Chapter 8 #2
Is good. They promise.
Fine, ask them to rise high and fast and come after us. We’ll need them to keep watch while we land and repair everyone.
Is dangerous , Kaia said.
Yes, it was, but we had no choice. We’d lose Taitia, at the very least, if we tried for the aerie right now. She simply couldn’t keep the speed up, and continuously running interference to protect her would likely end with other drakkons injured or dead.
Kaia passed the orders to everyone, and we flew on, following the Sheer’s precipice.
The storm continued to rage around us, washing acid away from scale, membrane, and flesh, leaving raw, open wounds behind.
I had no sense that we were being followed, but tension still pulsed through me.
The riders wouldn’t give up easily. All we could do was hope the storm’s ferocity kept them grounded long enough for us to get back into the air and then home.
And we had to do it all before night fell and allowed the rest of their birds to rise.
We reached the scree slopes and levelled out, flying past the foothills and into Mareritten proper.
I grabbed my long viewer and scanned the area, looking not only for a Mareritten presence but also for somewhere safe to land.
Eventually, I guided Kaia toward a range of hills that folded into the sea.
They were tall enough for the drakkons to hunker behind, and as long as we kept a watch atop the hillside until Yara and Cansu joined us, we should have enough time to mount and rise if the riders or indeed the Mareritt came this way.
The drakkons swooped around and flew in behind the hills, folding their wings and thrusting out their feet to land. Taitia couldn’t control her speed properly and all but crashed, forcing Jassy to leap from her back lest she be squashed by the tumbling drakkon.
Both came up onto their feet okay, even if Taitia did look a little put out by the inelegance of the whole maneuver.
Once Kaia was on the ground, I tugged the packs containing the medical supplies free, undid the clips holding me on, and slid down her leg. “Hannity, grab a long viewer and get up the top. I’ll treat Rua’s wings once I take care of Kaia.”
Hannity tossed me her medical pack, then unclipped the long viewer and dismounted. “You’d best be treating yourself, too, Commander. You’ve got some nasty bits of metal poking out of your body.”
And now that she’d mentioned it, I could definitely feel each and every one of them. But none were in spots that were hampering movement, and it was more important Kaia be repaired than me.
Not to me , she said.
A comment guaranteed to melt the hardest heart, and no one could ever accuse me of that when it came to drakkons.
I plucked out the ones I could reach, then scratched her eye ridge and ducked under her neck to scan for wounds.
Her left wing had three tears, her right, one, and her tail was raw where acid had swept across it.
Like your head , she rumbled.
I frowned and felt my scalp. There was indeed a raw, hairless patch a good two fingers wide that stretched from just above my right ear around to the back of my head.
If not for the flask of water and the fierce rain, the acid might well have burned through my skull and into my brain; it was a stark reminder of not only how dangerous the stuff was, but just how close I’d come to death.
I shivered, then dumped the packs on the ground and pulled out the antiseptic numbing salve.
After dabbing some on the raw hairless streak along my scalp, I treated her tail, then moved on to her wings, coating the remaining raw spots with the salve before swapping it over for the silk webbing, stringing it across the gaps between her phalanges and reattaching the loose membrane as best I could with sealer.
The end result wasn’t pretty, but, given a good half hour or so to harden properly, it should enable her to fly without restriction.
As I came back out from under her wing, both Yara and Cansu arrived.
Want them land? Kaia asked. Or watch from above?
I glanced up, shading my eyes against the continuing drizzle so I could check them both for their “minor” wounds.
Cansu had what looked to be a shallow chunk of skin and scale taken out of her rear thigh, and Kele was no longer wearing her coat, suggesting that she, like me, had been hit by acid, but that was it, thank Túxn.
Tell them to move out to sea but keep the shoreline in sight. If the riders do come after us, they’ll spot them first and head their way. That’ll give the rest of us time to rise and attack.
Like this plan.
The attacking part of it, no doubt.
Attacking fun.
Not when the odds are against us.
Killed many today. Odds better.
Which was true but still didn’t mean the odds had fallen in our favor. I whistled Hannity down from the top of the hill and helped her treat Rua before I walked across to Jassy to check Taitia.
Worry etched the young soldier’s features. “I’ve patched her wings and her tail like you showed us, Commander, but I’m not sure I’ve removed all of the remaining metal in that shoulder wound.”
“What does Taitia say?”
She wrinkled her nose. “She says the wing isn’t restricted, but I don’t know... I mean, it went in really deep. Should I seal it? Leave it?”
“It never hurts to seal a wound, but drakkons heal extraordinarily fast, Jassy, so as long as the metal has gone, she shouldn’t have any future problems. Have you felt inside the wound?”
“You mean, shoved my arm into it?”
She looked horrified at the thought, and I had to restrain my laugh “Mind if I climb up and check?”
Jassy nodded, and a heartbeat later, Taitia extended her leg. Once I’d taken off my glove, I rolled up my sleeves and washed down my right hand and arm, then clambered up. The wound was bigger than my fist and deep enough that I couldn’t see much beyond the raw and jagged edges of the entry point.
“Jassy, warn her that I’m going to feel inside the wound.”
“Will it hurt her?” she said, concern now joining the lingering horror.
“As long as I’m careful, it shouldn’t be too bad.”
“Okay.”
I also warn came Kaia’s comment. Is good.
Thanks. I carefully reached in, gently feeling my way along the left side of the wound.
It was ragged and trenched, no doubt a result of the double row of spikes that had adorned the bolt’s head, which had obviously been designed to cause as much damage going in as it did if any attempt was made to remove it.
Taitia had been lucky, because it appeared to have missed major muscles, ligaments, and veins, trenching instead through flesh and fat.
I was almost shoulder deep when I reached the pointy end of the wound—the bit where the bolt’s sharp tip had finally stopped.
I warily stuck a couple of fingers into that deeper bit, and something cold and sharp sliced into flesh.
I swore, but didn’t pull my hand free, instead shifting my fingers around until I found the “shaft” then followed its length until I found the end that still lay embedded in muscle.
It was an arrow-shaped shard of metal rather than the bolt’s complete tip, and it was a good six or seven inches long.
While it probably wouldn’t cause her immediate problems, long-term it might lead to infection, especially given, as Kele had noted, the riders used shit as a weapon and Vahree only knew what coated their spears.
I felt around to ensure it hadn’t sliced right through whatever muscle held it so tightly, then glanced around at Jassy. “I’ve found a bit of metal right at the very back of the wound—warn her I’m about to remove it.”
Jassy did so, her gaze briefly going glassy. “Right, go.”
I gripped the shard as best I could and then pulled back sharply.
The bolt moved fractionally, then stopped; I slid a finger down the shaft again, pushed into the wound, and eased the bit of muscle or ligament or whatever the hell it was caught on over a slight hook in the metal, then drew in a deeper breath and tried again.
This time, it came free with a suddenness that had me falling backward.
Taitia snapped her head around and stopped me falling.
I rubbed her cheek and thanked her, then righted myself and tossed the shard down to Jassy.
“Toss the antiseptic salve and sealer up. I’ll apply them while I’m here.”
She retrieved the tub from her pack and tossed it up. I tugged off the stopper and liberally applied salve into the whole wound, dobbing extra into the smaller trench that had held the shard to ensure there was no chance of infection from either the shard or the blood from my sliced finger.
After sealing the wound, I slithered back down her leg and washed the gunk and blood from my arm and fingers, then rolled my sleeves back down and checked that Cansu, Aarvi, and their kin were okay.
Only then did I take off what remained of my coat to check my wounds.
Golden feathers rained all around me, testament to just how many of the damn things had lodged into skin.
Moisture trickled in a dozen different spots, so I directed internal fingers of flame at all of the cuts and abrasions to cauterize and seal, and did my best to ignore the ensuing discomfort.
By the time all that was done, the sun had begun its descent into night. We needed to get moving. Fast.
I grabbed my packs and scrambled up Kaia’s leg, attaching everything back onto the clips before tugging the quill pen and its tablet from my pack.
“Kaia, can you ask Yara what the situation is weather wise back toward the Black Glass Mountains?”
Says storm still there, she replied after a moment.
Thanks. I quickly sent a bare-bones report to Esan, then added, Can the air mages extend the storm to the entirety of the mountains?