Windhaven

her.

'Tya,' she said, wondering.

The landsguard left them, bolting the door behind them, with the assurance they would be right outside if anything was needed.

While Maris still stared, uncomprehending, Evan went to Tya's side. 'What happened?' he asked.

'The Landsman's bullies were none too gentle about arresting me,' Tya said in her cool, ironic voice. She might have been speaking about someone else. 'Or maybe it was my mistake to fight them.'

'Where are you hurt?' Evan asked.

Tya grimaced. 'From the feel of it, they broke my collarbone. And chipped a tooth. That's all — just bruises, otherwise. All that blood came from my lips.'

'Maris, my kit,' said Evan.

Maris carried it to his side. She looked at Tya. 'How could he arrest a flyer? Why?'

'The charge is treason,' Tya said. Then she gasped as Evan's fingers probed around her neck.

'Sit,' said Evan, helping her down. 'It will be better.'

'He must be mad,' Maris said. The word called up the ghost of the Mad Landsman of Kennehut. In grief, hearing of his son's death in a far-off land, he had murdered the messenger who flew the unwelcome news. The flyers had shunned him afterward, until proud, rich Kennehut became a desolation, ruined and empty, its very name a synonym for madness and despair. No Landsman since would dream of harming a flyer. Until now.

Maris shook her head, gazing at Tya but not really seeing her. 'Has he lost his reason so far as to imagine that the messages you carry from his enemies come from your own heart? To call it treason is wrong in itself. The man must be mad. You aren't subject to him — he knows that flyers are above petty local laws.

As his equal, how could you do anything treasonous? What does he say you did?'

'Oh, he knows what I did,' Tya said. 'I don't claim I was arrested on false pretenses. I simply didn't expect him to find out. I'm still not sure how he knew, when I thought I'd been so careful.' She winced.

'But now it's all for nothing. There will be war, just as fierce and bloody as if I'd stayed out of it.'

'I don't understand.'

Tya grinned at her. Her black eyes were still sharp and aware despite her bruises and her obvious pain.

'No? I've heard that some old-time flyers could carry messages without knowing what they said. But I always knew— each belligerent threat, each tempting promise, each potential alliance for war. I learned things I had no intention of saying. I changed the messages. Slightly, at first, making them a little more diplomatic. And returned with responses that would delay or sidestep the war he was after. It was working — until he found out about my deception.'

'All right, Tya,' Evan said. 'No more talking just now. I'm going to set your collarbone, and it will hurt.

Can you hold still, or do you want Maris to help hold you down?'

'I'll be good, healer,' Tya said. She took a deep breath.

Maris stared blankly at Tya, hardly believing what she had just heard. Tya had done the unthinkable — she had altered a message entrusted to her. She had meddled in land-bound politics, instead of staying above them as a flyer always did. The mad act of jailing a flyer no longer seemed so mad — what else could the Landsman have done? No wonder he had been so disturbed by Maris'

presence. When word reached other flyers…

'What does the Landsman plan to do with you?' Maris asked.

For the first time, Tya looked somber. 'The usual punishment for treason is death.'

'He wouldn't dare!'

'I wonder. I was afraid that he planned to bury me here, kill me secretly and silence the landsguard who had arrested me. Then I would simply vanish, and be presumed lost at sea. But now that you have been here, Maris, I don't think he can. You would denounce him.'

'And then we would both hang, as treasonous liars,' said Evan. His tone was light. More seriously, he added, 'No, I think you are right, Tya. The Landsman would not have sent for me if he meant to kill you in secret. Much easier just to let you die. The more people who know of your arrest, the greater the danger to himself.'

'There's flyer's law — the Landsman has no right to judge a flyer,' Maris said. 'He'll simply have to turn you over to the flyers. A court will be called, and you'll be stripped of your wings. Oh, Tya. I never heard of a flyer doing such a thing.'

'I've shocked you, Maris, haven't I?' Tya smiled. 'You can't see beyond the horror of breaking tradition — not even you? I told you you were no one-wing.'

'Do you think it makes a difference?' Maris asked quietly. 'Do you expect that the one-wings will flock to your side, and applaud this crime? That somehow you'll be allowed to keep your wings? What Landsman would have you?'

'The Landsmen won't like it,' Tya said, 'but perhaps it is time for them to learn they can't control us. I have friends among the one-wings who agree with me. The Landsmen have too much power, particularly here in Eastern. And by what right? By birth? Birth used to determine who wore wings, but your Council changed that. Why should it determine who rules?

'You don't realize the things a Landsman can do, Maris. It's different in Western. And you were above it all, like all the old flyers. But it is different for a one-wing.

'We grow up like all the other land-bound, nothing special about us. And after we win our wings, the Landsmen still see us as subjects. The wings we bear command their respect for us as their equals, but it's a fragile thing, that respect. At any competition we might lose the wings and again be weak, lowly citizens.

'In Eastern, in the Embers, in most of Southern and even a few islands in Western — wherever the Landsmen inherit their power — they look with respect upon the flyers who were born to wings. They may disguise it, but they feel a sort of contempt for those of us who had to work and struggle to win a pair of wings. They treat us only superficially as their equals. All the time they are trying to control us, trying to buy and sell us, commanding us, feeding us messages to fly as if we were no more than a flock of trained birds. Well, what I've done will shake them, make them look again. We're not their servants, and we won't submit anymore to flying messages we despise, carrying death-warrants and ultimatums to ignite wars that might destroy our families, friends, and other innocents!'

'You can't pick and choose like that,' Maris interrupted. 'You can't — the messenger isn't responsible for the content of the message.'

'That's what the flyers told themselves for centuries,' Tya said. Her eyes glittered with anger. 'But of course the messenger is responsible! I have brains, a heart, a conscience — I won't pretend I don't.'

Abruptly, like a sluice of cold water, the thought 'This has nothing to do with me' doused Maris' passion.

She was left feeling angry and bitter. What was she doing arguing flyer business? She was no flyer. She looked at Evan. 'If you are through here, we had better leave,' she said dully.

He rested a hand on her shoulder and nodded to her, then looked to Tya. 'It's only a minor fracture,' he said. 'There should be no problem with its healing. Just rest — don't do anything violent that might dislodge the brace.'

Tya grinned crookedly, showing her discolored teeth. 'Like trying to escape? I have no activities planned. But you'd better tell the Landsman, so his guards don't forget themselves and massage me with their clubs.'

Evan knocked on the door for the guards, and almost immediately came the noise of the heavy bolts being drawn back.

'Goodbye, Maris,' Tya called.

Maris hesitated, about to walk through the door. Then she turned back. 'I don't think the Landsman will dare to try you himself,' she said earnestly. 'He will have to let your peers judge you. But I don't think they will be kind, Tya. What you have done is too dangerous. It affects too many people — it affects everyone.'

Tya stared at her. 'So was what you did, Maris. But the world is ready for another change, I think. I know what I did was right, even if I failed.'

'Maybe the world is ready for another change,' Maris said steadily. 'But is this the way we should change it? You've only replaced threats with lies. Do you really think flyers as a whole are wiser and more noble than Landsmen? That they should bear the whole responsibility for choosing what messages to fly, and which to alter, and which to refuse?'