Lords of the Sky

Sky Lords pierced my soul. I felt paralyzed, my feet rooted to the deck, my hand frozen about my dagger’s hilt. All I could do was watch, gape-mouthed and trembling. Had a Kho’rabi dropped down then, I think I should have stood still and silent as he slew me. I do not think I could have moved.

In moments the three airboats were directly overhead. It was as if an icy winter’s night fell. I did move then, for my teeth began to chatter uncontrollably, clattering in my mouth like madly beaten tabors. I felt my body begin to shudder helplessly. It seemed my eyes were connected by some occult thread to the airboats and I could only follow their progress, robbed of volition. They filled all the sky, and I thought I heard spirits howling, imps and malicious sprites delivered from Ahn-feshang to torment Dharbek. My head craned around; my neck ached with the pressure, but I could not shift my body. I saw nothing but the Sky Lords’ vessels. Cleton, Pyrdon, the Seahorse disappeared into some insubstantial occult shadow land. All that existed were those three vast airboats and myself. I had never before felt so utterly helpless; nor so dreadfully afraid. It seemed they hung an eternity overhead, but it could only have been moments, for as swiftly as they had come, they were moving inland, following the wide Treppanek westward toward Durbrecht.

For a while the sky behind them continued to roil, and there drifted down a faint, sulphurous smell. Then they were hidden beyond the line of the coast, and I found I could move again. I spat: it seemed a foul taste filled my mouth. I saw Pyrdon vomit. Cleton stood pale and silent, a hand running slowly over his yellow hair. We stared at one another. His face was set in lines of rigid horror; I suppose mine was the same. Then I realized something of which I had been aware throughout that horrid interlude, but on a subconscious level that only now impressed itself upon my conscious mind: The passage of the Seahorse had not slowed.

I turned to observe the oarsmen. They manned their sweeps as before, their rhythm unbroken. It was as though the ghastly magic of the Sky Lords had no effect on them. I saw Bors standing by the mast. His wide face was turned westward, to where the airboats had gone, and it seemed to me he wore a smile. I shook my head, blinking, and when I looked at him again his features were returned to their customary blandness. I decided I was wrong: that what I had taken for a smile was the residue of fear.

I turned back to Cleton and said, “They seem not at all afraid.”

He did not understand me at first and I said, “The crew-they went on rowing. The Sky Lords’ magic seemed not to affect them.”

“Perhaps it does not,” he said. His voice was hoarse. “Perhaps they’ve not the sensibility.” He forced a laugh. “I’d name them lucky.”

I licked my lips and wiped hands I suddenly felt were slick with sweat against my tunic “Still,” I said, “it seems strange to me.”

“They’re Changed,” he said. “You’re a Trueman.”

“And yet, when I saw a boat before, when I was young”-I frowned, recalling that evening on the shore when I had stood with my father watching that first airboat pass over us-“then all the animals in Whitefish village fled. Even the gulls quit the sky.”

“What do you say?” Cleton asked.

“I’m not sure.” I felt the furrowing of my brow. “Only that it seems … odd.”

“That the Changed do not feel what Truemen feel?” he asked, and chuckled. “Daviot, they’re lesser beings than you or I; not really that much more than the animals from which they come.”

“But that’s my point,” I said. “That even the animals sense the danger. These seemed … unaware … or not at all afraid.”

Cleton’s shoulders rose in a dismissive shrug. “Kerym’s trained them well,” he said. “No order was given to cease their rowing, so they continued at their duty.”

“Perhaps.”

He was an aeldor’s son-he had far more experience of the Changed than I: I allowed him the point, but I was not convinced. I did not understand why, but I felt sure there was more to it. I could not explain my conviction. Indeed, I could not truly name it conviction; rather, it was an amalgam of what I had observed, or thought I observed, and inchoate suspicion. I could put it in no better words, and for then I bowed to Cleton’s judgment. Besides, we had much else to concern us, as Pyrdon reminded us.

His face was gone again pale, and he wiped at his mouth, his breath sour with his puking as he stared to the west and said in a soft, horrified voice, “There were three. In the God’s name, there were three! And they’re headed for Durbrecht.”

“I think they’ll not damage the College.” Cleton made a joke of it for Pyrdon’s sake, I thought.

“But it’s not the time.” Pyrdon was too shocked to allow the jest. “The last Coming was but-what?-thirty years ago. It’s not the time.”

“It was a little over twenty-nine,” said Cleton, no longer laughing. “But still I think they’ll not harm Durbrecht.”

Pyrdon tore his gaze from the sky and faced us. “How can you be so sure?” he demanded.

His eyes asked Cleton for reassurance. I found his mood communicated to me and realized I hung on Cleton’s answer. He said confidently, “There’s powerful magic in Durbrecht. Remember the Sorcerous College is there, too.”

“And the Sentinels there.” Pyrdon flung an arm to the east. “And they did not halt the Sky Lords.”

“Aye, there’s that.” Cleton faltered a moment, less assured, then said, “But still, the greatest of our mages reside in the College of Durbrecht, and they’ll know by now the airboats approach. Likely the Sentinels were taken by surprise-Durbrecht shall not be.”

Pyrdon mulled this over. I could see that he wanted to accept it. No less did I, and when he nodded I felt relieved, as if his agreement took some weight from me. Then Cleton murmured. “And we’ll find out soon enough. All well, another day should see us there,” and I realized he was far less convinced by his own arguments than he pretended.

I could think of nothing to say.

I was roused from a dream in which I stood immobile on a becalmed galley as the sky above me filled with the Sky Lords’ airboats and a crew of Changed applauded the arrows that rained about me. It was a moment or two before I shook off the sensation of impotent horror and recognized Pyrdon. He said, “Come; look,” and there was such awe in his voice, I sprang immediately to my feet and followed him to the port side of the Seahorse. Cleton was already there, staring intently into the gray-white mist that hung above the water. It was not yet dawn, and the world was lit with the opalescent glow that presages the arrival of the sun. The forward running light cast a red illumination that reminded me of the Kho’rabi balloons. Pyrdon pointed and said, “There.”

I followed the direction of his outflung arm and gasped, for only a short distant off it seemed the skeleton of some vast primordial beast thrust from the channel.

Massive ribs curved upward, thick and black against the glow of the false dawn. The mist was damp and deadened smell, but even so I caught the aftermath of burning, as though a tremendous fire had been not long ago doused. Amongst the ribs I saw dark, solid objects that I did not at first recognize as the bodies of dead men.

Cleton said, “One airboat at least failed to reach Durbrecht.”

His voice was hushed by the enormity of the monolithic wreckage, and I said nothing, only nodded, staring. I wondered how many Kho’rabi knights had that boat carried, most sunk under the weight of their armor, those I could see caught amongst the burning spars of their vessel.

Pyrdon said, “The God be praised.”

I watched the wreckage go by, calculating the length of the airboat against that of the Seahorse. The Sky Lords’ craft was four times, or more, our length.

Cleton said, “I wonder how the others fared.”

“Destroyed like this, the God willing,” said Pyrdon.

I turned to observe the skeleton as it slipped away astern. It was soon lost in the mist, and then the zodiacal light faded and I fetched my cloak from the deck as the morning grew chill.

We none of us felt able to sleep after that awesome sight and stood on the foredeck wrapped in our cloaks as the sky behind us brightened. The sun rose, and before long we came in sight of Durbrecht. I felt my jaw drop.

The Treppanek curved slightly north here, a low headland sheltering a wide bay. Atop the higher ground