A wave of vertigo washed over Maris suddenly, as if she stood on the edge of a great precipice, wingless and about to fall. Then she felt Evan take her hand again, and when his fingers twined within her own, somehow she found the threat she needed. “You wouldn't dare,” she said. “Even your landsguard might balk at such an atrocity, and flyers would carry word of your crime as far as the wind would take them. All your knives could not long protect you then.”
“I intend to let your brother go,” the Landsman said loudly, “not because I fear his friends and your empty threats, but because I am merciful. But neither he nor any other singer will ever sing of Tya again on my island. He will be sent from Thayos never to return.”
“And us?”
The Landsman smiled and ran his thumb along the blade of the bronze knife. “The healer is nothing. Less than nothing. He can go as well.” He leaned forward on his throne and pointed the knife at Maris. “As to you, wingless flyer, I will even extend my mercy to you. You too shall go free.”
“You have a price,” Maris said with certainty.
“I want the black flyers out of my sky,” the Landsman said.
“No,” said Maris.
“NO?” He shrieked the word, and his hand plunged the point of the knife into the arm of his chair. “Where do you think you are? I've had enough of your arrogance. How dare you refuse! I'll have you hanging at first light, if I so choose.”
“You won't hang us,” Maris said.
His mouth trembled. “Oh?” he said. “Go on, then. Tell me what I will and will not do. I am anxious to hear.” His voice was thick with barely suppressed rage.
“You might like to hang us,” Maris said, “but you don't dare. Because of the black flyers you are so anxious to have us remove.”
“I dared hang one flyer,” he said. “I can hang others. Your black flyers do not frighten me.”
“No? Why is it then that you do not go outside your halls these days, even to hunt or walk in your own courtyard?”
“Flyers are pledged not to carry weapons,” the Landsman said. “What harm can they do? Let them float up there forever.”
“For ages no flyer has carried a blade into the sky,” Maris agreed, choosing her words carefully. “It is flyer law, tradition. But it was flyer law to stay out of land-bound politics as well, to deliver all messages without a second thought as to what they meant. Tya did what she did nonetheless. And you killed her for it, in spite of centuries of tradition that said no Landsman might judge a flyer.”
“She was a traitor,” the Landsman said. “Traitors deserve no other fate, whether they wear wings or not.”
Maris shrugged. “My point,” she said, “is only that traditions are poor protection in these troubled days. You think yourself safe because flyers carry no weapons?” She stared at him coldly. “Well, every flyer who brings you a message will wear black, and some of them will carry the grief in their hearts as well. As you hear them out, you will always wonder. Will this be the one? Will this be a new Tya, a new Maris, a new Val One-Wing? Will the ancient tradition end here and now, in blood?”
“It will never happen,” the Landsman said, too shrilly.
“It's unthinkable,” Maris said. “As unthinkable as what you did to Tya. Hang me, and it will happen all the sooner.”
“I hang who I please. My guards protect me.”
“Can they stop an arrow loosed from above? Will you bar all your windows? Refuse to see flyers?”
“You are threatening me!” the Landsman said in sudden fury.
“I am warning you,” Maris said. “Perhaps no harm will come to you at all, but you will never be sure. The black flyers will see to that. For the rest of your life they will follow you, haunting you as sure as Tya's ghost. Whenever you look up at the stars, you will see wings. Whenever a shadow brushes you, you will wonder. You'll never be able to look out a window or walk in the sun. The flyers will circle your keep forever, like flies around a corpse. You will see them on your deathbed. Your own home will be your prison, and even there you will never really be certain. Flyers can pass any wall, and once they have slipped off their wings, they look like anyone else.”
The Landsman sat very still as Maris spoke, and she watched him carefully, hoping she was pushing him the right way. There was a wildness about his puffy eyes, an unpredictability that terrified her. Her voice was calm, but her brow was beaded by sweat, and her hands felt damp and clammy.
The Landsman's eyes flicked back and forth as if hunting for escape from the specter of the black flyers, until they settled on one of his guards. “Bring me my flyer!” he snapped. “At once, at once!”
The man must have been waiting just outside the chamber; he entered at once. Maris recognized him; a thin, balding, stoop-shouldered flyer she had never really known. “Sahn,” she said aloud, when his name came to her.
He did not acknowledge her greeting. “My Landsman,” he said deferentially, in a reedy voice.
“She threatens me,” the Landsman said angrily. “Black flyers, she says. They will hound me to my death, she says.”
“She lies,” Sahn said quickly, and with a start Maris remembered who he was. Sahn of Thayos, flyer-born, conservative; Sahn who two years ago had lost his wings to an upstart one-wing. Now he had them back, by virtue of her death. “The black flyers are no threat. They are nothing, nothing.”
“She says they will never leave me,” the Landsman said.
“Wrong,” said Sahn in his thin, ingratiating voice. “You have nothing to fear. They will soon be gone. They have duties, Landsmen of their own, lives to live, families, messages to fly. They cannot stay indefinitely.”
“Others will take their place,” Maris said. “Windhaven has many flyers. You will never be out from under the shadow of their wings.”
“Pay her no mind, sir,” Sahn said. “The flyers are not behind her. Only a few one-wings. Trash of the sky. When they leave, no one will take their place. You need only wait, my Landsman.” Something in his tone, beyond his words, shocked and sickened her, and all at once Maris knew why; Sahn spoke as a lesser to a superior, not as equal to equal. He feared the Landsman, and was beholden to him for his very wings, and his voice made it clear that he knew it. For the first time, a flyer had become his Landsman's creature, through and through.
The Landsman turned to face her again, his eyes cold. “As I thought,” he said. “Tya lied to me, and I found her out. Val One-Wing tried to frighten me with empty threats. And now you. All of you are liars, but I am cleverer than you think me. Your black flyers will do nothing, nothing. One-wings, all of you. The real flyers, they care nothing for Tya. The Council proved that.”
“Yes,” Sahn agreed, head nodding.
For an instant Maris was consumed by rage. She wanted to storm across the chamber and seize the frail flyer, shake him until he hurt. But Evan squeezed her hand hard, and when she glanced at him he shook his head.
“Sahn,” she said, gently.
Reluctantly he turned his eyes to meet hers. He was shaking, she saw, perhaps in shame at what he had become. As she looked at him, Maris thought she saw a bit of all the flyers she had ever known. The things we will do to fly, she thought . . . “Sahn,” she said. “Jem has joined the black flyers. He is no one-wing.”
“No,” Sahn admitted, “but he knew Tya well.”
“If you advise your Landsman,” she said, “tell him who Dorrel of Laus is.”
Sahn hesitated.
“Who?” the Landsman snapped, eyes flicking from Maris to Sahn. “Well?”
“Dorrel of Laus,” Sahn said reluctantly. “A Western flyer, my Landsman. He's from a very old family. A good flyer. He is about my age.”
“What of him? What do I care?” The Landsman was impatient.
“Sahn,” said Maris, “what do you think would happen if Dorrel joined the black flyers?”
“No,” Sahn said quickly. “He's no one-wing. He wouldn't.”
“If he did?”
“He
's popular. A leader. There would be others.” Clearly Sahn did not like what he was saying.
“Dorrel of Laus is bringing a hundred Western flyers to join the circle,” Maris said forcefully. An exaggeration, probably, but they had no way of knowing.
The Landsman's mouth twitched. “Is this true?” he demanded of his pet flyer.
Sahn coughed nervously. “Dorrel, I—well, it's hard to say, sir. He's influential, but, but . . .”
“Silence,” the Landsman said, “or I'll find someone else for those wings of yours.”
“Ignore him,” Maris said sharply. “Sahn, a Landsman has no right to bestow or take away wings. The flyers have united to prove the truth of that.”
“Tya died wearing these wings,” Sahn said. “He gave them to me.”
“The wings are yours. No one blames you,” Maris said. “But your Landsman should not have done as he did. If you care, if you agree that Tya's death was wrong, join us. Do you have any black clothing?”
“Black? I—well, yes.”
“Are you mad?” the Landsman said. He pointed at Sahn with his knife. “Seize that fool.”
Hesitantly, two of the landsguard started forward.
“Stay away from me!” Sahn said loudly. “I'm a flyer, damn you!”
And they stopped, looking back at the Landsman.
He pointed again, his mouth twitching. He seemed to be having difficulty finding words. “You will—you will take Sahn, and—”
He never finished. The doors to the chamber burst open then, and Coll was dragged bodily into the room by a brace of guards. They shoved him forward toward the Landsman; he stumbled to his hands and knees, then rose unsteadily. The right side of his face was a massive purplish bruise, and his eyes were as black as his clothing.
“Coll!” Maris said, horrified.
Coll managed a feeble smile. “My fault, big sister. But I'm all right.” Evan went to him and examined his face.
“I did not order this,” the Landsman said.
“You said he shouldn't sing,” a landsguard replied. “He wouldn't stop singing.”
“He's all right,” Evan said. “The bruise will heal.”
Maris sighed in relief. Despite all their talk of death, it had been a shock to see Coll's face. “I'm tired of this,” she said to the Landsman. “Listen, if you want to hear my terms.”
“Terms?” His tone was incredulous. “I am Landsman of Thayos, and you are nothing, no one. You cannot give me terms.”
“I can and will. You'd do well to listen. If you don't, you won't be the only one to suffer. I don't think you realize the position you and Thayos are in. All over this island, your people are singing Coll's song, and the singers are moving from island to island, spreading it through the world. Soon everyone will know how you had Tya killed.”
“She was a liar, a traitor.”
“A flyer is not a subject, and cannot be a traitor,” Maris said, “and she lied to stop a senseless war. Oh, she'll always be controversial. But you'd be a fool to underestimate the power of the singers. You're becoming a widely hated man.”
“Silence,” the Landsman said.
“Your people have never loved you,” Maris continued. “They're frightened, too. The black flyers scare them, singers are being arrested, flyers are hanged, trade has been suspended, the war you started turned sour, even your landsguard are deserting. And you are the cause of it all. Sooner or later, they will think of getting rid of you. Already they know that nothing else will cause the black flyers to leave.
“The stories are everywhere,” Maris went on. “Thayos is cursed, Thayos is unlucky, Tya haunts the keep, the Landsman is mad. You will be shunned, like the first mad Landsman, like Kennehut. But your people will only endure it for a short time. They know the solution. They will rise against you. The singers will light the spark. The black flyers will fan the flames. You will be consumed.”
The Landsman smiled a sly, frightening smile. “No,” he said. “I will kill you all, and have an end to it.”
She smiled back at him. “Evan is a healer who has given his life to Thayos, and hundreds owe him their very lives. Coll is among the greatest singers of Windhaven, known and loved on a hundred islands. And I am Maris of Lesser Amberly, the girl in the songs, the one who changed the world. I'm a hero to people who have never met me. You'll kill the three of us? Fine. The black flyers will watch and spread the news, the singers will make the songs. How long do you think you will rule then? The next flyers' Council will not be divided—Thayos will become like Kennehut, a dead land.”
“Liar,” the Landsman said. He fingered his knife.
“We mean no harm to your people,” Maris said. “Tya is dead, and nothing will bring her back. But you will accept my terms, or everything I've warned you of will happen. First, you will give over Tya's body so she can be flown out to sea, and cast from a height, as flyers are always buried. Second, you will make peace, as she wished. You will renounce all claim to the mine that started your war with Thrane. Third, you will send a poor child to Airhome academy every year, to train for wings. Tya would like that, I think. And finally, finally”—Maris paused briefly, watching the storm behind his eyes, and plunged on regardless—“you will renounce your office and retire, and your family will be taken from Thayos, to some island where you are not known, and can live out your days in peace.”
The Landsman was running his thumb along the edge of the knife. He had cut himself, but he did not seem to notice. A tiny drop of blood spotted the white silk of his fine shirt. His mouth twitched. In the sudden stillness that followed her words, Maris felt faint and tired. She had done all she could. She had said all that she could say. She waited.
Evan's arm went around her, and in the corner of her eye she saw Coll's bruised lips twist into a slight smile, and abruptly Maris felt almost good again. Whatever happened, she had done her best. She felt as if she had just returned from a long, long flight; her limbs ached and trembled, and she was damp and chilled through to the bone, but she remembered the sky and the lift of her wings, and that was enough. She was satisfied.
“Terms,” the Landsman said. His tone was poisonous. He rose from his throne, the blood-smeared knife in his hand. “I will give you terms,” he said. He pointed the knife at Evan. “Take the old man and cut off his hands,” he ordered. “Then cast him out and let him heal himself. That ought to be a sight to see.” He laughed, and his hand moved sideways, so the knife was pointing at Coll. “The singer loses one hand and a tongue.” The knife shifted again. “As to you,” he said, when the blade pointed at Maris, “since you like the color black, I will give you your fill of it. I will put you in a cell without a window or a light, where it is black day and night, and you will stay there until you have forgotten what sunlight was. Do you like those terms, flyer? Do you?”
Maris felt the tears in her eyes, but she would not let them fall. “I am sorry for your people,” she said softly. “They did nothing to deserve you.”
“Take them,” the Landsman said, “and do as I have ordered!”
The landsguard looked at each other. One took a hesitant step forward, and stopped when he saw he was alone.
“What are you waiting for?” the Landsman shrieked. “Seize them!”
“Sir,” said a tall, dignified woman in the uniform of a high officer, “I beg you to reconsider. We cannot maim a singer, or imprison Maris of Lesser Amberly. It would be the end of us. The flyers would destroy us all.”
The Landsman stared at her, then pointed with his knife. “You are under arrest as well, traitor. You will have the cell next to hers, if you like her so well.” To the other landsguard, he said, “Take them.”
No one moved.
“Traitors,” he muttered, “I am surrounded by traitors. You will all die, all of you.” His eyes found Maris. “And you, you will be the first. I will do it myself.”
Maris was achingly aware of the knife in his hand, the dull bronze length of it, the smear of blood along the blade.
She felt Evan tense beside her. The Landsman smiled and walked toward them.
“Stop him,” said the tall woman he had tried to arrest. Her voice was weary but firm. At once the Landsman was surrounded. A burly bear of a man held his arms, and a slim young woman took the knife from his grasp as easily and fluidly as if she had pulled it from a sheath. “I'm sorry,” said the woman who had taken charge.
“Let me go!” he demanded. “I am Landsman here!”
“No,” she answered, “no. Sir, I fear you are very sick.”
The grim, ancient keep had never seen such festivity.
The gray walls were decked with bright banners and colored lanterns, and smells of food and wine, woodsmoke and fireworks permeated the air. The gates had been opened wide to all. Landsguard still roamed the keep, but few were in uniform, and weapons were forgotten.
The gibbets had been torn down, the scaffolding altered to make a stage where jugglers, magicians, clowns, and singers performed for the passing crowds.
Within, doors were open and halls filled with merrymakers. Prisoners from the dungeons had been set free, and even the lowest riff-raff from the alleys of Port Thayos had been admitted to the party. In the great hall tables had been set up and covered with huge wheels of cheese, baskets of bread, and smoked, pickled, and fried fish of all kinds. The hearths still smelled of roasting pig and seacat, and puddles of beer and wine glistened on the flagstones.
Music and laughter were in the air; it was a celebration of a richness and size unknown on Thayos in living memory. And among the crowds of the people of Thayos moved figures dressed in black—not, by their faces, mourners: the flyers. These flyers, one-wing and flyer-born alike, along with the previously exiled singers, were the guests of honor, feted and toasted by all.
Maris wandered through the boisterous crowds, ready to cringe at any more recognition. The party had gone on too long. She was tired and feeling a little sick from too much food and drink, all tributes forced on her by admirers. She wanted only to find Evan and go home.