Winged Magic

5

A pale glow softly tinted the eastern horizon by the time the clansmen discovered the Shar-Ja’s entourage had already left. A heavy guard still patrolled the southern bank, but only a small camp remained where the day before the entire meadow was filled with the rounded Turic tents. Most of the wagons were gone, too, including the Shar-Ja’s elaborate, covered vehicle.

Sayyed shrugged when he heard the news. “They can’t have gone far in this weather. We’ll find them.”

The clan camp quickly disappeared as well, the traveling tents and supplies loaded in wagons or on pack animals. The snow still fell in fitful showers through air damp and cold, but it was the last gasp of a storm already dying. That morning the sky looked dove gray instead of the steely blue of the day before, and the wind had left to blow its mischief elsewhere.

As soon as it was light enough to distinguish detail and color, Sayyed brought his prayer rug out of his pack and laid it carefully on the bare patch of ground left by Gabria’s tent. He knelt in the time-honored tradition of the Turic to pay homage to his god at sunrise. Twice a day he prayed, bowing to the south where his fathers believed the sacred city of Sargun Shahr was located. Although he had lived with the clans for twenty-six years and participated in some of their festivals, Sayyed still practiced the religious beliefs of the Turics and still carried the love of his god deep in his heart. He was grateful the clanspeople were not fanatical about their religion and had not tried to convert him. In respect to clan ways, he had allowed Rafnir to be raised in the traditions of Amara, Lord Sorh, Surgart, and Krath, telling his son only the meanings behind the different beliefs.

That morning, though, as he knelt in the cold light, he slanted a glance over his shoulder and saw Rafnir watching him. “Get a rug,” he ordered. “You don’t have to believe, but if you’re going to be a Turic for a while, you need to pretend.”

Rafnir gladly obliged. He spread out a horse blanket, knelt beside his father, and bowed his head. Wordless and attentive, he listened to the lines of his father’s prayers. The words were ones he had heard as far back as he could remember. They were songs really, songs of praise and gratitude and hope for a new day, and they rolled off Sayyed’s tongue with salutary humbleness and joy. There was comfort to be found in the phrases, and Rafnir found himself repeating them after his father. The deities addressed may have been different, but the heartfelt sentiments of each man’s prayers were the same.

By the time they were finished, the chiefs had gathered their men to leave. Sayyed and Rafnir rolled their rugs, loaded their bags behind their saddles, and threw clan cloaks over their Turic garb. They joined the mounted warriors and rode with them toward the rising sun. On Council Rock, the huge tent sat empty and abandoned, its task unfulfilled. Across the Altai, the Turic rearguard watched the clans ride away.

The chiefs were forced to set a slow pace for the morning because of the drifted snow and the snow-encrusted ice beneath the horses’ hooves. The warriors rode carefully, paralleling the Altai River toward the ruins of Ferganan Treld. If all went well, they would reach the sand hills south of Shadedron Treld in time to cut off the Turic raiders’ retreat over the border river.

Sayyed and Rafnir rode with the clans for nearly an hour until they reached the next passable ford on the swollen river. On a small knoll overlooking the Altai, they stopped with Lords Athlone, Wendern, and Bendinor.

Sayyed pulled off his cloak. He felt a genuine sadness when he passed it over to Athlone, a tug of regret he had not expected. True, he was secretly excited about returning to the Turic lands, but he had lived with the clans longer than the tribes, and he realized the Ramtharin Plains were now and forever his home. He grinned at Athlone, lively mischief suddenly glinting in his eyes, and he saluted his lord as a clansman. “Until we ride together again, Athlone.” He waved, then urged Afer into a canter down the slope to the river. His voice, lifted in the wild, high-pitched ululation of the Turics, sounded eerily on the still morning air.

Rafnir tossed his cloak to Bendinor, sketched a salute to Athlone, and turned Tibor after Afer. The lords watched as the two black horses plowed across the river and emerged dripping on the other side. In a moment the two were gone, lost to sight beyond a belt of trees.

For a while Athlone sat rigid on his stallion, his gaze lost on the southern horizon. It took all of his strength to sit still and not send Eurus galloping after Afer and Tibor. Fear for Gabria clung to the Khulin Lord like a wet cloak, and he wanted to challenge it directly, not delegate such vital responsibility to someone else. But Athlone was shrewd enough to accept the truth: he would be more effective north of the border in his own territory.

Silently he breathed a prayer, to Amara rather than Surgart, that the gods keep watch over his wife, his daughter, and the two men who risked so much to find them. At last he nodded to his companions and turned Eurus east, his thoughts already ranging ahead to Shadedron Treld and the hunt for the killers of his people.