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  Wing Magic

  Empire of War & Wings: Book Three

  Sarah K. L. Wilson

  Published by Sarah K. L. Wilson, 2020.

  Previously in the Winged Empire ...

  The crown prince took all the weapons from the people of Far Stones and they had no way to defend themselves from the dark magic that lurks there.

  Aella was meant to Hatch into someone who manifests a magic bird but she Hatched bees instead.

  The crown prince says he owns her now, and she’s afraid to defy him in case he takes it out on her family like the way he killed her father.

  Her allies are Zayana, Osprey, and Ivo.

  But Osprey is linked to the crown prince through magic and he’s bound to stop any moves made against the throne.

  Ivo wants her to be part of a secret revolution – a revolution that he and Osprey have already committed to.

  The crown prince has a spooky power – snake magic. And spooky allies with snakes of their own. But when he offered Aella in his place for their ritual, she learned a lot of their secret knowledge that comes back to her in flashes.

  Aella can also send her bees to buzz around someone and bring back little visions of what they are up to. She left one with the snake people, one with the crown prince, and sent one to watch over her family.

  But when she fled the crown prince’s torture and offer of marriage, he set Osprey to hunt her down.

  And that’s what you need to know.

  Map

  Elsewhere in the Winged Empire

  Wing Etruna sat cross-legged in the crow’s nest, breathing in the scent of the sea while her blue jay dove and soared around her. In a moment, the gong would sound, and she’d need to climb down to receive orders for the week. In a moment, this glorious freedom she felt from so high in the air would disappear and she’d crash back to reality but for now, it was only her and Izusa and with her eyes closed she could see through the eyes of her spirit bird as he soared and wheeled over the Imperial Tern Fleet. She liked to believe that when this life was over and the skies received her, that she could be a bird with him soaring through eternity side by side.

  Her bliss was interrupted as her jay spiraled in closer over the Fleet. Something was happening. Something big. Runners raced down the docks and where they found ships’ captains, orders were barked and men and birds leapt into action.

  Someone shook her shoulder and her eyes flew open, breaking the connection with her bird.

  “Wing Etruna!” the ship’s boy shook her again. “The Captain needs you. Now. By order of Le Majest, we sail.”

  “The Flycatcher sails?” Wing Etruna gasped, still shocked by her sudden return to her own flightless body.

  “We all sail. The whole fleet,” the boy said, practically dancing with excitement. “We go to quell our enemies in the Far Stones!”

  BOOK ONE: FLIGHT OF THE BEE

  The hum in your chest,

  The song in your heart,

  The cry from the heights,

  Echoes in every part.

  We’re none of us meant,

  For kissing the dust,

  In hope, we will rise,

  And do what we must.

  Songs of the Winged Ones

  Chapter One

  My mouth was dry and thick. I tried to swallow. Even that hurt as I pulled my limbs under me to sit up. There had to be water somewhere. Something pressed on me in the darkness.

  “Don’t move.” Zayana’s voice was barely a whisper. “Stay still.”

  I froze at the urgency in her tone and tried to listen.

  Around us, voices called to one another. My eyes began to adjust to the darkness, and I realized I was under a covering in the front of a boat. I could hear the water lapping against the hull and smell brine. We were in the sea, then. This boat was too small for that. It rocked back and forth, yawing precariously. My belly rolled in response.

  Oars banged against the hull and the muffled sound of voices again broke through the cloth covering me. I moaned without meaning to and a bee slipped from my hand, manifesting and hovering in the close air under the tarp. Warmth flooded me and with it, a gasp of reassurance as the bee lit the tiny space I was in.

  How long had I been passed out and lying here? My whole body ached, my injuries flaring hot and angry.

  I opened the edge of the cuff around my wrist to look at Os’s feather. It glowed purplish-white but when I touched it, it was only warm, not hot like it would be if Os was near. I breathed a sigh of relief and closed the cuff. Wherever we were, we had not yet been caught. Something had delayed Osprey. Perhaps he was too injured to pursue us.

  The light filtering through the tarp went dark suddenly and the sounds above me seemed louder and more echoey than before. The minutes passed slowly as my throat grew drier and my thirst greater. After my bold words and actions just hours ago, it seemed wrong to be hiding under a tarp in a boat like a smuggler.

  I couldn’t have said if it was hours or just very, very long minutes until finally the tarp was dragged back and Zayana silently offered me a waterskin.

  I drank from it thirstily, grateful to lean into the refreshment of water. When I was done, I met Zayana’s worried eyes.

  “Thank you,” I whispered.

  She nodded tightly, looking around us with big eyes.

  We were in our boat, but this section of water was surrounded by close wooden slats which formed a room barely bigger than the boat. A ladder climbed up from the center of the small room through a trap door above. I could just barely make out the sound of Ivo’s voice through the trap door. He was speaking to someone quieter than he was, and I couldn’t hear them at all, only the cadence of my Guide’s voice as he replied to the quieter speaker.

  “It’s almost noon,” Zayana whispered. “We fled down the coast through the sea to this place. Wing Ivo knows someone here.”

  Her hands were clenched in her dress and there was no sign of her bird.

  “Where is Flame?” I asked but she just shook her head. She was so tense I could have used her for a shelf, stacking books or tools on her tight shoulders and fidgeting hands.

  “Are you hurt?” I whispered. Fear gnawed at me. Just because Osprey wasn’t close didn’t mean other Claws were not nearby. Everyone would be watching for us now.

  She scoffed, her eyes suddenly wide and glassy.

  “No, of course not. My life is just ruined, and the life of my sister, and the hope that either of us might survive the year. Nothing to trouble crazy rebels like you and Wing Osprey.”

  “What do you mean ‘the life of your sister’?” I asked. “She isn’t tied to your obedience in some way, is she?”

  After all that had happened, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Empire had done something like that to her, too. I searched Zayana’s pained face, afraid of what I might find there.

  She scoffed. “Only in the same way your family is. In the same way all families are. It wasn’t supposed to be like this! When Wing Xectare and Wing Ivo fought over who would be my Guide, I saw three gulls and one dove into the water. That’s supposed to mean good fortune for the person who sees a change in circumstance! It’s not supposed to mean disaster, and yet it was barely an hour later that the city was attacked and now we’re fleeing Le Majest and even with all I did for him, I doubt he will remember and be merciful.”

  Well, she was right there. He certainly would not be merciful. And now he saw me as his own even more than he had before. I fought to keep my breathing measured and even but the slightest slip into remembering that made fear ricochet through me. Loathing and terror were things you could always count on with Juste Montpetit. But it worried me to see Zayana breaking like this. She was usually so careful and cautious. I thought I even saw tracks on her face from
drying tears. Had she been crying before she got me that water?

  “What am I going to do?” she whispered, covering her face with her hands.

  “Join us,” I said quietly. “That’s what you’ll do. It’s the best place for you.”

  “And what? Watch my sister punished in my place?” Was she crying behind those hands? I wasn’t good at knowing what to say to help with crying.

  “You can’t do anything else,” I reminded her. I was trying to put myself in her place. Trying to imagine wanting this life and then having it snatched away by the goals of other people – goals I didn’t even share. I could see her perspective, but she needed to be practical, too. “You’re here with us and you’re already branded a traitor, so you might as well join us all the way. You’ve seen what’s happening. You’ve seen all the injustices. You’ve seen that snake the crown prince manifested. You’ve heard the things he said to us. Why not join us and find a different path?”

  “You’re wrong,” she whispered.

  I involuntarily drew backward. Wrong? Was she crazy? She’d seen what I saw! How could she think the Winged Empire was still something to follow or engage in? Didn’t she see that my hands were shaking just from the memories?

  “I do have options,” she continued. “I could just find the nearest Claw and turn you in.”

  I swallowed. I hadn’t expected that.

  She pulled her hands from her tear-streaked face so suddenly that I worried for her.

  “Sign,” she gasped, “I need a sign.”

  “O ... kay,” I said. She was in worse shape than me, despite the pain I was in from the beating last night. My eye throbbed and my belly hurt so much that I wasn’t sure I could stand up straight. But I couldn’t’ think about me right now. I needed to slow down and help Zayana. “Where do you learn about these signs? There sure are a lot.”

  “My nurse taught me,” she said with a look that suggested I’d asked her how she’d learned to dress herself. “Just like all children on the mainland are taught.”

  “Well, you seem to believe it more than the others I’ve met.”

  “I have faith.” She said that with a trembling lip like her faith was on the edge right now. She was studying the wood around us, looking for her sign.

  “Maybe you could send Flame to go and look after your sister,” I suggested. After all, I had sent my bee. It brought me a lot of comfort.

  She rolled her eyes. “He’d fade in a mile. A useless plan.”

  “How do you know?” I pressed. After all, my bees did not fade in a mile. Even now, I was picking up little flashes from them. Ixtap, nursing a gash he’d gotten in the fight. His snake wrapped around it as if trying to caress it better. Someone – Juste, maybe? – huddled in a dark corner sobbing. Wow. He must have liked me even more than he let on with all that marrying business. I’d broken his heart. Or maybe he was even more unhinged than I had feared. I swallowed at the memory of my last minutes with him. If he ever got his hands on me, he would tear me to pieces.

  You’ll be fast and smart and that won’t happen, Aella. I stroked the bracelet Osprey had given me, more grateful than ever for a way to know where he was. But then I shook my head. Every time I thought of him I saw mental images of him descending on us and ripping us to pieces with Os’s talons. That was not helpful. Think of something else. Anything else.

  “A knothole with a saw cut running through it!” Zayana gasped, pointing at what she’d seen.

  “I guess that would be common in any construction project.” I looked around at the rough job done on the walls.

  Her eyes narrowed.

  “But even so,” I said, trying to salve her hurt feelings, “you still saw it while you were looking for a sign.”

  She relaxed, running a hand through her long dark hair. Even now, it was smooth as a sheet.

  “It means broken ties,” she said, her face twisting like she was going to cry again.

  I held my tongue. Maybe she would just decide to join us if I let her interpret her signs. After all, ‘broken ties’ had to mean her ties to the Winged Empire.

  She gasped.

  I waited but eventually, my curiosity got the better of me. “What is it?”

  “Two ants caught in a spider’s web.”

  “What does that mean?” And how in the world could you go through life seeing signs in absolutely everything? You’d never get anything done!

  “Absolute loyalty. The binding of your heart to another’s.”

  Well, that sounded promising. She could break her ties to the Winged Empire and be a loyal revolutionary. I smiled and very cautiously, she joined me.

  “Thank you for sending Flame to rescue me from that awful place.” It was easy to sound genuine. “I wouldn’t have escaped without him.”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t rescue you. He was just supposed to look for you.”

  “Well, then I’m doubly blessed,” I pressed, but she looked uncomfortable at my gratitude.

  I was saved from this quagmire of shifting emotions by Wing Ivo opening the trap door above us and motioning for us to climb. I grabbed the ladder first and pulled myself up, forcing myself to ignore the stabbing pains through my belly where the Claws had kicked me. One day, I’d pay Juste back, blow for blow. I’d take his precious kingdom out from under him and free my people. And I’d escape the clutches of Osprey to do it.

  I felt a stab of guilt at that. Because though he would hunt us down and utterly destroy us, he didn’t want to. It was hard to fully blame a man for doing a thing he didn’t want to do to save the lives of other people. He was probably in more pain than I was after all the times he stabbed himself to try to distract Juste from me. And from that stab to his chest. I shivered at the memory of doing that to him and was grateful when Ivo’s weather-worn hand grabbed mine and helped me up into the room above. I needed the distraction. I could hardly bear to think of Osprey right now.

  “My friends will lend us horses,” Wing Ivo whispered as I looked around the small room. Tables were laid out with buckets and large barrows. The place smelled strongly of fish – both fresh and rotting. I fought against gagging. Ivo gave me a pleased smile and I returned it. “And they’ll provide us with supplies, since we are caught without them. Our hunter will expect us to flee into the Forbidding. It would make the most sense, since our skills are strongest in the wilderness, but we will not make this easy for him. We’ll flee into civilization, rather than out of it.”

  My heart sank at the thought. “Won’t there be more ways for us to be caught with so many Wings and Claws along the way?”

  “We’ll just have to be more careful than ever,” Wing Ivo said, helping Zayana up the last rung of the ladder into the fisherman’s wharf house. “Whatever you do, keep your voices down and your faces out of sight.”

  “I’m sick of constantly running from something,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “I want to run to something.”

  “One thing at a time, girl!” Ivo’s voice was a growl as he crept to the door and looked through the slats.

  “This general – the one with the two ravens. I want to find him,” I insisted. If I was going to keep from going crazy with worry, I needed a goal.

  “So did everyone for a few years. And then we all lost hope. Wherever he is, he’s passed our reach,” Wing Ivo said distractedly. “It’s been more than a decade since he was taken. Even if he lives, he is lost to us.”

  “He lives,” I said firmly. My visions of the Hissan had been real.

  “Then let him keep living – and let us keep living, too, and for that, we must flee.”

  “Osprey will catch us eventually,” I said, my belly rolling at the nerves that washed over me just from speaking my fears aloud. “It’s amazing that he hasn’t caught us already.”

  Ivo said nothing, but Zayana shifted her weight uncomfortably.

  “I want to have accomplished something before I’m dragged off to be married to the crown prince,” I said stubbornly.
r />   “Married?” Ivo’s head whipped around.

  “That’s what he said he’d do after he was done torturing me.” I couldn’t keep the acid out of my voice. “He wants my bees.”

  “You are the fiancée of Le Majest?” Zayana asked in awe.

  I shook my head. “I don’t want to be.”

  “But he said it was so?” she pressed.

  I shrugged, refusing to say it aloud. It would feel too real if I admitted it a second time.

  “Then you are,” she said, her eyes huge. She took a step back as if she was too nervous to be close to someone as honored as me. Juste should have chosen her. She would have given him all the respect and attention he craved.

  Ivo’s brow furrowed for a long moment, his eyes turning inward and then he nodded slowly. “If we want to find your general, we need to know where to look. I wasn’t there when he was taken and rumors are twisty things. Who knows where they have curved into lies? We’ll need to go read the records of the battle for Karkatua.”

  “Does that mean we need to go back to Karkatua?”

  “No. The records are kept in the city of Glorious Ingvar in the Oriole Monastery. We’ll have to go there.”

  The door swung open suddenly and a young man hurried in. “Master Alson says to put these on. Hurry.”

  He handed us dark cloaks – far too warm for the weather. I put mine on anyway, pulling the deep hood up to cover my face.

  We followed him out the door to where three horses were being hurriedly saddled. A man in fishing garb looked up, nodded sharply to Ivo, and then returned to his work as he spoke.

  “It’s all I could spare. Even the horses ... well, it’s a lot to ask, friend.”

  “By the time we are finished, there will be more asked,” Ivo said grimly. “We will all be asked for our blood – rich and red – and only those who pay in suffering will still stand.”

  His friend made a sad sound of agreement and then motioned to us to mount. “Be safe. Be fast.”