The Battle Sylph (26 page)

Lizzy and Cara both stared, dumbfounded. Cara was sucking her thumb in confusion, Lizzy studying the battler. At last she addressed her father. “Where are we going?”

“To a place north of here,” he said. “You’ll like it—it’ll be an adventure. Now go gather your things. Hurry now, and take your sister.”

Grasping her sibling’s hand, Lizzy walked off, looking back periodically as she did.

Leon approached Ril where the battler had moved to stand at the great windows fronting the manor. The turrets of the castle were visible, along with a huge air ship tethered at the top. Ril crossed his arms and studied the distant ship, his expression pensive.

“What’s wrong?” Leon asked. “Has that guard realized we’re here?”

Ril shook his head. “There are four battlers on that ship.” He regarded his former master evenly. “I want to go now.”

Four battlers? No one had sent four battlers to anything less than a major war, and then not for centuries. Leon flushed cold and turned, running back into the hallway. “Girls! Move! Forget everything but a change of clothes. Hurry! We have to leave now!” His daughters yelled in protest, but he turned back into the front room. “Can they sense you?”

“Hidden like this? No.” Ril paused. “They will once I change to carry you.”

“How much can you lift?”

“Enough,” Ril replied. “Unless one of them is in a shape that can fly.”

Leon could think of at least three battlers in the king’s service with that ability. “Move!” he bellowed again. “We leave in five minutes!”

Despite his order, it took ten before they were downstairs, all the girls crying, save for Lizzy. Betha sobbed in confusion as she tried to bundle her children in cloaks, the baby swaddled in blankets. She was desperate with terror, and the girls picked it up from her. Only Lizzy was unafraid, her eyes shining as she shifted from foot to foot.

“Are we traveling by carriage? I always wanted to travel by carriage.”

“Not quite,” Ril said. He stood by her side, waiting patiently.

Leon ushered his family out. The afternoon air was cold. It hadn’t yet started to snow as it had on the Shale Plains, but he sensed it would soon. Snow was probably falling again where they were going, relentless, and he hoped his wife and family would forgive him. And he hoped the rest of the Community wouldn’t make their lives hell just to get back at him.

Likely not, if they thought it would irritate Ril.

“Ready?” he asked the battler. Ril nodded, his eyes on a cloaked shape at the closed front gate who was staring in at them.

“We’re not expected to walk, are we?” Betha whimpered, holding the youngest girls close. Ril stepped forward—and suddenly he was changing, surrounding them with smoke and lightning. The girls screamed as the darkness lifted them. Leon felt Ril hesitate, adjusting himself, and then the battler was moving upward, much slower than he had before.

“Ril!” he shouted. “How are you doing?”

You don’t have to yell,
Ril grumbled in his mind.

Leon felt his way through the darkness, finding his wife’s hand and squeezing it. She pressed against him, weeping, and he wrapped his arms around her and the girls, hugging them all close.

“It’ll be okay,” he promised. “It will.”

His family drew close, all except for Lizzy. She squirmed free instead, struggling forward to press her hand against the solid darkness that was her father’s battler. He felt warm and solid.

“Are we flying?” she asked.

Yes,
he answered, his voice echoing in her mind.

“I want to see!” she demanded.

There was a moment’s pause, and then she felt him shift around her, a wave of shadow pushing her forward and up. The darkness parted, and suddenly a strong breeze caught her hair, blowing it back while she squinted into the wind. They were high above the ground, the trees and houses tiny as dollhouses below.

Ril flew through the cold air, his body huge and nearly shapeless, bulbous and dark. His wings were massive, stretched out to either side. Behind them the castle and the city retreated into the distance, while above the sky was a beautiful blue. Distantly Ril sensed the battlers, and something else he hadn’t told Leon. Tempest was on that ship: the second-oldest sylph in the kingdom and almost the most powerful, an air sylph who could carry that entire ship faster than Ril had ever flown.

Lizzy squealed in delight, clapping her hands excitedly as she leaned into the wind. Ril held her gently, almost dancing in his own joy as he carried her and her family, pushing himself beyond endurance and fleeing faster than he ever thought he could toward the wasteland, with his love in his embrace.

Galway stood at one of the windows the sylphs had made, looking out over the endless snow. It was a wide window, letting in a lot of light but no cold. Some of the fire sylphs had taken and heated sand until it turned hard and clear. This distorted the view in odd ways, but was better than shutters by far. There were so far only a dozen of them on the cliff’s sheerest face, but they were popular, and several other people jostled him for the chance to look outside.

He’d waited too long. His curiosity about Heyou and the others had trapped him. He’d have to wait for spring now and leave his family wondering if he’d died. For ten years he’d kept his promise to return before the snow fell. At his home it likely wasn’t falling yet, but it would be soon.

Around him, the people suddenly scattered like birds, and Galway straightened, looking at the distorted reflection of a teenage boy behind him. Those who’d been gazing out the window regrouped a short distance away. Heyou was respected, but he wasn’t the most frightening of the battlers. They didn’t leave completely.

“You left your lady?” Galway asked, turning around.

“Mace is with her.” Heyou tilted his head to one side. “You’re unhappy, aren’t you?”

“You can tell?” He’d gone to pains to hide it. No one else needed the added stress, provided it even mattered to them.

“We can feel emotions. Makes us better guards.”

He smiled. “I suppose it would.”

“I don’t know what you’re unhappy about, though. I can’t tell that unless you’re my master.”

Galway shrugged. “I intended to be back with my family by now. Don’t think I regret helping you—I don’t. But I miss them.”

“Why don’t you go home?”

The trapper gestured to the window. “The snow out there is too deep. It would take me weeks to get through, and it’s dangerous. I might not make it at all.”

“Oh.” Heyou frowned, considering. “I could take you.”

Galway blinked. “What?”

“I could carry you. I could take you home. The horses would probably be upset though.”

Galway laughed, the winter suddenly not appearing so bleak. “I’d appreciate that,” he admitted. “I really would.”

Heyou nodded. He stared out the window, his lip twisting.

“Is there something else?” Galway asked.

“Yeah.” The boy grasped his hands behind his back, pulling them away from his body and arching his spine. “Mace says he doesn’t want any of us tied to the queen only. He says we should all have someone else to draw on and who can keep us here, just in case. I don’t think anything will happen, but he’s bigger than I am, and old. It’s weird. I’m the lead battler, but everyone else is older than me. I doubt Ril cares, but I think it bothers Mace a bit. He’d like to have Solie, too, but she won’t let him. So he’s got that widow instead. She kind of makes me nervous, but he likes her bossing him around. Kinda queenlike and all, even if she is just a master.”

Galway crossed his arms and leaned against the stone wall. “What are you trying to ask? I assume there’s a question in there somewhere?”

“Oh.” Heyou let his arms drop. “Mace wants me to get a
master. Someone other than Solie who I can get energy from if I have to and who’ll be another link for me to stay here.” He frowned. “But if I take you home, I won’t be able to get energy from you. You have to be here. I hadn’t thought of that.”

“You want
me
to be your master?” Galway asked, genuinely surprised.

“Well, sure. You’d still hold me here, even if you went home. And you can come visit us again in the spring.” He sounded hopeful.

Galway gaped. Never in his life had he thought he’d gain a sylph. He’d had the childhood dream, of course, as did most boys, but he’d never imagined a battler. Even for the rough boys he’d grown up with, they’d been too frightening. The thought of Heyou asking him now was so ludicrous he almost had to laugh.

“I thought you didn’t like men,” he said.

Heyou made another face. “I do. I don’t. I mean, I don’t really like men, but Solie says they’re not like battlers. We don’t have to fight you all the time like battlers from other hives. And I don’t want a woman as a master. I have Solie. It would feel weird to have another woman. I don’t want Solie to get jealous or think she might have to. I only want her, so I need a man for a master.” He hesitated and regarded Galway directly. “And Mace says to be careful. If you’re my master, you can control me. I don’t want that. But I…trust you.”

Galway was silent, moved. There was only one answer he could honestly give to a confession like that. “I’d be honored,” he told the boy. “And I swear to you, I’ll never take advantage.”

Heyou smiled, tension going out of his shoulders. It must have been hard for him to ask, Galway realized, probably alien to everything he was used to. He’d already seen what having a master had meant for the other battlers. But he’d
also seen what they were like now. Mace was happy with the widow, presumably, and Ril had deliberately kept the same master. Of course Galway saw how Leon tiptoed around him, even as he manipulated the rest of the Community into doing what was necessary to ensure their survival, but there was affection there on both sides. Galway would have to talk to him about how he managed that sometime, now that he had a battler of his own. Sort of. Heyou wasn’t his. He had no delusions about that. He wouldn’t allow himself.

“What do I do?”

“We have to do it through Solie,” Heyou explained. “We can’t just make someone our master on our own.” He gestured at the door and Solie came in, accompanied by Mace.

The girl shrugged. “It’s okay, Galway. I’ve done this before—for Loren and the widow.” She made a face. “It feels kind of weird.”

“Does it?”

Mace stepped forward, dropping his shape to become smoke and lightning, and those people who hadn’t left when he arrived gasped. The battler reached out with black tendrils, one to Solie, one to Heyou, and one to Galway himself. It felt like a satin-covered rope, thin but strong, and at its touch the trapper felt something twist inside of him. His senses doubled, and for a brief moment he felt something that was him go into Solie. An essence that he somehow knew was Heyou joined it, and inside her it changed to match his. Galway had a startled moment of feeling as though he’d been duplicated, and then that feeling was replaced by a sudden sensation of concern that the wrong choice had been made, along with an underlying determination to guard and protect Solie that he doubted would ever go away or fade. None of it came from him, though.

Galway’s eyes widened. “Am I feeling you?” he asked Heyou.

The battler nodded. “Yeah. A master can almost always feel their sylph, same as we feel all of you. I can tone it down, though, once I figure out how.” He looked up at Mace, who returned to his human form. With a nod to Solie, the big sylph went out, having never looked at the man to whom he’d given Heyou. Galway wasn’t sure he approved.

Heyou frowned as if wondering the same thing. “Mace said he always hit his master with his hate aura ’cause he hated him, and so that it would drown out his master knowing what he really felt. I won’t do that to you, though.”

“I’d hope not,” Solie said.

“You won’t have to.” Galway clapped a hand on his shoulder. “You can feed from me now, correct?”

“Yeah. You won’t really feel it, though. Leastways, Solie never does. Ril says Leon could tell sometimes, but Leon’s weird.” Solie made as if she was going to smack him, and Heyou ducked, grinning.

Galway laughed. “Well, you’ll have to let me know when you take a nibble, and I’ll see if I can feel it.” He led both Solie and Heyou out, then, the other people staring curiously as they went. The rumors would be flying, he knew. Heyou hadn’t tried to hide what he’d asked, and really there was no reason he should have. The battlers were as much a part of the Community as anyone else.

He’d have to stick around a few more days, Galway decided, now that he knew he could go home after all. He wanted to explore this new relationship and make sure he and Heyou were both comfortable with it before he left. He’d definitely have to come back in the spring, maybe bring the homestead with him, once the Community was moved and his family would be an asset instead of a drain on their resources.

Happy, Heyou walked between him and Solie. Galway
could feel the boy’s pleasure and it was nice. A little odd, but good. He was pretty sure he was going to like this.

King Alcor stood watching on the battlements of his castle, Thrall at his back, as the battlers and their masters were boarding the air ship. Jasar went first, his mouth tight and his spine stiff. Shield padded at his side, head low to the ground and snarling. Behind him, three of Alcor’s generals followed, each with his own battler. Alcor had never bothered to learn the creatures’ names.

One of the sylphs was a hunched thing in a filthy robe, possessed of arms tipped with foot-long claws instead of fingers. Its claws were held up before it like those of a praying mantis, and it started at every sudden noise. Its face was oval, its mouth a round shape overstuffed with fangs jutting out in every direction. The second battler was a golden beast like a great cat, its body sinewy and corded with muscle, its eyes a vividly insane green. The third was a giant spider, walking on a dozen legs instead of six, and with a hundred eyes on its face above its massive fangs.

All three hated, as did Thrall, and their loathing made Alcor’s stomach roll and hurt. The pain had been there for years, worse when he was stressed, and no matter how often the healers fixed it, when the stress came back, so did the pain. It had returned when his son was killed, and it was back again now.

The king wasn’t sure how much of what Jasar had told him was true, but his inclination was to believe the bulk of his report, though that thought put him in a rage. Leon had betrayed him! How much Jasar had to do with it, Alcor didn’t know, but he did know this much was true: his strongest battle-sylph master had turned traitor. And for what? For bribes from a group of pirates he’d been told were dealt with? Apparently they were larger and more organized than Leon had intimated—or that Jasar had seen from his hiding
place on the air ship. The courtier’s cowardice was the one thing about which Alcor had no doubts. It was part of the reason he’d been willing to give him a battler in the first place. Jasar would never have the intelligence or courage to really use one. He never would have lost Mace if he’d dared stay close enough to see Leon’s actions.

The four battlers had their orders, though, and even if Jasar was planning to hide during this fight, that still left three sylphs not bound to cowards. They would kill every last one of those pirates, including the girl. Her battler wouldn’t be able to stand up to four, and even if Leon was there, they would still be outnumbered. Ril would be killed and the traitor brought back. Leon would be broken on the rack and whatever was left put in a cage before the castle gates for everyone to watch die. Alcor was in a bad enough mood that he wanted a scapegoat.

Whichever of the generals failed to bring him back would take his place in that cage, and they knew it. Alcor saw the determination on their faces, and he nodded grimly. They wouldn’t fail him.

After the battlers boarded, the ordinary soldiers followed. The pirates would likely try to run, and swordsmen and archers would be needed to hunt the last of them down. Battlers were good for mass destruction, but not strategy. As rumors of the betrayal and stolen battler were moving through the castle and city, Alcor must see them all crushed. Then he could focus on his other problems…like finding a replacement for his lost heir.

His stomach twisted again, acid eating through it, and he turned before the air ship departed, striding back into the warmth of the castle while shouting for a healer. Thrall followed, as wordless as ever.

He’d never imagined it was possible, but Ril reached the Community just under five hours after he left Leon’s manor,
cutting a twenty-hour journey by three-quarters. Circumstances demanded he do everything he could in order to gain them time. Lizzy rode on his back all the way, enjoying the wind on her face and the sensations of flight. The others stayed inside him, the younger girls somewhat calmer but still nearly more than their father could handle.

A lot of the heavy snow covering the hive and that which they’d had to dig through was now gone, melted or blown away by sylphs, and Ril saw people outside as dusk approached. They were pointing up at him. He labored up to the cliff, exhausted. Battlers weren’t really made to carry loads, and he’d pushed himself beyond endurance to return as fast as he could. Still, he dropped down as lightly as he could, shifting to human form and letting the shrieking girls tumble out onto the ground.

Lizzy rolled, giggling, and rose to her feet as he dropped to his hands and knees, gasping. “Ril!” she shouted. She and her father knelt on either side of him as Betha struggled to round up the younger girls. “Ril,” Lizzy wailed, her hands warm on his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“Go help your mother,” Leon ordered. The girl looked at him fearfully and hurried over to Betha. She kept looking back, though—Ril saw it before he had to close his eyes. He was utterly drained.

Leon pulled him close. “Take whatever you need,” he said, and lifted him in his arms, carrying him through the cold air to the stairwell. Ril let himself be conveyed, his head resting against Leon’s chest as he drank the man’s energy—drank deep—and tried to remember that there were no bonds holding him back anymore, and he could kill him by drinking too much. He didn’t know where the limit was, though, and finally stopped himself.

He was taken to the queen’s audience chamber, the Petrule family either left behind or following, he wasn’t sure which. “What happened?” he heard Solie shrill as he was
laid upon something soft. Or soft enough—straw poked at him through the blanket covering the bale. He felt the other two battlers close by and relaxed. Everyone was safe.

“He got us here in an afternoon,” Leon told the queen. “He shouldn’t have flown so fast, but we had to warn you. The king has a ship with four battlers on it. They have to be coming here. We need to be ready.”