The Cloud Roads

Chapter Ten

Pearl stalked forward, her spines flaring. Half a dozen warriors landed behind her, shifting to groundling as they settled on the paving. Branch stood among them, as well as River and Drift.

Chime shoved to his feet, fell back a step, and threw a worried glance at Jade and Flower. Root and Song just looked confused. Everyone had shifted to groundling. Moon couldn’t tell if that was automatic deference to Pearl or if she had used her queen’s power to make them do it, the way she was keeping Moon from shifting back to Raksura. Jade just folded her arms and looked frustrated.

Pearl bared her teeth. “So here you all are, speaking in secret.”

Stone growled in pure exasperation. “Pearl, what are you doing?”

Desperate, Balm turned to Jade. “I didn’t tell—”

“I know it wasn’t you,” Jade said quietly.

That was when Moon registered the guilt on Branch’s young face. Stupid, stupid little... This was like a bad joke.

“Branch.” Flower didn’t raise her voice, but Branch flinched. “It was your idea to come here. Balm said we should meet at the cave above the Bird Valley, but you said this was better because it was further away.” She lifted a brow. “You fooled us very easily. We didn’t suspect a thing.”

Helplessly, Branch turned to Pearl. The queen said, “He was being loyal.”

“Loyal?” Jade’s spines flared. “We have to speak in secret because you keep telling the Fell everything we do!”

Pearl rounded on her in fury. “I’ve told the Fell nothing!” she snapped. “I’m trying to buy time.” She turned to glare at Stone. “By not letting them in to talk you’ve made them suspicious and more likely to attack.” Her gaze went to Moon. Her lips drew back in a sneer as she paced toward him.

Moon circled warily away from her, knowing better than to let her get within arm’s reach. His skin itched with the urge to shift, but he was trapped in groundling form. He saw River, standing back with Branch and the other warriors, smile derisively. Pearl stopped as Moon backed away. She tilted her head at Jade, saying, “So you didn’t take him yet. Having second thoughts about polluting our bloodline with a stray?”

Jade hissed between her teeth. How does she know that? Moon thought incredulously, torn between humiliation on his part and fury on Jade’s. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t tried.

“Buy time?” Stone repeated. “How? The Fell want to kill us all—”

Pearl shook her head. “That’s not what they want.”

In pointed disbelief, Jade said, “Then what do they want? Tell us. I’m sure we’ll be fascinated.”

“Fascinated isn’t the word.” Pearl hesitated, then drew in a sharp breath. “They want to join with us.”

Everyone stood there for a moment, still with surprise. A rustle of confusion flitted through the warriors, though none of them dared to speak. Even River and Branch and the others closest to Pearl looked uncertain, as if they hadn’t heard this before, and wished they weren’t hearing it now. Moon thought, That can’t mean what I think it means.

Flower stepped up to stand next to Jade, her expression caught between incredulity and dismay. She said, “The Fell told you this? When?”

“Not long ago. The first time they came to the colony,” Pearl said. Under the concentrated stares of Stone, Jade, and Flower, her spines seemed to droop a little. River and her other warriors didn’t look so confident anymore. Branch looked sick.

Stone shook his head, unwilling to understand. “By join, do you mean eat? Because...”

“No.” Pearl lifted a hand to her head, and for a heartbeat she looked exhausted. “Their flight is failing too. They said their progenitor died a few months ago. That’s when they first approached me.”

Before this, Moon would have given a lot to see something that shocked Stone, but he didn’t want it to be this something. Stone said, “You’re saying they want to breed with us.”

Pearl looked away.

The temple was quiet except for the buzz of flies from the pool. Even the trilling birdcalls from the forest seemed distant. Chime was the first to break the silence.

“That’s not possible,” he said, his voice thick with horror. He turned to Flower. “Is it?”

Everybody turned to Flower. She wet her lips, and said reluctantly, “It might be. The mentors who study the Fell have always believed that we came from the same source. That the similarities between us and the rulers are too pronounced to be coincidence.”

Moon had a terrible realization, and he had to ask, “Stone, at Sky Copper, you said the clutches were missing?” Though he kept his voice low, it snapped everyone’s attention to him as if he had shouted.

“I couldn’t find the bodies of the royal clutch in the nursery,” Stone answered, and rubbed his eyes. “The Fell took them.”

Took them alive, Moon thought, sick. Alive as prisoners of the Fell.

“How could you... how could you conceal this?” Jade stared at Pearl, and her voice came out in a low hiss. “I should rip your heart out.”

“I didn’t say yes, you stupid little child. I’m not insane.” Pearl bared her teeth. “But I didn’t say no, either. I knew what would happen if I did.” She stepped back, her tail lashing uneasily. “I didn’t expect them to attack Sky Copper. I thought they just wanted us.”

“Our nursery has Arbora and warriors, babies and fledglings.” Flower looked ill and old, the skin of her face so pale and translucent Moon thought he could see her bones. She pushed her hair off of her forehead and paced away a few steps. “Sky Copper has... had at least one fledgling queen, and probably two younger consorts.”

“Why didn’t the Fell join with them then, if that’s what they wanted?” Chime burst out. “They must need Arbora, too. Why destroy...” He hesitated uneasily. “Unless they made Sky Copper the same offer.”

“And their queen said no,” Pearl finished, watching them. “That’s what I believe happened.”

Stone stared at her in helpless dismay. “Why didn’t you tell me this, Pearl? Or tell Flower or Jade, or Petal or Bone or Knell? You didn’t think we had a right to know?”

“Because I knew you didn’t trust me,” she said wearily. “You’d just accuse me of treating with the Fell again.”

Flower flung her hands in the air. “Pearl, I didn’t accuse you of that until you let a Fell ruler into the colony to speak to you. You told me nothing!”

Pearl hissed at her. “There was nothing you could do. Nothing to be done. This was my burden to bear. You’ve said your scrying is useless. You can’t see anything. None of the mentors can.”

Flower turned away from her with an angry shake of her head.

“You could set a trap!” Moon shouted, unable to stand it a moment more. “You have something they want, so you make them think they have you and then you kill them. You don’t negotiate, you don’t let them...”

Pearl snapped around to face him, the barely restrained violence making him fall back a step. “You little idiot, you don’t know anything!”

“Stop it!” Flower held up her hand. “All of you be quiet.” Her head was cocked, as if she was listening intently. “Stone, there’s something here.”

Stone turned away from Pearl, scanning the empty temple. “Where?”

Moon looked around too, hampered by trying to keep Pearl in his peripheral vision. Nothing moved in the still air. Through the archway he could see the pool, a cloud of insects humming above the scummy surface and the carcass. “The water.” The words came out before he finished the thought. The opaque water, that might be a pace deep, or twenty paces, thirty paces. The stench that concealed any trace of what might have passed through the temple...

Green water erupted from the pool as something huge burst up out of it. Moon dove sideways and shifted in mid-motion, even before he realized it was a major kethel.

It plunged up the steps, charging under the archway, and headed straight for Stone. Stone shifted into his Raksuran form just before it struck him, bowling him over backwards. Moon lunged for it as it passed, but a casual blow from the kethel’s tail sent him flying, bouncing off the paving before he skidded to a stop. He lifted his head in time to see the kethel pin Stone against a pillar, and thought, Pearl let us shift; she didn’t know the Fell were here.

Heart pounding, Moon rolled to his feet. Bodies sprawled on the ground; the kethel had knocked everyone across the temple, and some of them hadn’t been quick enough to shift. He started toward Stone but someone shrieked a warning and he spun back to face the pool.

A second, smaller kethel heaved up out of the water and surged up the stairs into the temple. It ducked under the square archway and stopped. The horns studding its head were draped in fragments of the grasseater corpse that had concealed the Fell’s distinctive odor.

Moon braced himself to leap for its throat, for the thinner scaled skin at the edge of its armored collar. He had to slow it down, give the others a chance to get away. Then he froze in shock. There was something on its chest, a bulbous, dark tumor, like the sac that had been attached to the cloud-walker’s back. He had a heartbeat for the horrified thought, Oh, tell me that’s not...

The sac split open as if sliced from the inside and dakti spilled out, ten or more. They dropped to the floor and bolted into the temple. The kethel grinned, the long jaw revealing a double row of fangs, and charged.

Then Jade hit the paving beside Moon, landing in a crouch. As the kethel lowered its head, sliding to a halt across the mossy stone, Moon darted to the left and Jade dove right. The kethel made a grab for Moon, whipping its head down, but he twisted away, feeling its talons brush against his furled wings.

Moon saw a flash of blue and gray pass over the kethel’s armored forehead. The instant of distraction had allowed Jade to leap atop the creature’s back. Snarling in fury, the kethel forgot Moon and reached up to claw at her. Moon lunged in, getting under its head, clawing up past the heavy armored plates on its chest. He ripped and tore at the softer scales of its throat. It shrieked in pain, but the wash of blood and ichor that flowed down its hide from above told Moon that Jade had just ripped out one of its eyes.

The big claws scraped at Moon from behind, catching in his wings and dragging him away. But Balm shot past him, leapt up to the kethel’s throat to claw at the same spot, and tore at the jagged wounds Moon had left.

Moon ripped the disemboweling claws on his heels across the kethel’s palm as he tore himself free. He leapt to the creature’s shoulder, dodged a snap of its jaws, then swung atop its head.

He landed low on its skull and saw Jade climb back up the kethel’s back; one of its wild blows must have knocked her off. Moon scrambled higher up the skull and got a precarious hold on the armored brow ridge, his claws slipping on the impervious scales. Looking down, he saw one of its eyes was half shut and leaking blood and pus, the lid ripped through. Keening in pain, the kethel twisted around to reach for Jade. Moon stretched forward and stabbed his hand into the remaining eye.

The convulsion flung him off. He slammed into the pavement. Stunned, he lifted his head to see the kethel reeling away, staggering back toward the archways out of the temple. That’s one, he thought, and shoved to his feet.

Warriors were scattered around, locked in bloody fights with dakti. Others lay unmoving on the pavement. He saw a dakti tackle Song, but Chime leapt on it from behind, tearing it off her. The kethel still fought Stone, the two big bodies writhing in combat, black and red blood running over the temple floor. Pearl, atop the kethel’s head, tried to rip at its eyes, but it kept its head down, its jaw buried in Stone’s throat. Pearl couldn’t get purchase. She must have worked a claw in somewhere, because the kethel let go of Stone to fling its head back and knock her away.

Moon lunged forward to take advantage of the opening, but something beat him to it, the white form of an Arbora. Flower? he thought in dismay, as she leapt straight into the kethel’s jaws. It snapped down on her, then reared back. Convulsing, it flopped over backward.

Moon made the distance to it in two long bounds and landed beside it as the big creature stiffened and went still. Not quite still—the pockets of loose skin in its cheeks moved, as if something inside was trying to get out.

Moon yelled in alarm, grabbed the lower jaw, planted his foot on the upper, and shoved. With a crack, the stiff jaw unlocked and Flower spilled out of the kethel’s mouth in her groundling form. She landed on her hands and knees, gasping. The jagged end of a long piece of wood had been driven into the soft flesh at the back of the kethel’s throat.

Moon released the jaw and leaned over Flower. He had to take a harsh breath before he could speak. The stench coming from the dead kethel’s gullet made his throat raw. He couldn’t imagine how Flower felt after much closer exposure to it.

“Are you all right?” He hadn’t seen the stick in her hands in Arbora form, and obviously, neither had the kethel. She must have snatched it up in groundling form and shifted with it, hiding it with the same magic that hid groundling clothes and weapons, then shifted back in the kethel’s mouth. Moon didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified.

She nodded, gripping his arm for support and letting him help her stand.

“I haven’t done that in a while.” She choked and leaned over to spit. “It’s not a good idea. Stone?”

Moon turned, looking back, expecting to see Stone dragging himself upright. But he still lay where the kethel had dropped him, sprawled on his side on the temple floor. The kethel had torn rents in his scaled hide, and there was a bloody bite in his throat.

“Oh no,” Flower whispered. Moon’s heart contracted. He ran to Stone, barely pausing to rip apart a last wounded dakti that blundered into his way. He flung himself down, eye level with Stone.

This was the first time Moon had clearly seen Stone’s face in his other form, without the blurring effect that he wore like a cloak. His eyes were as big around as Moon’s head, slit in pain, and he panted through clenched fangs, a rough, desperate sound. Moon couldn’t tell if Stone saw him or not.

Moon heard a step behind him and twitched around. It was Jade. She knelt beside him, laid a hand on Stone’s cheek.

“His wings?” she asked, waiting tensely for the answer.

Flower had hurried around to Stone’s back.

“Not broken,” she reported. “He kept them folded.”

Moon was relieved. If Stone had given in to the impulse to use his wings to try to lever himself up under the kethel’s weight, it would have probably broken both, and that would have made his injuries even more devastating. If Stone hadn’t been an experienced and canny fighter, he would be dead.

Flower circled back around Stone’s body, anxiously looking over his wounds. “It’s bad, but he can heal. He’ll have to stay in this form. If he shifts, these wounds will kill him.”

Jade started to speak but a sound shattered the air, a wail of heart-deep loss and pain. It froze Moon in place for an instant, sliced open a buried memory of blood and broken bodies.

Not far away, River knelt over a body, Drift crouched next to him. The figure was in groundling form, twisted and broken. Moon pushed to his feet and moved close enough to see the face. It was Branch.

The others gathered around. Root was limping. Song, Sand, and a couple of Pearl’s warriors had bites and claw marks from the dakti. Chime had a gash across his chest, and Balm was so covered with kethel blood that Moon couldn’t tell if she was injured or not. Pearl stepped in, knelt beside River, and carefully touched Branch’s neck and face. Almost gently, she said, “He’s dead, River. I think the first kethel struck him.”

River made a noise again, a low moan of pain.

Jade hissed out a harsh breath. “Branch told you our plans, Pearl. What else did he do?”

Pearl stood, her claws working as if she wanted to use them on Jade. But she said reluctantly, “Branch was the one who brought me the first message from the Fell.”

That’s convenient, Moon thought, giving her a sideways look. But if Pearl had planned this trap, she wouldn’t have let them shift to their Raksuran forms to fight. Much as he would like to suspect her, he couldn’t get around that fact.

“Someone told the Fell we were meeting here,” Jade said, a growl in her voice. “If it was Branch—”

“No!” River snarled at her. “Not Branch.”

“After we got back to the colony and talked to Stone and Flower, I don’t know where he went.” Balm shook her head, appalled. “I went to rest... He could have left again...”

Pearl glared at Jade. “We’ll deal with this later. We have to get back to the court. The Fell will already be there. All this was a ruse to get Stone and me away from the colony so they could attack.”

“I know that,” Jade snapped. She turned to Flower, who still sat beside Stone. “You’ll stay with him?”

“I will.” Flower nodded. “Send help when you can.”

“The Islanders,” Chime said suddenly. He turned to Moon. “If Branch was the one who betrayed us to the Fell—”

River rounded on him furiously. “It wasn’t him!”

Moon ignored him. Chime was right. If Branch had told the Fell about the meeting here, then he would have told them about the flying boats. The Fell would know that groundlings were nearby and would search the area for them. He said, “I’ll warn them.”

“No.” Pearl gave the order sharply, not bothering to look at him. “We need everyone to defend the court.”

Moon tensed in rebellion. Pearl could mate with herself; he wasn’t letting the Islanders die for her stubbornness and Branch’s perfidy. But Flower said, “Let him go.”

Moon turned to her. She was crouched on the floor, and her eyes were like mirrors, blind and opaque. She shook her head, suddenly normal again, the moment passing so quickly Moon thought he imagined it. She said again, “Let him go.”

Pearl spat. “You’re finally having a vision? Now?”

Jade just said, “Chime, go with Moon to warn the Islanders. Come to the colony as soon as you can.”

Moon flew back to the ships at Chime’s fastest pace. There was no sign of the Fell in this direction, but that didn’t mean they were safe.

Against his will, he was seeing Pearl’s situation from a different perspective now. He was beginning to think this had been the Fell’s plan all along, to make the other leaders of the court distrust her. Stone, Flower, and Jade hadn’t completely fallen for it, though Moon certainly had. But it had made them doubt her, perhaps kept Pearl from speaking to them until it was too late. It didn’t mean Moon trusted her any more than before, but it would be a relief if she wasn’t actively in the power of the Fell.

The tips of the ships’ masts came into sight, barely distinguishable among the trees. Moon slowed and circled in. All three vessels were moored to the ground with heavy ropes, about forty paces above the jungle floor.

Moon landed on the deck of the Valendera, Chime not far behind him. As startled sailors hurried toward them, Moon shifted to groundling. They halted around him, staring. The Fell blood that had been on Moon’s scales transferred to his clothes and skin. He felt punctures on his back and sides from the kethel’s claws, sharp pain in his ribs from slamming into the temple’s floor. Chime shifted, then winced and rubbed at the claw-slash on his chest.

Delin, Diar, and Niran pushed through the other Islanders, and Delin stopped, staring at the blood. The others looked aghast, but Delin only furrowed his brow. He said, “We were too late.”

Chime flinched at that accurate assessment of the situation. “Yes. And the Fell know you’re here. You have to run.”

There were shocked exclamations from the crew gathered around. Delin swore in the Islander language, then said, “We must abandon the ships and hide. We can’t outrun them.”

That was what the Fell would expect, and that was what Moon was counting on. “The one who betrayed us never saw how many ships you brought. Take the fastest, put everyone on it, and run for the coast.”

Delin’s expression cleared. “Excellent.”

“Oh, that’s good,” Chime said in relief. “When the Fell find the two empty ships they’ll search the forest for the crew, and not look for a third.”

Diar nodded agreement, obviously thankful to have an option that didn’t mean certain death. “It’s worth the chance. We’ll take the Dathea.” She turned away, shouting to the others. The crew scrambled to obey, some running for the ladders to the holds.

Niran drew breath to speak, and Moon knew he was going to say it was a trick to keep the boats. Moon was prepared to throw him onto the Dathea; they didn’t have time for an argument. But what Niran said was, “I’ll stay behind. If the Fell don’t destroy the ships, I can try to take one back and—”

Delin turned to him in exasperation. “The Fell will search for us, and when they find you they will force you to reveal where we’ve gone. Then they will know to look for a third ship, and they will catch us all. And you will be dead for nothing!”

“We can’t lose these ships!” Niran folded his arms, as if determined not to budge. “We can’t afford to, and you know it.”

“Can you even make it work by yourself?” Chime asked, waving a hand toward the mast and the complicated array of ropes.

Delin answered, “It’s possible, but difficult and dangerous. He wouldn’t be able to use the sails, only the forward motion of the sustainer, so progress would be slow. And if a storm came up, he wouldn’t be able to drop the anchors and crank the ship down to the ground or tie it off, so it would surely be damaged by the wind.”

“It’s worth the chance,” Niran said, stubborn as a rock. “If I can return with one—”

Moon barely managed not to hiss in frustration. “The Fell will eat you alive, and that’s if you’re lucky. Keeping your people away from them is the only thing that matters.”

The Islanders, carrying packs and bags brought up from below, climbed over the railings onto the Dathea, while several men stood ready to cut it free from the other two ships. Diar turned back to listen to the argument, and said, “He’s right, Niran, we must leave. We can build new ships.”

“Not if we can’t pay our debts.” Niran shook his head. “I have to stay behind. Once they see we aren’t here, they may leave.”

Chime stared at him incredulously. “The Fell will find you, and even if they didn’t, you couldn’t survive on the ground in this forest, not alone.”

Niran still looked unmoved, so Moon added, “If you stay behind, you’ll have to come with us.” There was no way Niran was going to agree to that.

Niran said, “All right, if I have to.”

Before Moon knew it, it was settled. Delin hurried off to make sure his books and writing materials were moved onto the other ship, Niran went with him, and Moon cursed his own stupidity. Chime snorted and said in Raksuran, “Pearl’s going to love this. She doesn’t like groundlings.”

“Pearl doesn’t like anything,” Moon pointed out. Maybe the Fell wouldn’t destroy the ships once they found the Islanders gone. Anything was possible.

As the crews readied the Dathea to leave, Diar arranged a few details for verisimilitude. They hung a long rope ladder from the railing of the Valendera that dangled all the way down to the ground, as if this was the route the crew had used to flee. A few sailors climbed down and ran around in the ferny growth below the ships, breaking branches, leaving tracks and trampled plants. They also dropped a hastily gathered bag of bread and dried fruit, left a torn head cloth behind on a thorn bush, and pitched a couple of sandals down the hill into the thicker trees. Moon thought it would work. The Fell weren’t ground trackers; they hunted almost exclusively by air, and since their prey was nearly always groundlings trapped inside buildings or on the open streets of towns or cities, he thought they would be fooled. He hoped they would give up quickly when they couldn’t find the Islanders in the surrounding jungle.

It all took only a few moments, and they were done by the time Niran returned. He wore a sturdy cloth jacket and carried a pack. “I’m ready,” he said. He looked more determined and angry than nervous.

The Dathea was casting off, and Delin waved from the deck. “Take care!” he shouted. “Send word to us when you can!”

Moon waved back, watching as the ship lifted up, turned, and headed back toward the coast.

Sounding miserable, Chime said, “The boats were a good idea. It would have worked. We could have moved the whole court. If we’d been a day sooner—”

“Then the Fell would have attacked a day sooner, or come after us,” Moon said. There was no point in what-ifs. He turned to Niran. “You’re going to have to trust us.”

“I know.” Niran sounded like he would rather do anything but.

As they flew over the jungle toward the colony, Moon knew it must already be under attack. They were flying into the wind and the stench of Fell was laced all through it, mingled with blood and dirt and the clean scent of the river.

They passed over a clearing, an area where a large fallen tree had flattened the other growth around it, and on impulse Moon circled back to land. Chime followed him, alighting on the piles of broken deadfall, setting Niran on his feet. Niran staggered sideways and sat down on a heavy branch, holding his head. “You fly much faster than I thought,” he gasped.

Chime ignored him. “You smell it?” he asked Moon, twitching with worry. “We’re too late.”

Moon turned to Niran, speaking in Altanic. “The Fell are at our colony, we can scent them. I don’t want them to see you; if they do it might make them look harder for the others.”

Niran looked up at him, nodding ruefully. Even if he was still suspicious, he couldn’t argue with this. “I’ll wait here for you.”

It was the best solution, but Moon didn’t want to leave Niran on the ground alone. The Islander didn’t know this territory, and if they couldn’t return for him, he would be helplessly lost.

“Stay with him,” he said to Chime. That solved a second problem. Moon had a bad feeling about what they would find at the colony, and maybe Chime didn’t need to see it.

“What, you don’t want me in the battle?” Chime said, uneasily.

That was part of it, too. “Just stay here,” Moon said, and leapt into the air.

Past the next set of hills, the valley came within sight, and then the big step pyramid where it straddled the shallow river. Large, dark shapes flew in steady circles around it, like carrion birds over a dying grasseater—major kethel.

He had known they were too late, but it was still a sight to make his blood curdle.

Jade, Pearl, and the warriors stood on a bare hilltop, looking toward the colony. With them was a group of Arbora, a small group, only forty or so. They can’t be the only survivors. Moon banked to land near Jade.

“Were you in time?” she asked, her eyes still on the kethel circling the colony.

“Yes.” He didn’t want to tell her the plan, not where others could hear. Moon looked over the Arbora, and his throat tightened. There was Bone, the old hunter with the scar around his neck, but he didn’t see Petal, Bell, Rill, Knell or any of the others he knew. There were no children, and they didn’t look as if they had been in a fight. Most of them were hunters, still carrying rolled nets and short spears.

“Good.” Jade hissed through her teeth. “Where’s Chime?”

“I told him to wait for me. Do you know what happened?”

Sounding sick, Balm answered, “Bone and the others were in the forest when they saw the kethel fly in. They ran back to the river, but they met Braid and Salt and a few others who had been in the gardens, close enough to the colony to see what happened. They said that the first kethel brought smaller Fell, rulers or dakti, to the top of the colony. They started back inside to try to fight, but suddenly no one could shift. Knell was outside on the lower terrace. He shouted at them to run. Knell didn’t follow. He must have stayed to try to gather the soldiers.” Her voice was choked. “It doesn’t make sense. They should have fought. Even if they were taken by surprise—”

“They couldn’t fight, if they couldn’t shift,” Jade told her. “And the Fell would take hostages.”

A few paces away Pearl stirred, her spines lifting uneasily. “Keeping them from shifting is a queen’s power,” she said. “How could the Fell have it?”

Jade shook her head slightly, the shocked stillness of her expression turning thoughtful. “They could have a queen. They could have the queen from Sky Copper. Stone said he never found her body, or any trace of her.”

“Even a reigning queen couldn’t keep the entire colony from shifting, not unless they were all together in the same room. It wouldn’t affect the Arbora on the lower levels.”

Balm’s indrawn breath wasn’t quite a hiss. “A ruler is coming this way.”

A shape flew toward them. Behind him, Moon heard Root make a faint, frightened noise.

Jade said, with deadly emphasis, “Friend of yours, Pearl?”

Pearl’s tail lashed once. “It’s Kathras, the one that came to the court while you were wasting time on your pointless journey.”

With a growl in his voice, Bone said, “You want to fight each other or face this thing?”

The ruler drew closer, riding the wind to land lightly only a short distance away. He folded leathery wings, and paced toward them through the tall grass, picking his way almost delicately.

“Kathras.” Pearl greeted it, calm and even. “How did you do this?”

“They wanted to join us,” he said. “We hold no one prisoner.” He spoke the Raksuran language, like the dakti at Sky Copper. Moon had never heard a Fell ruler speak anything but Altanic before. The rigid bone crest behind the ruler’s head didn’t betray emotion the way spines or frills did.

His gaze moved over them, resting for a moment on Moon. Moon felt the scales on his back itch, the urge to raise his spines, the nearly overpowering need to rip the creature apart.

Jade watched Kathras with predatory calm. She said, “Who was your spy?”

Kathras inclined his head toward her. “Your new consort.”

Moon hissed in pure surprise, then felt like a fool. He should have expected this; he was the obvious choice, the only newcomer to the court. He felt the others staring at him, but Jade just sighed.

“Predictable,” she said, and added acidly, “I’m surprised you didn’t say it was me.”

Pearl ignored it all, her attention focused only on the ruler. “What do you want from us, Kathras?”

The cold eyes turned back to Pearl. “We have what we want.”

“Arbora, sterile Aeriat. That’s not what you want,” Pearl said. Her voice took on a different tone, warm and low. She eased forward, focused on Kathras, and Moon felt intense heat brush past him, even though she was more than six paces away. It was a faint echo of the connection he had felt when he had first seen Pearl. She was trying to use it on Kathras, trying to pull him in, seduce him, the way she had Moon.

Pearl said, “You want a queen. You need a queen. Let the others in the colony leave, and you’ll have one.”

Kathras cocked his head. “They don’t want to leave. Come into our colony. You will see that all is well.”

Drift stirred, uncertain. “If one of us has to go—”

“No.” Jade cut him off, not taking her gaze away from the ruler. “If you go inside, you won’t be able to shift, and they’ll have you, too.”

Drift shook his head, helpless, anguished. “How do we know?”

“It’s a trick, a Fell trick. It’s what they do,” Balm added in a hiss. “You think the others want to be trapped in there with them?”

“Drift, be quiet,” Pearl said. Her eyes were still on Kathras. “Your plan won’t work without a queen. You know you need me. Let the others go.”

“When we seek a Raksuran queen,” Kathras said, his fangs showing, “we will seek one of strong mind and body, fertile, and not so easily fooled.”

Pearl lunged at Kathras, but he darted backward, avoiding her claws by a hairsbreadth. As if nothing had happened, he said, “Come whenever you wish. You will all be welcomed.” Then he turned and leapt back into the air.

The warriors and hunters snarled. River crouched to launch himself after Kathras, but Jade said sharply, “No, idiot. We can’t fight them now.”

“She’s right.” Pearl watched Kathras fly away. She breathed as hard as if she had just been in a fight. “They can threaten to kill the clutches and fledglings, or just send a few kethel against us.

“We need to go, before they come after us.”