Tyle Sands -- page 6048

Excerpt fom Wolf-Speaker

***Daine meets Rikash when he comes to retrieve his friend and charge, Maura of Dunlath.***

Stormwings were landing on the ground in front of them. Three moved out of Daine's sight. Turning, she saw them settle on the road behind her, cutting off any escape. Coldly she leveled her weapon at the nearest Stormwing, a male who wore a collection of bones braided into his long blond hair.

He stared back at her, contempt in his eyes, then looked at the younger girl. "Tell her we mean no harm, Maura."

"You're on speaking terms with *them*?" Daine asked.

Maura shrugged. "They visit Yolane and Belden a lot. He is Lord Rikash."

"And *she* is a Stormwing killer," barked the snarl-haired brunette who had spoken to Tkaa the day before. "She slew one of our queens last year!"

"She tried to kill me," Daine snapped. "It was a fair fight - a lot fairer than she deserved!"

Rikash hopped around Maura and stepped near Cloud, looking her and her rider over with chilly green eyes. The mare had seen his kind before. While their scent of rotten meat and bad death hurt her nose, she had learned to stand fast when they were near. She eyed Rikash, small ears flat against her skull. Daine knew what was in the pony's mind: one more hop and he'd be in range for a bite.

Don't hit the feathers, Daine warned silently. They'll cut your mouth.

Don't teach your dam to nurse a foal, Cloud retorted.

"You are quick to judge us, Stormwing killer," Rikash snarled. "Too quick, for a human. You come from a race that spends more time murdering your own kind than do all the immortals put together, yet you insist you are better than us." He spat on the ground, and looked at Maura. "You cannot leave Dunlath, and you must not stay here. Come home. Yolane doesn't need to know you were away."

"You mean she hasn't noticed I'm gone," Maura said bitterly. "Has anyone?"

"That is unjust," the Stormwing replied, firmly and gently. "You know very well that the cook and your nurse are frantic that you've vanished."

"I left them notes. I told them not to worry."

There was something odd between these two, Daine realized. The immortal spoke to Maura with affection. That was impossible. Stormwings were cruel, heartless: she had enough experience of them to know that. Worse, Maura addressed Rikash as she might an older brother or an uncle.

Watching the immortals, Daine saw that she needed help. Starlings gathered with the coming of fall, to gossip and to migrate. Nearby she found three such flocks, each with over fifty birds, and called them to the trees and rocks around her before she looked again at Maura and Rikash. "Do you know what hissort do?" she asked the younger girl. "They befoul the dead who fall in battle. They live on human fear and anger. They're monsters!"

Maura shrugged thin shoulders. "They can't help how they're made, Daine."

"Maura" - Rikash shook his head - "you can't just run away from home. And you shouldn't encourage her," he told Daine. "You're old enough to know better."

"I already know better," retorted Maura.

Daine glared at the Stormwing. "I haven't been encouraging her. I tried to make her go back. You're the one with wings, you take her.

Maura sat on the ground, chin sticking out. "I won't go back, and you can't make me. They're traitors. I won't stay under the same roof with them. My father would haunt me all my life if I did."

"Let us talk of this out of the way of prying ears," Rikash said, an eye on Daine.

"We can speak of it now. Daine can't tell anyone. She's stuck here, too!"

"Quiet!" ordered the Stormwing. "You're a child. You do not understand what is taking place, and you must not speak of mattes you cannot comprehend."

Her sense of humor overpowering her hatred of Stormwings, Daine looked down so Rikash couldn't see her smile. Obviously he liked Maura, or he would have bullied rather than debated her. She could also see debate was useless. Maura had the bit between her teeth and would not obey orders. "Go on," she urged the fuming immortal. "Shut her up. I never thought to see you stinkers balked by anyone, let alone a ten-year-old."

Rikash turned red under his dirt, and a few of his own flock cackled. "It is hard for us to bear young," he said, a hint of gritted teeth in his voice. "That being the case, we value others' young, paticularly when they are neglected. Affection has led me to induldge Lady Maura more than is wise."

Maura sighed. "All right, Lord Rikash. I'll hush. Only, I'm not coming back with you. You don't have to tell them you saw me."

Rikash shook his head. "If you were mine, I would beat you," he said with grim resignation. He looked up at Daine, eyes sharp. "As for you-"

Daine grinned, and made a silent request of the starlings. They set up a clamor, flapping their wings and voicing painfully shrill, loud whistles. "Go on," she told Rikash, raising her voice to be heard. "Take me in. You might last two or three minutes in the air with my friends going for your eyes."

The Stormwings looked at the birds with alarm. Starlings, cowards and clowns alone or in small groups, were bullies in a flock. Their whistles alone made the immortals try unsuccessfully to cover their ears.

"The gods help you if I catch you in the open," Rikash snarled, flapping his wings. "Maura, you had better rethink your choice of friends!" The Stormwings took to the air as the starlings jeered and insulted them. Wheeling, the immortals flew straight at the barrier and passed through.

"But what about your friend?" Maura cried, grabbing Daine's arm. "It was him making the noise, wasn't it? They might hurt him!"

"I don't think so," said Daine, watching the barrier. There was a sound like a thunderclap. The Stormwings returned, covered with soot from claws to crown and reeking of onions. "They hate onions," Daine told Maura as they flew by, tears running down their faces as they sneezed frantically. "We found out last fall, when we helped mop up after Pirates raided Port Legann."

"Goddess bless," the younger girl breathed, watching the retreat until the Stormwings were no longer in view.

Dismounting from Cloud, Daine let the pony go ahead of them on the trail to the caverns. "I can't believe you *like* them," she muttered.