Chapter 5
From the ashes of an empire we will rise again – in one form or another. Our time is far from over. We are Dragonairs. We are eternal.
Queen Evanya’s diary, final entry
Soaring. Pale gold wings, outstretched, shifting as the wind gusted, then yielded. The wings flapped, once, then steadied out again, caught on the wind, gliding effortlessly. Thick clouds obscured below, yet the bright blue of the high sky, sharpened by the sun’s glow. Warmth radiated through flesh and scale, burrowing deep into bones and thought. Then the wings snapped shut. Diving. Wind cut like a blade, droplets of rain slashing relentlessly; then, only the steady fall of rain…and a plume of smoke ahead. Dark, ominous, billowing up from the peaks of snowy mountains, stretching out for as far as the eye could see...
A savage cry tore through the air, anguished.
Wren sat up in her bed with a scream, clutching her chest. T5R5FCShe stayed there until her heart slowed, thoughts cleared, focused. No one came in, so no one had heard her scream. Instinctively, she touched her throat, winced. It was raw, like she’d been sick – or screaming.
With a sigh she dragged herself out of bed, stumbling over to her chest. She yanked on her furs, yet let her cloak out, and then sat down as she laced her boots on. There would be no climbing today, so she omitted the strapping she usually wore on her back. As she stood she glanced at her sword, tucked quietly beneath the bed. For her father’s strange expression of recognition, which she realised was pretty silly, he hadn’t said anything – no one had on it. For all their concerns of her missing, presumed killed, and the story she’d told them, they brooked the topic no more.
Four days since she’d gotten back and it was as though they were walking on egg shells around her, afraid to broach the topic. She didn’t know if she was glad or not, only that she was restless since coming back, itching for a climb. Aside from the short expeditionary climbs, which weren’t even very high and involved more hiking than she liked, there was nothing available. Any of her usual places were gone, either destroyed or now out of reach, even for her. So, she kept herself busy by helping her mother by preparing food for the women in the central hut, whom were still labouring over the last few bags of powder.
On her way to the communal hall where her mother worked she saw Flynn by the well, drawing up a pitcher. He saw her walking past, waved her over with a broad grin, white teeth flashing. With a smile she wandered over, thoughts of the dream momentarily dispelled.
“We didn’t get to talk when you came over,” he said, feigning hurt.
“I…I needed to get out. I was tired,” she said. “Sorry.”
“Hey, it is fine. We’re all just glad you’re alive. Not every day someone survives a wyvern attack, you know?” He said with a teasing smile, though his eyes betrayed curiosity – he didn’t buy the story she’d sold. Perhaps because he didn’t want to. It didn’t suit his fantasies of magic and far off battles and something exciting – a far from everything that was the village.
It didn’t matter what he wanted was the truth. She’d told one story, so she had to stick to it.
“By the gods grace,” she murmured.
He snorted. “You believe in them as much as I do.”
“Maybe but can’t be spouting heretical stuff. How’s the expeditions been going? Any new routes?”
A shadow clouded his face as his brow furrowed, marring his usually pretty face. It made him seem older, wearier.
“I found one but it’s a hard climb. Might be up your speed, actually,” he said, the idea lighting a fire in his mind.
The prospect of a climb, a hard one at that, excited her, let her heart race away. She hadn’t expected it, so it was a welcome distraction; that, and it got her away from the village. It wasn’t as though she loathed the village, only that since returning, she had a gnawing sensation to be somewhere else – the feeling was hard to pin, to define properly. All it left her was that restless feeling, steadily growing, unfed by her own limited wanderings.
“I’ll come over to the hall later, see the maps. A climb would be the best thing for me right now. I need the ice and wind and the sky, put things back in perspective,” she said.
The long look he gave her said he wanted more of an explanation, as if she wasn’t clear enough. The mood of talking more passed and she lied, said that she was late and her mother would be angry. Then she promised that she’d come later that day, see what he had. That seemed to ease him, so he smiled, and let her go. In truth, her mother wouldn’t care so much if she came or not – perhaps she would, before the incident.
With a sigh she strode towards the communal hall, ready to sink her hands into some dough and forget everything, if only for a little while.
Barely a few hours later she could barely stand on her own two feet. Not one accustomed to tiring easily, a hazard in her profession, she was forced to sit in the corner of the kitchen on the stool. Her mother came over and handed over a mug of steaming hot tea.
“You look tired – go, rest,” she said gently.
“That’s all I’ve been doing,” snapped Wren, then regretted her words immediately. “I’m sorry, mother. I shouldn’t snap at you. You don’t deserve that.”
She simply put a hand on Wren’s shoulder, which somehow felt worse than just being tired. Like she was now a fragile doll, something to be coddled. All her life to that point she’d fought against that and had gotten to the point where she wasn’t anymore – until she returned from the dead.
“I’m just glad my baby came home. I worry every time you climb. It scares me half to death but now you’re home, here, well I’m glad you’ve stopped.”
Wren looked up sharply. “Stopped?”
“Given up climbing, of course.”
“I haven’t?”
Her mother frowned. “But I thought?”
“I’m here because I need to keep busy and there were only minor climbs and mostly hikes for new routes. Nothing strenuous. I just spoke to Flynn, though, he’s got a good climb ready for me,” said Wren quietly, then looked to the fire. “To be honest, I’m far too tired. In a few days, maybe. See how the weather holds.”
When she looked back her mother was back at the table, aggressively slicing vegetables, her lips a thin line. She never openly disapproved of the climbing. In any other village a dangerous role undertaken by a female might be frowned on. In hers, however, climbers being rare, and the dried powder the village produced was its life blood. Lose that and the village would die. Her mother knew that and open disapproval of climbers, of anyone brave enough to do it, was frowned on. She’d be a pariah by fighting Wren on it and that she wouldn’t do.
Wren stood and walked over to her mother, kissing her cheek, then murmuring goodbye, that she was heading back to sleep. Her mother didn’t say anything as she retreated, which hurt but Wren let her keep her silence. Her mother was proud, adored her children but she was an outsider, having been brought into the life of a village where people climbed dangerous mountains for a flower grown nowhere else. All for a powder that had numerous properties. She didn’t understand why it wasn’t just the men doing it. It was one thing to go to war, another to climb a mountain; in war, you had an army, weapons, support of a kind. As a climber, yes you had your team but they weren’t holding you on the cliff. That was all you. You pick the wrong hold and slip? You die.
That was the life of a climber.
The walk back was short, uneventful and she found the house empty, the fire cold. Still, she wasn’t frozen, so she changed and climbed under the thick bed of furs. Wrapped up in their silky warmth she fell into a deep sleep, drawn by the dull ache in her body and a weariness she couldn’t explain.
By the evening she woke again but by then Elise had returned. She sat by the fire, needle in hand as she mended one of her dresses, softly humming. Bathed in the amber glow she seemed content, a picture of domesticity. It was hard to think that, as a child, Elise had been as daring as Wren, off chasing her sister through the fields, wild and reckless. Then they grew up and the similarities stopped. Sure, they were close, as sisters can be but there was a distance now, in other ways.
Her sister glanced up. “You’re up.”
“When did you get back?” Wren asked, leaning on the wall.
“Not long. I had a little mending, so I wanted to get started. How are you feeling? You seem tired lately. Bad dreams?”
“Surprisingly, no. I don’t know. Perhaps what happened is catching on me,” said Wren with a smile.
Elise scrunched up her face. “You make it sound like an ailment. Honestly, I don’t think I could do what you do, return to it after being snatched away. It wanted to eat you, Wren! How does that not scare you?”
Because I stared it down…and won.
“What happened to the girl that used to follow me everywhere? I remembered you wanted to be a climber, too. You were good, too. I always thought we’d be up there, together,” said Wren.
“I grew up, Wren.”
“You believe I haven’t?”
“No,” she said carefully. “You have. I did it because I thought being by your side was what I wanted, that it was where I found peace and happiness. The climbs we did as kids were fun, yes but I never climbed without you. Do you remember when we climbed up to devil’s crest?”
Wren laughed and sat down. “Mother was furious.”
A smile split Elise’s features, the memory returning clear in her mind. In that moment Wren felt like a conspirator in some grand scheme, rather than two sisters who once defied their mother, scaring her half to death.
“Yes, she was. That is not the point. No, we got all the way to top and I turned to embrace you, to enjoy the feeling with you but your gaze was on the mountains. You couldn’t look away. There was this magic in your eyes. It was intense, dizzying and I couldn’t understand it. I looked where you did and I saw the mountains but not the way you did. Then I knew. Your heart was in that place, in the climb, in those mountains. Something has always drawn you to them, more than anyone in this village. It makes you a brilliant climber.”
“The best kind of climber. I do not think anyone in this village would argue that. When we got down I removed myself from the climbs and saw if I might find something else in the village that drew me the way the mountains did. I found it.”
“The stables? I thought you are there because their stable hand, Luca, is pretty?”
Elise rolled her eyes. “Oh, Luca is pretty and so are the horses. No, I do it because we get to ride out sometimes – that’s what draws me. The world beyond this village. I found my magic, out there, in those wilds. It’s why I wish to leave.”
Wren paled. “Leave? Go where? With whom? You’re a young, unmarried lady!”
“Don’t act as though you’re suddenly full of propriety,” said Elise with a snort. “Besides, aunt Gwendolyn in Roa has agreed to take me on. Mother was more than agreeable.”
Wren feels like she’d been blindsided by her sister, hurt by the lie. The desire was not, as Elise had said, a new thing; it had been there, simmering beneath the surface, steadily growing. That, and any letter sent to Roa would takes weeks to arrive – and that was by the fastest mail rider. In truth, it would’ve been months and even to send required one to go to the village at the bottom of the mountain, a few hours ride and only in the warmer months. From there, it’d be delivered to Roa. It was a long time to hide such a thing from her…and Elise hadn’t seen fit to share.
She stood, feeling cold, angry, not trusting herself to speak. Any notion she had to tell her sister about what she really saw vanished. Scornfully, she kept her mouth shut.
“You’re angry with me?” Elise said, shocked. “I thought you’d be overjoyed for me!”
With a snarl Wren spun on her, feeling a surprising surge of fury. It exploded with her, a white-hot rage, that made her limbs feel hot, like they were on fire.
“You kept this from me for months – no, years apparently! You’re leaving this village. When were you going to tell me if we didn’t have this discussion? When you were in Roa?”
Elise recoiled, stung. “I didn’t know aunt would agree. She’s never met me…I didn’t want to say something then to have her say no. Do you think I wanted that pity?”
Rationally, Wren saw her point, probably would’ve done the same in her position but the anger refused to die; instead, it swelled, writhing violently in her mind and she had the sudden urge to lash out, to tear something apart with her bare hands.
“I wouldn’t pity you!”
Her sister was on her feet, eyes flashing angrily. “Oh yes you would! I may not be a climber but that doesn’t mean I’m delicate, that I need your bloody protection. I need to make something of myself, be more than just what I am in this village. Besides, this place is dying, Wren! Do not think how I don’t notice how you bring less and less each year, that you have fewer and fewer Climbers!”
Wren could only stare at her red-faced sister, breathing heavily, eyes narrowed to thin, accusing slits. The fury in the room was palpable, suffocating, dizzying. The dig at the Climbers, the fact that stung more like a jab at her own inadequacy, like it was her fault their village was slowly dying, just made her angrier. Venomously, vindictively so.
“Then rather than help, try to do something, you run because your heart isn’t here!” Wren spat accusingly and stalked to the door. “At least one of us isn’t running away, Elise.”
She was out, slamming the door – and wood splintered with a sharp crunch. She spun around. Hairline cracks split across the door, fanning out like a lighting bolt. Sharply, she looked down, saw her hands shaking hard. The door opened, making her lift her gaze. Elise stood there, shocked, gaping right at Wren.
Without thinking, she hurried off – straight to the Climbers hall. Mira was inside, packing her gear for the next climb, sitting by the warm glow of a low burning fire. Behind her Flynn sat at the table, reading a book, pausing only as she approached and, seeing her, set the book aside.
“Wren? What’s wrong?”
She wasn’t shaking anymore but she must’ve looked a sight; red, angry, scowling. A caged beast. From Mira’s intense look, scrutinising her, maybe even enjoying how on edge Wren was, she certainly didn’t look good.
“Nothing. Where’s this climb specifically?”
At the table she eyed the map sprawled out, running her finger over one of the trails. Flynn stood and pointed to one of the closer peaks, barely an hour’s walk, followed by what looked to be a decent climb. No black dots, which meant no hand holds in place. It wasn’t a problem, not for her – she’d climbed without ones before. It just meant she’d have to climb a little more carefully.
“I’ll scope it out, get a better handle on places for holds and mark them as I go. At the top I’ll suss out a rigging point for when you come and put the holds in.”
Flynn studied her cautiously. “You say that as though you’re climbing today.”
“The weather isn’t conducive to a climb. I’m bored not stupid,” she said with a small, ghost of a smile; then, seeing the long look he gave she shrugged. “Okay, I’m a little off right now but I’ll be fine.”
“Just don’t push it, okay?” He said with concern thick in his voice.
They both knew the dangers of climbing emotional. You made mistakes. In their job, such ones got you killed – or your team killed. That’s what made him afraid, that he’d lose a Climber. There had been deaths before – unavoidable, really – but it didn’t reduce the fear that every time you went out you might not come back. It hung over them all, a nagging voice, a guiding hand to caution you when you might be inclined to do something reckless.
She held his gaze, steady, assured. “I won’t.”
In truth, she was scared to climb angry – to do anything in the state she was in. One moment she was so tired she could barely think, the next angry enough to hurt someone – badly. She’d never experienced anything like it but, since coming back, she felt all over the place, like her mind was fraying at the seams.
“Good because I don’t want to bury anyone this season,” he said grimly. With a sigh he wandered over to a nearby chest and cracked it open. “Look, this is grim enough talk, want a drink? You look like you need one. How about you, Mira?”
Mira shook her head as she stood, bag packed. “My gear is ready for tomorrow, so I’m heading home. I’ll leave you two. I think Vaughn, Max and Prilla are coming by this evening to pack.”
Flynn nodded and then she was off, closing the door behind them. Wren joined Flynn by the fire, sitting opposite him, nursing the drink he offered. She stared into the flames, calming in the basking glow, yet dimly aware Flynn was watching her. When she looked up his gaze darted to the fire.
“How’s Max and Prilla? They’re back to work?”
The newly married pair had been expected to retire – or, at least, one of them. Probably Prilla, if they intended to follow through with their intentions for children.
Flynn sighed, took a deep sip of his drink. “After you were taken the next day they came in. I guess they knew how fragile our numbers are and felt bad we were short. I know we’ve got the juniors but they don’t climb this time of year. They won’t be ready till next year, and if they all stay on at all.”
“A couple seemed determined to stay,” said Wren, recalling the few classes she helped in. “That changed?”
“The wyvern attack had two effects; brought Max and Prilla back, plus a few indications of retired Climbers coming back; then it made the parents afraid to send their children on to the final phase.”
It made sense. Older Climbers knew all about Wyverns, had lived with their risks. They’d simply see it as numbers issue and step in, though once one or two stepped in, they’d withdraw their offer. As for the parents, they didn’t understand, unless they’d been Climbers themselves. All they’d see it as were bad beasts that might snatch up their babies.
“Everything is different now,” murmured Flynn. “When I started it wasn’t this bad. Now there is whispers of moving the village, of abandoning this place altogether.”
“It’s hard to think that will happen but if we run out of flower to sell we won’t have much of a choice. I don’t want to live. These mountains are my home. What would I even do down there? Be someone’s wife on a little farm? I’d lose my mind at that.”
Flynn glanced at her, curiously. “Is that why you said no to Vaughn?”
She waved a dismissive hand. “I said no because I didn’t feel the same as well as not wanting to retire simply because I married. Vaughn would see himself obligated to stay on, that I’d be the one expected to retire. Do you see me doing that? Being okay with it?”
“No,” he agreed. “You’re different, Wren. I mean, I like the cliffs as much as anyone but you? You’re more at ease on the side of a mountain, nothing securing you, than anyone else who’s ever climbed before.”
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