Earthbound, p.12
Earthbound, page 12
“And leaving where?”
“In the beginning, they moved up and down the edge of the Reaches, but recently they have been driving inland,” Syracuse said.
“They moved quickly at first, no doubt aided by the deep soil here and proximity to the Tumult, but they slowed as they moved inland. Earthbound this size naturally avoid the deep-rooted forests and land with a soul of bedrock,” Una added.
Knox nodded absently, wrapping his mind around the information. It was an invasion, the earthbound the leading edge to soften any defences clusters had. “Have you heard word from any of the other coastal clusters?”
Una sucked in wrinkled cheeks. “Our communications went down over a month ago, before the first Tumultians arrived. Since then, we have heard nothing from the clusters to the south, but to the north, Cypress was destroyed.”
Cypress marked the northernmost point of the Mercurial coast. Knox frowned, confused. “As in occupied like Beryl?”
Syracuse hands flexed into fists and his young face hardened. “They set fires to the surrounding forest, hemming it in. The whole cluster burnt to the ground. A handful of people escaped and found their way here.”
Una shook her head, grey hair falling free from the knot tied at her neck. “Too few. It was a massacre.”
If the Tumultians wanted to take a cluster or two along the border, their job was done, but to wipe out a prosperous cluster of the region spoke to another motivation entirely.
“How large is their force?” he asked.
Syracuse and Una shared a look, and she shook her head. “It’s difficult to get accurate numbers. They keep moving troops in and out of the area.”
“We’ve been kept busy trying to gather supplies and have had to cut down our number of scouts watching them.” Syracuse explained, looking chagrined.
“I’m going to need to see this for myself.”
“We could get you in close,” the younger man said eagerly, straightening his shoulders. “How soon?”
“As soon as possible.”
A flicker of concern swept across the creased features of the older woman. “For what purpose?”
The question surprised him. “I need to give the Order an accurate report.”
She raised a greyed brow. “Even if you get all the answers you need and leave today, help from the Order would be months away. Without supplies, we will be in a sorry state by then.”
“Months? The trip can’t be more than a couple weeks.”
Syracuse shifted uneasily. “We have not been able to secure any craft. They leave too distinct a track to use around here. We’ve been moving exclusively on foot.”
Knox rubbed at his beard, untrimmed hair feeling unruly beneath his hand, and looked around the platformed camp. As ingenious as the design was, they were surrounded in the heart of what was now enemy territory. “If we get enough craft, we could evacuate everyone all at once up into the mountains.”
As if the two were one, both Una and Syracuse’s expressions dropped into a frown at the statement.
“We will not leave. This is our land, our home,” Syracuse said.
Una patted his arm proudly. “The boy is right. We are bound to this soil. Leaving is not an option.”
“What do you want from me then?” Knox asked. “I cannot fight off an entire Tumultian army, and without support from the Order, we cannot free your cluster. How will you survive in the coming days? Your movements will become more and more restricted until they find you or you starve.”
Una tipped her chin defiantly. “We are preparing. Winters here are mild, and even now we are adding insulated rooms where we can gather in the cooler months. I have no doubt the Sky sent you to us to help keep these people safe and alive.”
His stomach knotted. His next steps always seemed so clear to those who didn’t hold the oaths. He couldn’t leave them to starve while he ran home, but neither could he stay here indefinitely. The Order needed to be warned of what was coming. Other clusters would need his help. The answer came in a flash of inspiration. “I need a craft to return to the Order, and you need supplies.”
Syracuse’s eyes lit with fresh fire. “A raid!”
“It would put lives at risk,” Knox cautioned. “If we are smart about it though, we can do everything to ensure the camp stays safe.”
Una smiled approvingly, to his relief not pressing for a greater commitment, and looked to Syracuse. “Send out the word to the scouts and have all but those we need for defence come in.”
“It will be a couple days before we can reach them all,” Syracuse warned.
Una waved a hand in the air as if the time were meaningless. “We will set the raid for four days from now, if it agrees with the Overseer.”
The idea immediately chafed. They didn’t have time to waste and yet—his eyes rested on the young man’s eager expression—he would need all the time he could get to prepare this group for a raid. Knox nodded and Syracuse gave a quick bow before he ducked from the room.
Una pushed herself up with a groan and turned back to Knox. “Enough talk for now. Let’s go check on your friend.”
She led him through a maze of walkways and finally around a large tree trunk jutting through the floor and pushed aside a curtain that separated another set of walled-in spaces. Loghin lay atop a bed of cedar boughs and was neatly tucked in with a colourful blanket. Una fussed over him for a moment and then waved Knox closer.
“Knox,” Loghin croaked, “you’re back.” His eyes drifted over Knox’s stained tunic. “Took care of ‘em, I see.”
His features were pale and eyelids heavy. It was a miracle he was still conscious. “How did they get you up here?”
Una’s eyes flashed with a mischievous glint. “We made him ride the supply pulley. He howled like a stranded fox kit.”
“It’s a flat panel—no rails or edges. One wrong move and I would’ve tipped clear off,” Loghin said, defensive. “That might’ve been the most terrifying moment of my life.”
A grin broke through Knox’s worry. “More than being swallowed by an earthbound?”
“Let’s call it a tie,” Loghin said, a wry chuckle breaking through before turning to a thick-sounding cough.
Knox sobered. “We’re going to be here for a little while. We need a craft and this cluster needs supplies. I’m hoping a raid will provide both.”
“You going alone?”
“Ideally—”
Una clucked from the corner. “Of course he’s not. Our best scouts will join him.”
Loghin caught his eye, and Knox saw the same hesitation he felt—those stranded here in the treetops were not trained to fight.
“We are at war,” he said quietly. It didn’t ease the guilt he felt at allowing those unprepared to join him, but it shifted Loghin’s expression.
“That changes things.”
Knox nodded. “We need to shore up things here and get back to the Capital. The Order needs to be warned. The Tumultians are beginning to push inland.”
“They know how to not attract attention; Tumultians are spies first,” Una said quietly. “The earthbound will be their first attack. They will not march in big, loud waves until they are certain the battle is already theirs.”
“It’s only going to get worse for those in Rikken,” Loghin said.
A weight settled onto Knox’s chest. “As soon as we have a craft, we will head back to warn them. Hopefully we can get there in time to keep them from any further harm.”
“And if not, Tehran is there,” Loghin offered.
A cool breath of relief rushed through Knox. He would owe his friend far more than a drink by the time he returned home. Thoughts of Emilia, her face framed by her dark curls and her brown eyes catching the lamplight stole his breath. Fear for her made his blood pump and he could feel the flush of power fill his limbs. Tehran is there, he echoed to himself, and forced his hands to relax. This was the heart of their oaths; they would both serve those who needed them.
Knox swallowed, pushing his worry aside and fixed Loghin with a firm stare. “Rest up. I need you fit to travel in less than a week.”
A snort sounded from the corner, as Una expressed her thoughts on the matter. Eyes drifting closed, Loghin’s mouth widened into a faint grin. “I’ll do my best, Overseer.”
Whether Sky Above
Emilia
Emilia lay under a bench seat in the rear cabin of Tehran’s hovercraft with her head resting on a small travel sac. Something in her had snapped at her mother’s confession. She’d packed a bag, scratched out a note, and escaped through her bedroom window unseen. With only minutes to spare, she managed to slip into the back of the transport.
Now hours later, laying on the dusty floor of the utilitarian hovercraft, with the smell of oil and metal in her nose, her mother’s defence of the Order still soured her stomach. Their hold over those who served under them was sickening. When Knox first told her he was laying down his oaths, Emilia attributed it to outdated dogma pressuring him, but the more she learned the more she wondered. Tehran’s account had made it feel personal. Calculated. The Order wanted to remove anything that could possibly hold more sway over an Overseer than their vows. Her mother’s confession only served as further confirmation. They leveraged body and soul to control hearts and mind. This is the true nature of the Order.
Her jaw clenched in muted anger, and she imagined confronting the Elders, charging them as complicit in Knox’s death. The facts would condemn them. Knox never failed the Sky in word or action. They stole his gift even as he continued to serve, sacrificing his own life. Emilia’s breath caught, and she clamped her thoughts down like a tourniquet. Think of something else. Not that.
She’d seen fear in her mother’s eyes and an edge of worry gnawing at Tehran. Neither would admit to distrusting the Order, but they both felt it in their gut that something was off in the Reaches. If they weren’t free to find the answers, blinded by their oaths as they were, she would. With such thoughts swirling to the steady hum of the vehicle, exhaustion pulled her back into sleep.
◆◆◆
“Stones, are you kidding me, Em? What are you doing here?”
Emilia opened bleary eyes to Tehran’s silhouette filling the cabin’s back door. She pushed out from under the bench, stiff from sleeping on the hard floor. Her stomach cramped and she cringed as he held out a hand to her.
“I couldn’t stay—” The rest of her sentence was cut off as he pulled her forward and she was crushed against his chest in a bear hug. Her feet found the ground a few moments later as he released her with a shake of his head.
“I should’ve known you’d find a way. You rode in the back this whole time?”
She straightened. “Well I didn’t fly in halfway.”
A relieved smile broke across his face at the sarcasm. “You okay?”
She stretched carefully and groaned. “I will be. Where are we?” She looked around at their surroundings in the dusky light. They were stopped on a rocky knoll with a few scraggly trees that spotted an area not much larger than their craft. Low, stilted buildings sat in irregular patterns down below them in a wide valley, but none were lit with the soft glow of artificial light.
“Outside of Arris.”
Emilia’s eyes caught on a crackling fire and a small cook station set up. The transport he’d commandeered for the trip was slightly larger than the courier craft used in the cluster. It had storage built into the exterior as well as the back cab where she’d hidden. “How long have we been stopped?”
“Not long.”
She rubbed at her face and gathered her hair, pulling it back into a loose braid. “Are we going further tonight?” she asked, trying to hide the fatigue she felt. For having slept, she felt no better for it.
Tehran eyed her and opened a side panel on the cab. “No. I was going to make myself something to eat and then crash. I didn’t get any sleep last night and not much the night before. I’m starting to feel a little thin.”
Emilia took in his familiar features. His amber eyes under heavy brows still flashed with strength, but grey rings betrayed the truth—he was pulling on his power to stay awake. Stubble was turning to a short beard. Time marched over grief with quick strides.
I’m not the only one trying to keep up appearances.
“How long are you going to keep this?” she asked and teasingly poked at his cheek. “I’ve never seen you with so much as a shadow before you got fed up with it.”
He gave a listless shrug and pulled some more gear from a side panel in the craft. “I don’t know. It feels right, somehow. A way to remember—”
He trailed off and they both grew silent. Knox’s short beard was easily a defining feature. Tehran fidgeted uncomfortably with the clasp on the bag he held.
“I like it.” She forced the smile to touch her eyes and moved to help free the stuck buckle. The buckle popped open under her touch.
He gave her a half-hearted smile. “I know it’s an empty gesture, but I needed something to keep him close.”
She pressed her lips tight and nodded, not trusting her voice.
Tehran turned with a cough and shifted the conversation. He pulled out another collapsable stool and dropped it before the fire. “You sit and I’ll make you dinner.”
Emilia didn’t have it in her to argue. She moved to the fire’s gentle warmth and sat.
Once the lentils were warming over the fire, his amber eyes found hers. “What are you doing here, Em?”
She looked towards the night sky. The brightest stars peeked through thin clouds sparking chirps from dusk beetles. “I couldn’t sit there with my mother hovering over me with that worried expression for a moment longer.”
He accepted the explanation without comment and dished her up a small bowl of the spiced beans. They ate together in an easy silence. Once the meal was cleaned up, Tehran handed her some bedding and pulled out a second set and threw it onto the roof of the hovercraft. With an easy leap, he followed.
Emilia gave him a confused look.
“I can keep an eye on things from up here. You can sleep in the cab.”
A twinge of guilt gave an uncomfortable pinch as she watched him unroll his bed. She hadn’t even considered the inconvenience her presence would cause. Tehran didn’t even have the decency to act annoyed. She opened the back and made up her own bed before returning to the fire. “Will the Order help?”
“Of course they will,” he said too quickly.
“Tehran—honestly.”
He dropped to the ground and joined her at the fire, before letting out a long breath. “I know they can; I’m worried if they will. We have evidence of a threat to the Reaches, but whether it is seen as a threat to the Mercurial remains to be seen.”
“So much for the Order protecting the innocent.”
Tehran frowned. “Protecting the innocent is our responsibility as Overseers. Protecting the Mercurial is the responsibility of the Elders. We have different vows.”
“I didn’t know that.”
He pursed his lips, gave her an apologetic look. “I shouldn’t have said anything. I always say too much around you.”
A familiar knot of disappointment lodged in Emilia’s throat. Secrets upon secrets surrounded her. “My mother was an Overseer.”
Tehran looked up, surprised. “Maven?”
Emilia couldn’t help but laugh. “No, my other mother.”
Tehran didn’t seem as amused by her joke. “She told you this?”
“Right before I left,” Emilia sighed. “I think she was trying to help me understand what Knox went through, but all I could think was that she’s been lying to me all this time.” And I climbed out a window like a child.
His brow creased, worried. “What did she say exactly?”
“Exactly? Nothing. She wouldn’t say anything outright. She left it to me to fill in the blanks.”
“She didn’t tell you anything she shouldn’t have?” His voice was low but earnest.
She frowned and thought of Maven’s response to her questions. “I don’t think so. She was hesitant.”
He sucked in a deep breath and looked to the sky, obviously relieved. “Good.” He turned back to her, looking uncharacteristically serious. “Knox warned you about guarding the secrets we hold about the Order, right?”
Emilia huffed a sigh but nodded. Part of being bound to an Overseer was swearing to protect their secrets. “Of course, but I don’t see what—”
“Em, believe me. We are going to the Capital. You cannot breathe a word of your mother. Not of anything you think you know or your opinions on the Order. You understand?”
Her heart quickened at his intensity. This serious version of Tehran was hard to reconcile with the light-hearted man she knew.
“Okay,” she said. “But why—”
“It’s dangerous. The Capital is not like the Reaches. The Order will expect you to have some knowledge because of your bond with Knox, but it’s safer if you feign ignorance as much as possible.”
Annoyance flared and Emilia narrowed her eyes. “How am I supposed to know what’s allowed if you don’t tell me?”
“Assume you are allowed to know nothing.”
She crossed her arms. “This is ridiculous. I’m not going to pretend to be some oblivious sycophant.”
He pressed his head into his hands. “Oh Skies, Em. You can’t talk like that. Knox would wring my soul if anything happens to you.” He looked back up at her with a face drawn into a pleading expression. “You have to understand how the Order works. Oaths leave little room for mercy.”
“I know how the Order works.”
“No, you don’t.” His jaw flexed as he searched for the words. “The most lenient, gracious punishment the Order doles out for failing to uphold oaths is what Knox experienced. Humiliation, expulsion, and stripping an Overseer of all strength. This is mercy.”
Clearly he hoped to scare her, but his words only served to infuriate her further. The Order could take their magnanimity and shove it up their overly-rigid hindquarters.
“I will not go to the Elders playing the fool.”
Tehran’s face paled. “The Elders? Emilia—you can’t. You have to be oath-bound for an audience with them.”
