The Serpent Sea

Chapter Four

They started the search through the strange twilight world of the mountain-tree’s roots, finding their way through the hanging moss and vines, the forests of fern trees, and the marshes. The teachers and the rest of the Aeriat had been told to keep searching the inside of the tree and up into the branches, on the chance that some trace of the thieves had been left inside.

Moon searched the ground with the hunters, but he didn’t hold out much hope. Unless the groundlings had camped for a long period while trying to find a way into the tree, the damp and time would have wiped out any sign of them. And if they did find old evidence of a camp, it wasn’t as though there would still be tracks to follow.

But there just wasn’t anything else they could do at the moment. Casting over the ground in a stand of reeds, he passed a clearing where Jade, Stone, and Flower were talking. He heard Jade ask Stone, “Does it have to be that seed? Can we get another?”

Stone didn’t sound hopeful. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

Flower wasn’t as discouraged. “I told Heart and Merit and the others to unpack the court’s library. The answer should be somewhere there. I’m going to join them now.”

Moon continued through the reeds, working his way further out. If we could get another seed… It was a hope to hold onto, at least.

As the roots spread further away from the mountain-tree, they grew smaller, only as big around as the trunks of the big fern trees. Some roots arched up off the ground, forming fantastic shapes, supporting curtains of moss and vines.

Then Bramble, one of the hunters, slipped out of the brush and made a faint clicking noise, beckoning Moon. Startled, Moon ducked under the foliage to follow her. He had been so convinced they wouldn’t find anything.

They came to a tall thatch of big green flowers with brilliantly red centers. Bramble crouched in its cover and pointed.

Not far past the flowers was a shallow pond, barely more than a widened section of stream. It was home to a collection of snails with dark brown shells. And there was something crouched over the pool, watching the snails.

It was a groundling, but of a kind Moon had never seen before. Its legs and arms were skinny as sticks, lightly furred, and its torso was narrow and flat, and seemed to be all ribs; its stomach and bowels must be tiny, and he couldn’t tell where it kept its sex organs. The head was squarish, eyes and mouth round, the nose just a slit. It had vines draped around its body, or maybe they were growing on its skin; it seemed to wear them like clothes.

Moon would have been half-inclined to think it was just a big treeling, but it had a bag slung over one shoulder, made of braided grasses, and a couple of sharpened sticks lay beside it on the rocks. Moon also thought a treeling would have noticed them by now. He looked inquiringly at Bramble, who shrugged to show she had no idea either.

It didn’t look at all like the dead groundling, but if it lived here it might know something about the theft. Moon eased forward, and made a clicking noise in his throat.

The groundling glanced absently around, saw him, and froze. Then it shrieked, bounced up, and splashed across the pool to dodge off between the ferns.

“Go get the others,” Moon told Bramble, and lunged after it.

He caught up with it in two bounds, landed on top of the curve of a root as it ran beneath. He could have caught it, but he was afraid if he dropped on it his weight would crush it like a bundle of sticks.

It ran through another stand of trees and he jumped to the ground to follow. Several hunters caught up with Moon just as he reached the end of the copse and slid to a halt. He had found a village.

Big round structures, huts made of woven sticks, hung from the undersides of the tallest roots, connected by elaborate webs of vine rope. There were dozens of them, strung all back through this part of the roots, as far as Moon could see. More of the strange groundlings gathered on the ground below. They sat on grass mats, weaving vines or sorting through piles of vegetation. They stared in blank surprise at Moon and the hunters. Some leapt to their feet or called out, but none made threatening gestures.

Chime dropped down next to Moon, and a moment later Stone walked out of the trees. Stone was still in his groundling form, which was probably a good thing, since they didn’t want to terrify these people.

“These aren’t anything like the dead groundlings we found,” Chime said, studying the strangers. “The ribs were too big.”

Stone eyed the nervous groundlings. “These are Kek. They’re native to this forest, like we are.”

Jade landed beside Moon and folded her wings. Song came up behind them, while Root and Vine perched on the fern tree branches overhead. The hunters gathered around, their spines pricked with curiosity. Jade said, “These people live under the roots?”

Stone said, “They’re good for the tree. They help keep the soil around it healthy. We didn’t have any Kek when the court left. They were dying out in this part of the forest.” He stepped forward, holding out empty hands.

One of the Kek came toward them as the others gathered nervously behind it. It looked old, as far as Moon could tell. Its body was thin even by Kek standards, and it had lots of white stringy things hanging off it in odd places. It was wearing a necklace of small shells, and carried a staff with tattered leaves attached to the end.

Stone added, “They don’t have any reason to take the seed. But they might have seen who did.”

With Jade and Chime, Moon sat down on the spongy carpet of moss that covered the ground and listened to Stone talk to the Kek. The Aeriat and the hunters gathered behind them, perched in the fern trees, and the other Kek, reassured by Stone’s overtures, came out to gather around their leader. Some tiny Kek, the young of the tribe, peered at them from the safety of the hanging huts.

Fortunately Stone could speak a pidgin version of the Kek language, which he had learned when he was a boy, who knew how many turns ago. The old leader, whose name was something that sounded like “Kof,” could speak a pidgin version of Raksuran, but not Altanic or Kedaic or anything else Moon recognized. With gestures and a lot of fumbling for words, Stone drew out their story.

These Kek had left the roots of their original colony tree when their population became too large for comfort, splitting off from the main tribe. When applied to for help, the Raksura there had given them directions to this colony tree, long abandoned, and they had traveled across the ground in search of it, finally reaching it about twenty turns ago.

“They know a lot about us,” Chime said hopefully, “Maybe they took the seed for safe-keeping or something and they’ll give it back when we ask.”

To that optimistic suggestion, Stone replied, “Shut up.” Moon nudged Chime with his shoulder in sympathy. But he didn’t think there was much hope that the Kek had taken the seed. If the Kek knew a lot about colony trees and depended on their roots as a place to live, they would know better than to do anything that might hurt one. He couldn’t see these delicate creatures breaking bins and jars searching for treasure, or knocking inlay out of carvings. They didn’t even wear wooden beads; everything they had was made from plants, with flowers or snail and insect shells for ornaments.

And when Stone asked about strange groundlings coming here recently, Kof shook his staff in assent.

It had been when the warm rain season ended and the cool rain season started with the second growth of the moss-flowers, which Stone identified as being a little more than a turn ago. When he asked if the groundlings had come on foot, Kof had waved vaguely.

“They must have come on foot. They couldn’t get a wagon through here,” Moon put in.

“They might have had a flying boat, like the Islanders,” Jade said. “That would have been more of a clue to where they came from.”

Stone coaxed out more information. Apparently Kof hadn’t seen them himself. The Kek who had approached them to talk had been attacked, and three killed. The village had feared they were being invaded, and all had fled to a safer position on the far side of the tree. But the scouts who had stayed behind had seen the groundlings enter through one of the doorways in the roots.

“How did they open it?” Jade asked, overriding several people trying to ask the same question, including Moon and Chime. Some of the Kek jerked back in alarm.

Stone paused to hiss for quiet. Kof lifted his hands. “Do not know. Door opened.”

“What then?” Stone asked.

After a time, the scouts had seen the strange groundlings leave through the same door. Not long after that the groundlings had left the area, a process which Kof described with vague waving motions. When the Kek had ventured to investigate, they had found the door closed again.

“That doesn’t tell us much more than we already knew,” Jade said, tapping her claws impatiently. “What did the groundlings look like? Did they have skin or fur?”

Stone translated the question, but Kof scratched his chin tendrils thoughtfully, not seeming to understand. Moon shifted to groundling, which caused a stir among the Kek. Apparently it had been a long time since they had seen a Raksura shift. He leaned forward beside Stone, and pushed his sleeve up and held out his arm. “Skin like this, like we have, or something else?” Stone held out his arm too, dull gray next to Moon’s dark bronze.

Kof reached out and touched Stone’s arm, then Moon’s; it was like being gently brushed with sticks. Kof turned and spent a few moments consulting the other Kek, some of whom had presumably seen the groundlings. Then he spoke to Stone again, who translated, “At least some of them had bare skin like our groundling forms. They didn’t see many of them closely, so the others might have been different.” He added to Kof, “But your scouts didn’t kill any? Up in the root passage near the doorway?”

Kof replied with an emphatic negative. The strange groundlings were strong, and had metal weapons, and the Kek knew they couldn’t survive a battle. They had hoped only for the strangers to leave, and once the strangers had, they hoped they never came back.

“Tell him they won’t come back,” Jade said, propping her chin on her hand, disappointed. “They got what they wanted.”

They left the Kek, who were happy to have the colony tree inhabited again, even though Stone had told them it might not be permanent. When they got back to the greeting hall, Stone went up to lie on the floor of the queens’ level and growl at anyone who came near him. Pearl disappeared, probably to barricade herself in a bower with River and her other favorites. Bone went down to report the conversation to Flower and the other mentors, who were trying to find information about the seed in the court’s library.

Moon ended up standing in the teachers’ hall with Jade, Chime, and a dispirited collection of Aeriat and Arbora. “What do we do?” Bell asked, glancing uncertainly at Rill. “We were going to clean out the rest of the bowers on this level, and start working on the gardens, but…”

“The flying boats need repairs before we send them back,” Blossom added, then made an exasperated gesture. “I mean, even if we have to use them again, they still need work.”

“And we still have to eat.” Bead shrugged wearily.

Jade twitched her spines in half-hearted agreement. “Whatever happens, we’ll be staying here for a time. The hunters will search for game, with the warriors to make scouting flights and guard them. The others can keep making the bowers comfortable, and start the repairs to the flying boats.”

Everyone seemed relieved to have a decision made; even if they didn’t know what to do in the long run, at least they knew what to do now.

As the group dispersed, Moon caught Chime’s frustrated expression. He nudged him with an elbow. “Go help Flower and the others.”

Chime hesitated. “You think I should?”

“That’s more important right now.” From the way the others were talking, all the hunters and most of the warriors were going out to hunt. They didn’t need Chime, and the mentors could probably use all the help they could get.

After a moment of indecision, Chime nodded. He seemed relieved to have something to do that he felt confident about. “You’re right. I’ll go help with the books.”

As Chime left, Jade said, “I’ll go down and help them as well. I don’t know as much about the library as a mentor, but the last few turns I haven’t done much more than study.”

Moon realized he had been assuming that he was going on the hunt. “Uh, do you mind if I go hunting?”

She tilted her head, giving him a sideways look. “Would it matter if I did?”

A little stung, Moon said stiffly, “Yes.” Then he hesitated and found himself adding more honestly, “Probably.”

Jade sighed, but it was wry. She said, “Go on.”

Moon went.

The hunt turned out to be almost interesting enough to distract Moon from worrying about their immediate future. With a group of Aeriat, he scouted the suspended forest, finding that grasseaters lived on the platforms of the mountain-trees. After a consultation with Bone, they decided to focus their attention on a herd of jumping grasseaters that looked like the eastern bando-hoppers, except with dull green fur, horns, and much meaner dispositions.

The colony tree’s platforms weren’t connected to those of the surrounding trees, though the Arbora had found the remnants of wooden bridges, long since collapsed. The Aeriat flew the hunters over to a platform near the bando-hopper-like creatures, and the hunters took it from there, finding their way from tree to tree, leaping or swinging down to the lower platforms, crossing branches, or climbing the swathes of greenery to the higher levels.

In a clearing on one of the platforms, perched on a dead hopper, Moon watched the end of the hunt. They still needed to identify the big predators in the area, and the Aeriat would have a lot more scouting to do, but he could believe that this suspended forest was the place the Arbora had been meant to live. The green-tinged sunlight was bright, the place sang with birdsong, the breeze, over the blood and dead hopper, was laced with the scents of a hundred different flowers. As Bone dragged another carcass into the clearing, Moon said, “This is a good place.”

“Well.” Bone straightened up and shook blood out of his head frills. “It would have been.” He sounded resigned.

Moon didn’t think it was time for resignation yet. “We fought off a Fell flight that had crossbreed mentors,” he pointed out.

Bone sighed. “If we had something to fight, I wouldn’t worry.”

When the hunters called a halt, Moon helped transport the carcasses back to the colony. They had enough fresh meat for the whole court for a few days, and the Arbora could dry some to store. The hunters took over the skinning and butchering, and Moon flew to one of the platforms to stand under a small waterfall, rinsing his scales off. He had fond memories of the hot water baths at the old colony, heated by rocks that the mentors spelled to give off warmth. They could have much the same set-up here, once they cleaned out the moss and figured out how to get the water to flow back into the pools throughout the tree. If they were here long enough.

To dry his wings, he flew over to the platform where the flying boats were docked and landed on the Valendera’s deck. A group of Arbora worked on the ship under Niran’s direction and Blossom’s watchful eye, sanding away claw marks, patching holes, and winding new ropes. The news had already spread, and Moon found Niran unexpectedly sympathetic. “It’s similar to the loss of a ship’s sustainer,” he said, leaning on the railing. “The rock that forms flying islands is hard to obtain for those who have no means to reach it. Instead of trying to purchase it, some try to steal it.” He shook his head. “But we know where to get more, and we don’t live in our ships.”

Blossom leaned on the railing beside him, her spines and frills drooping with depression. “I don’t know what we’re going to do. We were all counting on living here.”

“Can’t you find another place to live in this forest?” Niran asked. It was something Moon had been wondering himself. “Are there other deserted colonies?”

Blossom’s expression was bleak. “There must be, but all of them would be claimed by their original courts. Just like this tree still belonged to us, even though we hadn’t been back here in generations. If we take someone else’s colony and territory, even if it’s unused, it leaves us vulnerable to challenges by other courts. We’d have to leave the Reaches completely. That’s a long trip, when we don’t know where we’re going.”

Moon had no answers. There were more than enough Arbora working and he didn’t want to just stand here and watch. He jumped over the side, flew back up to the knothole entrance, and took the winding passage into the greeting hall. Several soldiers were still there on guard, a considerably more glum group than they had been that morning. One looked up, a dark green Arbora with a heavy build, and Moon recognized him. It was Grain, one of the soldiers who had ordered Moon out of the old colony on his first day there.

If Grain remembered the incident, Moon couldn’t tell; he looked just as depressed as Blossom. He told Moon, “They’re all down in the big room below the teachers’ level, reading.”

Moon twitched his tail in acknowledgement and headed for the stairs. “Big room below the teachers’ level” actually took in a lot of territory, but he found them in the room they had been using to sort the unloaded supplies from the ships. It was round, with several passages leading away or up into the bowers, and the domed ceiling was a carving of the sky, with the sun’s rays stretching out to give way to stars, then the half-moon. Light-shells ringed the room, set just below the rim of the carving.

All the mentors and several teachers sat around on the floor, reading from loosely bound books or piles of loose parchment. Jade sat near Flower and Merit and Chime, paging through a thick book.

Moon shifted to groundling, because everybody else was, and Jade was in her Arbora form. He went to sit next to her, and she put an arm around his waist to tug him against her side. He leaned against her, and rubbed his cheek against hers. She said, “Was it a good hunt?”

“It was great,” he said absently, distracted by the book. The paper was a thick, soft parchment, the binding a silvery cord as thin as wire, the covers a soft blue reptile hide. The writing was absolutely incomprehensible. It looked like a solid block of serpentine scrawl, ornamented in places with colored inks. He hoped he was looking at some sort of decorative embellishment, until Jade turned the page and hope sank. He snuck a look at the books and papers that Flower and Chime and the others were examining. No, this was actually the writing.

He could read Altanic and Kedaic well, and pick out words in several other common groundling languages, but this was a complete mystery. He assumed this was written Raksuran, but he couldn’t even tell where one character ended and another began. He had had the vague idea that there might be a book about consorts, something that would give him some idea of how to behave, what was expected of him, or at least a better frame of reference. That was out; there probably was something like that, but it wasn’t going to be written in Altanic.

He hesitated, but asked, “Did you find anything yet?” If they asked him to help, he wasn’t sure what he was going to say. He would have to admit it eventually and ask someone to teach him, but he would rather not do it just yet. He didn’t want to give River and his cronies anymore ammunition to use against him just now, not with the court so unsettled.

“I think we finally found where we need to be looking,” Jade said, her voice dry. “That’s an improvement.”

Chime stirred, rubbing the back of his neck. “We started with the oldest records first, but those all seemed to be from the time Indigo and Cloud led the court away.”

Flower nodded, not looking up from her book. “It looks like the paper they used started to fall apart, and they had to re-copy most of the old volumes. They were in too much of a hurry to bind most of it. So we can’t go by age of the cover to tell the date. We just have to read until something indicates it.”

From what Moon could tell, she had continued to read the entire time she was speaking. Being a mentor was apparently even more complicated than it had seemed at first glance.

Merit turned a page, yawning. “At least we found out that when the court originally left, there was no mention of anything being wrong with the tree.”

“Stone already said that,” Heart pointed out.

Merit shrugged. “I know, but at least if he hadn’t been here to tell us we would have found it out anyway.”

Heart frowned at him. “Could you make less sense? I almost understood that.”

“Argue later, read now,” Flower said, a growl in her voice.

Moon waited until they were all deeply engrossed in the books again, then slipped away.

He stopped at the nurseries to visit the kids, trying to forget the court’s troubles while the Sky Copper royals played mock-fight with some of the young fledgling warriors, and the baby Arbora climbed on him.

Spring came to sit next to Moon, and said, without preamble, “Copper says we can’t stay here.” She was a gawky, half-sized warrior; she and her clutchmate Snow were the oldest warrior fledglings, the only survivors of the old sister-queen Amber’s last clutch.

Moon eyed her over the head of the Arbora toddler who had clamped herself to his chest. It was either Pebble or Speckle, he couldn’t tell them apart yet; even their scent was identical. “Who’s Copper?”

Snow, who was shy, edged up behind Spring and supplied, “He thinks he’s smart, because Flower says he’ll be a mentor when he grows up.”

Moon ruffled Pebble or Speckle’s head frills, trying to think how much to say. The little queen Frost had switched sides at some point in the mock-battle and had pinned Thorn to the floor; she stopped to listen, and so did the rest of the combatants. Bitter, perched on Frost’s back, watched Moon with wide eyes. Three teachers, busy feeding baby Arbora, also looked over this way, worried and curious.

Moon let out his breath, resigned to being the bearer of this news. “We don’t know yet. But we might.”

He was braced to have to explain the theft of the seed, and just hoped he could do it in a way that wouldn’t make them all feel that the tree might be invaded at any moment. But Frost just said, “On the flying boats?”

Moon admitted this would probably be the case. Then Thorn flung the distracted Frost off him, Bitter pounced, and the game resumed.

Snow bounded off to join the other fledglings, but Spring said, “They don’t understand.”

Moon thought Frost, Bitter, and Thorn probably did understand, but compared to what they had been through, moving again just wasn’t a daunting prospect. The others were still unsettled by the Fell attack, and most seemed to be just pretending it hadn’t happened. Spring was old enough to realize all the implications of their situation, and maybe starting to feel the weight of the responsibility she would have soon, as a female warrior from a queen’s clutch. He tried, “We survived the Fell, we’ll survive this.”

It worked better on Spring than it had on Bone. She sat up a little straighter and said, “We will.”

Later Moon went back to the teachers’ hall, but found that in a frenzy of organization, the Arbora had moved everyone into newly-cleaned bowers. He found the one Jade had been moved into, a good-sized room on the far side of the nurseries, with a balcony looking out onto the stairwell and an intricately carved ceiling. Furs and cushions had been arranged on the floor for seating areas, there were warming stones in the hearth basin, and the blankets were piled into the big hanging bed. Moon found his fur blanket on top and took that as a good sign that he was living here too. He slung himself up into the bed for a nap.

Jade woke him sometime later, climbing atop him for sex before he had a chance to ask how things were going with the books. Afterward, she fell asleep, and he lay there stroking the frills along her back, thinking of how much he wanted to live here with her. He would live anywhere with her, but here was his first choice.

He drifted off again, and next time woke to Merit knocking on the bottom of the bed. “Jade? Flower says she found something.”

They gathered in the teachers’ hall, under the branches of the carved glade. Stone had reappeared, aborting the argument about who would go and get him. Vine brought Pearl, River, Drift, and a few other Aeriat back from wherever they had been. Chime, Bone, Knell, and Bell were here, but none of the others had been summoned. Everyone seemed to intend to wait until they had a coherent plan before calling everyone else together to hear it. Though given the speed with which news spread among the Arbora, calling a meeting of the entire court probably wouldn’t be necessary.

While everyone found a place and sat down, Flower settled in the center of the group. She had a roll of paper in her lap, its painted leather case lying nearby. “We found a mentor’s journal that speaks of the seeds. Unfortunately it doesn’t speak of what to do when a colony tree loses its seed. I suspect we may be the first court to ever have this problem, at least as far as our ancestors knew.”

Jade snorted in bitter amusement. “Why does that not surprise me.” Moon had been thinking the same thing.

Pearl spared her a glare, and prompted Flower, “Then what does it say?”

“It says how the seeds are made.” Flower tapped the roll of paper in her lap. “They’re taken from the heart of a mountain-thorn, a very rare plant that grows only in these western Reaches. This tree was seeded from a mountain-thorn about four to five days of warriors’ flight from here, which is occupied by the court of Emerald Twilight. Or it used to be occupied by it, when this was written.”

“They’re still there.” Stone’s expression was at its most opaque. He didn’t seem to find this news as encouraging as everyone else did. “I saw their scouts when I was here two turns ago. They’re the oldest court in this reach, and the largest.”

Jade leaned forward, her expression intent. “So we can ask them for another seed?”

Flower nodded. “I think it’s our best hope. Of course we don’t know if there are any to spare, but we can certainly ask.”

Everyone looked at Pearl. She twitched her tail angrily. “I suppose it’ll have to be a formal embassy.” She said this as if it was a terrible thing to contemplate.

Moon looked at Jade, whose expression was more disgruntled than grim. No one else seemed taken aback by the idea of a formal embassy either. Apparently Pearl just didn’t like other Raksura. At least it’s not just me, he thought.

“We’ll have to go begging to them,” Pearl added, her tail flick turning into a full-out lash. Her warriors sidled away a little, out of immediate hitting range.

Jade told her, “I’ll go. If you go, it will look like begging.”

Pearl eyed her angrily. “You’ve never greeted another queen before, not as an embassy. You never even went to Wind Sun.”

Jade bristled. “I would have, if I’d been given the chance.” She looked away for a moment, clearly gathering her patience. “It’s a good time for me to learn.”

Pearl was obviously torn between not wanting to give Jade an important responsibility, and hating the idea of going herself. She finally said, “Fine, then. You’ll leave tomorrow.”

Moon felt the tension in Jade’s body relax, and he took a breath of relief himself. They had a plan, a chance, or at least a way to get more information, and Pearl wasn’t going to be difficult about it. Or no more difficult than she normally was, anyway.

Then Stone cleared his throat. Pearl regarded him steadily for a moment. “What?”

He said, “Indigo Cloud doesn’t have an alliance with Emerald Twilight.”

Pearl dismissed it. “We’ll offer alliance. They have no reason not to accept.”

Moon managed to keep his expression blank. Emerald Twilight had no reason not to accept because Pearl hadn’t been here to antagonize them, the way she had Wind Sun, the court that had refused to help fight the Fell.

Stone scratched his neck, and added thoughtfully, “We almost went to war with Emerald Twilight, before Indigo Cloud left the Reaches.”

There was a startled murmur from everyone. “War?” Flower repeated, incredulous.

“Are you serious?” Jade demanded.

Pearl lifted her spines. “Was it something you did? Just tell us.”

Stone glared at her. “I was barely ten turns old.” Under Jade and Pearl’s concentrated stares, he admitted, “Indigo stole Cloud from a daughter queen at Emerald Twilight. I forget her name.”

“Stole?” It was Moon’s turn to stare. “What… how… That can happen?”

“We can only hope,” River put in, nastily. Drift snickered.

Moon met River’s gaze in deliberate challenge. “Do you need another beating?”

“Quiet, both of you,” Pearl snapped. She turned back to Stone. “Was Cloud taken?”

“Yes. The daughter queen took him when he was too young, and after a few turns, it wasn’t working out. There was no clutch yet.” Stone shrugged. “At least that’s our side of the story. I have no idea if that’s actually true or not.”

Bone shook his head, affronted. “Is this even in the histories?”

Flower groaned and rubbed her eyes. “I’ve never seen it there. And I’m fairly certain I’d remember.”

This sounded serious. Nobody seemed to think that maybe Emerald Twilight would have forgotten the incident by now. Moon wasn’t even sure what they meant by “stolen.” Kidnapped, carried off? Like the Fell did with the Arbora? He didn’t need anything new to worry about.

Jade tapped her claws on the floor, impatient. “How did it happen?”

Stone said, “This was when Indigo was still a sister queen—when her mother Cerise was still alive—and she was visiting Emerald Twilight. She saw Cloud and just… grabbed him. Half the queens in the Reaches got together to settle it to prevent a war, and by that time Indigo had talked Cloud into accepting her and repudiating his first queen. The other queens talked Emerald Twilight into letting it go.” He spread his hands. “It was a successful match. Indigo succeeded as reigning queen, the court renamed itself after her and Cloud, and they led us to a new colony when this one started to fail. They had eight clutches. But I have no idea how Emerald Twilight sees it.”

Everyone was silent as they digested that. Bell and Knell exchanged an uneasy glance. Bone growled under his breath, sounding disgruntled.

Chime cleared his throat. He said tentatively, “Maybe this would be a good time to revisit the discussion about changing the court’s name?”

Everyone ignored him. Jade asked Stone, “If we had to search for another colony, where would we go?”

Stone’s expression wasn’t encouraging. “If we stay in the Reaches, we’d have to find an unclaimed territory and build one ourselves. That means no solid shelter for the rain seasons, no prepared ground for gardens.” Her voice quiet, Flower said, “I’m afraid to think how many of the wounded and the aged wouldn’t survive that.”

Chime hunched his shoulders, as if shuddering at the thought. “We’ve had too many illnesses in the last twenty turns. I know it was the Fell influence on the old colony, but if we have another outbreak of lung disease…”

Moon could imagine it all too readily. He had seen enough failing groundling camps to know what could happen. A fire, a flood, a bad crop year, a disease that took too many for the group to recover. Small settlements were vulnerable, especially when forced to migrate.

Stone didn’t acknowledge their comments, and just continued, “If we go back outside or into the Fringes… I’d have to scout for a ruin to settle in.”

“And hope you could find one before this tree collapses on us,” Knell said.

Pearl told Jade, “We’ll try Emerald Twilight first. You’ll just have to go anyway and hope that… Just hope.”

Jade nodded, for once in complete accord with Pearl. “I will.”

The talk turned to who would go, and exactly what a formal embassy should consist of. Apparently five warriors was the right number for a formal greeting, and everyone thought that the addition of Stone and Flower would show how serious their errand was. Also, Jade admitted, it might make Emerald Twilight think twice if they were inclined to be difficult and refuse the greeting. It was a much more serious breach of etiquette to ignore a line-grandfather and an elderly Arbora mentor.

“It takes away their choice to refuse,” Pearl explained, still cranky even though she wasn’t going. “Be aware that that alone may make them angry.”

It was a good point, but Moon didn’t think it mattered. If the other court was inclined to be angry, everything they did or didn’t do was just going to make it worse. He was going to say so, when Pearl added, “And you’ll need a consort with you. Moon will have to go along.” Her tone made it clear she didn’t enjoy this prospect at all.

Startled, Moon looked at the others, expecting an argument. Instead, everyone just nodded agreement. Some of it was reluctant agreement, but no one protested. Jade said, “But is he recovered well enough for a long flight?”

Flower said, “He should be. He’s young, and his injuries healed well. And I’ll be there if he has any trouble.”

It wasn’t his injury that Moon was worried about. “Are we sure that’s a good idea?” He wanted to go, to see the mountain-thorn if for no other reason, but the etiquette of the formal visit sounded fraught with complication. There were so many nuances he didn’t understand, even here. He didn’t think he was ready for a big busy court yet. “Stone’s already going.”

Flower explained, “Stone is a line-grandfather. And they’ll expect Jade, as a sister queen, to bring her own consort. A sister queen and a consort are essential for a first-time meeting with a court of Emerald Twilight’s stature.”

With a grim expression, Knell said, “And when they ask what court he’s from, what are you going to say?”

And here was yet another nuance Moon didn’t understand. As far as he knew, he was from this court. “What do you mean?”

Jade answered, “It’s going to be a formal embassy. If we introduce you, we have to give your lineage.”

“Oh.” That was going to be awkward. He didn’t want to have to explain himself or prove that he wasn’t a crazy solitary every time they met someone new. “Can’t we just make one up?”

Jade gave him an exasperated look. “No.”

He thought it was the best solution. “You could say I came from Sky Copper.” The only survivors of the destroyed court were Frost, Thorn, and Bitter, and they could probably be coached to confirm the story if it was ever necessary.

Stone looked intrigued at the suggestion, but Jade said, “Moon, no.”

There was an uneasy silence.

Stone said, “So it’s going to be, ‘This is Moon, we won’t say where he came from so you can assume he’s a feral solitary.’”

Jade gave him a sour look. “How about, ‘and this is Stone, our cranky line-grandfather that we dragged along so he could start fights with everyone.’”

Grimly determined, Pearl told Moon, “You’ll have to tell them the truth. Just don’t embarrass us.”

Moon suppressed an irritated hiss. “I’ve walked into strange camps and settlements all my life. I know how to act.” But even as he said it, he knew he would probably eat those words.

Later, Moon and Jade sat outside on the edge of the knothole, watching the fall of night under the mountain-trees. The light had turned a deep green-gold, gradually fading as the sun set somewhere past the trees. A little flurry of tiny yellow flying things played in the spray of the waterfall. When one strayed close enough, Moon realized they were flying frogs, something he hadn’t seen before. On one of the platforms about a hundred paces below, a group of Arbora still explored the beds of the old gardens, searching for buried roots. A few young warriors flew around under the upper branches, looping and diving in play.

Her voice tight, Jade said, “I hope we can stay here.”

It had to be what everyone was thinking tonight. Stone hadn’t promised them anything, and this place had been more than any of them had expected. Moon leaned against her shoulder and said, “That was good, when you got Pearl to send you to Emerald Twilight instead of going herself.”

Jade’s spines rippled in a shrug. “It’s not as if she wanted to go. She hates talking to other queens.” She added, “I think we’ll take Vine with us. Pearl trusts him, and taking him will make us look more united to the rest of the court.”

Moon thought it was a little late for that. No one in the court with any sense could possibly have missed the tension between the two queens. But he didn’t have any real objection to Vine. “What about Balm? She’s done this before.” Balm had gone to Wind Sun with Vine in an unsuccessful attempt to ask the other court for help.

“I want her to come. We need a female warrior to speak for us when we arrive. Floret’s the only other one who’s spoken to other courts before, and she’s close to Pearl.” Jade stirred uneasily. “But I’ve tried to talk to Balm, and it didn’t go well. It was hard on the boats. There was nowhere private, and she wouldn’t fly off anywhere with me.”

It might be that Balm just didn’t want to talk about what the Fell had done to her, not yet. Moon could understand that at a bone-deep level. “Tell her you need her help. Tell her it’s her duty.”

“It’ll make her feel guilty.”

“She already feels guilty.” It might as well be used for a good purpose.

Jade thought about it a moment more, then nodded. “It can’t hurt to ask. I’ll go find her.”

Jade went inside, and Moon sat there a while longer, watching the light fail. He was about to go in when a green warrior swooped down from above, cupping his wings to land on a narrow ledge just below the lip of the knothole. It was River.

Moon leaned back and propped himself on his arms, deliberately casual. “Here for that beating?” He really hoped so.

Sounding amused, River said, “You should be afraid of this trip, solitary. This will be a big court, with lots of consorts to spare.”

Moon didn’t show his sudden sense of unease. “So.”

River climbed a little closer, gripping the bark with his claws. “Jade’s never been near an adult consort she wasn’t related to. All the ones at the courts near us were taken already, or too young. Why do you think she settled for you?”

Moon shoved forward and shifted in a blur of movement. But River fell backward off the ledge and twisted into a dive through the spray of the waterfall.

Moon stopped, trying to settle his spines. Chasing River was no good. It wasn’t as if he could kill him when he caught him. It would upset the others too much.

The words stung because they were true. By the time Jade had grown to adulthood, Pearl had driven off the consorts who had been born to Amber, her sister queen, sending them to other courts. The other consorts had died of illness, or been killed in fighting off attacks on the colony.

Stone had said Azure had chosen him out of the lot, but Jade hadn’t had a choice. It had been Moon or nobody, and the court had been reluctant to move without a consort for her.

He knew Jade wanted him now, but his position in Indigo Cloud had been far more secure when he was the only available consort in flying distance. He knew queens could take more than one consort, and have warrior and Arbora lovers, but that wouldn’t affect his place in the court. And he had thought that as long as he was with Jade, he could handle it. He hadn’t counted on the members of the court who weren’t happy with an ex-feral solitary as first consort having the opportunity to pressure Jade to replace him.

Moon turned and went back to the passage, taking it through to the greeting hall, snarling under his breath. Now he had yet another reason to be uneasy about this trip.