Worldbinder

THE SWALLOWS

Fallion and Jaz had not even laid down to rest when the Wizard Sisel came and whistled outside the chamber door.

Siyaddah opened the door, and the wizard strode into the room and addressed Fallion. “The High King requests the company of you and Jaz…in his war room.”

Without a sound, Jaz followed Sisel out the hallway.

Fallion stopped at the doorway, peered into Siyaddah’s eyes, and spoke the old farewell of his court, “Sworn to defend,” then hurried after his brother and the wizard.

“So, how do you like the nursery?” Sisel asked.

“What do you mean?” Fallion asked.

“The upper portions of the fortress are where we keep the children,” Sisel said. “They are our greatest treasure. The wyrmlings will have to fight through every man among us to reach them.”

Fallion had not been aware of many children in the rooms around them, but then, he had come to the citadel late at night, and most likely they were all abed.

Still, he made a mental note. Siyaddah’s apartments were on the seventh floor above the streets. The names of the occupants were painted in yellow beside the doors.

The wizard took them down four levels, into a huge map room.

There on the floor was a map of the world, painstakingly sculpted from mud and painted. It bore little resemblance to Fallion’s world.

At the center, it seemed, was Luciare. Crude lines had been scratched in the mud with a stick, superimposing the boundaries of Rofehavan and Indhopal and Inkarra, lands that Fallion knew. Red dots indicated major cities and fortresses.

Jaz peered at the map and let out a gasp, then sank to his knees with a moan.

And as Fallion stared at the map, it filled him with fear. The borders were all wrong. The lands of Toom and Haversind and many of the northern isles had not existed in King Urstone’s world. The continent of Landesfallen had not existed. What happened to them in the change? Fallion wondered. Did all of the people living in those lands suddenly find themselves falling into the sea?

Fallion was horror-struck. He and Jaz had left family and friends in Landesfallen. Myrrima, Borenson, Draken, Erin. He imagined them flailing in the depths, no land in sight-not for hundreds and hundreds of miles.

“Sisel,” Fallion said, staring at the map. “What have I done?”

“We…are not yet certain,” Sisel said. “It will take months, perhaps even years, to learn the extent of the change. But the Earth Spirit whispers peace to my soul.”

“We have family in Landesfallen!” Jaz said.

“My heart tells me that they live and love you still,” Sisel replied softly. “Many changes have taken place, but haven’t you noticed-no one, to my knowledge, found themselves in a river or pond. I believe that there is a good reason for that. It was inherent in the spell you used to bind the worlds together.”

Fallion suspected that Sisel was right.

Still, he was not completely at ease.

High King Urstone approached slowly, put a hand upon Jaz’s shoulder, and whispered words of comfort. Sisel translated. “If we live through this night, an expedition will be sent out to map our new world, to find survivors, and to claim them as allies and friends.”

“Thank you,” Jaz said, trying to hold back a sob.

“You are welcome,” Sisel translated. “And now, the King has a question for you. His champions are taking endowments even as we speak, and he thanks you for the use of the forcibles. But he wonders if you would like to take endowments this night, too?”

“Tell him no,” Fallion said. “We thank him for the offer, but he will be better off having one champion with forty endowments than eight champions with five.”

“The king agrees with you,” Sisel said after listening to the king, “and is also foregoing the kiss of the forcible. He wants you and Jaz to follow him.”

The king left the war room and its maps and retainers, took Fallion and Jaz through a rich red curtain, back through a short hall.

A second audience room opened. On the floor were three sets of enormous wings, like those of a bat. Each set was splayed wide. A thin red membrane connected the struts. To Fallion, they looked like living flesh, cut from a body.

“These are yours,” Sisel told Fallion and Jaz. “You two slew their previous owners, and the king has proclaimed them yours, as spoils of war.”

“Great,” Jaz said, trying to lighten the mood. “So, how do we cook them?”

“They are not to eat,” Sisel said. “They are to wear. He wishes for you to put them on before the battle. It may well be that you are forced to escape, and these would be a great aid. You can travel faster than a horse, and few could catch you. The Knights Eternal might, but they will not fly in the full sunlight. Remember that.

“Such wings are exceedingly rare. We do not believe that the enemy has more than a dozen pair, all told.

“Most of all,” Sisel continued, “these will aid you in your travels. You need to go to Courts of Tide and begin to enlist the help of your people. With these, you could be there by noon tomorrow.”

“How do they work?” Jaz asked, excitement rising in his tone.

“Work?” Sisel asked. “Just put them on. It will take a few minutes for your body to learn how to respond, and it will be weeks or months before you become proficient with them. But in time they work like your legs do, without any thought on your part.”

Jaz hurried to the nearest set of wings, picked them up. Each wing met at the back and joined. When he lifted them, the wings began to fold, leaving their tips upon the floor. Where the wings joined was a pair of spikes, as white as bone, each about ten inches long. The spikes were wet, as if they had just been cleaned, but Fallion could see blood on them. Their purpose was obvious. Fallion could see that if he pulled the wings up onto his shoulder at the apex, the spikes would have to be inserted through his flesh.

“Are you afraid?” King Urstone asked.

“I,” Jaz began. “They look too big for me.”

“They are fine for someone your size,” Sisel said. “Besides, it is better if they are a little large. All the better to get the wind beneath you. Your glide will last longer, and your flights will be farther. Did you not notice that the Knights Eternal choose bodies that are smaller than those of most wyrmlings? This is the reason.”

“Does it hurt?” Jaz asked.

Sisel admitted, “More than you’d like.”

“I’ll go first,” Fallion offered.

He went to a set of wings, picked them up, and grabbed onto the bonelike prongs. He set the prongs up on his shoulder, in front of the clavicle. The design suggested that they should fit that way, but he wondered if the prongs would pierce a lung or some other vital organ. Perhaps it was meant to go behind the clavicle. “Like this?” he asked the wizard.

“Take off your tunic,” Sisel suggested. “You don’t want to get blood on it.”

Fallion removed the tunic and his cape, leaving only his black leather trousers.

Sisel adjusted the wings, so that the apex met at the center of his back and the prongs set just in the flesh of his shoulder in front of each clavicle. He said, “About there, I would think.”

Without further warning, Sisel shoved the wings on. The spikes pierced Fallion like lances, and he felt white-hot fire in them. He staggered forward a step, suddenly growing faint, and fell to one knee.

He could feel the spikes twisting, seeming to bend back, fusing with his scapula.

For a moment, the wings were just dead weight on his back. Blood oozed from the wounds, running in rivulets down his back, and he imagined that he would die.

And then, an instant later, the wings came to life. He could feel the skin between the webbing as if it were his own skin, could feel blood coursing from wingtip to wingtip.

Without a thought the wings began to flap on their own, clumsily at first, but he could feel the lift in them, as if they were sails catching a strong wind.

Then he flapped them consciously, stretching out, grasping at air, pulling down eagerly so that his feet suddenly lifted off the floor.

The pain eased quickly, and Fallion said in wonder, “It’s, it’s like getting…new hands. You can feel everything.”

“And it hurts?” Jaz asked.

It hurt. Fallion could still feel the pain. The spikes in his shoulder still burned, but the sensation was swallowed up in joy and wonder.

“A bit,” Fallion admitted.

“I think maybe I’d still rather eat them than wear them,” Jaz said.

“The pain will dull in a few minutes,” Sisel offered. “In a week, the wings will feel as if they were born to you.”

King Urstone fitted his own wings upon him, and Sisel gave them a shove. He did not stumble as Fallion had, but only stood for a moment, wincing, until the pain began to subside.

He spoke, and Sisel translated. “Come. Let us take our maiden flight!”

Sisel drew Jaz’s wings to his shoulder and let them pierce him, and eagerly Fallion followed the king down a short corridor and into an alcove that had been gouged into the cliff.

Here, the folk of the city could come for a breath of fresh air when they tired of the tunnels, or could stand and peer out over the countryside. Only a low rock wall stood between them and death.

They were high above the ground, hundreds of feet up the mountainside. Fallion had known that he was traveling up as he walked through the twisting hallways, but he hadn’t realized how far they had climbed. The wind was boisterous, gusting this way and that. A layer of clouds had begun to rush in from the east, blotting out the stars. The brightest light came from down below, from the spirits of Luciare’s guardians. Blue-white, the light reflected from the city walls onto the grounds below.

“What do we do now?” Jaz asked nervously.

High King Urstone climbed up on the rock wall and stood for a moment, his legs shaking nervously.

“You’ve seen young birds leave the nest?” the Wizard Sisel asked. “Do what they do!”

“Most of the young birds I’ve seen,” Jaz said, “wind up dead at the bottom of some tree.” The king stood for several moments, flapping his wings experimentally. “Isn’t it kind of windy?”

Then Urstone jumped, and went plummeting.

Fallion raced to the edge of the balcony, stood peering down. He could see the king flapping frantically, his wings catching for a moment, then seeming to lose purchase.

The king screamed, and Fallion thought that he was dead, that he would crash onto the rocks below, but suddenly the wind caught beneath his wings, and he went soaring for a few dozen yards, then flapped frantically, canted to the left, and soared again. The king screamed again, and Fallion realized that he was not screaming in fear, he was shouting in exultation.

“I’m next,” Fallion said, and before he could change his mind, he took a running leap and jumped over the cliff.

He forced the wings to beat rapidly, found his heart pumping hard from exertion. He rose as he did.

It was not effortless, not like the childhood dreams he’d had of floating across the sky like a wind-blown leaf. He found that he had to concentrate. He had to pull the wings in and up on the up-stroke, stretch them wide on the down. He had to pull them forward vigorously to gain speed, let them relax when he soared.

It was not easy. In fact, it was hard, like running a race.

And it was pure ecstasy.

Fallion fluttered about the tower, and found that he had a better knack for it than the king did.

Perhaps it’s the weight, Fallion thought. The wings were all roughly the same size, but the king, with his warrior clan blood, outweighed Fallion by at least a hundred pounds, probably closer to a hundred and fifty.

In moments, Jaz came winging up beside him, and shouted, “Let’s go over that hill!”

He pointed to a hill at least four miles away, a dark hump rising out of the night, stately evergreens at its peak, all weathered and blasted by lightning over the years.

And so they raced, laughing, as they had done when they were children, their wings beating rhythmically. Fallion thrilled to the wind coursing beneath his wings, and fought back tears. In a choked voice he said, “When last I rode a graak, I thought I would never fly again.”

“I think,” Jaz shouted, “we could give those graaks a good race, now.”

And it was true.

They reached the hill in less than four minutes, but the quick flight left Fallion with sweat streaming down his cheek, sweat that would quickly dry in the cool night air. They circled the trees, looked out above the valley in the distance-and saw the wyrmling horde.

It was miles away. A few stars still shone over the valley, and by their pale light Fallion could see wyrmlings in the distance, starlight glinting on their bone helms. They looked like cockroaches thick upon a floor, for they covered the land.

There were larger things among them, a trio of moving hills and enormous lizard-like kezziards, while giant graaks winged sluggishly above, casting vast shadows. And fluttering around them were tinier figures, like midges, the Knights Eternal.

“Come on,” Fallion said in rising concern. He glanced back toward their mountain fortress, its peak gleaming white in the distance. “Let’s go.”