LE FAY Chapter One Excerpt
The setting summer sun cast the Northern Sea in ice-specked shades of gold. The ice creaked, cracked to pieces, groans tossed far by gale winds. The waves battered the black-rocked shore, frothy-white, the air smelling of cold and salt. Along the black shore spread a town, ever snow-bound, ever full of the songs of gryphons, refugees from the world over, chased there by wolves and the imperial hooves of unicorns.
The town’s name was Eishaven. Thick forests of pine, aspen, and beloved holly encroached upon the town from east and west. From the south barreled arrow-straight train tracks, a lifeline to the rich, warm lands of the United Zakarian Confederacy. Far to the west and southwest rose iron mountains of perilous heights. Many gryphons who did not fish in the ocean or hunt in the forests flew daily to the mountains and mined.
The sun loomed cloudless, half-hidden past the mountains. The waves crashed against the black shore, drew back, crashed again with a spray of water and ice and salt on the tongues of gathering crowds.
From the waters rose a Wolf-Lord, striding from waves to shore, bared fur white as the ice behind her, her hair a long sweep of fire down her back.
The Wolf-Lord raised the sword in her left hand, the black blade gleaming. At once, the three-tailed kitsune atop the gilded stage halfway between the sea and the crowds loosed a burst of fire from her hands. The flames enveloped the approaching Wolf-Lord for a moment, dispersed, the Wolf-Lord now dry, now dressed in black pants and shirt, black cape flowing to the side in a stout wind.
The crowd cheered.
Her step quickening, the Wolf-Lord, Princess Candida, joined her wife Shun on the stage, strode to the front as the kitsune drifted to the back to better work her illusion magics.
For a moment, Candida allowed herself to bask in the cheers. They were hard-earned cheers, earned with the blood and sweat of hard work, earned by two years of faithful living there among them, stranger and trespasser. There had been days she wasn’t sure she could overcome the weight of her heritage. Daughter of Queen Celeste of Romulus, outcast for her disabilities, branded criminal and traitor for saving innocent gryphons from slavery. But now, the town cheered.
“ONCE UPON A TIME!” Candida bellowed, her muzzle set in a grin as the crowd of gryphons, minotaurs, fellow Wolf-Lords, and the rare reptilian zakarian settled down in anticipation.
“Once upon a time,” Candida said again, not yelling, still loud enough for the whole crowd to hear, “far to the west of here, there was a sweet and beautiful valley, Featheren Valley. A land of gentle waters, of wild flowers, and of gryphon song!”
Alongside Candida’s words, Shun weaved blossoming illusions of green and gold across the stage, visions of a land known only in bittersweet memories.
“In this valley there lived a young and sprightly sparrow-gryphon. Kristoff! He was the son of a renowned hunter, but Kristoff wanted more from his life. He dreamed of adventure before his time, of accompanying his father south, to valley’s end and the dreaded, deadly Rotwald, most dangerous of forests!”
The green of the valley illusions faded, overtaken by the towering reds of the Rotwald. The crowd oohed, parents holding their children closer. Candida saw this and felt a familiar pang, ignored it, pushed on with her story.
“Kristoff, it should be known, was a petty troublemaker in his village. Lies came as easy as songs to his beak, and coins always seemed to find their way to his talons. It was no great surprise when one night, when his father was away north in a hunting party against the feral wyverns of the mountains, Kristoff stole his father’s spare crossbow and spear and went south. The journey was three days if taken on foot. Flying, as Kristoff did, heedless of being seen and tracked, it was half a day. He made it to the Rotwald with time to spare, thinking of nothing but the glory of returning home victorious, laden with the bounty of his solitary hunt.
“And oh, what bounties the Rotwald offered, to the dumb and unlucky! I could recount the beasts for days on end! Bears roamed the woods, big as houses. Fire-bees, stingers punching through even iron armor to burn the flesh within. Ghosts and devils, spiders the size of unicorns, trees come to life with the blood of the dead coursing through them. Kristoff, brave and foolish Kristoff, thought of none of this, marching on beneath the red-dappled leaves with spear forward and—”
KRAKABOOM.
A blast of noise and heat swept the air and rocked the stage from behind. Candida staggered and nearly dropped her sword. Shun swore viciously. The crowd stirred uneasily, uncertain if this was part of the show.
Candida turned to the sea, eyes widening. The gold and white of the Northern Sea at sunset was marred by rising smoke, thick and angry. Far out, a large passenger ship could be seen aflame, its masts rent apart and its long bow slowly, slowly but clearly, sinking closer and closer to the icy waters.
Shun swore again, more loudly. Candida shouted “KURT!”, ran for the rear of the stage as she did so, ears perking at the beat of wings drawing swiftly behind her. At stage edge she jumped, landed on the back of her crow-gryphon friend, was joined a split-moment later by Shun managing the maneuver somewhat more sloppily. “Shoot! Shoot, shoot, shoot!”
“I don’t have my steam rifle on me,” said Candida, shaking her head to get the trailing end of Kurt’s blue scarf out of her face. “Anyway, I don’t think shooting things is going to help with a sinking ship!”
Shun groaned. Kurt asked “Were we even expecting any ships today? Do you know it?”
“No,” said Candida, gaze locked ahead toward the steadily nearing ship. Her heart hurt with fear and the thrill of the disaster, and softly under her breath she recounted to herself all the life-saving measures she had taken on learning in her role as Eishaven’s sheriff.
As they drew closer, the ship was in even worse shape than Candida had expected. Fires raged across the bulk of it, the masts torn down and thrown to the waters. As Kurt brought them down for a landing, Candida saw bodies scattered across the deck, mostly gryphons and Wolf-Lords, all bearing the unmistakable signs of battle, a battle they had lost.
Shun jumped down from Kurt first, quelling the nearest flames with her Fire Elemental. Candida dropped down after her, stumbling as a blackened section of the deck buckled beneath her greater weight. She pulled her right foot free and looked up, waving Kurt away, to keep flying. “Go get more gryphons! We’ll look for survivors!”
“Yes, ma’am!” shouted Kurt, turning back to town as fast as his broad black wings could carry him. Candida stood there a moment, watching him go.
“I’ve almost got this,” said Shun, drawing Candida’s attention back to her more immediate surroundings as the last of the fires on the main deck died. “Come on!”
The slow sinking of the ship continued, the slant of the deck beneath their feet growing gradually more noticeable as they made their careful way toward the rear. Shun checked each body they passed, finding no luck with any of them. The captain’s quarters were demolished, blood splashed across the scorched walls and shattered desk.
“What a fight,” remarked Shun. Candida gave no reply.
Below deck, they found more bodies, more dead. They split up to quicken the search, Shun remaining there, Candida wading down to the next and lowest hold. She found down there an overwhelming aura of death. The waters there, freezing cold, were cloudy with blood and worse. The stench of blood and gunpowder clung heavy with each breath. In the dim light of dying spell-charged lanterns, Candida saw twin rows of gryphon beds run for half the length of the hold, the other, far half taken up by a large wooden table and several crates. With the tilt of the ship, these had all piled up in the farthest corner.
Candida steeled herself and waded farther into the hold, pushing away a burnt cardinal-gryphon floating beak-down in the water. “Hello?” she called out, eyes narrowed as she peered through the dark. “Hello! Is there anyone here alive!? I’m here to help! Hello!”
From somewhere, Candida’s ears picked up a noise, muffled, almost inaudible over the rush of waters and creak of wood. Candida paused, listened for the noise to repeat itself, ears straining desperately for any sign of life.
Thump.
Fear lent speed. Candida turned and fell to her knees, teeth gritting as the waters reached up to her chest in her new position. Frantic hands ran across the floor, claws catching on the edges of a carefully hidden compartment below where the table had once been. Immediately, Candida dug her claws in and pulled, tearing the compartment’s door off.
A moment later, a pinto unicorn filly burst out of the water, kicking and whinnying in her panic to breathe and keep afloat. “Mommy!”
Candida stared for a long, dumbfounded moment, a unicorn the last sort of creature she had expected to find, young or old. A sudden crash of breaking wood from somewhere near spurred her back into motion, scooping the panicking unicorn filly into her arms and standing. In panic, the unicorn struggled, hooves kicking into Candida’s sides and the dagger-like horn jabbing unnervingly close to her right eye. “Calm down, oh God, calm down! It’s okay, I’m getting you out of here! I’ve got you and I’m getting you out—”
Another crack of breaking wood from somewhere in the ship, heavier and louder, the groan of a stressed hull reaching its limit. Candida squeaked out Shun’s favorite curse, weathering the unicorn filly’s renewed struggles as she waded through the now-swiftly rising waters back to the stairs. By the time she reached them, the waters had risen to the middle of her chest even when standing to her full height, the sheer cold of the water slowing her further.
“Shun!” she cried out, struggling up the steps to the next deck. She looked about, grimacing with the sudden light of still-burning fires after the chilly gloom down below, saw nothing through the haze of smoke but the shadows of barrels and stacked cargo, dangling ropes, roasting bodies dead where they fell. The heat of the fires burnt at her muzzle, but her feet felt only an encroaching cold as the rising waters chased her and the unicorn filly up. “Shun, where are you!?”
“Candy!” A new shadow emerged from the fires’ haze, resolving into Shun struggling along while supporting the weight of a tan-furred minotaur a full head taller than her. The kitsune looked back and forth between their respective survivors for a moment, grimaced. “Wanna trade?”
The rising waters reached Candida’s knees, Shun’s upper thighs. Candida passed the unicorn over, taking one of the minotaur’s arms over her shoulders and guiding him along toward the stairs, to fresh air and safety. As he leaned on her more and more for support, she grit her teeth and took him into a bridal carry.
Outside, the horizon burned with the sunset. The lingering ship fires blazed all the brighter for the growing dark around them. Overhead, doing their best to avoid the smoke, Kurt had returned, circling alongside a pair of goose-gryphons. Without a word they flew down to help. One of the goose-gryphons took Shun and the unicorn filly, now merely hanging limp and breathing hard in the kitsune’s arms, onto his back, immediately taking off back to town. Candida huffed, shoved the minotaur up onto the other goose-gryphon’s back, only noticing after his departure the horrid warmth of his blood across her side and along her arms. She stood there on the sinking ship, frozen by the smell, the sensation of it, wondering at the minotaur’s wounds and what could have caused them.
“Candida!” Kurt shouted, almost right in her ear as he landed beside her. “Hurry, now!”
The shout jarred Candida back to herself. Shaking her head, she turned and swung onto Kurt’s back with practiced ease, looked around the ship one last time to be certain, absolutely certain, they were leaving no other survivors behind. But she saw no one else but the dead. With a press of her heels into his sides, Kurt rose, swiftly putting the ship behind them as he flew for the shore, for Eishaven, for home. In the falling dark, Candida clung close against his back and worried.