“You don’t know where you were going,” Moon said, driving the point home. If she would admit it, maybe it would help break whatever hold the Fell had on her.
“I was going to scout!” Balm snarled.
Jade watched Balm carefully. “You said you were going to the blind to speak to Blossom. And I told all the Aeriat to stay on the ground until we left for the attack.”
Balm spread her hands, helpless and frustrated. “I know that, but I wasn’t going far.”
As an explanation, it wasn’t much, and Moon saw the doubt in Jade’s eyes. He said, “It’s not her fault. She doesn’t know they’ve done this to her.”
Pearl turned to Flower, sounding thoughtful. “Is that possible? That she could be under the Fell’s power without knowing it?”
“They do it to groundlings,” Moon said in exasperation. “It doesn’t look like this; it’s much easier to tell. The groundlings do whatever the Fell want, and they don’t know why.”
Jade snapped, “Moon, quiet.”
Moon shut up, unwillingly. At least they seemed willing to believe him.
“It’s possible,” Flower said, her eyes narrowed in speculation. “Balm has no reason to betray us.”
“Of course I don’t!” Balm looked ready to weep.
“Anymore than Branch did,” Flower finished quietly.
Everyone was silent, watching Balm uneasily. Then River said with bitter satisfaction, “I told you it wasn’t Branch.”
The last place Moon wanted to be was on River’s side, but he was right. All the evidence against Branch could also be leveled at Balm. She had the same opportunities to slip away from the colony as Branch had. She had known they were going to the Golden Isles, known about the meeting at the Blue Stone Temple, known that flying boats had come back with them, but not how many. And she had known that Moon and Jade had flown toward the east, but hadn’t known they had gone for the poison until last night.
Flower folded her arms, still speculative. “Balm, will you let me see through your eyes?”
What?
Moon thought, startled, but everyone else seemed to know what she meant. Balm looked around at them all. “Yes, I’ve nothing to hide.”
Flower nodded. “We’ll do it now. Come back to the blind.”
“I’m sorry,” Moon said to Jade, though he knew there was no help for it. It would have been better not to expose what had happened to Balm in front of the whole group—Moon knew that better than anybody—but that hadn’t been possible.
Jade shook her head, took Balm’s wrist and led her away after Flower and Pearl.
Moon followed with the others. The hunters spread out, but the Aeriat still pointedly surrounded him. He couldn’t keep his spines from flaring in response. It was mildly gratifying when they backed off a little, even River and Drift.
Moon found himself walking next to Chime, though he wasn’t sure if Chime had meant for it to happen or if it was just an accident. Moon had to ask, “Flower can see thoughts?”
“No, mentors can’t do that.” Chime frowned at the ground. “But she can see if there’s anything in Balm’s head that isn’t supposed to be there. It’s hard to describe. You look into someone’s eyes, past the surface, and you can see colors, and interpret them.” He added bitterly, “I did it once, before I turned into an Aeriat. It’s not easy, but Flower is very strong.”
They reached the blind, and a hiss from Bone sent most of the hunters scattering back to their watch positions. Niran waited at the entrance, a couple of waterskins slung over his shoulder.
“What happened?” he asked, looking around at all of them.
“It’s a long story,” Chime told him, nervously. “Wait out here for now.”
Niran grimaced in annoyance but turned to go back to the poison clearing.
Jade had already led Balm into the blind. Moon ducked under the branches and followed the others inside. In the main area, Stone still lay on the pallet, apparently deeply unconscious. Strike, his skin now completely mottled by the poison, curled up next to him. Stone must have been awake at some point, because he had moved his hand to rest on the boy’s shoulder.
Balm shifted to groundling and sat down by the hearth, as the others found places out of the way. She told Flower, “I’m ready.”
Then Pearl said, “Moon first.”
Moon hissed at her. Pearl tilted her head, staring at him coldly. He felt a pressure grow in his chest and behind his eyes, the pressure to shift to groundling. He resisted, too angry to give in.
It could have gone on for a while, Pearl refusing to give up and Moon trembling on the edge of shifting until he collapsed from exhaustion. But, sounding mortally exasperated, Jade said, “Moon, just do it. This won’t hurt you, and it’ll prove you aren’t under any Fell influence.”
He had to admit it sounded rational when she put it that way. His voice grating with the effort of resisting Pearl, he said, “Will Flower be able to do both of us?”
“Don’t worry about me,” Flower told him impatiently. “Now come on.”
Moon shifted to groundling just as his legs went weak, and he sat down hard on the bare dirt. Still glaring up at Pearl, he said, “Go ahead.”
The other Aeriat relaxed, and Pearl looked away. She tried to seem unaffected, but her stiff spines betrayed the effort of trying to force him to shift. He was bitterly glad to see it.
Flower knelt in front of him and tugged her smock into a more comfortable arrangement. “Now, just be still.” She put her hands on his face, a light touch. Her skin felt cool and dry. Moon waited, defensive and impatient and wondering why helping these people had ever seemed like a good idea. After a moment, she said, “Moon, stop fighting me.”
“I’m not fighting you,” he said, gritting his teeth.
If I was fighting you, we’d all know it.
Flower gave him a hard stare. “If you keep it up, I won’t have enough strength left to look into Balm.”
Moon hissed in frustration. He wasn’t aware of resisting her and had no idea how to stop. “I don’t know what to do.”
“He’s stalling,” River said. “He’s deliberately—”
Jade snarled at him. “River, shut your mouth or I’ll shut it for you.”
Vine, the biggest male warrior, and a couple of others growled in agreement; apparently River was getting on their nerves, too. River looked at Pearl for help. Pearl just stared him down, and River unwillingly subsided.
Focused on Moon, Flower ignored the others. In a soothing voice, she said, “Just relax. Look into my eyes, think about something else.”
He looked into her eyes, dark brown like most of the Arbora’s, the edges rimmed with green and gold. All Moon could think about was that if she saw anything that wasn’t supposed to be there, the Aeriat would kill him. Or the bleak future he faced, living alone in a tree somewhere, if he survived the battle with the Fell.
Then he blinked, realizing he had lost a moment. Flower was getting to her feet. She ruffled his hair and told the others, “Clear as the day.”
Moon pulled away, twitching uneasily. It would have been less strange if he felt something, if some trace of the intrusion lingered. Fighting the urge to huddle in on himself, he looked up, but the others were all watching Balm. She struggled to keep her expression calm, but she looked strained and anxious.
Flower sat in front of her. Smiling reassuringly, she put her hands on Balm’s face, gently tilting her head back.
At first it didn’t look any different from what Flower had done to Moon. Then Flower’s eyes started to change, to turn silver and opaque, the way they had in the Blue Stone Temple. The others stirred uneasily, and Moon was unwillingly fascinated.
Suddenly Flower jerked back from Balm, sitting back on the dirt with a thump. She gasped, “It’s true.”
Jade hissed, her claws coming out. “The Fell? They’re controlling her?”
Flower nodded. “Their taint is in her mind. And I saw something, on the queens’ level of the colony.” The silver sheen slowly faded from her eyes, making Moon’s skin creep.
“No,” Balm protested, horrified. “I’d know. Wouldn’t I know?”
“This is strong, stronger than I’ve seen before.” Flower bared her teeth. “I couldn’t find the thing that was causing us harm, because it wasn’t here. It was somewhere else.”
Jade dropped down beside her, saying urgently, “Flower, what do you mean? What did you see on the queens’ level?”
“It’s a Fell—I’m not sure what kind. Like a ruler, but not.” She made an impatient gesture. “All I have is a hint of color from its mind. I’ll have to see it in the flesh before I can say. But it’s been watching us for turns. I saw the colony through it.”
“This was the thing causing sickness in the colony?” Pearl demanded. “How?”
Flower looked up, her face flushed. “This Fell flight has been watching us through this creature.”
“That’s not possible,” River said, sounding offended by the possibility. He looked around at the others. “It can’t be... We’ve never heard of that before.”
“Just because we’ve never heard of it before doesn’t make it impossible,” Chime said. He wrapped his arms around himself, looking deeply worried. “And we’ve known—everyone knows—the rulers can share their memories. They can see through the dakti, maybe the kethel too.”
And speak through the dakti,
Moon thought, remembering what he and Stone had seen at Sky Copper. Thinking of that, it suddenly seemed a lot less unlikely.
“But there was no Fell in the colony for a ruler to share memories with,” Bone said, his voice thoughtful rather than protesting. “You mean this thing just thought about the colony and saw us, heard us?”
“Not very well,” Flower admitted, “Or the Fell wouldn’t have needed to get inside Balm’s mind.” She winced. “It must have been like a mentor’s vision, just enough to give them the general idea of what we were doing.”
Jade shook her head, appalled. “And it made us sick, made clutches die.”
Flower let her breath out in an angry hiss. “The concentrated attention of a flight of Fell was directed on us. The Fell ruin everything they touch; that’s not just willful destruction. Their magic carries a taint, even if they don’t intend it. After turns of focusing on us, the taint... affected us.”
Unexpectedly, Pearl said, “It makes sense.” She didn’t even look surprised. “If there had been anything physical inside the colony, something the Fell had managed to put there, we would have found it by now.” She shook her head, the tips of her fangs showing. “We looked hard enough.”
Jade nodded reluctant agreement. She asked Flower, “Is this the creature that has a queen’s power over the court, that kept them from shifting to fight or escape?”
“It could be.” Flower turned to her. “If it can watch us from a distance, it could have other powers.” She shook her head, frustrated. “I have to find out what manner of creature this is, where it came from. If it’s a new kind of Fell.”
“That we can find out later.” Jade’s gaze turned cold. “For now, we know we have to kill this thing.”
Pearl said deliberately, “After we put the poison in the water and it’s had time to work, the Aeriat can fly to the top of the colony. If this creature is on the queens’ level, we can find it and kill it.”
Bone sounded dubious. “That’s if you can keep your wings long enough to reach the top of the colony.”
Jade shook her frills impatiently. “It’s our best chance. And if killing this thing means we can shift inside the colony again—”
“Then we’ll have that advantage,” Pearl said, her expression grim. “If not, so be it.”
Balm had listened to them all, stunned and sick. “Why did they choose me? Was it something I did?”
“Maybe it wasn’t only you,” Vine muttered uneasily. He was the one who had been sent to Wind Sun with Balm. The fact that he had spent that time alone with her, with no idea she was affected this way, must have been shocking to him. “They could have caught any warrior who ever left the colony alone. Flower will have to look into all of us.”
No one looked happy about that prospect. But Chime said, “Balm’s the only one who’s tried to leave since we found out about the poison. If there was anyone else, they could have easily gotten away in the confusion when Moon was stopping her.” He looked at Balm, wincing in sympathy. “And if the Fell were watching us, knew things about us, they may have picked her because they saw she was close to Jade.”
“I’ll still have to check all the warriors,” Flower said, sounding grim at the prospect. “But if the Fell did this to more than one or two, it might have come to light in a mentor’s augury. They may not have wanted to risk it.”
“But can you make it stop?” Balm asked Flower desperately. “Make the Fell let go of me?”
Flower shook her head reluctantly, and spread her hands. “I’ve never had to do that before.”
Balm turned to Moon. “Did the groundlings have a way to make this stop? To get the Fell taint out of their minds?”
“I don’t—” Fell usually killed the groundlings they took this way when they were of no further use. He had no idea what might happen to survivors—if any. But he didn’t want Balm, or the others, to get the idea that death was her only option. The only thing he could think of was to buy time until they could talk to someone who might know, like Stone or Delin. “I think it went away when the Fell who did it died.” Maybe that was even true.
Jade knelt in front of Balm, taking her hands. “In that case,” she said, her voice hard and fierce, “we’ll just have to kill every Fell we find, to make certain we get the right one.”
The others finished forming the plan, such as it was, and there was nothing to do but wait until sunset. Moon’s nerves still itched and he needed to be alone for a time. He slipped out of the blind, looking for some tree roots to hide under.
He heard someone come out after him, and Jade’s voice said, “Moon, wait.”
He kept moving until she added, annoyed, “Moon, don’t make me catch you.”
He stopped, feeling tension in a tight band across his shoulders. “I’m not leaving. I’ll be with you when you attack the Fell.”
Jade halted just behind him. “If you hadn’t caught Balm... There was no way she could reach the colony without us realizing what she’d done. The Fell would have known there was no use sending her back. They would have kept her.”
“I know.” Balm would have told them about the poison, and the Fell would have done to her whatever they were doing to the rest of the court. He thought of his only full day at the colony, when Balm had directed them toward the plain with the statues as a good place to hunt, and how they had caught a scent of Fell. He wondered now if she had gone there alone at some point in the past, for privacy or to explore, if that was where the Fell had caught her.