He rasped out, “Are you going to kill me?” He didn’t think he was asking a lot. He was dying anyway, and they would have to leave soon; the least they could do was not leave him for the Dwei or the desert scavengers.
“It’s a thought.” Pearl turned her head to look down at him. She was in Aeriat form, the light catching the brilliant gold of her spines. “You’ve caused us enough trouble. It’s either kill you or make you pay for it in clutches.”
“Pick one and get it over with.”
She cocked her head. “But it doesn’t occur to you to call out for Jade.”
“There’s no one out there. The others are dead.” Then Moon thought, Wait, where am I?
Pearl frowned, laying the back of her hand against his cheek. “Merit, go and wake Heart.”
That was when Moon gave up trying to talk. Even he could tell that what he was saying didn’t make sense, and it hurt too much to make the effort.
The next time he was really aware of anything, it was daylight again, and he heard Chime shouting, “Stone’s here!”
Good, Moon thought. Stone was practical. I can talk him into killing me.
But the next person to lean over him was Flower. Her hair was tangled and wild, as if she had let Stone carry her in groundling form. She cupped her hands around his face and said, “Moon, it’s all right. Just relax.”
This time when he sank into darkness, it was deep and silent.
Moon dreamed he was swimming in a black sea, too far under, trying to find the surface. Something in the darkness below grabbed his ankle and yanked him down, and the dream-jolt made him twitch awake. Blinking at the dusty ceiling, he took a sharp breath, braced for pain. It came, but not in the overwhelming wave he vividly remembered.
His left arm was bent and strapped across his chest; not moving it the least little bit seemed a very good idea. His shoulder and collarbone alternately throbbed and burned, like hot metal buried beneath his skin, and the ribs on that side stabbed him every time he took a breath. His skin felt dry and too hot. His clothes were soaked with sweat. Carefully, he moved his feet, and bent one leg a little. That was probably a good sign.
“Moon, you’re awake?”
That was Flower, sitting nearby. It was reassuring that he hadn’t imagined her earlier. He wet his lips. “Sort of.” His voice still sounded pitifully weak.
“You’ve been in a healing sleep for the past three days.” Flower laid a cool hand on his forehead. It felt so good he closed his eyes again. Then she said, “We’re getting ready to leave. The flying boats are here.”
He blinked. “Our flying boats?”
“Yes. Niran is steering one, and he showed Blossom how to steer the other.” She brushed the hair back from his forehead. “When Stone woke up and was able to shift, he thought it best to get the court away from the colony as quickly as possible. We loaded everyone onto the two boats, with as much of our supplies as we could salvage. Fortunately the Arbora had already started to get ready to leave before the Fell attacked. Most of the really necessary tools and things were packed in baskets in the lower part of the colony. Stone and I came ahead to see if you all had found the stolen Arbora yet.”
Moon could hear the wind outside, wailing through the hollows of the ruin. “What about the Dwei? I thought they were going to attack us.”
“Stone persuaded them not to,” Flower said, with irony in her voice.
From somewhere behind him, Chime said, “Actually he told them they could leave us alone and we’d be gone in a few days, or he could tear what was left of their hive apart and kill them all.” Chime moved into view, looking around the room. His clothes were dusty and his cheek was smeared with dirt. “Are we ready to go?”
“Very ready,” Flower told him. She pulled a leather pack into her lap, sorting through it. “Is Jade on her way?”
Moon took a deep breath and rolled onto his good arm. His back protested with a stabbing sensation that took his breath away. When the room swam back into focus, he heard Flower say in exasperation, “Moon, what are you doing?”
“I’m sitting up.” Gritting his teeth, he levered himself into a sitting position with his good arm. Oh, that hurts. Bones ground against each other in ways they weren’t meant to, his vision went dark, and his stomach tried to turn. After a moment the wave passed, and he swayed, but managed to stay upright. He let out his breath, careful not to jostle his ribs. It felt odd to be sitting up, and he remembered Flower had said something about three days. The room was bigger than he had thought, with an arched doorway that looked out onto an open court strewn with rubble. The wind stirred the drifted sand up into whirling patterns.
Chime hovered over him anxiously. “Just stay still! Jade will be here any moment.”
That was the point. Moon wanted to prove he could walk to the boats, even if he would need help to get up into one. He just hoped the boats were very, very close.
Then Jade landed in the sandy court with Vine, Floret, and Song. She folded her wings, stopped in the doorway to shake the sand off her scales, then strode into the room. She looked at Moon and demanded, “Why is he sitting up?”
Flower told her pointedly, “Because he’s a bit too delicate at the moment for me to wrestle with.” She pulled a folded drape of fabric out of the pack and handed it to Jade.
“I was going to walk to the boats,” Moon said, feeling as if things were moving too fast for him. He couldn’t see any remnant of the scratches Ranea had left on Jade’s arms and chest.
“Of course you were.” She knelt, shaking out the drape and carefully wrapping it around his shoulders. It was soft, and the scent of sweet herbs was trapped in the folds. “Put your arm around my neck.”
He did, threading it through her spines. She slipped an arm under his legs, gathered him gently against her and stood up. She carried him out to the court, and murmured, “Brace yourself.”
He tightened his hold on her neck and set his jaw. The jolt as she took to the air made him suck in a breath, but the flight was brief, and the light thump as she landed on the deck didn’t hurt. He caught a glimpse of the fan-sails, tightly folded up against the mast, and a crowd of Arbora milling around on the deck. Claws scraped wood as they hurried to clear a path for Jade. As she carried Moon down the narrow stair below deck, he heard Niran yell instructions about casting off.
She took him into the nearest cabin and carefully put him down on a pallet of silk blankets and cushions. It was wonderfully soft, if not as warm as the sand in the ruin. The ceiling and walls were dark wood, rubbed fine until the grain showed. Glowing moss was stuffed into a clear glass lamp meant to hold a candle, and baskets, the tightly-woven ones used at the colony for storage, were packed in against the walls, taking up much of the space. Jade crouched next to him, arranging the blankets. He said, “You know the Fell came to Indigo Cloud for me.”
Jade shook her head. “Don’t worry about that.”
That wasn’t exactly an answer, and he tried to muster the strength to pursue it, but Flower came into the cabin, telling Jade, “Everyone’s aboard, and they’ve gotten the water casks refilled.” The boat trembled and swayed, and she caught hold of a basket to steady herself.
Jade bared her teeth. “If that was the Dwei, I’m going to tear their—”
Chime ducked into the cabin, dumping an armload of leather packs atop a basket. “That was Stone, trying to land on the boat without knocking the mast down.”
“I need to be up there.” Jade touched Moon’s face. “Rest.”
As if he had a choice. He watched her leave the cabin, taking the stairs up to the deck in one bound. The brief exertion of sitting up and then being carried here had already exhausted him, made him feel as if he was trapped under water again, fighting the weight of the moss nets. He managed to ask, “The boats are going to the new colony?”