Storms (Sharani Series Book 2) (30 page)

Lhaurel stepped forward and the aevian bent down and nuzzled her hand with its beak. This one was certainly friendlier than Fahkiri had been.

“What’s his name?”

“Her,” Khari corrected. “And she doesn’t have a name. She never bonded with any of the Roterralar until now. There’s a lot of that going around right now. I hate rushing bondings and the like, but there’s nothing to it. We lost a lot of aevians in the Oasis and others, well, others haven’t returned to the eyrie. Thankfully, there are a lot of aevians left who lost their riders in the Oasis.”

“Thankfully?” Lhaurel gave Khari an incredulous look.

Khari held up a hand. “Peace, Lhaurel. I meant they’re willing to carry other riders without bonding them.”

“Will you two quit nattering so we can get a move on?” Cobb’s gruff voice drew their attention. The older man sat astride a large, whitish aevian, looking comical in the harness. A pair of short swords were strapped to his back, though he looked uncomfortable astride the aevian.

“I would tell you to watch your tongue, Cobb,” Khari said, voice flat. “But I know you’d just ignore me. Remember though, I can still kick you out.”

Cobb didn’t reply, but his eyes seemed to challenge her. Lhaurel wondered what had made him so sands-blasted irritable lately. Regardless, Lhaurel needed to hurry. She hurried over to one of the many bins scattered around the room and pulled harness and saddle free. She saddled her aevian—only feeling a small twinge of guilt at thinking about the creature as
her
aevian—and then threw on the harness over her robes. Khari was off somewhere, checking saddles and harnesses, and giving instructions.

As Lhaurel was tightening the last strap on her harness, she realized she was unarmed. She hadn’t worn a sword since the Oasis. In all honesty, she hadn’t even wanted to consider using a sword again. She’d invested so much time into training with it that it had, in large part, defined her. In Lhaurel’s mind her current state had begun and ended with the sword she’d picked up in the Sidena Warren all those months ago. But if the Orinai had really come? The words of the scrolls she’d been reading returned to her mind, reminding her of the powers they possessed and the hints of their nature.

“Lhaurel!” Khari’s voice cut into Lhaurel’s reverie, snapping her from her thoughts. She blinked and looked over at Khari, who was holding a long, red-glass dagger out to her.

“What’s this?” Lhaurel asked, taking it.

“If you’d been paying attention you would have heard. Are you sure you’re fit enough to come on this trip?” Khari asked, hard words softened by the concerned expression on her face. “There’s been a lot going on. No one would blame you if you stayed behind to collect yourself and recover.”

Lhaurel snorted. She looked down at the dagger and grinned slightly as recognition hit her. A glass dagger couldn’t be manipulated by a magnetelorium or any of its later Iterations, at least according to the scrolls she’d read.

“It works,” Lhaurel said with a nod, sliding the weapon under a strap on her harness. “Are you all waiting on me, then?”

“Yes,” Cobb said. “So let’s go.”

Lhaurel nodded and climbed up onto her aevian’s back and clipped into the saddle. She felt a momentary wash of surreal memory, but that passed as Khari leapt up onto Gwyanth’s back.

“Let’s go,” Khari shouted. “For those of you riding aevians for the first time, hold the saddle tightly and prepare yourselves when we descend as it will be brutal. Normally we’d train you better, but we don’t have the time.”

With that she whistled sharply, and all eight aevians leapt into the air and climbed into the sky with the sound of beating wings and blowing sand. Unlike Fahkiri, his sister didn’t follow Khari and Gwyanth up high into the sky. Instead she hugged the ground, flying with quick, short bursts of rapid wingbeats curving back and forth instead of in a straight line. Lhaurel followed Khari’s path only several hundred feet below the aevian’s mother, using a small portion of her powers to lend her additional strength.

Lhaurel breathed in deeply, letting the sheer joy of flight fall over her and take with it most of her stress and worries. She’d half worried that flying would have lost its wonder and majesty for her, but she’d been pleasantly surprised. It was different, that was unavoidable, but the joy of it was still there. It was like the enjoyment of a small child with a new bauble. They didn’t enjoy playing with their older toys any less, they just enjoyed them differently.

When she'd first mounted the aevian, her weakened state had almost overwhelmed her. She’d been forced to draw upon her powers to give her strength. Still, she was grateful she was clipped in and, outside of landing or taking off, she could relax somewhat.

They flew northeast for several long hours, stopping once to rest at a hidden well that more than a few of their number grumbled at discovering. Khari lifted the lid, ignoring the grumbles for the most part. She doled out water to each of them and their aevians in turn before returning the bucket and then placing the lid back over the well and covering it with sand.

Cobb had refused his share without comment, though from the expression on his face and the pale tinge on his whiskered face, Lhaurel guessed that flight didn’t agree with him.

They were back in the air again within only a few short minutes of landing. Lhaurel was the first to spot Farah and her aevian. They sat in the lee of a large broken pillar that looked like it had once been part of a stoneway bridge. Another aevian was there as well. Lhaurel assumed it was Nabil. Lhaurel whistled sharply and leaned forward, signaling her aevian to descend and letting Khari know as well, provided she heard the whistle, that is.

Since they were already flying low, the dive was shallow and without the customary lurch of Lhaurel’s stomach that she’d been expecting. Still, in just a few seconds Lhaurel was unclipping from the saddle and hitting the ground. Her knees threatened to give out on her, but she reached out to her powers instinctively, using her own blood as fuel for a brief instant. It gave her the strength she needed to stay on her feet, but left her feeling tired when she released it. In that moment, however, Lhaurel had felt Farah’s deep exhaustion and the matching exhaustion from the two aevians. Nabil’s was laced with pain as well.

Farah looked over at her when Lhaurel landed on the ground.

“They’re gone,” Farah said, worry and anger making her voice quaver. “There’s blood on the ground over here.”

Lhaurel strode forward to look as Khari and the others landed a short distance away. There were more than a few screams that drifted over to them, but Lhaurel ignored them.

“Someone said the two strangers were wounded. Is it their blood?” Lhaurel asked as she approached the shallow depression in the sand.

Farah shook her head. Nabil hissed as more people approached, but hopped back out of the way. He seemed to be favoring one of his legs.

“The two Orinai were over here,” Farah said, gesturing down a little ways. “You can see where they bled there. This is different. It’s fresher. I think someone took Gavin.”

Nabil hissed again and let out a piercing screech. Khari came over and looked over the scene. Lhaurel moved to one side and glanced sidelong at Nabil, pointedly ignoring the bloodstains in the sand. Was that a chain manacle around Nabil’s leg?

Lhaurel approached the massive aevian slowly, hands raised. “Easy boy,” she said softly as a few of the others pushed forward. “Let me take a look at that leg.”

Nabil hissed, but it was a muted sound. Lhaurel ducked down and took a closer look at the manacle. It was fresh and new, though there didn’t appear to be any lock on it. How would someone have been able to get it to stay on Nabil’s taloned foot then, unless they’d somehow fused the metal . . .

“Kaiden,” Lhaurel hissed with a sudden vehemence.

Nabil hissed above her.

“It was Kaiden,” Lhaurel called over her shoulder. She made her way closer to Nabil’s knobby, scaled leg. She was careful to avoid the clicking talons. Khari moved up behind her as Lhaurel reached out to touch the manacle. It had dug into the skin and there was blood, both fresh and drying, in the metal and down Nabil’s leg. A bit of chain dangled from a metal loop attached to the manacle.

“Farah, take a third of the group and go southwest,” Khari ordered. “Cobb, take another group and go north until you hit the brine sea and then follow the beach. Stay alert. Kaiden is nearby somewhere.”

The others moved into action. Lhaurel put her hand on Nabil’s leg and whispered soothing words as she tested the manacle’s hold on Nabil’s leg. It was stuck fast and she was still weak, but if she were able to pull it with both hands it may break free. The issue was going to be working her fingers between the manacle and Nabil’s leg.

“Keep him still,” Lhaurel said to Khari, drawing once more on her powers and then setting to work.

A few minutes later, Nabil was manacle free, though both Lhaurel and Khari had been knocked to the ground more than once. Thankfully, neither had been speared by the large aevian’s massive talons. Lhaurel had bound a few strips of cloth torn from the bottom of her robes to the wound. She’d thought about healing him, but decided to wait. Kaiden was somewhere close. Healing drained her too much to be of much use to anyone afterward. She couldn’t take that risk.

“He’ll be fine now,” Khari said, getting to her feet. “I’m going to take the others and do a circular pass around here and see if we can spot anything.”

Lhaurel got to her feet.

Khari held up a hand. “Stay here.”

“Why should I?”

“I assume if Gavin manages to escape he’ll head here,” Khari said. “This is the last place Farah saw him and where he told her to come back to. I’d leave someone else, but you’re the only one who is powerful enough to face Kaiden alone.”

It made sense, but Lhaurel grimaced anyway and chewed on her bottom lip. She didn’t
want
to remain still, not with Kaiden around. He was evil. He’d killed so many already. He was like a buzzing insect she couldn’t see, always present but unable to be silenced.

“Fine,” Lhaurel said. “Just be careful, alright?”

Khari grinned. “I’m always careful. Maneuver before battle, Lhaurel. Strategy before tactics.”

The short woman leapt up onto Gwyanth’s back and signaled for the others to make ready. Most were already in the saddle, some having never gotten down. Lhaurel recognized the man she’d broken among them. He looked uncomfortable in the saddle, but every now and then he patted his aevian’s back in a reassuring fashion.

“Let’s go,” Khari shouted.

The small group of aevians lifted into the air in a cloud of dust.

Lhaurel watched them go, then turned back around toward the shade in the stoneway pillar’s shadow. Nabil and the aevian Lhaurel had ridden here hopped after her, taking refuge in the lee of the pillar as the wind tossed sand into the air.

The aevians appeared on the northern horizon as the sun was just beginning to touch the top of the Forbiddence to the west. She’d spent several hours waiting for them, jumping at every small sound.

Lhaurel rose to her feet and the two aevians with her rose as well, shaking their feathers and creating a little cloud of dust. Lhaurel had toyed with coming up with a name for Fahkiri’s half-sister, but none of the names seemed to fit. It wasn’t like Fahkiri. That name had simply come to her when she’d needed it.

Nabil shrieked and stretched out his wings, impatience evidence in his constant fidgeting.

“Easy boy,” Lhaurel said, reaching out and patting him on the side. “They’ll be here soon enough.” At least, she hoped they would be.

A few more anxious minutes passed before Lhaurel could make out that some of the aevians were doubled up. One of the riders had something slung behind them on the saddle, presumably tied in place.

“Please don’t let it be Gavin,” Lhaurel found herself saying. She chewed on her bottom lip, hands clenching and unclenching at her sides. How had they gotten so far away in such a short time? The aevians had been gone for over an hour. That was half a day’s walk through the sands. It had been well over a day since Gavin and Farah had left, but surely it had only been earlier today that they’d found the Orinai and Farah had left to come get them. Unless, that is, Farah had flown through the night. Perhaps Gavin had been far from here when she’d lost him.

The aevians and their riders came closer, close enough that Lhaurel could make out the features of the individual riders and recognize some of the aevians. Khari’s group. So they hadn’t been that far away. Khari’s patrols had taken the area around the stoneway pillar. Near her, Nabil hissed and leapt into the air, nearly knocking Lhaurel to the ground in his haste to get into the sky. A few powerful beats of his wings took him into the sky and toward the group of aevians. One of the riders who was riding double waved and whooped and Nabil gave an answering cry.