Lords of the Sky

thought that so much wicker and wood as made the baskets beneath must denude the slopes of all these hills. I marveled, and Deburah sent that unspoken message to Peliane, so that Tezdal gave back answer.

“The skyboats take in the breath of Byr and ride Vachyn’s winds. These you see are readying to fly.”

I’d no more faith in Byr or Vachyn or Dach than I felt in the One God. I thought, from all Tezdal had told me, that what I saw was a magnificent human construction. A vast enterprise that satisfied an entirely human dream, fueled by priestly ambition. But I could not help but marvel at that ambition and the labor of its construction.

Then I must marvel anew at the entirely physical prowess of the dragons.

As the squadrons fell, Deburah’s lust to join her kin swept heady through me. I gave her her will, and we dropped down to where the skyboats hung and joined in the ravaging.

It was a liberation. I was a fisherman’s son from White-fish village, and the skyboats were the nightmares of my childhood: it was that child’s triumph to see them rent by the claws and fangs of my dragon. No less, I felt- through Deburah-the desire for freedom of the elementals bound to service of those boats. And as we ripped the bloodred cylinders apart and rode the gaseous blasts escaping them, so we freed the aerial spirits from their bondage. They laughed as they flew clear, and I felt ethereal hands brush my face in gratitude. Some, like soft silken figures spun out of moon’s light, coldly kissed my lips or darted thankful, insubstantial fingers through my hair. Mostly I felt Deburah’s pleasure in the destruction of malign magic.

Then guilt as we winged skyward, no prey left any longer below, only wreckage that lit the flanks of the red-mouthed mountain with a brighter, more immediate glow. I saw Tezdal riding Peliane, who had not descended, held aloft by the Sky Lord’s will and torn for that between her desire to please him and the lust she shared with the other dragons. I felt her sadness and his, and his was a soul-deep wound of hope and confusion.

I brought Deburah higher, to join Peliane, and sent out: I think it could not be otherwise, my friend. I doubt we could have stopped the bulls.

No, he answered me, likely not.

We end a war, I said, and build a peace. And there were not many of your folk slain.

He gave me back, No. Only their dream.

Which we’ll make good, I said. The Ahn shall find a place in Kellambek again, and all men live equal.

He answered me, Likely so, and closed his mind, so that I knew only Peliane’s concern for the awful sadness in him. I thought on how I’d felt when we descended on Kherbryn and had no answer for that, but only pity.

Then Rwyan came up on Anryale and told me Bellek took the squadrons to Ahn-zel and Ahn-wa-wherever the hot-breathed mountains fed life into the skyboats, to destroy them on the ground, before they had a chance to fly-and suggested we go down to the dozijan to give our terms to the Attul-ki.

It was a little after dawn; long enough after that the sun struck bright lances of golden light around the edges of the red-lipped mountain, like rays of hope flung against the fading night. The peak blushed, no longer entirely from its summit, but now also from the fires burning down its slopes, that glowing matched by all those other places where the armada of the Sky Lords was destroyed.

The dozijan was built upon a ledge of the mountain. It was a splendid and forbidding structure, standing high above the town below, the two connected by a winding road. Both town and temple were lit well with lanterns-none there could have ignored the clamor of our coming, or what we did-but the bulk of their structures stood still in shadow. I saw that the dozijan was a place of wood and stone, the walls and bases all dark granite, the upper levels swooping curves of timber and outflung balconies, with overhanging roofs and narrow windows. There was a high stone wall set with a massive gate that we ignored.

We landed in the pebbled courtyard, Rwyan and Tezdal and I. Those dragons Bellek had left with us settled where they could-on towers and spires and walls-so that all the dozijan was ringed with grim dragonish shapes.

And the Attul-ki came out to meet us.

They were dressed in robes of crimson and black, decorated with arcane sigils in gold and silver weavings. They bore no arms, and if the dragons awed them, they hid it well. They faced us as if we were what we were- intruders, invaders of their holy place. There were perhaps fifty of them, likely as similar of visage to me as any Dhar would seem to them, save for the obvious leader. He was taller, and his hair was a silver that glittered in the morning’s sun as it came up over the buildings behind. I wondered if he’d planned it so: I could not imagine any folk so self-possessed they would wait indoors whilst dragons landed all around and glowered down, their breath a susurration that drowned the birds’ song and filled the yard with the memory of digested meat. But these did and only stood in silent ranks as that impressive figure strode out in front.

His tilted eyes dismissed me with contempt, lingered an instant on Rwyan, and fixed on Tezdal.

Tezdal bowed deep. I saw his face lorn then. He would not meet that gaze but only said, “Dhazi, forgive me.”

He had tutored us enough in the language of the Ahn that past winter that I was able to somewhat follow what they said. The emotions in their words, the dragons gave me, and the rest Tezdal told me later. Then, I watched as the Dhazi studied him, as I’d long ago seen tutors in Durbrecht study some biological specimen. I was reminded of Ardyon: almost, I bent my knee.

The Dhazi said, “Do you betray your people and your gods, gijan? Do you renege those vows you made, that you come here with these land-stealers to defeat the Conquest? Do you forget that you are Kho’rabi?”

Tezdal fell to his knees. He lowered his head to the pebbles of the yard and wailed a heart-forsaken cry.

“Traitor, you,” the Dhazi said. “Blooded Kho’rabi, you. But you come with Dhar to break the dream of the people and gainsay the dictate of the Three. Apostate for that-damned by the Three and all the Kho’rabi. Were you fit, I’d tell you take the Way of Honor; but you’re not! Better you live out your miserable life in remembrance of disgrace and die outcast and alone. The Three be praised the lady Retze does not see this.”

I did not understand all he said, but I found its import in the ice-cold tone and the steel-hard glimmer of his unforgiving eyes; and I saw what I’d not ever thought to witness: Tezdal groveling in guilt and self-abasement. I was embarrassed for my friend, and terribly angry. I hated that hard priest as I’d not found it in myself to hate anyone, save Allanyn, so fierce before. I thought him bound to a view he would not change. I felt in him a surety of belief that allowed no other opinion. I heard the dragons stir as they received the tide of my dislike. Their wings rose like banners in the morning sun, and their displeasure filled the yard with a threatening whisper that was further emphasized by the irritated gnashing of their fangs and the scrape of their talons on stone and wood. I watched Tezdal bow his head-that hard, proud man bow his head! My friend, who should not need to subjugate himself thus!

In carefully rehearsed Ahn I said, “We come to talk of peace. The Ahn come back to Kellambek.”

I heard the Dhazi say, “We shall come back. Oh, yes! We shall come back! We shall come back with your flayed skins for sails; and the bones of this sad traitor set afront our skyboats in all his disgrace.”

That was too much: Tezdal was my friend and looked, like us, to build a better world. I drew my sword in warning. A foolish move that, to threaten with plain steel such sorcerers as these. I heard Rwyan shout and saw the Dhazi smile dismissively as he raised a casual hand. I was flung back, as if a giant fist came hard against my chest. My head spun, aching, and I think that had Rwyan not sent her own magic to my aid, I should have died there. As it was, I tumbled down beside Tezdal, fighting for my breath. Through eyes awash with tears of pain, I saw the Dhazi level a condemnatory finger. I moaned in rage and agony and knew I could not avoid his cantrip.

But the dragons were swifter and, perhaps, angrier.

It was Peliane who took him and clutched him a moment in her talons. Not long; but I heard him scream as he saw her jaws gape wide, and the fangs there, before they closed and cut him asunder like butchered meat, and he fell down all bloody and in pieces. And then the others fell on the Attulki and slew them, so that soon there was nothing left in the yard of the dozijan except bloody wreckage strewn across the pebbles, and Tezdal weeping, and the dragons gone wild to tear up the roofs and the walls and leave only devastation behind.

And all the while Tezdal kneeling and wailing, as if his life were stolen and all his hope gone.