Wulmaer

Macsen was, sure enough, waiting for them in Odiana, on the other side of the vast Headsman’s Lake. As Wulmaer, Cassia, and Trefor alighted on the shore outside the inn, Macsen was already on the inn’s steps, waiting for them. He didn’t even appear winded, which could not be said for Wulmaer or Trefor. The two of them doubled over, the membranes in their wings pulsing as their lungs struggled for air. Even Cassia, whose wings were more adapted for long distances, had to spend several minutes in the courtyard, catching her breath.

Once they had recovered, Macsen got up and padded down the beach to them. Wulmaer looked at the easy way he walked and tried not to glare.

“The innkeeper told me there’s a Ganlin living nearby,” Macsen said, his pony-sized bulk glistening with sweat.

Well, Wulmaer thought with a little satisfaction, At least it wasn’t as easy on him as he tries to make it look.

“You started questioning already?” Trefor asked, a bit too sharply. He knew the bargain Wulmaer had made, and like most winged Dyrian, he resented the idea of being placed under a grounded. On the other hand, Cassia, whose place Macsen had usurped, seemed to take it in stride.

She walked up and patted Macsen’s sweaty back. “You get us a room, Macs?”

“Four of them,” Macsen confirmed.

Wulmaer looked up in alarm. “I only have so many sparks—”

“The innkeeper honors the old code,” Macsen said. “He houses us for free.”

The three winged Dyrian glanced at each other. “Wow,” Cassia finally said, glancing at Macsen. “How did you pull that off, Macs?”

The quadruped’s mouth fell open and drool began to accumulate on the sand beneath his heavy jaws. A little startled, Wulmaer realized that Macsen was grinning.

“I taught his dog not to run away,” Macs said. “Chased him back home a few times until he got the idea.”

Wulmaer frowned. “You had enough time to train the innkeeper’s pet?”

Macsen continued to drool into the sand, but his emerald eyes were glittering with mischief. “I’ve been here a day and a half. I was bored.”

“Bullshit!” Wulmaer roared. Then, at Macsen’s sober stare, he said, “Truly? A day and a half?”

“I didn’t sleep on the run here,” Macsen admitted. He sounded a bit guilty. He glanced at Cassia. “Sorry, Cass. I really wanted to come.”

She waved a taloned hand at him. “I knew you’d be here first, silly. Don’t sweat it.” She then turned her attention to preening, pulling wind-damaged feathers out from the group and linking the barbs back together, her bone-crushing mandibles smoothing them out with a gentleness that made Wulmaer blink every time he saw it.

“Tell us about this Ganlin,” Wulmaer said. “Can we reach him before dark?”

“The Ganlin’s dead,” Macsen said. “I tracked his body to a grave that had been dug in the woods behind his farm.”

“Missing a hand?” Wulmaer asked.

Macsen cocked his big head at him with a look that said, How did you know? “Yes.”

Wulmaer tightened his jaw until it hurt. “All right, that’s a place to start. Let’s get inside. Maybe the innkeeper will have noticed some strangers in town recently.”

The portly old man hadn’t, but his daughter had. She was approximately waist-height on Cassia and toddled to their table with her hands delicately balancing beer steins for the three winged Dyrian. For Macsen, she brought a bowl of what looked like milk.

“She thinks I’m a cat,” Macsen said, with a shrug. Then he proceeded to unabashedly lap it up, to the little girl’s delight.

Cassia noticed the name lovingly carved into the wooden dish. “Who is JimJim?” she asked.

The girl immediately teared up and looked away.

“JimJim was her cat,” Macsen said. “Died about the same time the Ganlin did.”

Wulmaer frowned and leaned toward the girl. At the counter, the innkeeper saw the motion and looked like he wanted to come intervene, then quickly went to find something else to do, wringing his hands like a nervous hen.

“Tell me,” Wulmaer said, taking her shoulder in a hand, “How did your cat die, little one?”

“The horse ate it,” the little girl whimpered.

Macsen spewed milk back into the bowl and looked up. “What?”

“The horse,” the girl repeated. “The strangers’ horse.”

Cassia gave Wulmaer a meaningful frown that said, Don’t overreact, she could mean something else... and said, “You mean the horse bit your cat, honey?”

“It ate it, it ate it, it ate it!” the girl screamed, stomping. Tears were running down her face, now. “It had teeth like him.” She poked a finger at Macsen.

“Gods,” Wulmaer whispered. “She’s talking about a tszieni.”

At the name, Macsen’s batlike ears flattened against his skull.

You know why they take the hand, don’t you, Wulmaer? Aderyn’s voice asked him again, her pretty face cocked in quiet meaning as she watched him.

To eat the soul, Wulmaer finished for her.

“Listen to me,” Wulmaer said softly, “Cassia, I need you to fly back to the Observer. Tell her what we’re dealing with.”

“Truly?” Cassia whispered. “In the flesh?”

“The hand was missing,” Macsen whispered.

Even Trefor looked shocked. “If every Ganlin fell prey to a tszieni—”

“We’d be dead already,” Wulmaer said. “They didn’t all fall prey to them. But a few of them did, and that’s enough.”

“And here I’ve been playing in the woods with the innkeeper’s dog,” Macsen said, his whole body tensed, as if he expected the soul-thief to gallop through the door at any moment. “No wonder it kept trying to run away.”

“Perhaps it’s still around,” Wulmaer agreed. “Dogs have better senses than we do. Trefor, find the innkeeper. Ask if any other humans have gone missing recently. Macsen, go outside and see if you can smell it—”

“I can’t.”

“And Cassia, I’m sorry dear, but you’re going to have to stretch those wings again. I want Aderyn informed by tomorrow afternoon, at the latest. If they killed enough Ganlins, they might make a run at the Citadel.”

“You think there’s more than one?” Cassia whispered, her glossy, antlike face twisting in worry.

Wulmaer thought back to the scrolls. “Including this one, there were at least three cases where the victim’s hands were missing. I believe if we find the other graves, we’ll find more. If they got to the Ganlins on the Slopes—”

“No,” Macsen interrupted. “The tszieni won’t walk on stone. That far in the mountains...the Ganlins up there were safe.”

“Perhaps that’s why they cut the line,” Cassia suggested.

“Perhaps that’s what killed the line,” Macsen amended. “One tszieni, trying to ford a weigh-line, would contaminate the whole branch.”

“Just like what happened,” Wulmaer murmured, remembering Aderyn’s report of diseased aspens.

Cassia looked pale. “Would it make it through?”

Wulmaer, who had seen one try, years ago, shook his head. “No. The aspens will protect their tenders.” He shook himself. “Besides, Trefor is right. The beasts won’t walk on stone. Ganlin Hall would have been free of tszieni.”

No one said what they were all thinking—free of tszieni, but not of Vethyles.

“Go tell Aderyn we’re diverting from our original plans to hunt down the tszieni that killed this Ganlin,” Wulmaer said. “Tell her she should send more teams to investigate the other disappearances. Teams with leaders that were alive to see the last outbreak in the war with Etro.”

“You think someone’s summoning them?” Cassia whispered.

“It’s possible,” Wulmaer said, his jaw clenching. “A natural one still survives. We never killed Pathenian.”

That night, Wulmaer couldn’t sleep. The human beds were too small and ill-formed, and Wulmaer hated sleeping on his stomach. Halfway through the night, he gave up and dragged the blankets off the mattress to pile them in the floor in one corner, but even curled into his customary ball, snout facing the door, Wulmaer couldn’t sleep.

In his mind, scenes of the last tszieni hunt haunted him. It had taken place in a backwoods area in Norfeld territory, as far from civilization as one could get. The locals had been just as afraid of the Auldhunds as they were of the monster that was eating their children and livestock. It had been laughable—and utterly sad.

Wulmaer could have saved many of their little ones, a dozen or more, if the locals had helped him. But every time he came to a homestead to ask directions or news, they reacted with knives and swords and bows, thinking him to be the killer. And, living as far as they were from civilization and its domesticated foodstuffs, their aim was good. He still had a scar under his rib where a huntsman’s arrow had punctured his side as he fled, almost skewering a lung.

Sighing, Wulmaer got to his feet and walked to the door, hating the way his talons clicked upon the hardwood with every step, sure it would wake his companions.

When he stepped out into the hall, however, Trefor and Macsen remained in their rooms. Cassia, as the strongest flyer amongst them, had begun her journey back to the Citadel that evening. Macsen’s door had a blanket propped in it, to keep the latch from closing on him.

Feeling a bit of pity for the handicapped Dyrian, Wulmaer walked past the open door and out into the inn’s common room. The fire had died down to coals and the candles had been snuffed. Though Wulmaer had decent eyes in the dark, he needed fresh air. He went to the door, then frowned when he found it propped open with a candlestick that had been laid on its side.

Pulling the door open, he found Macsen’s huge form sitting on the porch, staring out over the moonlit lake. “Auldhund.”

Wulmaer sighed, realizing that Macsen was staring out in the direction Cassia had taken that evening. Of all of them, Macsen had been the most vocal about his opposition towards sending her back alone.

“She was the best flier,” Wulmaer said, shutting the door behind him. “Trefor and I slowed her down on the way here.”

“She puts on a show,” Macsen said. “She was as tired as either of you.”

Wulmaer snorted, and Macsen turned to him, a silver stream of drool trailing from his huge jaws. “I worked with her for ten years on rounds.”

Wulmaer frowned, then glanced out at the bay. “You think she made it?”

“It’s not the lake I’m worried about,” Macsen said. “If it swallows the right soul, a tszieni can fly.”

Wulmaer glanced up at the sky, in reflex. “It would take a drake’s soul to give wings to something that big. Useable wings, anyway. All the drakes live in the mountains. Won’t come near rotted soil.” Then his breath caught.

“The Spyre holds a fire drake captive deep in its bowels,” Macsen said.

“It escaped,” Wulmaer whispered. “Two months ago.”