Chapter 8
“You’ve heard of the Freeborn Faction?” Vorik asked, not hesitating to launch into the explanation he had promised to Princess Syla as they walked painstakingly slowly through the tunnels under the gardener castle, her injured bodyguard ensuring they couldn’t assume the brisk pace that Vorik wanted.
Through his link with Agrevlari, he’d learned that, with the dragons gone and wyverns no longer feasting in the castle above, the local military had regrouped and marched in to look for survivors.
Some of them had to know about the tunnels and would descend into them to search for any of his people who lingered.
“I haven’t. I’ve read widely enough to be aware of some of your history, but if that’s something that’s developed more recently, I’ve been busy at Moon Watch Temple.” A pained wince crossed Syla’s face. “I am—was—a healer there.”
That temple must have been destroyed. A number of them had been. Vorik hadn’t been responsible, but the dragons, always prone to the predatory savagery inherent in them, hadn’t been as pinpoint in their attacks as the riders themselves.
Vorik looked at the bodyguard, suspecting him more worldly.
It made his shoulder blades itch to have the armed and vengeful man walking behind him, but he would have to show some trust to them if he had any hope of doing as his brother wished and earning the trust of the princess.
They were, of course, as suspicious as Vorik had expected.
He didn’t blame them and couldn’t help but think the general had given him an impossible task.
When he’d tried a slight smile on the princess, aware that she had suffered great loss and wouldn’t be in the mood for flirting, she’d drawn back in what he guessed was stunned horror.
After so many generations drifting apart, the gardeners and stormers had many cultural differences, but he suspected stunned horror looked like stunned horror across all human civilizations.
When Fel, who was probably distracted by his pain, finally noticed Vorik looking in inquiry, all he did was grunt. Whether that meant yes, he’d heard of the faction, or no, Vorik couldn’t tell.
“Ah, I’ll explain briefly. As you’re aware, if you’ve studied history, Your Highness, the stormers never started out as a large cohesive unit.
We come from people who were exiled or voluntarily left the protected Garden Kingdom islands in fits and spurts over the centuries.
Those who went solo into the dangerous world didn’t live long, so many banded together in small tribes, but my ancestors wanted freedom, not to suffer the rule of a king, so nobody sought to set up a central government.
But now… Well, since you’ve been sheltered, you may not be aware that the number of scaled predators and other creatures capable of devouring humans whole has increased as the climate around the world has grown harsher, with storms, droughts, and even volcanic eruptions more frequent.
We’ve always had to be careful to survive out there—there’s a reason we call people we trust sky watchers and warn each other to watch the sky when they depart—but it’s gotten harder to survive in recent years.
There have been precious few edible things to forage on the mainlands and less sheltered islands, and the skies are more full of predators than prey. ”
Though he had to watch and listen for other threats in the tunnels, Vorik glanced back often, hoping Syla was listening intently.
He didn’t expect a gardener to be sympathetic to his people, especially when the stormers had just destroyed so much of the kingdom’s capital and killed her entire family, but he hoped she would at least understand some of what motivated them.
That would make it easier for her to be sympathetic to him, to believe he might prove an ally.
“Get to the point, rider,” Fel growled.
That the bodyguard said the noble profession like an insult, as if riders were pirates or brigands, made Vorik bristle.
He was honorable, damn it. He’d only attacked military ships or cargo ships with armed escorts, and he’d always battled them openly, not striking in the night.
But… he admitted that some other riders used more guerrilla tactics.
Especially those from tribes on the brink of starvation.
It was hard to resist a cargo ship full of freshly harvested crops.
“In recent decades, the tribes have banded together for common purposes,” Vorik said, keeping his voice calm, trusting he wouldn’t win regard from the princess by sniping at her injured bodyguard, “and created a loose coalition. None of the tribes rule over another, but all who want to be allied send soldiers to be trained, either as part of the Storm Guard or, for those who have great aptitude and can entice a dragon into allowing itself to be ridden, the Sixteen Talons Air Fleet. Our goal is—”
“We know what your goal is.” Grim-faced, Syla looked past him toward an intersection.
As of yet, it was empty, and Vorik didn’t hear anyone elsewhere in the tunnels, but his dragon’s warning made him want to hurry.
“Yes, we soldiers have not hidden our goal.” Enticed by the thought of the wondrous fruits and vegetables and delicious flesh of livestock that had never known a life of tension and terror, Vorik had been known to cry out for the destruction of the sky shields more than once as he’d battled ships navigating from island to island, out from under the magical protection as they carried supplies throughout the kingdom.
“But the Freeborn Faction is different. They—we—” Oh, how painful it was to touch his chest as he uttered that we and pretend his allegiance, “—have attempted to open negotiations with your queen in recent years. Those of us in the faction seek permission to return to the kingdom and are willing to obey its rules in exchange for the easier life found under the sky shields.”
From what Vorik had heard, the king had been more open to negotiations, but the queen ruled—had ruled—without sympathy for outsiders. She hadn’t wanted to allow stormers under any circumstances to visit the kingdom. Ever.
Syla’s eyebrows drew together, and she looked to her bodyguard.
“That faction’s envoys haven’t been trusted when they’ve shown up,” Fel said, then lowered his voice. “You’d have more details than I if you’d gone to more family dinners.”
Thanks to his keen hearing—it was one of the magical attributes that his bond with Agrevlari lent him—Vorik didn’t have any trouble hearing the man.
Syla looked toward the tunnel’s arched stone ceiling, or maybe she was looking through it with her imagination to the castle above. “I… haven’t decided yet whether it’s fortuitous or dreadful that I didn’t arrive at tonight’s dinner in time.”
The bodyguard opened his mouth but didn’t seem to know what to say and closed it again.
Vorik stopped in the intersection, a single lantern mounted there burning low.
He doubted his people had lit the way and suspected the now-dead princess, who he knew had been lured down for a tryst with Lieutenant Mavus, had been responsible.
Vorik regretted that Mavus had died to the bodyguard’s mace but didn’t know how he might have stopped that.
It had been bad enough that Anok had blurted sir and been startled when Vorik rushed in.
Neither of the men, of course, had been filled in on General Jhiton’s recently formed plan.
Vorik was glad that Anok had caught onto his eye-widening signals and had figured out to play dead when Vorik thrust his sword between the soldier’s arm and chest instead of, as he’d attempted to convey, through Anok’s heart.
Princess Syla had seemed a little suspicious as they’d walked away from the chamber, but she must not have figured out the ruse completely, or she would have ordered her bodyguard to finish the man off.
She certainly wouldn’t have left Anok there with the shielder.
Oh, the thing had looked utterly destroyed to Vorik’s eye, but he trusted Anok would ensure it was before slipping away.
Vorik hoped he would also be able to take Mavus’s body with him so the lieutenant could have a proper funeral pyre, incineration by a dragon, as all who served in the Sixteen Talons wished to be in the end.
If not… Well, he’d been willing to give his life—and risk unrest in the afterlife—to ensure the stormers finally, finally had access to the lands under the shields.
“What matters is that the Freeborn Faction wants peace with your people, not war,” Vorik said, drawing their gazes back to him.
He didn’t add that those belonging to the treacherous little group were willing to undermine the Storm Guard and even the Sixteen Talons by passing information along to gardener spies.
It had only been by extremely careful planning and letting only the most trusted officers know about this day’s attack beforehand that the riders had been able to keep the details from leaking out.
Success had not been certain, not in the least. “We have so many taloned and fanged enemies in the world that we in the faction believe humans should work together going forward. We didn’t want this attack.
” Again, Vorik made himself touch his chest to imply he was a part of the faction, though it galled him to claim that allegiance.
It also bothered him to lie to the princess. Oh, he didn’t care to lie to anyone, under any circumstances, but she hadn’t done anything to earn his deceit or the implied disdain that went along with being mendacious with a person.
Vorik didn’t feel disdain for her. He even smiled at the memory of her hurling her pack at Anok.