both bared fangs at Chime, crouching as if preparing to leap at him. Chime shifted in response, falling back a step. He was a dark reflective blue, with a gold sheen under his scales and wings folded against his back.

That they had all shifted seemed to indicate that the fight was on. Here we go, Moon thought wearily. He hadn’t even been here long enough to find a place to sit down. He shifted, flaring his wings, spines, and tail to look bigger.

The response wasn’t exactly what he had anticipated. Both the Arbora leapt backward out of reach, badly startled, shifting back to groundling almost in tandem.

The first one muttered, “Sorry,” and they both backed away, turning only to slip out through the nearest doorway.

Chime shifted back to groundling, and he looked startled, too. “Oh, I didn’t—”

“You handled that well,” a woman said, sounding amused. She stood barely three paces away, watching them, and somehow Moon hadn’t noticed her before. Her groundling form was small, with unkempt, ragged white-blonde hair, and very pale, nearly colorless skin. Her face was thin, making her look older than she should, and her dress was a loose red smock with a torn hem. “Shell and Grain have been effectively embarrassed, but they know it’s their own fault.”

Moon shifted back to groundling too, since he was the only one who hadn’t. He shrugged one shoulder, uncomfortable with the woman’s scrutiny.

“Can you talk?” Chime demanded.

The woman lifted her brows at him in reproof. “Chime.”

Chime waved a hand in exasperation. “Well, he hasn’t said anything!”

Moon folded his arms, even more uncomfortable. He knew he probably looked surly, but there wasn’t much he could do about that. “I can talk.”

“Ah.” Smiling, the woman inclined her head to him. “I’m Flower, and this is Chime.”

“I’m Moon,” he admitted warily.

Flower asked, “Will you come with us?”

Moon’s first impulse was to say yes. Then it occurred to him that going off with Stone just because he asked him to had gotten Moon far across the Three Worlds in the middle of a situation where he had no idea of the dangers or what anyone’s motive was. “Where?”

“Just down to the bowers.” After a moment, she clarified, “The living quarters.”

It wasn’t as if Moon had anywhere else to go just now, but he still hesitated. “Do you have food?”

Chime looked puzzled and a little suspicious. “Why wouldn’t we have food?”

Flower nodded seriously. “Yes. It’s nearly time for the second day-meal, and we have plenty to share.”

That did it. “Then I’ll go with you,” Moon said.

Flower led the way to the next chamber, to a narrow stairwell. It had more of the blocky carvings standing out from the walls and, as they descended, Moon noticed the steps were a little too tall for his comfort. They weren’t nearly tall enough for the giant stature of the groundlings in the wall carvings; either the artists had been exaggerating for flattery or for some ritual purpose, or they had had a wildly disproportionate view of themselves.

“There are other ways down,” Flower explained, glancing back at Moon, “but this is the quickest and we don’t have to shift. Well, the quickest for me. I don’t have wings.”

“We’re both mentors,” Chime added firmly, as if Moon might argue.

Moon was glad most of their attention was focused on not stumbling on the awkward stairs; it gave him a chance to adjust to the fact that he was with two shamen without betraying any dismay. Except... hadn’t Stone said that mentors were a caste of the Arbora? He slid a look at Chime. “You’ve got wings.”

“I know that,” Chime said, pointedly.

All right, fine, Moon thought, and dropped the subject.

Several levels down, low enough to hear the rush of the river somewhere below them, they turned into a maze of small rooms with ceilings streaked with old soot. Niches were carved out of the walls, probably meant for lamps but now stuffed with glowing moss, like the light-baskets Moon had seen in Sky Copper. So far, that seemed the only similarity; this place felt cramped and closed-in compared to what he had seen of the ruined mound. Remembering Stone’s answer on this subject hadn’t been very informative either, he asked, “Why did you pick this place to live?”

“We didn’t,” Chime said, sounding resigned. “The court has been here at least seven generations.”

“Many of us think we should go back to the west, where we came from in the first place,” Flower said as she stopped at a doorway. She looked up at Moon, her face thoughtful and a little worried. “It’s why Stone went to the Star Aster Court for help. Didn’t he tell you?”

Moon hesitated, then found himself answering honestly. “Sort of.”

“Hmm,” Flower said to herself, and stepped into the room. “This is the teachers’ court. The mentors use it too, but there aren’t nearly as many of us.” The lintel was low and both Chime and Moon had to duck under it. Inside, the ceiling was just high enough to stand comfortably, but this room didn’t feel cramped; one wall looked out into an open atrium lined with pillared porticos, and heavily planted with fruit vines and white and yellow flowers. Three low doorways led off into other rooms, and cushions and woven straw mats were scattered on the floor. Moon smelled baking bread, and his stomach cramped in pure lust.

A young man ducked out another doorway, startled to see them, or maybe just startled by Moon’s strange presence. He had dark hair and bronze skin, and a stocky, strong build. Flower told him, “Bell, this is Moon. He’s been traveling with Stone for days, and he’s starving.”

Moon knew he should have been trying to get more details about the situation, like why the Fell had been allowed in, and what was likely to come of it. And he needed to find a casual way to ask the direction of the nearest groundling territory in case he had to leave here in a hurry. But Moon was thoroughly distracted by the food and the number of people who kept coming in to be introduced by Flower. Bell, with helpers Rill, Petal, and Weave, brought big wooden plates with cuts of raw red meat, pieces of yellow and green fruit, crispy bread, and lumpy white things that turned out to be root vegetables baked in sweet spices. It was a surprise, and a relief, that except for not cooking the meat, they ate like groundlings, and didn’t just hunt for big kills. Moon had started to miss bread, cooked roots, and fruit.

By the time he made it through the first helpings of everything, he had an audience of more than twenty people. They were all in groundling form, and all seemed to be half a head or so shorter than he and Chime.

When most of the people in the room were finished eating, Bell and his helpers brought out brown glazed clay pots and cups, and Flower poured tea for Moon. Watching him, her face serious, she asked, “Were you with Stone when he stopped at Sky Copper?”

Everyone went quiet, hanging on his answer, and Moon tried not to twitch uncomfortably. “Yes.”

“Is it true?” Petal asked worriedly. She had dark hair and warm brown skin, and a serious set to her expression. “The Fell killed them?”

Moon knew the kind of lies and distortions the Fell were capable of, and that if there were any possible way to make Stone out a liar, they would try it. He said, “Some dakti and a kethel were still there. If Stone had known he needed to prove it, he could have brought their heads back.” Not that Moon would have enjoyed traveling with even dead dakti.

Chime looked at Flower, his jaw set stubbornly. “Pearl can’t ignore this. She’ll have to admit that the Fell are too dangerous to ally with.”

“She doesn’t have to admit anything. That’s the problem,” Flower said with irony. She glanced at Moon, who thought he was keeping his expression noncommittal. She smiled in apology and explained, “Pearl is our reigning queen. She allowed the Fell to enter the colony to ‘negotiate.’”

“How many Fell?” Moon asked cautiously.

Bell settled on a mat next to Flower, saying ruefully, “It was only one ruler and two minor dakti. We didn’t really get a close look at them.”

Moon nodded, folding another square of bread around several syrupy root slices. “It always starts with one.”

Chime, who picked at the fruit with a depressed expression, looked up, frowning. “What do you mean?”

Moon managed to swallow a large bite without choking himself. “When they take groundling cities.”

Everyone absorbed that in worried silence. Petal wrapped her arms around her knees as if she were cold. “I wonder if Pearl realizes that.”

“She does.” Flower’s mouth was a grim line, as if the yellow fruit she was slicing presented some desperate problem. “Our histories have chronicled the Fell’s advances in the larger groundling capitals around the Crescent Sea, and in the Star Isles. Some of the mentors of the last generation made a study of it.”

Bell asked Moon, “You lived with groundlings?”

Moon just answered with a combination shrug and nod. He realized he was still having trouble getting his mind around the fact that these people knew what he was.

Flower wasn’t deterred by his failure to answer. She passed the new plate of fruit to the newcomers in the back and asked Moon, “What court did you come from? I know you were living alone, but where were you born?”

Moon hesitated over that. He could lie, but if he did, this was going to turn into that conversation, the one where he was asked ordinary, innocuous questions he had no way to answer. Pretending to be a groundling had trapped him into it time after time. And it would be for nothing, if anybody bothered to ask Stone. “I don’t know.”

Flower lifted her brows at that, started to speak, then hesitated. Puzzled, Chime asked, “Were you living near the Star Aster Court?”

“I don’t think so. I’m not sure where it is.” Moon decided to get it over with and admitted, “I hadn’t seen another Raksura in a long time.”

Petal frowned doubtfully. “How long?”

Moon shrugged. “About thirty-five turns. I think.”

Flower watched him with a particular concentration. Bell and Chime stared at Moon, then at each other. Petal shook her head slightly, almost in disbelief, and said, “But you must have been a fledgling, then.”

Moon shrugged again, trying to think of a way to change the subject. Saying, Hey, do you think a Fell flight will show up in the next few days? might do it.

“But why?” Chime asked. He made a vague gesture, taking in the room, the group of teachers and mentors. “Why avoid other Raksura?”

Moon couldn’t help betraying a little exasperation. After all, he had looked for these people for at least fifteen damn turns before giving up. “I wasn’t avoiding anybody. I didn’t know where I came from, what my people were called. My—The others died before they could tell me.”

“Who were—” Chime began, and Flower held up a hand for him to be silent. She said slowly, “I have a terrible feeling...” She wiped the fruit syrup off her hands, watching Moon. “Did Stone tell you why he wanted you to come here, to the Indigo Cloud Court?”

Moon was getting a terrible feeling too. By habit he had taken a seat near the open wall into the atrium, and no one was behind him. “He said you needed warriors to help defend the colony.”

“That’s partly true.” Chime looked dubious. “He was going to try to get the Star Aster Court to send at least a couple of clutches of warriors, but—”

Flower said deliberately, “Stone went to look for a consort. He didn’t say he had succeeded, and the two soldiers who challenged you earlier obviously didn’t realize what you were. You aren’t wearing the token that Jade sent with Stone, and it’s not easy to tell a young consort from a warrior in groundling form.”

Everybody was looking at him expectantly. Confused and wary, Moon asked, “What’s a consort?”

Now everybody was looking at him as if he had said something crazy. Petal put a hand over her mouth. Chime’s jaw dropped.

Flower bit her lip. “Yes, that’s what I was afraid of.” Hesitating, as if choosing her words carefully, she said, “A consort is a male warrior. A fertile male warrior, who can breed with a queen.”

What? Moon shook his head. “But I’m not—”

Flower nodded. “You are.”

Moon kept shaking his head. “No. How could you possibly—”

Anxiously, Chime put in, “Your scales are black. Only consorts are that color. You didn’t know? You really didn’t know that?”

I really didn’t know, Moon thought blankly. I really didn’t know a lot of things. “But Stone is—” that color. Stone who had said he had children, grandchildren.

Flower leaned forward, carefully explaining, “Stone is a consort. Or was, turns ago. Pearl, the reigning queen, is one of his line. Jade is her daughter, the only surviving queen from her last royal clutch.”

“He didn’t tell me that,” Moon managed to say. He pushed to his feet, turned, and took a couple of long strides outside to the atrium, where the grass and plants were green under the wan cloudy daylight. He shifted and jumped straight up the wall.

He caught the ledge above and climbed. Using the clinging vines and the cracks and chinks in the old stone to get up out of the atrium, he made it to the broad ledge of the next level.

He needed more of a drop to clear the side of the pyramid, so he followed the ledge around to where it hung out over the river. A woman sat there, glumly surveying the water and the hilly gardens. Her scales were a soft but vivid blue, with a silver-gray pattern overlaying them like a web. Her wings were folded, and the frills and spines behind her head formed an elaborate mane, reaching all the way down her back to her tail. They flared out as she sat up, startled.

“Sorry,” Moon muttered, and dove off the ledge.

The sky threatened rain, though the air was warm and close. Moon flew upriver a short distance, far enough to get past the terraced gardens, but still in sight of the pyramid. The river was wider here, with pools all along the banks. A small stream trickled down from the hill, turning into a waterfall where it tumbled over the rocky bank and into a pool. Its edges were overhung by trees with broad leaves longer than Moon was tall, forming drooping curtains. He landed on a flat rock that jutted up from the shallow water, and shifted back to groundling to conserve his strength.

He sat down and put his feet in the cool clear pool. This was his fault. He should have pushed Stone for more information, asked more questions, but it was another engrained habit from turns of hiding what he was. In most groundling societies he had lived in, if you asked questions, it was an invitation for others to ask questions back, necessitating more complicated lies. It was less dangerous just to listen and try to glean information that way. Idiot, he told himself again.

Tiny little fish, blue-gray to blend in with the river bottom, came to investigate his feet. They scattered as Moon climbed down the rock and waded to the waterfall. He stood under the spray, hoping it would clear his head. It didn’t, but at least it washed several days worth of dust and grime out of his skin and hair and ragged clothes.

He stepped out of the fall, shaking water out of his hair, and sensed movement above him. He squinted up to see a winged form against the gray sky. The scales were dark blue, the vivid color dimmed by the rain clouds.

It didn’t surprise him that they had sent someone after him. That was part of the reason he had come out here, to see who they would send, and if they would come to talk or to try to drag him back. Moon wrung the water out of his shirt and watched as whoever it was spiraled down. As the figure drew closer, he realized it was an indigo blue warrior carrying someone still in groundling form: Chime and Flower. They landed on the flat rocks above the bank, and Chime set Flower on her feet as he shifted to groundling.

“There’s no reason to be upset,” Flower said immediately. She waved her hands in helpless frustration. “It’s an honor, and a responsibility too, of course. Like being born a queen, or a mentor.”

Chime added rapidly, “Stone is the only other consort in the court now. The ones in Pearl’s clutches didn’t live, and her sister queen Amber died, and Rain, who was Pearl’s consort, and the younger consorts, Dust and Burn and all the others—all died in fighting with the Sardis, or the Gathen, or went to other courts, and then there was a bad outbreak of lung disease, we’re susceptible to that, you know, or maybe you didn’t know, and—”

“I’m ...” Moon made a broad gesture, taking in the whole valley. “Not ready for this.”

“For what?” Flower looked a little desperate.

“I don’t know.” If he couldn’t explain it to himself, he couldn’t explain it to them. He had come here thinking he would do what he always did: try to fit in. Not that it had worked out so far, but he had never found a better alternative.

Flower spread her hands. “Just come back and rest, and talk to Stone. You’ve come all this way, and you have nothing to lose.”

Moon wearily scrubbed his hands through his hair. Of course, she was right about that. But it still felt like he was giving something up when he said, “I’ll come back.”