Dark Wyng

  The crow shifted sideways, making its eye fully visible. Arrkk! it called, and descended through the trees.

  Ren thought no more of it.

  Until a short while later, when he was startled to hear a man’s voice drifting up through the branches. “You’d best come down, boy. Any skaler worth its weight could see the hole you’ve made in the trees. The storm is fast blowing out. This forest will be your friend if you want to stay hidden.”

  Who is this? Ren said to Grystina.

  No one we have met before, she replied.

  “And what are you? Friend or other?” Ren called.

  Through the spikers he could just see the back of a figure, making his way through the forest on a whinney.

  The man laughed. “I am what I am, Ren Whitehair.”

  Ren’s heart thumped. “How do you know me?”

  “The whole world knows you, boy. Your wild adventures are swift becoming legend. I have been most anxious to meet the child who journeyed beyond the skaler’s scorch line, learned their tongue, and befriended their young.”

  Ren sought a better gap to spy through. What he saw made him jump so hard his head struck the branch above. “Pine?” he whispered.

  She looked up from the back of a pure white whinney.

  And she smiled, though it was not a smile that Ren had ever associated her with. It was Pine he was looking at, that was right enough—her unwashed hair, her small grubby face, those sly brown eyes so easy with the truth. All of that ticked a place in his memories. It was the mouth that perplexed him. There was the tooth that had earned her her name, growing in the center, big enough to plow a small field. But there, to either side of it, sat two more. Pine Threetooth. It had no ring to it. And what was she doing in the forest with a stranger?

  There is only one way to find out, said Grystina.

  She was right. Either he nested there or took his chances on the forest floor.

  Stay alert, he said.

  And he began to descend.

  At the lowest branch, Ren paused to rest. He could see both whinneys clearly now. The leading one was brown and common and carried the stranger on its back. The other, Pine’s white mount, had a horn twisting out from the center of its head.

  What is this beast? Ren asked Grystina.

  I have never seen its like before, she replied. The horn resembles a dragon stig, but it has enchantments upon it that I cannot read.

  Ren focused on the stranger. “Say who you are.”

  “My name is Ty. I am a traveler,” said he, a confident notch in his smooth, dark voice. He looked up and stared Ren full in the face. Ren thought he felt Grystina shrink back. “The girl I think you know.”

  Oh, yes, Ren knew her well enough. The last time he had met Pine, she had called the tribe down on him for bringing Gariffred the drake among them, an act that had led to the death of Ren’s father. He had no love for Pine, no matter how many teeth she planned to grow or what strange beast she rode. “How is it you travel with her?”

  Ty looked over his shoulder at the girl. He seemed to sense the tension between them, but made no comment about it. Pine smiled faintly, this time keeping her mouth fully closed.

  “We are returning from a tragic quest,” said Ty. “We and three others rode to a cave where we expected to recover the body of one of your tribesmen. We were disturbed by skalers. We two escaped. The others were burned.”

  “Burned?” Ren clamped an arm to stop it shaking.

  Ty reined back his whinney before the beast could crunch into a spiker cone. “That is what skalers do, is it not? Burn all that stands in their way?”

  He despises dragons, Grystina said. Yet I feel he has an odd respect for us. There is something dangerous about this Hom. Be wary, Ren.

  Ren was paying no heed to her. “Which … ?” Which ones, he wanted to ask. Which dragons had killed yet more of his tribe?

  Pine interpreted his question as “Who?” She rolled out the names. “Cob Wheeler, Oleg Widefoot, Rolan Woodknot. Their ashes fly on the wind.”

  Cob? Oleg? They were senior men in the tribe. And Rolan was scarcely five winters older than Ren. Ren’s head swam with shock. “When did this happen?”

  Ty stretched his fingers. “Barely one day hence.”

  While Ren had been imprisoned. Yet Grendel had said nothing of it. “Then … their captive was not one of you?”

  “Captive?” Ty seemed surprised.

  “I speak in the skaler tongue,” Ren said, his eyes darting as he tried to make sense of all this. “One of them told me they had taken a man.”

  “Under what circumstance?” Ty now glanced harshly at Pine, as if she had done some wrong by him.

  Ren thought he saw Pine lift her shoulders. She seemed changed somehow, not quite the wisp he’d left behind. It disturbed him faintly, but he could not say why. And all Grystina could offer was, She too has a deep aversion to our kind. There was nothing new in that. Most Kaal despised the dragons. Yet Ren was struggling to guess at a reason why a girl as slight as a flower stalk would go on a dangerous quest with the men. “I know not,” he replied to Ty’s question. “There was no time to ask why they took a captive.” Was it his imagination, or had this slip of news angered the stranger?

  Ty nodded slowly. “Then we must return to the settlement in haste and find out who has suffered this misfortune, and speak of what might be done about it.” He clicked his fingers. A large crow descended from the trees. “Go to the mountains,” he said to it. “Bring me news of any men you see.” He stroked the bird’s throat. “Send the chief watcher back to me. Do not give it a reason why.” He thrust his arm high. The bird flew away fast through the forest.

  “You command them?” asked Ren. “How so?” He had once known a man who carried a one-eyed caarker on his shoulder and kept it there with scraps of food. But he had never seen the black birds do a man’s bidding.

  “But for their watchful eyes,” Ty said, avoiding the question with an artful slant, “we might have missed your fall.”

  “And that?” Ren gestured at the white whinney, which had turned its head to look at him. There was a pleasing calmness in its pale pink eye, almost a longing to be recognized. He thought he felt an odd kind of kinship with it. But, mindful of Grystina’s warnings, he did not look at the beast too long. “I have seen no whinney like it.”

  Pine stroked the mane as Ty gave another guarded reply. “Many wonders lie beyond the mountains, boy. Girl, step down.”

  “What?” said Pine, as if this was a huge impertinence.

  Ty ignored her moody air. “The boy is hurt. He has more need of a ride than you.” He turned back to Ren. “I say once more, the winds are changing; you had best come down from your perch, Ren Whitehair. You are fallen from the sky, ragged and scathed. Your mother, Mell, grieves daily for your absence. You will be a welcome sight to her. This burning you have learned of pains the breast, but do not let it hinder your escape. You are escaping, are you not?”

  Ren tightened his lip. Despite Grystina’s warnings, his desire was still to march back into the mountains and put a spear through Gallen’s throat. He was certain the Veng were responsible for the deaths of Cob and the others. But the stranger was right. He was weary and hurt. It made sense to return to the settlement, recover, and think on what to do.

  He looked at the ground. Spikers grew tall before they branched. The prospect of the drop was deeply unappealing. He could have phased to the ground with ease, but did not want to risk revealing his powers. So it was either the drop, or try to slide down and have his finger ends scraped off by the bark.

  He dropped, landing in a ball of agony again, his left knee on fire, his back the same.

  The brown whinney snorted. Ty pulled it around and started picking his way through the trees again. “Follow us when you are able. Shade will know the way.”

  “Urrr,” groaned Ren, rolling into a kneeling position.

  Pine dismounted and led the horse up. “Do not run, Whitehair. Shade will no
t allow it.” She threw the reins at him, then started after Ty on foot.

  “Pine, wait.”

  As she turned, he saw the new teeth again. She had fixed them in place with some kind of sap. They sat skewed in her mouth, like a broken fence. “Who is he, this stranger? Whence does he hail?”

  “He is Ty,” she said, as if that was all anyone needed to know.

  “Why do you ride with him?”

  “Because I choose to.”

  Again, she turned. Again, he called her back. “Your robe. Are you wounded?”

  She looked at the stain, now dried to near black. A buzzer was jigging across it, trying to take what nourishment it could. In a flash Pine picked the creature off and put it inside her mouth. It was still buzzing as she swallowed. “No more than you,” she replied. And she took a cloth off Shade’s back and threw it at Ren, saying, “Clean yourself.”

  It was the kindest thing she’d ever done for him.

  “My boy! My boy!”

  Over and over Mell cried these words as she hugged Ren to her and kissed his wounds. Mutts turned circles, barking with excitement. Men and women abandoned their work. Children ceased to play. The whole Kaal settlement gathered in the clearing to look at the boy who had once been condemned to death for daring to consort with skalers. But gather was all they did. For with so many menfolk dead or injured, there were none rushing forward wielding their fists or spears to challenge Ren.

  And so Mell showed him off proudly, a hero.

  “See,” she cried, standing behind him, her arms a protective brace across his chest. “See how my boy comes home to me, bleeding, torn in cloth and skin. Look at the color that flows from his wounds. Red. He is no skaler! He is Kaal!”

  The crowd parted and one man did limp forward. Bryndle Woodknot was his name, father of Rolan. He limped because he had twisted his left foot, climbing, as a boy. The foot hung like a weight at the end of his leg, its best use a prop to keep him upright. Bryndle rarely involved himself in matters that fighting men decided, but his mind was sharper than most of their swords. He looked hard at Ty as the stranger dismounted, then back along the trail for Oleg and Cob. Longest of all he looked for Rolan, but saw nought but empty tracks in the erth. “Where is my boy?”

  “And my husband?” said Merrilyn Widefoot. She drew a shawl around her as if she already knew to expect bad news.

  “And Cob?” a few lone voices shouted, for Cob had no wife or kin to claim him.

  “Have skalers been here since we traveled?” Ty asked.

  “No,” said Bryndle, his eyes as gray as a grinding stone. “Answer what you are asked: Where is Rolan, and Cob, and Oleg? Why are they not returned, but Mell’s boy is?”

  “Cob and Oleg are cruelly murdered; I fear your son is in the skalers’ company.”

  Gasps of all kind accompanied this news. Merrilyn Widefoot fell to her knees, sobbing so loud it set the mutts howling. And though no one wailed for Cob, Ren could hear the Kaal muttering anxiously about who would lead them now. He looked around for faces of husbands and hunters he knew. His gut churned, for very few men looked back.

  Bryndle raised a hand for silence. His fingers curled into a shaking fist. “Why? Why would they take my son?”

  “I know not,” said Ty.

  Pine bent down and picked a small flower.

  Bryndle came nearer, dragging his dead foot through the dirt. He wisely fell short of striking Ty, but his sorrow had boiled up quickly into anger. “You were with him! How did this seizing come about? What now of all your gallant talk? Your promises of how the beasts could be tamed?”

  “Tamed?” said Ren. He wriggled clear of his mother.

  “Aye,” said Bryndle, sweeping around. “Your own ma it was who told us Pine had gone with the men because her songs would make the skalers kneel. What say you on that score, stranger? Did the girl forget her lines? Speak!”

  So Ty explained how they had reached the cave and left Pine by the stream, tending the whinneys. He thought a moment longer, then said, “The skaler descended fast from the clouds, too quick for us to call on anything but prayers. We could not seek shelter in the cave, for the entrance was blocked by stones. The skaler saw us trying to break through. It must have believed we were violating the burial place of its companion. That was the only incitement we gave it.”

  There is some truth in this, said Grystina, flowing briefly into Ren’s mind. Yet I feel that Ty holds something back.

  “What color was the beast that attacked you?” asked Ren.

  “Green, like the first grass of spring,” said Ty. “In shape, less stout than most skalers you will see, but filled with double the spite.”

  Veng. Ren’s thoughts went straight to them.

  Widening his voice to the crowd, Ty said, “I witnessed Cob and Oleg burned. I saw no similar fate befall Rolan, for I was running to protect the girl. She was bravely riding up the hill on Shade and met me before the beast could turn its fire upon us. We used Shade’s enchantment to disappear. After that, the beast let us be.”

  What enchantment? Ren asked Grystina. On the journey to the settlement, he’d been lulled into sleep by Shade’s easy step. He had spent the entire trip lurched forward, his head against her neck, dreaming, oddly, of his father, Ned.

  The beast can lose itself in a slip of light. It happened once on the journey through the forest, when it turned to look back at Pine. There is an auma around it like nothing I have ever encountered before. Yet it seems to be in some kind of torment.

  Torment? Ren glanced worriedly at Shade. The whinney was calm, but staring around the camp as if looking for something that was no longer there. He turned his head as his mother spoke to Ty: “If you were with Pine and saw it not, why do you say that Rolan was taken?”

  “For that, you would have to ask Ren,” he answered.

  And all eyes were back on Ned Whitehair’s son.

  “Well?” said Bryndle. The word could have skewered a snorter’s throat.

  “I … I too was captured,” Ren said, nervous at having to speak so free. “But I have formed an alliance with some of the beasts—”

  “Alliance?” Bryndle frothed with disbelief.

  “Aye,” said Ren, turning to face him. “Gabrial—the guardian of the young one I saved—is teaching me their words and has pledged himself to me. I learned from his companion that a man had been taken. That can only be Rolan.”

  “A skaler has pledged itself to you?”

  “Aye,” said Ren. He noted a light in Ty’s dark eyes.

  Those gathered muttered among themselves.

  Pine looked on thoughtfully and plucked her flower.

  “I know not why Rolan was taken,” said Ren, raising his voice to the crowd. “But I say this to give you hope: The beasts are not dull of mind. They do not kill without reason.”

  This set alight a fire in Bryndle. Before Mell or Ty could stop him, he had gone up to Ren and struck him to the ground. “Nine men,” he said, a deep quake in his voice. “Nine brave men, set alight at the edge of the forest as they journeyed to return your pupp to its kin. Where was the reason in that day’s killing? Or would you have me dull of mind?”

  “Fiend!” cried voices from the crowd. Women who had lost their husbands, sons, and brothers to the skalers. Children who would never see their fathers again.

  “Targen the Old,” Bryndle went on, drawing a fresh lament from the tribe as he named another significant fatality. Targen had been the Kaal’s spiritual leader, possibly the greatest casualty of all.

  “Let him be!” snapped Mell, trying to draw Ren back. She clawed at Bryndle as if she would take an eye from him.

  But Bryndle would not let it be. “Four women and a girl half the size of Pine, crushed or maimed when skalers and darkeyes warred above us. Nearly half our shelters flattened or burned. How can you come back and speak of an alliance when these beasts have brought nought but death upon us?”

  Ren wiped his mouth. He rose unsteadily and stood before Bryndle.
“The skalers are at war among themselves. But I cannot tell your ears what they do not want to hear. So I pledge these words instead: I will cross the line again and bring Rolan home.”

  “No,” gasped Mell.

  Ren held her away. “I have unfinished business in the mountains, Ma. I have enemies among the skalers, as well as friends.”

  Bryndle scorned him with a hollow laugh. “People of the Kaal! Listen well to this! The son of Ned Whitehair speaks bold to us again! He announces another reckless quest that will surely bring more fire upon us!”

  “You would rather your son be abandoned?” said Ty. His interruption instantly quelled the crowd. He raised an arm. A large crow settled upon it. Ren noticed some squints of fear among the tribe.

  “Speak,” Ty said. To the bird, not Bryndle.

  The crow shuffled nervously and spoke in low rasps.

  Ty stroked its neck as though to thank it. “Bryndle Woodknot, your son is alive,” he said. “He is held in a cave, high on the mountain the Kaal call Longfinger. He is hurt and cold, but not mistreated. The bird brings no clue as to why he is there.” And quickly, before anyone could even murmur, Ty clamped the bird’s neck in his free hand and crushed it. The throng gasped. Ren heard someone spilling their gut. Shade snorted and scraped a hoof. Ty held the crow aloft for all to see, then threw it to the nearest mutt. People turned their faces to the wind. Even Ren shuddered a little. But his mother, he noticed, though she looked upon Ty with fear and distaste, also showed a glint of admiration for him, perhaps because he had taken Ren’s side. Whatever the reason, it troubled Ren more than the slaying of the crow.

  “A punishment, for not informing me sooner,” Ty said. And Ren thought he was speaking not to the Kaal, but to other watching crows. “I hear the boy’s words and I say he speaks well. We must go back into the mountains and teach the beasts a lesson.”

  “How?” said Mell. She curled her hair behind her ear.

  Now Ty looked upon her with the same admiration she had shown to him. “I said a day would come when we might strike a blow against the skalers. That day is fast upon us. Boy, are you able to call this beast you say you befriended?”