[ Y E A R 1 0 1 6 , T H E S E C O N D A G E ]
Later the following morning. You can put your time traveling shoes away for now.
FLIGHT.
There was something uniquely comforting, Liliana decided, for a wingwoman to be in flight. The way the world stretched out below her in a giant mismatched carpet of hills and farmland, disrupted only by the winding rivers and lakes. Then, a familiar sight would appear on the horizon. At first, hazy suggestions of mountains like the fat fingers of a sleeping giant reaching up to catch the sun. But then, as you flew over the thick forests of Aikerness, they grew so much that they dwarfed even the giants.
The Sikkim.
There were thousands of mountains: young and uneven rows of stubby, green shoulders rising and falling like the round scales on a caiman's tail. Gradually these would give way to sheer-faced, saw-toothed ridges still miraculously covered by green, and finally, the gray giants streaked in snow stood behind. Beyond that final ridge lay the Fangs and beyond the Fangs, no one knew for sure.
Liliana smiled. Above the world, she detached herself from its troubles and tribulations. Her responsibilities did not exist in the sky. War did not exist in the sky.
They were eagle-riders. Legends, whispered by the townsfolk they died to protect. Liliana was one of the best, but she still wondered what it would be like to believe this ugly reality of war and destruction was a myth—to live in a world filled with simpler concerns like whom she would marry and whether or not it was going to rain.
"You would die of boredom," Nanook quipped.
"And you are eavesdropping on my private thoughts."
The harpy eagle's laugh rippled through Liliana's mind. "I could not resist the allure of your alternate self-portrait of sewing by a window."
Liliana glared at the back of Nanook's gray-white head and ruffled his crown feathers. He laughed again, and this time, she joined in until their voices faded into the wind.
I would get bored, Liliana conceded. Nanook was right as usual. But sometimes she believed that boredom was better than war.
Her shoulders sloped forward gently as her body melded with the rhythm of Nanook's wing beats from where she sat upon him, her legs hanging down to rest near his broad, feathered chest.
The grime of battle clung to her despite the whipping of the wind as they soared. Nanook hated blood, but he tried to forget for Liliana's sake. They spoke little of their fears, Liliana and Nanook. Hers – the fear of the dark, his – the fear of blood. Discussion was not necessary. In war, weakness simply was not an option.
The wingwoman leaned closer to his auburn feathers as Nanook cupped his wings upward. A moment later, the hiss of his downward thrust whirred in her ears. The spray of the mists that surrounded the Hold, her home and the fortress of the Order of Águila – an ancient order of warriors started by King Éoran in the time of the great wars of the First Age, gave way to the gentle rays of light that flowed down like golden-rain around us. The township of Fernglen seemed as though they were leagues away, but Liliana knew that on a clear day if one looked to the west, it could be seen without difficulty.
She kept reminding herself the battle was over, but, in her heart, she did not believe it. The screams of the Fallen Ones still rang in her ears. Forgetting was easier, though, once the Hold was in sight. Liliana took in a long breath of the almost sweet, damp air, laying her hand on Nanook's neck. "It is good to be home."
"Indeed it is," the eagle replied, his regal voice echoing through her thoughts.
The air whispered in Liliana's ears, reminding her of the gentle voices of the naiads that used to come and sing in the Great Hall of the Hold. How many years had it been since they came? She could not remember.
Liliana let her eyes flutter closed as rays of sunlight flitted across her face, wishing she could just fade into the ringing memory of their saccharine calls.
"Ho! The eagles are returning!"
Nanook's starboard wing tipped upwards, reaching into the clouds above us before they leveled out. Liliana saluted to the sentinel, who was standing and waving wildly. The joy on his face spoke clearly of a long, seemingly unending watch upon the walls of the Hold.
"Do you return to us victorious?" he shouted in question as Nanook gently flapped his wings, pulling us up into a warmer current.
"We do," Liliana hollered back over.
"Elindir is with us!"
The young woman turned her head so that he could not see the wary expression that crossed her face. It was a closely kept secret that she was not so strong in her belief as the others. Always, doubt gnawed at her thoughts, pushing her into a state of indecision and discomfort.
How could one so powerful let such turmoil descend upon his land? And why was she to trust he could deliver them? They were on their own. The silence of the fabled God of the Kingsway made that much abundantly clear to her.
Nanook's wings tugged slightly upward as he caught a draft.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
They lurched forward, shooting toward the landing bay, a massive cave scooped out of the cliffside whose gaping mouth opened toward the south. The sheer face of the mountain extended hundreds of wing-spans below before it sank into the forest floor below. The way the air wove into intricate currents around the Hold and especially in front of the Bay made Liliana think of the tapestries hanging on their mosaic-covered walls. Every thread held a unique purpose in the masterpiece, just like every invisible strand of the wind.
These same tangled air currents made landing in the Bay one of the most challenging feats wingmen and wingwomen faced in their daily life. One false move—one wing-tip out of place, and the winds would throw a rider and her eagle against the mountain with the unceremonious disinterest of a bird cracking open a tree nut.
Earlier that fall, they lost a cadet from House Raven that way, although no one talked about it anymore.
A moment later, the great gray-and-white eagle lighted down in the shelter of the Bay, his talons scraping across the smooth, stone floor. Liliana sat up slowly, ignoring the pain in her back, and slid from Nanook's shoulders. Behind them came the others: Sashi and Tarik, Marc and Eli, and Coco, exhausted but in high spirits.
Her feet touched the ground, and she was back to reality: the war, the troubles and tribulations, the responsibilities. She had half a mind to turn around, grab the saddle horn, and sail back into the early morning sky with Nanook for another few hours.
Dammit.
A voice spoke to her. There, at the edge of the battlefield. The words hung in her mind like poison, slowly making its way to her feet and fixing them there.
No, today there would be no escape.
The healers and cadets from House Dove swarmed all around, peppering them with anxious, eager questions. Marc, who dismounted only moments before, sent Liliana a desperate look that penetrated the haze of exhaustion sweeping over her. The young woman gave him a small smile. She directed the awestruck cadets toward the giant, burly warrior, and silently slipped away into the relative obscurity of one of the many hallways leading out from the Bay.
Sorry, Marc.
A hand caught the crook of her arm, and Liliana spun around to meet the scolding glare of Lady Adeniyi. Liliana smiled, pulling her oldest friend into a tight embrace. "Yi-yi," she breathed in the smell of incense and coconut oil as the woman wrapped her arms around Liliana's sagging shoulders. "Sorry."
The set of her mentor's jaw already told her she was in trouble. Adeniyi was not one to waste time with drawn-out tongue-lashings or dog and pony shows. She was succinct, unapologetic, and direct: all lightning and no thunder, and her words rarely missed their mark.
Liliana learned over the years to spot the subtle, silent warning signs, and she braced for impact. The set of her mentor's jaw harkened her impending fury like a trumpet, and Liliana knew she probably deserved it.
Fortunately, time tempered the stormy disposition of her fierce-hearted friend. Her love was still as relentless and mighty as the southern winds that came from Aikerness and beyond. She was the light of the north star: an unchanging, ever-present anchor that guided lost sheep homeward. She was truth, and there was no lie in her.
For most, Adeniyi was a gentle force of nature: one who could move the very mountains she stood on and, in the same breath, the one who appeared to follow their trails with the effortless grace of a humble pilgrim. She was the kind of being who would shape the centuries: a reformer who would change the course of the river one stone at a time.
Only those closest to her saw beneath the serenity: saw, in those flashes of lightning, there was an unimaginable power under heavy guard. Liliana saw it many times: the tapestry of her soul. At Adeniyi's core, there was the heart of a star: a fire that could consume entire kingdoms in a single breath. Power as deep as the mountains were tall.
Adeniyi's life taught her that her silence was more palatable than the fire she wished she could set free, so it burned inside her instead. But even she had her limits, and Adeniyi won every battle she fought. Every gentle force of nature occasionally bears a one-hundred-year storm. Calculated and meticulously prepared for, she was a way-finder.
It was a skill the warrior had yet to pass on to her apprentice: discretion and self-restraint. Part of her often wondered if it was too late already. Part of her hoped that it was.
Liliana was the thunder that too often preceded the lightning, too eager to wait to make her entrance, and Adeniyi did not raise her to apologize for it. She was a way-maker, a living contradiction between hot and cold: in one moment, a lighthouse in the darkness; in another, the storm driving ships to rocky shores.
Her love was like the rain that the storms brought. When she arrived, her light reached into the darkest places, her waters drove into the deepest places. For the ones she loved, her rains were like the warm, spring cloudbursts. Gentle and invited. A refuge. For the ones she fought against, she was a swirling tempest, laying waste to everything in her path.
Liliana often found herself pitted between bullies and misfits, outcasts, and stone-casters. As she grew up, she gained respect for her frankness and her ability to push herself and others to reach impossible goals. Her willingness to go to war for the innocent.
Although she was still a few inches shy of her mentor, Liliana was still unrecognizable from her former self. The willowy sprite of a child grew into a rugged young woman: impossible to miss. Even her golden curly hair seemed to take on a wild kind of character, only tamed when Liliana tucked it into a braid or beneath a scarf.
Adeniyi knew, though, when she caught a glimpse of those evergreen lighthouses, their eyes spoke the same ancient tongue: their hearts held the same fire, their souls nursed the same storm. She was the lightning and the wind; her charge was the thunder and the rain.
Finally, Adeniyi spoke. Golden bangles jingled as she threw up her hands in disappointment, "First of all, you smell terrible. Secondly, is this how you return to me now that you are to be the Seer?" she asked, arching one eyebrow and then the other. "Without so much as a word that you have come home safe."
Adeniyi stared at her. "You are not well. I will call for Lady Diana." Adeniyi started to open her mouth, but Liliana shook her head.
"Better not. I am afraid Diana will want to take more than the edge off my back pain, and—"
Her mentor's eyes flashed. "There is something you want to remember about the battle."
A statement, not a question.
The young captain only nodded. Adeniyi did not press any further. For that, Liliana was thankful.
"Could you do it then, please?" Liliana asked in a whisper.
Adeniyi's eyes flashed with uncertainty and then nodded, motioning for them to walk. Her hand found the injured place on Liliana's back, and warmth spread through her as the flesh knit itself back together. Liliana's face scrunched as the pain increased for a second before disappearing. "Thanks."
Adeniyi only dipped her head. "The Council will be waiting for your report," her friend added, dropping her hand back to her side, as they continued to walk. "On the performance of the cadets."
Another headache in the making. Liliana bowed slightly. "Of course," she lied; she had no intention of staying on topic. "I am relieved to hear it is not because I am in trouble again."
Adeniyi threw her former apprentice a withering scowl.
Liliana grinned and volunteered a dismissive shrug in her defense. "What? If we are not discussing the merits and fallacies of war then we are usually talking about how I have managed to break another one of the tenets in our wonderful, one-hundred-page code.
"Discussing is one way to describe your style of discourse with the esteemed members of the council of which I am one." The older woman steepled the fingers of both her hands over the bridge of her nose. "I do not know who gave you this notion of invincibility, but it was not me. Perhaps you were not beaten enough as a child."
Liliana flashed a wide smile at Adeniyi, "Hate to disagree—"
"—except that you do not," she interjected.
Liliana was unfazed. "But that one would be on you, Master Yi-yi."
Adeniyi exhaled loudly and rolled her eyes. "Trust me, Liliana. If I thought it would have helped tame that demon of a spirit you have inside of you, I would have sent you to the Burrows and let the hoe and field do my beating for me, but someone had a way of using clever words and remembering obscure loopholes that allowed her to get out of it."
The young captain tipped her head back, sprigs of curly hair escaping from her bun and bouncing as she laughed. "Again, who showed me the library and told me to read as much as I could?"
Her mentor groaned. "See? This is what I am talking about—this having an argument for everything. Mark my words, Captain Liliana, one day you are going to come across a situation neither your sword nor tongue can save you from, and I hope I am there to see it so I can say I told you so."
Liliana threw her arm around Adeniyi's shoulder and leaned her head to rest on her opposite shoulder, "You know you love me."
"Do not push your luck," Adeniyi growled but she couldn't help the smile that spread across her face, "You do not know me that well."
Liliana tightened her hug. "Of course I do."
Adeniyi sighed and led her former apprentice through a maze of arched, mosaic hallways that were covered in dazzling geometric patterns. Eventually, one of the corridors opened up into the heart of the mountain, where a beautiful natural cave formed the Great Hall. Here, the members of the Order all gathered to eat, to dance, and to share stories. When they were lucky, members of House Nightingale would perform ballads or plays, showcasing their musical prowess and impressive knowledge of Aerlinian lore with harmonies and lyres.
On the walls, beautiful mosaics were highlighted by the shifting seasons and beams of sunlight that fell through expertly cut ventilation shafts. When she was younger, Liliana spent many days studying the walls, tracing her fingers across faces whose names time forgot.
Outside of mealtime, it was usually empty other than cadets who'd been assigned the task of cleaning—usually as a form of punishment. Liliana gave a quick wave to one of her own flock, a House Eagle cadet, as he swept away the crumbs from the evening meal. Poor lad must've gotten in trouble.
Again.
Adeniyi gave Liliana a knowing look. "It would seem that someone continues to inspire rebellion in the hearts of the cadets of House Eagle."
"I think you could make the case that the house has a long legacy of rule-breakers," she quipped before turning toward the chambers of the High Council.
As they approached the massive, wooden doors, Liliana felt her whole body tense. "Here we go," she murmured. Adeniyi opened the doors in one fluid motion, and her charge fell in step behind her. For once.
The council chambers were round, with tall but narrow windows covering most of the outward-facing wall. In the center of the room, there was an ornate, round redwood table. The captains of the other houses were already seated, and most of the five members of the high council were present as well. Lady Diana occupied the seat of the Seer. The seat of the high king or queen of Áerlas remained empty, as it had been for as long as Liliana could remember.
"Nice of you to finally join us," Lady Diana greeted them with a small, sweet smile as she cocked her head to the side. "Captain Liliana, I trust you have an excuse for your disheveled appearance — or shall I open the windows? We all know how stuffy it can get in here."
Lady Diana was a willowy woman in her mid-thirties from Ethyra, a small coastal kingdom that was bordered half by Aikerness and half by Altan. Her long, blonde hair was plaited neatly so that it fell over her shoulder in one long braid. Her light blue eyes seemed kind, almost motherly. She was young when she rose to power, but even hardship that came with power was kind to her. She held a kind of child-like innocence about her that time had not yet taken away.
Liliana heard many of the cadets say they could be sisters.
Adeniyi took her seat among the high council and wasted no time in responding, "Lady Liliana decided a swift delivery of the mission report was more important than her personal comfort. Surely you can appreciate that, Lady Seer." Her words were like ice.
Lady Diana did not turn to look at her but instead kept her eyes locked on Liliana's. "I am sorry, Lady Adeniyi. I did not realize that the captain of House Eagle was so tired she could not answer her own queries." She tilted her head again, this time to the other side. "Does our lovely Southern friend speak the truth, Liliana dear? It must have been a more eventful patrol since you tarried nearly a day longer than expected. I imagine you must be quite exhausted. I did not even see you with the others in the Bay."
Liliana's rage boiled away the haze of exhaustion that hung in her mind. Trust a healer to how to hit every pressure point in one paragraph. "Yes, High Councilwoman Adeniyi Odele explained the situation very well. Unless you would like for her to repeat it again?"
Lady Diana leaned forward, positioned her elbows delicately on the table, and perched her chin on top of her interlaced fingers. "I must say, Lady Liliana, it never ceases to amaze me that a seamstress's daughter grew up to be such a formidable warrior. Nurture over nature, I suppose."
"I will pass your compliment to the creator of the rigorous training regime designed by the elders of House Eagle during my next visit to the Kirkko," Liliana replied evenly. "It also seems that my question escaped you. Does High Councilwoman Adeniyi Odele need to repeat herself?"
Lady Diana's eyes narrowed into slits. "My apologies. That will not be necessary. What do you have to report?"
Liliana took a deep breath, not bothering to take her seat. "The cadets performed exceptionally well under the circumstances. I, Hisashi, and Marc," she added, nodding toward the other captains, "believe they are ready for the trials."
There was a murmur of agreement from the others at the table. The uncommon accord was short-lived: Lady Diana's voice cut through the murmuring, "I assume this is all, Lady Liliana? Or is there something more you wish to share with the Council?"
Liliana could not bring herself to meet the eyes of her mentor as she took a deep breath. "I cannot ignore the advances of Pervez and his legions of Fallen Ones any longer."
The young captain heard a sharp intake of breath that could only be Adeniyi preparing to interject.
But not today.
Today, Liliana beat her to the punch, a flash of lightning in her own right:
"I believe we must go to war."
D I S C U S S I O N Q U E S T I O N S
1) If you could fly anywhere in the world right now, where would you go?
2) Who are you more like: Adeniyi or Liliana? Why?
3) Is there ever a right time to go to war? Why or why not?
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W O R D C O U N T
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