Cloudbound (33 page)

Faster.

The clouds hung gossamer thin between our tower and the ledge, though nearby, darker bands of cloud gathered. I hoped we were high enough. Wik leapt first, and we followed.

When we launched, battered by the headwinds, Wik flew zigs and zags to reach the ledge. First we swept towards the ghost tower, far in the distance. Then we made switchback turns, flying synchronized, like Nightwings of old in the dark city skies. Aliati echoed now and then to help Wik, and the littlemouth began to luminesce on my shoulder.

“They can hear you too!” I laughed. She sounded delighted, but focused on coiling the tether as it grew slack. The ledge came into view as we hit the rain line.

On the ledge, Wik and I helped Ceetcee into her wings. She looked green, nauseated. “It's normal,” she said, a hand on her belly. “Just harder than usual down here. I can still fly.” She winked at me while I tightened Ciel's wingstraps, but I caught her looking nervously over the cloudscape. She knelt by Beliak, and I joined her at his side as she whispered, “Everything will be all right.”

“It will.” I touched her cheek. I hoped she was right. “Fly safe.” She pressed my hand close to her skin, warming it.

When they were ready, Ciel and Ceetcee jumped from the ledge and circled in the dark gray sky, waiting for us. Wik hooked Beliak, I lifted Djonn in the sling, and Doran followed with Moc.

Aliati and Kirit flew behind us with Hiroli.

We crossed between the towers on a storm gust, the most direct, most dangerous way. It was rough going, but with the wind behind us, we neared the cave quickly. At the very end, a spill of wind hit Ceetcee and she spun wildly and fought to right herself. I dove behind her, trying to help her and carry Djonn at the same time, until she evened out on her own.

The edge of rain began to splat the cave as we landed. Lichen and fern fronds clinging to the incline below the cave dipped and rebounded as each drop struck. The wide tower trunk's overgrowths shuffled the wind into new patterns around the cave mouth. I set Djonn down as Ceetcee landed, then banked away until they moved inside the shelter, making room for me to land.

From the cave mouth, Ceetcee watched the sky, shivering. By the time the others came into sight, the rain fell in sheets and thunder had begun to boom again. Kirit and Aliati trailed behind, and Hiroli struggled.

I yelled out to them and at the gusts that bore them. “Hurry!” I leaned into the storm, reaching, trying to pull them closer with my voice. We were few enough, and too far lost already.

 

26

CLOUDBOUND

Aliati and Kirit shepherded Hiroli towards the cave while storm winds surged.

The junior councilor's eyes grew wider with each bolt of lightning. Storm-panicked, she flew erratically, paying little attention to the changing wind currents. Only with the others' whistled encouragement did she make it to the cave.

When Hiroli landed in a shivering sprawl on the ledge, we pulled her inside. Ciel helped her out of her wings. The other two spiraled close again, but the wind blew them off course at dangerous angles. On her next approach, Aliati crashed into the tower wall above us, then slid down its side. She dangled feet-first over the cave edge, wings dripping.

We caught her and helped lower her into the cave.

“That must have hurt,” Wik whispered.

Shards of light broke around us, and thunder crashed repeatedly, drowning out Aliati's curses to the tower, Hiroli, and the wind.

Meantime, Kirit fought hard to avoid getting blown away from the tower. Finally, she tucked her wings and crashed deliberately below the cave. She landed with a thump in the undergrowth, her wings snagging on the clinging nettles there.

In the city, “cloudbound” meant to disappear. No songs marked the lost, no Remembrances.

In our storm-struck cave, “cloudbound” meant that the city had disappeared. No one would help us. We were all we had left.

Doran anchored a spidersilk tether for me, and I handed him my satchel with Maalik safe inside before descending the tower's overgrown wall to reach Kirit.

“All right?” I shouted in the lashing rain. I laced my fingers into broadleaf ferns growing on the towerside to avoid skidding down the slope. Kirit did the same as she crept towards me, grimacing. Her replacement wings dragged behind her, the yellow silk streaked with dirt and leaves.

“I'll live,” she said, shivering hard enough to make her teeth chatter.

Her footwraps torn and filthy, Kirit began to climb. Rain soaked her gray robe, the hem dragging damp against the tower. Finally, she pulled herself over the ledge and disappeared into the cave.

Lightning cracked, filling my nose with burnt air. Unwilling to be singed next, I scaled the tether quickly. Kirit and Wik reached over the edge and caught my arms.

When they dragged me back into the cave, I stripped my soaked wings from my shoulders, then peeled off my outer robe. I wrung that out by the cave mouth. Four useless tower marks spilled from a pocket. I leaned my wings on the wall, next to the others' frames.

We'd led our group of Lawsbreakers to safety without losing anyone, but safety felt wet, dark, and tremendously cold.

I paced, trying to warm up. Ceetcee beckoned me over to where she huddled with Beliak, Ciel, and Moc, but I didn't want to drain their warmth. Besides, I couldn't sit still.

My pale under-robe wrapped damp around my shoulders, a mildew taint strong in my nose. There was no getting warm here, no being dry.

Aliati, her palms and the left side of her face scraped raw, watched Hiroli jump at each new roll of thunder and shook her head. Then she helped Djonn settle, exhausted, against a wall and began searching through their satchels for anything dry.

“We left so much in the ghost tower that we'll need down here. Flint, lanterns, oil. Food.”

“I have flint,” Djonn said. “I lost only my toolbox, not the important things.” He reached his hand to a pocket and fished out a chunk of ancient flint and a striking stone.

Aliati pulled a dry robe from her satchel and gave it to Hiroli. She took the flint from Djonn. “Now all we need here is dry fuel.” She laughed hollowly. “And to figure out where we are.”

Where was here? My eyes met Aliati's, and I didn't have to speak the question aloud. Bigger than the ghost tower cave, this one was also colder and darker. After being buffeted by the storm, I wasn't really sure where we were, either.

Aliati finally said, “No scavengers have ever come this far. We're running on rumors and myth.” “The Horror of the Clouds.” “The Bone Forest.” Those were the myths. They got us here. But there aren't any songs about how to survive here.

I'd gone into the clouds seeking answers, hoping to undo the damage I'd helped create on the council. Now I'd stranded us farther from the city than even scavengers were willing to go.

“We'll make do,” Ceetcee said from where she sat. She huddled, wrapping her arms around herself and the twins. She began to hum The Rise, then thought better of it, switching to “Corwin and the Nest of Thieves.” Very slowly, Ciel joined her, weaving the new verse in. The littlemouth clinging a nearby wall glowed softly when the girl sang.

As the two began to make up more verses and rename songs, Kirit joined them, and even Doran, once he picked up on the words. The cave echoed with Ciel's and Ceetcee's high notes, Kirit's rough ones, and Doran's, cautious and deep.

We waited for the rain to stop, singing, and even laughing. The others sat, but I could not stay still, instead I paced a damp circuit of the cave.

Kirit watched me from where she sat huddled miserably in Wik's robe. “We need to go back. To finish this.”

“Maybe,” Doran said teasingly, “if we'd waited to confront Dix together, we'd be above the city right now.” The words hung in the air; though they'd sounded playful, he hadn't been teasing at all.

“That's enough,” I said, though I, too, wished she'd waited, or that I'd moved faster to stop her. Doran shrugged and got up to search for fuel.

“We're hungry, cold, and out of sorts,” Aliati said, glaring at all of us. “No need to make it worse.”

Wik shifted uncomfortably, unable to lean against the wall thanks to the lashes on his back. Djonn watched pain cross his face. “Dix didn't give you anything for the pain?” he asked, a tinge of jealousy in his voice.

Wik grimaced. “You're the artifex Dix was looking for. Where were you?” He sounded like a Singer of old, demanding answers.

Djonn waved his hand and reached into his satchel. Hummed Ciel's verse from “The Nest of Thieves.” “Into the clouds. And I took Dix's precious lighter-than-air plans with me.” He held it up so that it reflected the next lightning strike, shining light around the cave.

The wind filled our silence with hollow sounds as we took in Djonn's theft—both the brazenness of it and the danger.

Hiroli roused from where she'd been half asleep near Doran. “She's going to want that back.”

“I think you're right,” Djonn said, nodding. “Though she can't read it. No one knows how to but me.”

Doran watched Djonn wave the plate in the cool air. “We should put that someplace safe.”

Without another word, Djonn tucked the plate back in his robe. “Done.” The two stared at each other for a long moment. The cave suddenly felt much smaller and more uncomfortable.

The rain kept falling, and cold gusts whistled through the cave. I knelt by Ceetcee and Beliak. He'd closed his eyes, and his skin was hot to the touch. I pulled a half-empty water sack from my satchel and set it near him. Clinging to the damp side of the sack were the broken pieces of my father's message chip. I pressed them between my fingers, wishing Naton could help us now.

In the quiet, Wik asked Moc about Laria. The boy shook his head, refusing to answer. Wik turned to Hiroli next. “They didn't hurt you?”

Hiroli looked at the bone floor near Djonn's feet. “They couldn't. I'm council, and they knew I didn't know where Nat had gone, or anything about the plates. They kept me in a foul alcove anyway, filled with webs. Dix didn't want me telling anyone that she had Moc.” She swallowed. “When they fed me just before Allmoons and I got woozy, I started to worry.” She turned to us and smiled. “But then you found me.”

Wik frowned, as if he could still taste the drug. “People can share a Law or a song easily. But Dix wants to possess those brass plates, or at least what they represent. They're trouble.” He looked about to say more, but winced instead and tried to find a more comfortable place to sit.

The temperature in the cave dropped again. “You could say that about any metal,” I said.

Aliati nodded agreement.

“Perhaps.” Wik shrugged as if he didn't really think so.

Now that I was dry, I wrapped my arms around Ceetcee and Beliak, trying to shield them from the cold air. But my thoughts were far away, in the towers above the clouds, and Laria in particular. Even if we were safer now, not everyone was. We'd told the silkspinners about Rumul, and they'd confronted Dix. Friends from the northwest quadrant had sounded alarms and distracted her blackwings. Doran's guards had started fights to draw them away into the night. We'd rescued our friends. But then we'd left those above defenseless against the retribution of Dix and her blackwings. And we'd left others we loved up there too. Macal, guiding the northwest. Those who had spoken against the Conclave.

“Who's with Elna?” Was she alone, after Doran had promised protection?

“My daughter and her mother,” Doran replied. “Both good fighters, if it comes to it.”

That didn't ease my mind. Doran looked troubled too. “They'll hold their own,” he said. “And Elna's stronger than you give her credit for.”

It wasn't his right to tell me about my mother, but I held my tongue.

The cave air grew thick with lost opportunities and broken chances. If Kirit had gone along with the plan. If Hiroli hadn't been captured. Ciel. If Doran had been able to keep hold of the city while we'd been searching for answers. If I'd been faster.

If Dix hadn't found the brass plate among Rumul's effects. I began to pace again.

“Hiroli and Moc, you were at Laria for days,” Doran said. “You must know something more.” I remembered Dix leaning over Rumul's body, interpreting his whispers, and shuddered.

Moc looked bleak. “They promised me wings. I offered to help find Nat in trade for new wings, I think.” He put his head on his knees.

“That was the drug, Moc,” Djonn said. “It makes you helpful. Compliant.” He looked down. “I know—it did the same to me.”

Hiroli blinked. “I heard Dix talking, a couple times.” She smiled grimly. “They thought I was sleeping. She told visitors Kirit was colluding with rogue Singers now, that she'd infiltrated the Spire on purpose years ago.”

I growled and began to pace the cave. “That's ridiculous. Kirit was taken by the Spire. Used by them.” As my father had been. Between my fingers, the broken pieces of Naton's drawings clicked together, useless, but comforting.

Hiroli massaged the bridge of her nose, trying to remember. “Dix said the northwestern quadrant had planned insurrection a generation ago. That Ezarit had schemed with an artifex to gain power. Kirit had seen the plan through.”

That could be only one artifex: She meant Naton and the holes he'd drilled in the Spire. “She's saying Ezarit set that up, then sacrificed her daughter to the Spire? She's cloudtouched.”

Hiroli waved a hand back and forth as if pushing the idea away. “She's convinced the southwest towers and some in the east. Everything that's happened since? It's proof Ezarit didn't deserve to lead the city.”

“Don't speak that way of the dead, even if you're just repeating,” Aliati said before the rest of us could. Hiroli bowed her head.