On Wings of Fire: Chapter 9, Part 2

“What do you think? Discreet enough?”

Fyn took one look and burst out laughing. He nearly doubled over, dropping his pack and clutching his sides, little jets of fire shooting from his nostrils.

The girl that emerged from the bush where Cassia had gone to disguise herself… looked nothing like Cassia. She had made herself look like a human girl, with sun-burned white skin replacing her usual silver silver sheen. Her hair was russet brown instead of blonde, her face was dirty, and her clothing was plainer and torn in places. But what had made Fyn laugh so hard was the massive trellis affixed to her back. It extended a foot above her head and several inches past her shoulders on each side, and the illusion made it look like she had attached not only her own pack to it but also an assortment of other random traveling gear, including cooking pans, an extra bedroll, and a pot of dirt.

“You look like you’re going to tip over backwards,” he chortled. “I’ve seen humans carrying those, and they look just about that stupid. You might not fit through a door. But sure, discrete.”

“Says the one whose preferred form is fifteen feet long,” Cassia countered with a grin. “Look, I can’t just make my wings look like they’re not there. People might walk into them.”

But after glancing up and down the road, she did change the illusion slightly, shortening the trellis and removing some of the more jangly items on it.

Still chuckling, Fyn fell into step with Cassia (he was in his human form, just to make fitting into buildings easier) as they approached Timberglut, the town they’d been traveling along the Haverin River towards for the past two days. It was the furthest north trade port in the Basin and a hub of logging activity, just south of the northern boundaries of both Selachen and Raynen. The Haverin, which flowed all the way to Promise, divided the two Orders’ lands, but many towns along the river, including this one, spilled across both banks of the river and were a rare mingling point between the Orders.

Fyn had never been to Timberglut, but he had been on several excursions to a similar town along the same river, closer to Mt. Onyx. There were three kinds of people who lived in towns like this: humans who were on the run from something, trouble-making thunderbeasts taking advantage of the relaxed border security, and drakes that were trying to manage businesses dealing with either of the other two groups.

Unfortunately, he and Cassia were going to be looking for a member of the first group. They needed a Courier, a human capable of teleportation magic, to identify the plant clippings Cassia had found at Haven. Fyn had grumbled at that — wasn’t Cassia supposed to be the expert in human magic? But when he had said that, Cassia had only glared at him and shook her head.

“I don’t do teleportation magic,” she’d said with a shudder.

So they had to hope that they could find a Courier who knew where the clippings were from, and that this Courier would have a component linked somewhere near that place, and that he would teleport them there with few to no questions asked. Most Couriers were actively employed by one of the Orders, but there were always humans trying to run away, and for obvious reasons Couriers were harder to keep a handle on then most. If they were going to find a rogue Courier anywhere in Selachen, it would be someplace like here.

Cassia whistled as they walked, a lighthearted little tune that went skipping up to a peak and then tumbling back down, seemingly without a beginning or an end. She had done that a few times their first days traveling together, and Fyn had glared at her until she’d stopped the irritating noise.

But today, the notes floated on the air and blended with the slow-moving trickle of the river beside them and the swish of the wild grass on the banks, and it wasn’t quite as irritating as before.

Soon, Timberglut’s wooden barricade rose before them, and he and Cassia approached the large, copper-colored drake crouching at the gate. Fyn glanced at Cassia, hoping she would remember to let him do most of the talking while she looked like a human. She caught the meaning of his glance and nodded.

“Selach grant you hot fire today, sir,” he said, bowing his head respectfully to the drake. His instincts were urging him to sink to his knees, but this drake’s horns weren’t ornamented in any way, so he was only a normal cleric, a full-ranking adult member of Selach’s Order, and the guard had no way of knowing that Fyn technically wasn’t even an Initiate yet, so as far as he knew, they were of equal rank.

To his relief, the drake only grunted in response, and after giving Fyn and Cassia a once-over, jerked his head and allowed them to pass through the open gate.

That would never have been an acceptable response back at Mt. Onyx, but Fyn was too busy being relieved that the drake hadn’t challenged him to care, and soon his attention was stolen away by the bustling town around them.

Businesses and shopfronts built ramshackle from scraps of tall pine lined the streets, many rising several precarious stories into the air. Most had large signs out front with crudely painted symbols showing what the shop sold. Humans hurried past carrying goods or shopping. A gang of thunderbeasts were gathered in the street in human form. They wore only pants and were covered in feathers from the chest up. Unlike Cassia, whose wings were attached to her back, thunderbeasts’ wings grew directly out of their arms. They also had creepy bird-heads, with sharp beaks, and taloned feet. They were worse in thunderbeast form, four-legged with wings out of their back and hoofed back legs. And where Fyn and the other drakes breathed fire, they breathed lightning. Really, the only good thing to be said about thunderbeasts was that they were, on average, smaller than drakes, and could be beaten easily in a one-on-one fight.

Fyn didn’t realize he had stopped dead in the center of the street until Cassia tugged on his sleeve. “So, where are we going?”

“Um.” He glanced up and down the street and realized he had absolutely no idea. There had to be somewhere where the underground Couriers and other shady people did business, but he’d never tried to find a place like that. You probably had to talk to the right person, with the right hints. A promise of favor, a few coins…

“How much money do you have?” he asked Cassia.

Cassia looked doubtful. “Some.”

“It’ll have to be enough,” Fyn said. He started walking, turning corners at random, looking to get away from the main thoroughfare to quieter, more private businesses. Cassia followed him without question, though she stayed close to him and looked wary of the increasingly more filthy buildings and people.

At last, Fyn found what he was looking for: a dingy, narrow front sandwiched between two shuttered buildings. It had a cracked wooden sign hanging half over the door with a rough mug and a plate etched onto it.

“Yeah, this looks like the place,” Cassia muttered, following him as he went inside.

It was like Fyn had expected: dark and dull, mostly empty with a few figures sitting and nursing drinks half in shadow. Their entrance didn’t seem to draw much attention, beyond the bartender looking up expectantly. Fyn walked to the bar and leaned against it. The bartender stepped toward him into the light of a candle, and Fyn saw with a start that the bartender was a drake with scales an even deeper red than his.

“What’ll it be, kid?” the drake grunted. He was obviously old, with the scales around his ears graying and his unornamented horns clearly weaker than they used to be. Fyn felt a bit bad for him — imagine living your whole life and never making it past the rank of a cleric. Maybe that was why he was here, tending a filthy bar in an out of the way town.

Fyn took the bag of coins Cassia passed him from behind and put it on the bar, making sure it clinked noticeably. His heart was hammering in his chest. “Something more than a drink, thanks. I need a Courier. Someone who can keep their mouth shut, if you know what I mean.”

The bartender’s eyes narrowed, and Fyn saw a gleam of sharp teeth. He didn’t even look at the bag of coin, just at Fyn. Fyn folded his arms and met his eyes, trying to project an air of self-assurance. Of course he had done this dozens of times before.

It didn’t work.

“Out,” the bartender snarled, slamming a mug down on the table with a force that made Fyn jump. “I won’t be having none of your kind here poking around, trying to prove trouble’s where it ain’t. Get out afore I let Rob and Burta have their way with ya.”

He jerked a scaled finger over his shoulder as two enormous trolls, with sagging grey skin draped over large muscles, stepped up behind him, grinning at Fyn.

“We just want to do business—” Fyn tried, but then one of the trolls raised a fist threateningly, and Fyn stumbled backwards to dodge a blow that didn’t come.

“Your loss,” he snapped, trying to save face, and he ducked under the low-hanging sign and left the bar only to find Cassia already out there and snickering.

“What?” he demanded.

“Nothing,” Cassia said. “It’s just… you’re not very subtle. He obviously thought you were an undercover — what do you call wingkeepers here? People who make sure laws are being followed?”

“Firebrands,” Fyn said with dawning comprehension. “Damn it.”

“How about I go in next time? Humans are less conspicuous.”

“Sure,” Fyn said, still irritated. “Let’s see you do better.”

But to Fyn’s genuine surprise, she didn’t. Even though Fyn remained outside the next bar they found instead of going in, it was hardly a minute later that she returned, blushing. She self-consciously looked around to check no one was watching, then made her illusory self look older with a wave of her hand.

“They could tell I was too young. They thought someone was putting me up to it,” she said.

Out of desperation, they tried a third venue, the larger pub and in on the main street. But here again Cassia emerged shaking her head.

“It’s no good. It’s like they can smell ignorance,” she complained, leaning against the porch railing. “There’s got to be some sign or something. Some reason they know not to trust us.”

Fyn glared at the door. “We have money. We’re trying to pay them.”

“I know,” Cassia sighed, pushing up off the railing. “Come on. Maybe there’s room for one more bar in a town this size. Or we could try over the river.”

Fyn huffed out his feelings in two twin jets of flame. “Sure, whatever.”

He followed her as she turned down an alleyway and began heading toward the western side of town where the docks would be, thinking of several colorful names for the barkeepers they had met so far.

This kept him occupied enough that he did not hear the sound of footsteps in the street until it was too late. Five tall, broad-shouldered drake figures materialized out of the shadows in front of them. They surrounded Cassia in an instant, one of them placing an enormous scaled hand on her shoulder. Fyn heard movement behind him and saw another three drakes blocking his escape.

“What are you doing?” Fyn demanded, springing forward. “We’re on Selach’s—”

He cut himself off, remembering just in time Ashwythe’s command to never speak of his mission.

Which meant this was a bad situation. Fyn snarled and swelled into his drake form instinctively, his tail sweeping from side to side in the narrow street and knocking an empty crate over. Several windows slammed shut and the few stray figures on the street disappeared, except for one drunk figure who was slouched beside the crates, little more than a mass of dark hair.

Cassia was speaking quickly and quietly to the surrounding drakes. Fyn couldn’t hear what she said, but the tone of the drakes’ response was all too clear; the lead drake tightened her grip on Cassia’s shoulder and two more moved in to seize her arms. Her eyes were wide and anguished.

Sparks played around Fyn’s jaw, but if he burned them, he’d hit Cassia. “Leave her alone!” he demanded. “She’s with me, under my command. You have no right to her!”

“She is no human toy of yours, drake,” the lead drake spat, extending her hand directly at Fyn’s face. “Stand down, or I will not claim responsibility for what follows.”

Fyn dropped into a crouch, not taking his eyes off the lead drake as he tried to make sense of her words. Something seemed wrong…

Then he locked eyes with Cassia. She was shaking her head frantically, struggling against the drakes to no avail, and at last Fyn saw what she was mouthing. “Illusion! Not drakes!”

Fyn didn’t need telling twice. He leapt at the cluster of not-drakes, claws out and teeth bared, and they scattered before him, one dragging a kicking Cassia with him. But as Fyn landed, three not-drakes extended their hands, and a blinding light pierced Fyn’s skull. He crashed to the ground inelegantly, scrabbling to get his paws under him as he screwed his eyes shut against the pain.

“Cassia!” he shouted, taking wild swipes at the vague shapes around him. His mote of Selach raged inside him, and he only just managed to hold back the flames that wanted to spill from his jaws.

He’d meant to reach her, to be at her side so she could trade her wings to him and they could fly away like they had done in Haven. But she wasn’t there, and his vision was still splotched purple from that awful light. He heard Cassia scream and spun toward the source, only to screw up his eyes against another wave of blinding light. In seconds, she’d be beyond his reach.

Then Fyn felt a new presence at his side. Something slammed into the cobblestones and unleashed a wave of force similar to the one that had flung Fyn over the cliff, though not so strong. He heard the not-drakes’ cry out as they were thrown back, their bodies thudding dully against the stone.

Fyn forced his eyes open. All around him, not-drakes were lying winded on the ground several paces away. But right in front of him stood a girl. A human girl.

She was tall, with oak brown skin, hair bound back in long dark braids, and hauntingly familiar features. Her filthy clothes marked her as the figure by the crates Fyn had thought drunk. She was clutching a shaken Cassia tightly by the wrist. Her hand was outstretched as if to touch his snout, but a strange sort of glow clung to it that reminded Fyn of the spells the mage that he and his hatch mates had hunted had cast.

“Who are you?” Fyn managed, not sure whether to thank her or burn her.

The girl smiled. “A Courier. I think you were looking for one?”

And before Fyn could pull away, she touched his snout with her glowing hand, and the world collapsed down to a point and vanished.