The sister queen Onyx stalked around Malachite as warriors and the Arbora soldiers came forward to report to them. Her dark copper scales flashed angrily as her tail lashed. Malachite’s daughter queen Celadon stood beside her, while Onyx’s daughter queens waited nearby, along with Umber, Onyx’s consort.
The only other consort here was Shade, sitting to one side with his warrior Flicker and a worried group of teachers. Lithe hoped he hadn’t had the dream too. She glanced at him, but he smiled reassuringly at her. She and Shade might have Fell blood themselves, but they had never seen a real one until last turn. The thought of a Fell attack on the colony made Lithe’s skin turn to ice. Looking around the chamber, it struck her how many of the court were scarred by the Fell, on their bodies or their minds, even those who had been born later, or whose bloodlines had never left the Reaches. It can’t happen again, Lithe told herself. Not here. Please not here.
Tail lashing as she paced, Onyx spotted Lithe and said, “Perhaps Lithe has insights the other mentors lack.”
Lithe pressed her lips together. Most of the time no one commented or much thought about the fact that she was half Fell. Lithe never thought much about it herself, and was fairly sure Shade and the others didn’t either. When Malachite had brought them to the court, she had said they were a sign that the Fell had taken nothing from them that couldn’t be taken back, and everyone had accepted that. But Onyx had a sharp temper and liked to poke at Malachite through others, as poking directly at Malachite was a game too dangerous for even another queen to play. Still, when Lithe stepped forward to answer, she was relieved when Reed and Auburn stepped with her. She said, “We think it was a shared dream.”
There was a puzzled murmur from the watching Arbora and warriors. “But what caused it?” Malachite asked. Her voice was neutral and colorless, as if they were discussing a minor crop blight.
“The same cause as the auguries,” Onyx said, with another tail lash.
Celadon betrayed some impatience in the angle of her spines. “Probably, but we still don’t know what caused the auguries—”
Moth, one of the warriors on guard patrol, burst in from the opposite passage and scrambled to a halt in front of Malachite. He said, “A group of warriors are at the entrance platform. They say they have an important message from Indigo Cloud.”
“Indigo Cloud, in the east Reaches.” Lithe didn’t realize she had said the words aloud until Reed turned to her and said, “Whatever sparked the dream, it’s coming from the east.”
Onyx lashed her tail again and said to Malachite, “Of course, it would be something to do with your offspring.”
Malachite didn’t flick a spine. She told Moth, “Tell the Indigo Cloud party that I’ll hear their message in the queens’ hall now.”
A few days later, Moon woke during the night to the faint scent of smoke in the air. He nudged Jade gently until she rolled off him, and sat up. The light and his internal sense of the sun’s position said early pre-dawn; the window crystal was open and the air was just barely tinted with wood smoke.
They had seen some small settlements in the distance, mostly too far away to discern any detail, and once a structure stretching between two low hills, a little like a Dwei hive. The skylings who lived in it had fled the flying boat and hid inside before they could get a close look at them. But now the complexity of the scent on the wind told Moon they were approaching a much larger habitation.
He slid out of the narrow bed and picked his way over sleeping bodies to the nearest window. Briar, sitting by the door on watch, whispered, “What is it?”
“I think we’re coming up on a groundling city,” Moon whispered back. He paused and did a quick body count. “Where’s Stone? And Bramble?”
“They stayed with Delin.”
Stone had probably needed a break from the warriors. Moon reached the window and leaned out, but the sky was still dark enough to show stars, and he couldn’t make out anything in the distance. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to sleep anymore. He told Briar, “I’m going up on deck.” He shifted, and climbed out the window.
He scaled the hull easily, pausing to peer cautiously over the railing to make sure none of the crew were in eyeshot. They were more used to Raksura now, but still easily startled. The deck on this side of the ship’s spine was empty, so he slung himself over the railing and shifted back to groundling. He stretched and rolled his neck. The air was cooler, the steady breeze tugged at his clothes. He went toward the bow, tasting the air. He could scent the salt of the sea now, part of the complicated blend of odors.
He went forward, the deck still warm under his feet. Two crew members spoke in Kedaic on the other side of the spine, an idle conversation about someone’s relative’s prospects. There was a lamp hanging outside the hatch in the spine, one of the bright fluid lights, and Moon circled around the pool of illumination.
He reached the bow and leaned against the railing. Trying not to think about the clutch, the court, and what might be going on at the colony was easier up here than while lying in bed staring sleeplessly at the ceiling.
The sky was lightening, and soon he could see that they were traveling over coastal plain, with tall grass and stretches of marsh. The great dark expanse ahead started to show flickers of light. Trying to decide which sparks were in the port, which were on islands, and which were ships occupied him until he heard a step on the deck behind him.
He leaned back into the railing and watched Callumkal approach. He didn’t think Callumkal realized there was a Raksura standing in the shadows. To test the theory, he said, “We’re nearly there.”
Callumkal flinched and fell back a step. Then he made a rueful huffing noise. “I hope you were concealing yourself with some power of invisibility.”
At least Callumkal wasn’t taking it badly. Rorra would probably have never forgiven herself. “No, I was just standing here.”
“Well, it’s early.” Callumkal leaned on the railing. “You can see it from here?”
“Just some of the lights.”
“Hmm.” Callumkal squinted into the darkness. Most groundlings couldn’t see that well at extreme distances. “We’ll reach it by full dawn. It’s than-Serest, the largest trading port along this stretch of the western coast. We didn’t come this way before, of course. We went through the smaller port of Yukali, on the sel-Selatra. We’ll stop here briefly and purchase supplies.”
“Have you ever been here before?” Moon asked.
“No. Have you?”
“No.” Moon had never come this far north on his own. “Stone might have, but he hasn’t said anything.”
Callumkal considered the view for a moment. “We shouldn’t be there long.”
“You’re not worried about taking a bunch of Raksura into a groundling city?” Moon asked. Even if they all stayed on the boat, the idea made him uneasy. They had no idea if the people in than-Serest knew about Fell, and someone catching a glimpse of a shifted Raksura might prove awkward. Or worse than awkward.
Callumkal gave him a sideways glance. “Perhaps I wasn’t until just now.” He looked back toward the clusters of buildings along the coast, slowly forming out of the dark horizon, that he probably couldn’t see yet. “We won’t be staying long. And you don’t have to leave the ship, if you don’t care to.”
Moon appreciated the fact that Callumkal hadn’t attempted to make that an order. Jade, who probably didn’t want any of them, especially the Arbora and the more inexperienced warriors, leaving the boat anyway, would not have taken it well. “What kind of people live there?”
“Many kinds; it’s a very active trading port. I can’t pronounce the name of the main race, but they are from a group of species called Coastals. They run most of the ports along here and populate the closer islands. They come from an older groundling species that interbred with the shallow and deepwater sealings.” He added, “It is an interesting place. The port is still closely allied with the shallow-water sealing colonies just beyond the islands, and there is actually a great deal of interaction between them, with special trading areas in the docks.”