“You think the Elves had something to do with it.” She made it a statement of fact.
Tiger Ty pursed his lips thoughtfully. “I have to think that. It has to have something to do with their recovery of the magic—their return to the old ways. They wouldn’t say so, wouldn’t admit to a thing, the few I talked to. Ten years ago, that was. More, I guess. They claimed it all had something to do with the volcano and the changes in the earth and climate. Imagine that.”
He smiled disarmingly. “That’s the way it is, you know. Nobody wants to tell you the truth. Everybody wants to keep secrets.” He paused to rub his chin. “Take yourself, for instance. I don’t suppose you want to tell me what happened back there at the Wing Hove, do you? While you were waiting for me to spy your fire?” He watched her face. “See, I’m pretty quick to pick up on things. I don’t miss much. Like your big friend over there, all bandaged up the way he is. Scratched and marked from a fight, a recent one, a bad one. You have a few marks yourself. And there was a dark scar on the rocks, the kind made from a very hot fire. Wasn’t where the signal fire usually burns and it was new. And the rock was scraped pretty bad a place or two. From iron dragging, I’d guess. Or claws.”
Wren had to smile in spite of herself. She regarded Tiger Ty with newfound admiration. “You’re right—you don’t miss much. There was a fight, Tiger Ty. Something tracked us for weeks, a thing we call a Shadowen.” She saw recognition in his eyes instantly. “It attacked us when we lit the signal fire. We destroyed it.”
“Did you now?” the little man sniffed. “Just the two of you. A Shadowen. I know a little of the Shadowen. Way I understand it, it would take something special to destroy one of them. Fire, maybe. The kind that comes from Elven magic. That would account for the burn on the rock, wouldn’t it?”
He waited. Wren nodded slowly. “It might.”
Tiger Ty leaned forward. “You’re like the rest of them somehow, aren’t you, Miss Wren. You’re an Ohmsford like the others. You have the magic, too.”
He said it softly, speculatively, and there was a curiosity mirrored in his eyes that hadn’t been there before. He was right again, of course. She did have the magic, a discovery she had pointedly avoided thinking about since she had made it because to do otherwise would be to acknowledge that she had some responsibility for its possession and use. She continued to tell herself that the Elfstones did not really belong to her, that she was merely a caretaker and an unwilling one at that. Yes, they had saved Garth’s life. And her own. And yes, she was grateful. But their magic was dangerous. Everyone knew that. She had been taught all of her life to be self-sufficient, to rely upon her instincts and her training, and to remember that survival was dependent principally on your own abilities and thought. She did not want a reliance on the magic of the Elfstones to undermine that.
Tiger Ty was still looking at her, waiting to see if she was going to respond. Wren met his gaze boldly and did not.
“Well,” he said finally, and shrugged his disinterest. “Time to get a bite to eat.”
The island was thick with fruit trees, and they made a satisfactory meal from what they picked. Afterward, they drank from a freshwater stream they found inland. Flowers grew everywhere—bougainvillea, oleander, hibiscus, orchids, and many more—massive bushes filled with their blooms, the colors bright through the green, the scents wafting on the air at every turn. There were palms, acacia, banyan, and something called a ginkgo. Strange birds perched in the branches of armored, spiny recops, their plumage a rainbow’s blend. Tiger Ty described it all as they walked, pointing, identifying and explaining. Wren stared about in amazement, not permitting her gaze to linger anywhere for more than a few seconds, anxious that she not miss anything. She had never seen such beauty, a profusion of incredibly wonderful living things. It was almost overpowering.
“Was Morrowindl like this?” she asked Tiger Ty at one point.
He gave her a brief glance. “Once,” he replied, and did not elaborate.
They climbed back atop Spirit shortly afterward and resumed their flight. It was easier now, a bit more familiar, and even Garth seemed to have discovered a way to make the journey bearable. They flew west and north, angling away from the sun as it passed overhead. There were other islands, small and mostly rocky, though all sustained at least a sprinkling of growth. The air was warm and soothing against their skin, and the sun burned down out of a cloudless sky, brightening the Blue Divide until it glistened. They saw massive sea animals that Tiger Ty called whales and claimed were the largest creatures in the ocean. There were birds of all sizes and shapes. There were fish that swam in groups called schools and leapt from the water in formation, silver bodies arcing against the sun. The journey became an incredible learning experience for Wren, and she immersed herself in its lessons.
“I have never seen anything like this!” she shouted enthusiastically at Tiger Ty.
“Wait until we reach Morrowindl,” he grunted back.
They descended a second time for a brief rest at midafternoon, choosing a solitary island with wide, white-sand beaches and coves so shallow the water was a pale turquoise. Wren noticed that Spirit had not eaten all day and asked about it. Tiger Ty said the Roc consumed meat and hunted on its own. It required food only once every seven days.
“A very self-sustaining bird, the Roc,” the Wing Rider said with undisguised admiration. “Doesn’t ask much more than to be left alone. More than you can say about most people.”
They continued their journey in silence, both Wren and Garth beginning to tire now, stiff from sitting in the same position all day, worn from the constant rocking motion of the flight, and from gripping the knotted hand restraints until their fingers cramped. The waters of the Blue Divide passed steadily beneath, an endless progression of waves. They had been out of sight of the mainland for hours, and the ocean seemed to stretch away forever. Wren felt dwarfed by it, reduced by its size to something so insignificant she threatened to disappear. Her earlier sense of isolation had increased steadily with the passing of the hours, and she found herself wondering for the first time if she would ever see her home again.
It was nearing sunset when at last they came in sight of Morrowindl. The sun had drifted west to the edge of the horizon, its light growing soft, changing from white to pale orange. A streaking of purple and silver laced a long line of odd-shaped clouds that paraded across the sky like strange animals. Silhouetted against this panorama was the island, dark and misted and forbidding. It was much larger than any other landmass they had encountered, rising up like a wall as they approached. Killeshan lifted its jagged mouth skyward, steam seeping from its throat, slopes dropping away into a thick blanket of fog and ash, disappearing for hundreds of feet until they surfaced again at a shoreline formed of rocky projections and ragged cliffs. Waves crashed against the rocks, white foaming caldrons that threw their spray skyward.
Spirit flew closer, winging down toward the shroud of vog. A stench filled the air, the smell of sulfur escaped from beneath the earth where the volcano’s fire burned rock to ash. Through the clouds and mist they could see valleys and ridges, passes and defiles, all heavily forested, a thick, strangling jungle. Tiger Ty glanced back over his shoulder and gestured. They were going to circle the island. Spirit wheeled right at his command. The north end of the island was engulfed in driving rain, a monsoon that inundated everything, creating vast waterfalls that tumbled down cliffs thousands of feet high. West the island was as barren as a desert, all exposed lava rock except for a scattering of brightly flowering shrubs and stunted, gnarled, wind-blown trees. South and east the island was a mass of singular rock formations and black-sand beaches where the shoreline met the waters of the Blue Divide before rising to disappear into jungle and mist.