Sands (Sharani Series Book 1) (14 page)

He reached up and seized a crag of sharp rock with a hand that was already slick with blood and weak from pain. Stiff fingers wrapped around the stone. It cut into flesh as he put his weight on it and pulled himself up another span, shifting his foothold to another crag. He paused and glanced down, taking a moment to rest as best he could while clinging to a cliff over a hundred spans above the ground. The tops of the trees looked like small tufts of grass from that height. He could no longer make out the details of the small cave where he had left his grandmother’s body, sealing the mouth of the cave with rocks and mud. But he knew where it was. Neither time nor distance would dull that memory, or the poignancy of her final words.

Remember what it is that you have sworn to do.

He gritted his teeth as a gust of wind tugged at him, pulling at his clothes and tossing his damp, sweaty hair into his eyes. He would do what he had sworn to do, though he did not understand half the things his grandmother had told him. Legends, stories, hints of rumors and myth, she had recited them to him each night on the sands as if they were accounts of actual people. As if they were true. Stories of ancient heroes, kings and rulers, Warlords, and a history that was stunningly disparate from the reality around them. Tales of greenery. Legends of trees that grew with things called leaves instead of fronds. Myths of places without sand, where water fell from the sky year round. And cities. He hadn’t ever figured out what they were supposed to be. They sounded like massive warrens filled with thousands of people, but that wasn’t something he could really imagine. He doubted there were more than a few thousand people in all the clans together.

But somewhere in the stories and myths, she had instilled in him an understanding and a duty. She’d claimed they were descendants of the mighty Eldriean himself, the right of kingship their legacy. On the few times he had spoken to anyone else about the stories, they had claimed that both his grandmother and the stories were insane. But insane or not, he believed them.

He blinked, coming to that realization for the first time. He believed them.

His grandmother had raised him, given him everything he had. One look into her eyes as she spoke of the trees or the strange passings of weather and clouds in ancient times, and he knew that she wholeheartedly believed in what she taught him. And he had come to believe in it as well. To believe in the legends of a proud and noble people cast down from their lofty origins. A people that could be whole again, if guided by the right man. He’d never believed that man could be him. He didn’t want it to be him. But his grandmother did. Her dying request was sacred, and he would see it through.

The wind died down, and Gavin resumed his climb. He ignored the pain, discarded the emotions that swelled within him at the memories of sleepless nights beneath the stars as a child, his terrors only calmed in his grandmother’s arms and by the sound of her voice. He climbed to fulfill a promise. He climbed to escape the pain. He climbed because his grandmother pushed him onward, her encouraging words with him even after death.

Her legends spoke of a king that would unite the clans and drive out the genesauri, returning the desert to the land of lush greenery that it had once been. It was not a prophecy. She had been vehemently adamant about that. There was no such thing as fate or destiny. There were simply things proven and things disproved. Her legends spoke of a king who could unite the clans. She said that king could be him. He climbed to prove it true.

He reached out for another handhold, but it was just out of reach. Gavin adjusted his feet and tried again, stretching to his utmost to get his fingers around the lip of the tiny outcrop. His fingertips scrabbled at the rock.

Gavin’s left foot slipped.

He swore as his right foot was pulled from its spot by the weight of his falling left foot. Rock cut into his left hand as his entire body weight fell onto it. Blood seeped out of his fingers and slickened the rock. He growled, scrabbling for purchase with his feet.

His fingers started to slip, the skin peeling back against the rock. Gavin screamed, summoning every ounce of his strength and will. His left foot found a hold, his right following a moment after. The relief on his left hand almost overcame the pain. Almost.

He clung to the wall, weight balanced on his feet to relieve his aching hand. He stayed there for several long moments, his breath coming in long, ragged gasps. Pain numbed his mind, dulling his thoughts. It was impossible. Gavin knew he was never going to make it to the top.

He kept climbing anyway.

I wish that my old mentor were here to help with this cause, but alas, he is gone from this world. I shall see him no more. The importance of my task weighs heavily on my shoulders. Should I fail, we shall join him, too.

-From the Journals of Elyana

Tieran reached up and checked the leads that connected Lhaurel’s harness to the one girded about Fahkiri. Two thin leads hooked into the harness in front of her, and a long one extended from behind her. Lhaurel felt ridiculous, but Tieran assured her that she would need all three straps to stay seated on the aevian’s back as he flew.

“Now, when you get more accustomed to the way he moves and his flight patterns,” he said, giving the last lead a sharp tug to make sure that it was secure, “then you can remove most of the leads and leave just the one main safety tether in the back. For now, you need to get used to how he moves beneath you.”

The man grinned and stepped back, giving her a wink as if letting her in on a joke.

Lhaurel smiled back awkwardly, not understanding, which only made Tieran laugh harder. Lhaurel shrugged and shifted her seat on Fahkiri’s back.

A wide strip of leather served as a sort of saddle that stretched down the length of his broad back and protected his feathers from her movements on his back. A single handhold had been attached to the saddle where the aevian’s head met its back. Lhaurel felt tall and a little unsettled, though a thrill ran through her as the aevian stepped up to the edge of the cliff face. She glanced down the thousand-foot drop, her vision swimming. She looked up again, twisting around as Tieran approached.

“Try and be careful,” he said. “This is your first flight together as a warrior pair. You need to get used to each other. Let him fly; don’t try to direct him. Let him take you where he will. When you’re ready to come back, whistle sharply three times, and he’ll return to the eyrie.”

“Wait,” Lhaurel said, eyes wide with sudden panic, “you’re not coming with me?”

Tieran smiled, a twinkle in his eyes that was more impish mischief than jocularity. He stepped back and whistled once.

Lhaurel screamed as Fahkiri spread his wings in one massive burst of powerful muscles and launched himself over the edge, carrying Lhaurel with him. Fahkiri folded his sickle-shaped wings inward toward his back, becoming almost a perfect wedge the shape of a spearhead.

Wind rushed through her hair, sending it fanning out behind her like a flame. The ground approached at an astonishing rate, the sheer force of the wind stinging her eyes and making them water. Her pulse raced, and she screamed in fear or exultation or some combination of the two. They were going to crash into the ground. They were going to die. Gravity pushed her forward, and she felt the pressure increase on the straps of her harness as the safety lead in back held her in place. Her hands shot forward and wrapped around the pommel, holding it in a white-knuckled grip that threatened to crack bone. Her brain protested against the onslaught of pure terror and the absolute joy that battled for supremacy.

She sensed the motion before it happened. One moment they were plummeting toward certain death on the rocks and sand below, and then, suddenly, Fahkiri spread his wings with a violent, gut-wrenching shriek, only amplified by the sudden slowing and change of direction. He launched back upward into the sky with powerful wing strokes, climbing at great speed.

Lhaurel let out her breath in one explosive burst. Until that moment, she hadn’t even realized that she’d been holding it.

They winged higher, turning in a long curving pattern that brought them around so that they were suddenly facing the massive expanse of cliffs that made up the Roterralar Warren. The plateau stretched high into the sky, higher than Lhaurel remembered, and continued onward to either side for thousands of spans. She wondered at that despite the thrill of emotions that was coursing through her. She’d only sensed a small portion of the warren, and it was nowhere near as large as the plateau itself. Why waste such a large space?

Fahkiri continued to turn, each beat of his wings taking them higher, though the pace had slowed.

She studied that plateau, noticing the cavernous opening to the eyrie as they turned and almost waved to Tieran, who still stood at the mouth. Something stopped her. He looked so small, so far away. They were easily a hundred spans above him now and at least twice that away. He probably couldn’t even see her. This was her time, hers and Fahkiri’s. Besides, her hands were still fastened so tightly around the pommel that she doubted that she could unclench them without serious effort.

They climbed higher.

A handful of other aevians screeched in greeting as they flew past, a pair of smaller aevians and a few of their larger counterparts out stretching their wings. Fahkiri whistled back, though it sounded almost dismissive, as if they were intruding upon his domain.

As they turned, Lhaurel looked out over the dunes and sand to the east. The dunes rolled outward like massive waves, though there were patches of oddly shaped dunes that disrupted the symmetry and pattern. No, Lhaurel corrected. Not disrupted, changed. The more she looked at it, the more she realized that even the apparent irregularities were part of the desert’s strange beauty. Without them, the uniformity of it would have been bland and the majesty lost.

Lhaurel laughed in delight and leaned forward.

Fahkiri responded. He folded his wings and turned his beak toward the ground.

Lhaurel’s screams were cut off as they suddenly plunged for the ground. They were thousands of spans above the plateau by then, but the aevian’s body was perfectly shaped for such steep, sudden dives. They sped up. The wind dug into her eyes and tore at her hair, clothing, and skin. It forced the air out of her lungs, slammed her eyelids shut. Her mind was numb with sudden terror. Something warm trickled up her leg. She felt like she was falling off the back of him as they continued to fall faster and faster. She sensed the ground approaching at stunning, impossible speeds, felt the ground rise up to meet in its warm enveloping embrace.

Cutting through her terror, though, was the movement, the sudden turning, twisting, gut-wrenching motion as Fahkiri spun around and opened his wings. Air screamed through his feathers, and Lhaurel, unprepared, was slammed forward. Her head slammed into the pommel with bone-breaking force. Her nose shattered on impact, and she struck with enough energy that, for a moment, she blacked out. Only the tethers attached to the saddle and her harness kept her on Fahkiri’s back.

Her vision swam as she slowly came back into consciousness. A ringing sound pounded in her ears and she was awash in sensations of simultaneous pain and numbness. Something salty dripped into her mouth and there was a spreading warmth along her legs. She coughed weakly and sprayed scarlet fluid over Fahkiri’s back.
Blood?

Hands gripped her shoulders. A blade flashed and she was being pulled free from the saddle. She blinked. Had they made it back to the eyrie? She didn’t remember landing.

Someone said something, but it was garbled and muffled by the ringing in her ears.

Blinking rapidly, she fought the fog and stinging numbness that threatened to overcome her. Blood trickled down her face and into her mouth. Swallowing only brought the rusty taste of blood down the back of her throat. She was vaguely aware of Fahkiri screeching in agitation near her, feathers bristling outward at his neck and along his chest, but she couldn’t seem to focus on anything else. The rest of the aevian himself was blurry mass of grey and black, outlined by an aura of painful brightness. She shut her eyes against the pain.

Someone touched her face.

It was as if someone had poured boiling water over her. Skin rippled and bubbled like the surface of a stew pot simmering on the fire. Lhaurel’s breath caught in her lungs. Her blood seemed to froth and roil within her veins. Her eyes snapped open.

Khari stared down at her, eyes narrowed in concentration.

The pain vanished. Her vision focused. She swallowed and there was no taste of blood. She reached up a hesitant hand and touched her face. She felt only smooth skin and an unbroken, fully whole nose.

Fahkiri chirped his special chirp, obviously excited to see her moving and whole. Someone, probably Tieran, had removed Lhaurel’s harness, but there was blood on her robes.

“You might want to practice the landing a little more,” Tieran said. There was a grin on his face, but it seemed strained.

Khari rose, pushing herself up with her hands on her knees. She seemed tired, much more so than after her stunning display with the sword earlier.

“What did you do?” Lhaurel asked in a hushed tone.

Khari blinked rapidly a few times as she turned to regard her.

“One of the abilities of a wetta is healing, of others and oneself. Haven’t you wondered how you survived before Kaiden found you?” she said, blinking.

Lhaurel struggled to rise and managed to pull herself into a sitting position.

Khari shifted slightly, moving as if she were going to sit down, and then suddenly collapsed.

Tieran was at her side in a moment. “She’s out cold.”

“Is she going to be alright?”

Tieran carried the matron of the Roterralar into one of the adjoining rooms. He placed her on the bed carefully, though he didn’t appear to be overly concerned.

Lhaurel stood at the doorway to the small room, gnawing on her bottom lip. She had followed them after assuring herself that Fahkiri was safe. She didn’t understand what had happened, but somehow Khari had healed her, and the act had left the woman close to death. Somehow she could sense the woman now when she hadn’t been able to before. Lhaurel could feel a faint pulsing from the woman, as if her heart beat weakly. Khari’s weakened state was her fault.

“She’ll be fine,” Tieran said, one hand on Khari’s shoulder.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Lhaurel felt sick. How had she ever distrusted the matron? This woman had just put herself at risk to heal her. Bile rose in Lhaurel’s throat.

“All she needs now is a little rest and some water.”

“I’ll fetch her some,” Lhaurel said immediately, not pausing for a response.

She turned and hurried back into the eyrie. She broke into a jog that sent aevians in all directions. Fahkiri screeched in indignation as she passed him by without pausing. The women cutting up sailfin carcasses looked up when Lhaurel approached them and skidded to a halt. The loose sand got kicked up over them and their meat.

“What in the seven hells!?” a woman shouted, but Lhaurel ignored her.

A waterskin lay on the ground between the women, set aside for later use in washing or drinking. Lhaurel snatched it up without asking for permission and then dashed back across the eyrie floor. Shouts of anger and protest followed her. The aevians were smart enough to get out of her way ahead of time, even Fahkiri.

“Here,” Lhaurel said breathlessly, bursting into the small room with sudden fervor and handing the skin to Tieran.

He took it, though the corner of his mouth twitched slightly. “Thank you.” He stifled a cough with the back of his hand.

“Is it enough?” she asked, shifting her weight from one foot to the other and then back again. “I can go get more.”

Tieran unstopped the skin and held the tip to Khari’s lips. A small trickle of water escaped the nozzle and dripped down her lips and the side of her cheek. Her lips parted in response to the cool liquid, and Tieran poured a little into her mouth. Khari’s chest rose and fell, and she took in a deep breath. Her eyes flickered open.

“This is more than enough,” Tieran said with a smile.

Khari sat up and reached for the waterskin, gulping it down gratefully.

Lhaurel felt lightheaded with relief. She felt Khari’s strength returning, swelling within the woman with each gulp of water. Slowly, Lhaurel sank to her knees in the sand. Khari noticed her.

“Where’s your sword?”

Lhaurel blinked and suddenly started laughing, a deep, powerful, heartfelt laugh that worked its way up from the pit of her stomach. After the emotional highs and lows, Khari’s question seemed so ludicrous.

Khari arched an eyebrow at her while she stoppered the waterskin and passed it back to Tieran, who was also grinning like a fool.

“Explain yourselves,” Khari demanded.

Tieran spread his hands in an expression of innocence, though his grin belied the gesture. The grin turned into a great, booming bark of laughter.

Lhaurel looked at him for a moment, and then comprehension dawned. “I, um—” She looked at Tieran and couldn’t suppress a laugh. “Well, I thought something was wrong and Tieran—”

Lhaurel didn’t even have to finish. Khari groaned and shot the man an exasperated look as he chuckled. Lhaurel’s laughter died away when Khari turned back to face her, Tieran’s words and Khari’s expression cutting through the ethereal humor.

“Thank you for your concern, Lhaurel,” Khari said with a tight smile, “but I was never in any danger. I was already in the eyrie when Tieran whistled and called your aevian back. He has some unfortunate timing sometimes, and I witnessed your little accident. Healing leaves me weakened for a time, but it passes quickly enough, especially if I am given a drink of water. We can heal ourselves that way, too, through consumption of the water, which fuels our power. Forgive Tieran his jokes.”