if it’s required.”
“What a clever, intelligent idea. I’m certain it’s one that would never have occurred to any of your commanding officers on their own.”
Kaylin kissed corporal goodbye for another promotion cycle.
“Join the Barrani in their inspection,” he continued. “If you notice anything out of the ordinary, report it immediately. To me,” he added.
Marcus was not going to like that.
* * *
Severn met her in the office as she headed to the front doors, and fell in beside her. She filled him in as she jogged. He stopped to unwind his weapon chain. When spinning, it was proof against a lot of magic. Among other things. He caught up as she hit the streets. The Barrani had clearly been alerted by mirror before she’d made it down the Tower stairs. Teela was there, as was another of the human women—Rakkia. Tain and Rakkia’s partner stood back, armed and silent.
Teela met Kaylin’s eyes, shook her head slightly. Rakkia said, more pragmatically, “I see nothing.” She stepped out of the way as Kaylin approached the Aerians and stopped.
“What—what did you do?” she whispered at her familiar. She might have shouted, but for the moment, shock had robbed her voice of strength.
The familiar crooned. He set a wing, gentle this time, against her eyes.
She saw nothing at all out of the ordinary. No Shadow. No weird nets. No strange armor. But she saw normal wings. The familiar lowered his wing, and she saw very damaged wings. She’d seen Aerian wings take injury before. This was nothing like that.
“Kitling.”
Ignoring this, she poked the familiar, who lifted his wing again, sighing loudly enough to tickle her ear. The familiar then lowered his wing as she approached the Aerians. They were male, and given their build, younger than most of the Aerian Hawks; they hadn’t developed the training muscles the Hawks had. They were shades of brown, paler than Clint, and their eyes were decidedly blue, but no surprise there.
They were conscious, but mostly silent, except for weeping. The weeping made them seem younger than they probably were; they huddled together in pain. Or in terror. She wanted them to be terrified for one long minute. She was certain that the net they’d carried would have done Bellusdeo or Moran no good whatsoever.
But she’d always had a problem with tears.
“They’ve spoken some Aerian.”
“Anything intelligible?”
“Yes and no.” She glanced at the Aerians who were almost literally hovering on the periphery of a wide circle. “They’re terrified. They’re begging us not to take their wings. More or less. I didn’t understand the last phrase. Clint translated.”
Kaylin cringed.
“Half the Hawks are disgusted.” By which she meant the Aerian Hawks, because the Barrani Hawks were clearly all disgusted. “Are they clean?”
Kaylin hesitated.
“You’d better be certain they’ve got no magic on them,” Teela said. “And soon. The Hawklord is probably going to descend any minute now, and he’s not in the mood to have to wait for answers.”
“He told me to report to him directly if there was a problem.”
“Yes. Directly will be to his face in probably three minutes or less.”
* * *
Kaylin took advantage of the three minutes, focusing on her work. She did find time to utter a loud Leontine phrase, but that was as natural as breathing. The familiar squawked at her, and she sighed. “Yes, please.”
He obligingly lifted one wing in what was almost a caress. Or a sympathetic pat on the head. He covered only one eye. She looked through both, closing one or the other as it became necessary.
In winged view, the Aerians looked normal. They were obviously in some pain, but given what they had probably been attempting, she considered that deserved. It was the unwinged view that was disturbing. They were missing feathers. They were missing some essential parts of their winged anatomy. She didn’t know very much about the anatomy of wings, but these ones didn’t appear to be recently injured. There’s no way they could have flown with them. “Clint.”
He came to her, wary now. She hated it. She understood it—he’d made it perfectly clear—but she hated it. It made her aware of the vast gulf that separated them; the Hawk they wore wasn’t enough to bridge it. Not today.
“Can they fly?”
He looked at the ruins of their wings. “In an emergency, they could land,” he finally said. “They cannot fly.” But his expression was shuttered; it was wrong. There was pity, yes, but something else, as well.
She studied their wings through the wing of the familiar. She looked at the feathers, the ridges of their wings, the things that were missing in this world. She turned to look back at Clint; he looked the same when viewed through either eye.
Frowning, she asked, “Clint—could they ever fly?”
“...I’m not a doctor. But no. No, I don’t think so.”
Kaylin glanced up at Teela. “I wish Mandoran were here.”
“You’ve lost your mind,” Tain snapped. He might have said more, but Teela turned to look at him, and he fell silent. If it was a grudging silence, it didn’t matter.
“I believe he sees what you see. It’s not, however, standard magic.”
Bellusdeo, silent until then, said, “It is Shadow magic.”
* * *
Teela was right. The Hawklord landed five seconds later. He barely glanced at Teela, but did demand a report. The Barrani Hawk’s voice was toneless as she described the events she’d personally seen. Since she’d more or less seen nothing until the familiar had taken to the sky, her part was pretty simple. But the Aerians had appeared shortly thereafter, struggling to stay aloft, all thoughts of possible assassination or capture forgotten in their desperation to touch down the right way.
The Hawklord approached them.
The two huddled together like frightened children. “How,” he demanded, “were you able to fly?” He spoke in Aerian, his voice a crack of brief thunder. His eyes were blue; they matched the eyes of his prisoners.
The prisoners remained silent, their wings—what remained of them—drawn tightly to their backs in either fear or deference. Or both, since one was often a product of the other. It was clear that they had no intention of answering.
“What is your flight?”
Silence again. Other Aerians had joined the Hawks on the ground, and one or two were looking at the prisoners the way Clint had—but not all of them. Interesting. Clint knew, or thought he knew. But so did the Hawklord. She wondered how political this was all going to get.
“Are they a threat in their present
