Still holding on to each other, they bounced off various hard surfaces and then tumbled to a stop, crammed into a corner. Moon shook the water out of his frills and tried to disentangle himself from Chime and Lithe. They had fallen into the bottom of the hall and the water was pouring in, streaming across the floor toward them. The illusion of water was gone and rapidly being replaced by the real thing. Moon managed to stagger upright, then something grabbed his arm from behind.
He whipped around in alarm, but it was Malachite. She shoved him toward the base of the walkway and reached to drag Chime to his feet, then Lithe.
Moon staggered through the rising water toward the nearest support for the walkway, looking up, trying to see where the creature was. There was a dark blot at the top of the hall that had to be it; it had retreated away from the water, but he doubted it would give up that easily.
Malachite landed behind him, with Chime in one hand and Lithe in the other, both still dazed. Moon took Chime, pulling him against his side. Chime revived enough to loop his arms around Moon’s neck, Malachite slung Lithe over her shoulder, and they both started to climb.
They reached the walkway. Moon saw Jade and Shade waiting at the start of the ramp, both unharmed, and felt dizzy with relief. “I told you to go on,” Malachite said, her voice a growl.
Jade just bared her teeth at her. Shade said, “I wouldn’t go without—”
High in the roof, something made a noise like a high-pitched shriek, like tearing metal. Moon looked back to see the rent in the window running into the roof below and growing rapidly larger. He yelled, “Run!”
Jade snatched up Shade and they bounded up the ramp. When they reached the outer door, Lithe had recovered enough to be set on her feet, though she was still wavering a little. Chime could stand on his own but kept squinting and holding his head. They all watched anxiously as Jade boosted Shade up. He touched the flower blocking the doorway.
Moon held his breath, but it opened just like they thought it would.
They climbed and swung up through the opening, into the big chamber. It was a relief to see the huts still there, to see the invisible barrier still held the water back. Malachite and Jade went last, and both stood beside the flower until it closed. Moon hissed out a relieved breath. Jade nodded agreement. She said, “Let’s hurry. That thing will be desperate and the further we get away the better.”
Malachite started toward the first hut. “Get in, Lithe. You too, Shade.”
Lithe stepped into the hut, shifted to her groundling form, and sat down heavily on the floor. Shade followed and sank down next to her.
Jade said, “You go with them. I’ll take Moon and Chime in the other—”
Moon heard a faint sound behind him and spun around. The flower was rotating open. He fell back a step as the creature’s dark form flowed up out of it. One clawed limb was holding a rusted metal bar—the tool the groundlings had made to open the flower.
Chime whimpered in dismay. “I dropped it, when it knocked you off the ledge, I shifted for an instant and I dropped—”
Moon figured they could sort that out later. He grabbed Chime by the spines and shoved him into the hut, then slammed the door shut and twisted the handle. He shouted, “Pull the lever!”
Malachite and Jade braced themselves, spines flared, ready to battle to the death. The creature flowed toward them.
Then the creature froze, and the lump on top of its body that seemed to be its eyes swiveled upward. Moon looked up and saw the barrier trembling like a pool that a rock had been dropped into. He thought,
Oh, clever. One last defense.
Their ancestors might have meant to punish the thing by imprisoning it forever, but they had left a trap if it ever got this close to escape.
The transparent barrier shivered and started to give way, releasing first a shower of water like a light rain. It struck the creature like acid, like burning molted metal. It flung its limbs wide in a silent scream and its body started to dissolve. Pieces of the dismembered Fell tumbled out and scattered across the floor. Then its flesh ran in gray-black streams and it melted away.
Moon realized later the green blur was Malachite shoving him down, flinging Jade on top of him, then throwing herself on both of them. The shock as the full weight of the water crashed down still knocked him out.
He opened his eyes, saltwater burning in his throat and lungs, choking him. For a moment all he knew was that something was holding on to him, then his blurry vision cleared enough to show him that it was Jade. She had him clutched to her chest with one arm, the other holding onto to Malachite’s tail.
Malachite was half-climbing, half-swimming up the chain and vine attached to the hut. Moon looked down and saw the round metal roof moving upward.
Chime must have finally thrown the damn lever,
he thought, numb. Jade was kicking her feet to help Malachite along, and Moon forced his limp legs to move.
Moon blacked out again before they reached the surface. He came to when someone dropped him on a hard stone surface and then punched him in the stomach. Moon’s lungs tried to turn themselves inside out as he coughed up water; someone flipped him over and he went to his hands and knees, choking out the last of it. The first real breath was sweet.
He shook his head and saw Jade crouched next to him, being messily sick. Moon’s body felt like his blood had turned to lead, but he reached over and squeezed her wrist. He was exhausted and wanted to shift to groundling more than anything, but he knew the longer he could hold on in this form, the faster his abraded lungs would heal.
He looked up and saw Malachite standing over them. They were on the platform in the cave, where the huts were stored. She was watching the water with concentrated intensity. Then the surface churned and the hut lifted out, its chain clanging in the support beam.
The door swung open as soon as it was clear of the water and Chime stared anxiously at them. “They’re alive,” he shouted.
They were. Moon decided he had time to pass out again while the others were sorting out the situation, and did.
Chapter Twenty-One
M
alachite had to send Chime up to the entrance of the cave to bring Floret, so she could help them get out. In the end, Chime carried Moon, Floret carried Lithe, and Malachite carried Shade. Jade managed to fly on her own, out of pure stubbornness.
As they crossed back to the mainland, Moon still felt woozy and sick. He spotted the sac, resting in the waves some distance along the beach. The smoke had decreased to a thin stream and only a few dakti circled above it. The flight would have felt the deaths of its progenitor and what was probably most of its rulers. The young progenitor might have a chance to rebuild, or the remaining kethel might just kill her in a frenzy of grief and confusion. Either way, the flight was in no shape to make the long journey south to tackle Opal Night.
And we’re in no shape to tackle it,
Moon thought. He hoped the Fell decided to cut their losses and leave.
It took them some time to find the flying boat, even though Malachite knew in what direction it had been traveling. The sky was darkening toward evening when they located it; the strong wind off the sea had pushed the little craft swiftly inland. As they banked down toward it, Moon saw Stone on the deck, watching their approach. Two daughter queens of Onyx’s bloodline were on look-out, one perched on the small basket atop the mast, and the other on the steering cabin roof.
Chime followed Malachite and Jade down to land near the cabin, where Saffron gripped the control pillar with a determined expression. She sagged against it a little, profound relief crossing her normally hard expression. Stone just looked them over briskly, checking for wounds. “Are the Fell following you?” he said. “This damn boat stinks so bad, I can’t tell if their scent’s on the wind.”
Chime carefully set Moon on his feet. Keeping one hand on Chime’s shoulder to steady himself, Moon shifted to groundling. He didn’t immediately collapse, so he took that as a good sign. He said, “Don’t think so,” and his voice came out in a rough, barely audible wheeze.
Jade rubbed her eyes, her spines drooping from exhaustion. “I haven’t caught any Fell scent since we left the coast.” Her voice was better than Moon’s but not by much.
Stone frowned. “You need to get below.”
Moon couldn’t agree more. Malachite was already carrying Shade down to the hold, Lithe at her heels. With a worried frown, Jade glanced at Floret, who had shifted to groundling and stretched full-length out on the deck. “Floret, are you all right?”
Floret assured her, “I’m fine. I just don’t want to go down to the hold right now. We spent enough time there.”
Stone said, “I’ll keep an eye on her.”
As they limped after Malachite, Jade asked quietly, “Was it very bad?”
Chime said, “It was terrible.”
Moon said, “It could have been worse.”
Celadon met them at the bottom of the stairs. “Everyone’s all right?” she asked, her worried gaze going from Shade in Malachite’s arms to Moon, who leaned heavily against the wall to steady himself on the way down.
“Except for almost drowning,” Lithe told her, as she started across the cabin to where the wounded lay. She crouched down to touch Ivory’s forehead, looking anxiously over the others. “I need to make a simple for their lungs. And Shade’s been starved. Chime, could you—”
“I’ll start heating water.” Chime headed for the metal stove.
Malachite set Shade down and helped him sit. He still looked far too pale, the bruises under his eyes deep-set and his cheeks sunken. Moon sank down next to him and wheezed, “There’s food in that basket. Fruit and bread.”
Celadon hurried to get it. Jade started to pick up a blanket, then sniffed it and dropped it in disgust. Everything aboard the boat still stank from the combination of Fell and smoke, though the hold didn’t smell nearly as bad as it had before, with the mountain wind moving through the vents.
His voice a weak rasp, Shade said to Malachite, “I found out something I need to tell you. Forty turns ago the guide, that thing, told some Fell to go after the Opal Night colony in the east first.”
Malachite went still, staring at him.
Shade continued, “The progenitor told me. They weren’t related to that flight so they didn’t know much about what happened, only what the creature told them, though she tried to pretend like she did.” He turned to Moon. “You were right. They always lie the same way, and after a while you can tell.”
Celadon sat down, opening the basket of provisions, listening in increasing confusion. Her voice still rough, Jade said, “But why Opal Night?”
“Because it thought Opal Night had more in common with the forerunners, because of where the colony was outside the Reaches, that it was the oldest and closest one to the city where the creature was trapped.” Shade shivered, and wrapped his arms around himself. “The progenitor said the guide could sense a lot about Raksura, but we didn’t even know it existed. She seemed to think that was just because the Fell are superior.” He added, with irony, “I guess she didn’t think that at the end.”
Malachite took the provision basket from Celadon. “We’ll talk of it later. Eat.” Her voice was wheezy too, a reminder that she wasn’t invulnerable.
With thinly disguised impatience, Celadon said, “Can somebody tell me what happened?”
Moon started to speak, but the first breath turned into a coughing fit. Digging packets out of her satchel, Lithe said, “Chime and I will tell it. The rest of you be quiet and rest.”
It sounded like a good idea to Moon.
* * *
The simple Lithe made was one normally used for lung ailments, and it made Moon’s sore lungs and abraded throat feel better immediately. It also made the rest of the evening and night pass in a somewhat surreal sleepy haze.
He woke a few times to see Shade sleeping in a huddle under Malachite’s protective wing, and once to find himself curled up against Stone’s side. He remembered a vague conversation where Chime told him that they were going to owe Delin even more repairs, since while taking turns steering the boat, the two young daughter queens had scraped it against the rocks three times. Moon thought Delin was going to be more worried about the hole in the hull. But there was no sign of the Fell. The night was a dark one, with the half moon and the stars obscured by clouds, and the wind drove the boat hard.
Moon woke at dawn next to Shade, with Lithe, Saffron, and Floret sleeping nearby. He got to his feet, carefully picked his way around them, and went up to the deck.
The wind was like cool silk, scented with nothing but the sweetness of trees and the clean dust of the mountains falling away behind them. The sky was still cloudy but the morning sun broke through in spots, warming the wood of the deck under his feet. They were flying above foothills, sparsely forested with big fern trees and vividly pink thorn bushes. Moon thought he heard the distant high-pitched roar of a mountain skyling, but it was lost in the wind and might have been nothing.
Jade perched on the railing, looking down at the ground passing below, and Stone was up in the bow. Chime was in the steering cabin, yawning and leaning on the control pillar. Malachite sat in the center of the deck, facing back toward the way they had come, her eyes on the sky. She wore her Arbora form, though she didn’t look much less formidable. On the softer Arbora scales, it was easier to see her scars.
Moon went to sit near Malachite. She acknowledged his presence with a flick of a spine and tilted her head to regard him.
He started to speak, had to clear his throat, and said, “I’m sorry I said those things to you, back at the court.”
Malachite acknowledged the apology with a nod. “You’re angry at what happened. You’ll be angry for a long time. So will I. All we can do is try not to let it rule us. Or hide it better, when it does.”
Moon thought she was probably right. He looked into the wind, squinting against the dawn light. “I want to be with Jade.”
It was encouraging that Malachite’s reaction was a resigned snort. Her voice dry, she said, “I gathered that.”