Grym Prophet (Song of the Aura, Book Three) (15 page)

“The
inn
, Master?”

“The innkeeper.”

“Swaying Willow? I knew there was-”

“Silence.”

The single word froze Gramling's blood again. Blood. One of Pit Striding's most complicated- and powerful- elements. His Master could control the blood of his minions with a single thought. Best to stay silent. His chance of redemption would be ruined if he spoke again.

“A wise decision.”
Blast! I apologize, Master. I forgot that you can see my thoughts.
“The innkeeper is one of the Aura.”
No!
“Yes. He is none other than the Aura of Nymphs, Lord of the Rangers and one of my greatest enemies. You know we fight the Aura, Gramling, but do you know why?”

No.
Gramling merely thought it- he knew his master wouldn't need to hear.

“Come,” The Golden One said, and shadows wrapped them in an unshakeable grip.

Chapter Eleven: And So It Began

Lauro was so angry- at Elia, at himself, at the mysterious innkeeper- that he could only think of one thing: flying. He had discovered the inn's strange effect on his powers when he had first come here. The wind currents that he could always see were no longer visible, and it had not taken him long to find out why.

A mile or so of desperate fleeing, and the colorful currents returned. Lauro felt a coolness settle on his mind, as it always did when he was in touch with his gifts; but he quashed it in the furnace of his anger, Wind Striding with powerful kicks of his feet to lift himself into the air. In the nighttime sky, he navigated more by feeling than sight. The wind caressed his face, and he returned its touch. The currents around him were his muscles and bones, his flesh and blood.

On and on he flew, almost swimming through the air, his whole body in cooperation with the movements of the sky. Suddenly, a great inky darkness exploded on his vision, confusing the wind currents and dispersing his power. Before he could react, the prince flew right through it.

“Gah!” he choked, coughing and sputtering as his powers flickered and he dropped lower, out of the black mess of
something
. “Smoke!”

Smoke. He'd flown through smoke. What in Vast?

More of it was coming. Cloud upon cloud of coal-stained smoke wafted up towards him. He dodged some of it, but most of it hit him full on. There was no resistance when his body met it, but where it floated the wind seemed to die, even as it carried the smoke higher and higher...

With a muffled yell, Lauro realized he was falling faster than he could stop amidst all the smoke. A great blot of it curled up all around him, and he shut his watering eyes to stop them from burning. A frantic second of silent falling, then he was out of the cloud, Wind Striding frantically to stop his fall.

A dark metal shape like a tall pillar loomed up in front of him, leaning slightly to one side and belching volumes of coal-smoke from its open top. Cursing, Lauro struck out in front of him with his palms, then raked his hands to either side in a breaststroke. Wind rushed under his arms and lifted him out of harm's way, allowing him to pass just over the strange object.

Another, smaller pipe passed below him, and he flew nimbly to one side to avoid the billowing smoke. His eyes still stinging from the fumes, he dipped down and to the side, zigzagging to avoid whatever mysterious enemy was assailing him. Random, confusing sounds assaulted his ears: rushing water, creaking hinges, crackling flames, and turning gears. By the time his eyes were entirely clear again, he was mere feet away from slamming into the ground.

Lauro flung out his hands, cushioning what could have been a fatal crash with a well-placed gust of air.

It still hurt. Rocks and dirt bit at his body as he slammed into the ground and rolled for several yards. When he had finally stopped tumbling, the prince scrambled to his feet, fists clenched and ready to blast his enemy with a wall of wind.

But there was no enemy- at least not immediately. Lauro stumbled back in awe, his guard dropping entirely as his mouth opened and closed soundlessly. He had landed on the bank of the deep, wide river that had run parallel to the old Grymclaw road. The night sky above the running water was entirely blocked by six gargantuan shapes.

They were warships of a kind he had never seen before. They were huge, squat, and built of metal, like enormous armored toads with elongated bodies, straddling the snaky river. There were no masts, sails, or oars to be seen; just long, tilted smokestacks that looked as if they belonged in a Vastic forge, and giant turning gears that grunted and sent sparks flying at varying intervals as they ground together in an endless song of chaos.

Lord of the Four Winds
, Lauro prayed inside,
deliver us all!
What hellish forge had given birth to these monstrous things? And why were they here? Were they coming for him? Were they from his father?

Inside, of course, he knew the answer to at least the last question.
No... King Larion wouldn't waste such weapons on me. These are far more powerful ships than he has. If they were Vastion's, they wouldn't be here looking for me- they'd be fighting the pirate lords in the south.

That was a thought. Could these things be under a pirate flag? He had heard some of the names of the southern pirate lords, for they had always been a thorn in his father's side. But this looked too deserted, too sober for a pirate's vessel... and besides, it flew no flag.

Lauro crouched down low and crept closer to the edge of the riverbank, hoping for a clearer view.
Curse this overcast night, and doubly curse this blasted smoke!
Suddenly, movement on the deck of the strange ship caught his eye. The next moment, he was infinitely glad for the darkness he had just cursed.

A tall, black-clad form moved to the very back of the ship as it passed Lauro's hiding spot, chugging upstream with a muffled cacophony of mechanical noises. He could almost make out the face... but not quite. If only a little wind would come along...

A dangerous idea began to root itself in the prince's brain. Leaning down and lying flat on the bank of the river, he tried to make himself as invisible as possible. Then, stretching out one hand, he made a swift flicking motion with one hand.

The breeze began at his elbow, twisting and curling around his forearm until it reached his hand, where it grew until it burst from his palm with an almost-inaudible
whoosh.

Several tense seconds passed. The metal ship was almost out of sight in the shadows.

Suddenly the breeze reached the dark figure in the stern, catching his hood and pushing it back as naturally as a normal gust of wind. Then the night closed in around the smoke-spewing vessel, and it was lost to sight.

Lauro stayed where he was for another minute, his heart pounding and his pulse racing.

He had seen the face of the Pit Strider.

Something in his heart snapped. Not apart, though, rather... it seemed that something had snapped
back into place
.

The Pit Strider was heading towards the Swaying Willow with six ships of unprecedented might, with Creator-knows-what kind of enemies aboard, the Pit Strider himself excluded. Whatever he felt about Gribly, and however the idiots he'd once called his friends had mistreated him, he still owed them a warning.

Blast. Duty was hard.

As soon as he was sure that the mysterious fleet had gone far enough upriver that he would not be spotted, Lauro leaped to his feet with the intention of flying back to warn his friends at the inn.

Backing up a few steps, the prince took a running leap forward, out into the air over the steep bank of the river. Wind Striding kept him afloat, and he began to cross the open distance in a succession of rapid leaps from wind current to wind current.

About halfway across, the impossible happened.

He leaped higher than ever before, ready to ascend into the night sky, but a curious wetness soaked his ankle one moment, and the next he was ripped from the air and pulled towards the surface of the river with astonishing force. With a frantic glance down at himself, Lauro found that a dripping tentacle of ever-flowing water had reached out of the river and seized him by the leg.

“Off of me!” he yelled, but the water kept pulling on him, enchanted or controlled by something far more powerful than he. His grip on the element of the wind loosened, then fell apart, sending him crashing into the river with a loud
splash!

The liquid closed over his head like the door of a prison cell, as the tentacle of water drew him deeper and deeper into the depths of the river. The flow battered him from side to side, but he was held in place too tightly to be swept away. Frantically clawing and kicking, the prince attempted to swim away, but to no avail.

Sleep
, a voice in his head told him.
It is almost over. Let yourself sink into me...

“No!!!!” he screamed, and the river rushed in to fill his lungs and choke him.

Sleep,
the voice repeated.

And finally, he did.

~

Even without his Sand Striding abilities, it was easy as anything for Gribly to sneak past the bumbling Haedi who worked in the inn stables. Within an hour of his encounter with the Pit Strider, he was hidden in the hayloft above the horse stalls. They weren't just for horses, though; they were for every conceivable mount on the face of the world- and quite a few that he had never conceived of before at all.

Something had driven him to go there. A tiredness he had never felt before assaulted his limbs and body, weighing him down to the point where his thoughts were entirely occupied with finding a comfortable place to drop on his face and fall into the deepest slumber of his life.

And he did.

Chapter Twelve: Forest of Foretelling

Gribly stumbled out of the trees into a grassy, twilit dell with a single mighty tree in its center. His journey through the forest had been surreal and invigorating, and his desire for sleep was gone. He cared not that he was probably in a dream anyway, nor that in the waking world he was probably on the edge of yet another failure. None of it mattered anymore; just the quiet sweetness of the dell and the hidden majesty of the elusive being who had called him here.

There, seated on a throne made of the tree itself, was the one who had called him. It was a being of light and spirit like he had never seen before, and beside him sat...

Elia? Lauro? He couldn't decide which, and his mind felt incapable of focusing enough to figure it out.

No... it wasn't either of them- it was both. They were both here, in the dreamworld he couldn't understand.

Elia was up, running for him, wrapping her arms around him... suddenly his mind was crystal clear.

“Gribly,” she whispered, “we've done it! We've found the Aura! We've found Wanderwillow!”

~

Whether or not this place was part of the physical world, Gribly soon realized it could be nothing less than completely, utterly
real
. In the ensuing period of time- he could never be sure afterwards whether it was a minute, an hour, or a lifetime- he was greeted warmly by Wanderwillow, and somewhat less warmly by Lauro. Then, when the introductions had passed, all three were seated at the foot of the throne, listening to Wanderwillow speak. It seemed the Aura had known all along who they were and what their mission was. But, as he explained: