“Vendoin said it would be cruel to tell us what it was.” Cold settled in Moon’s stomach as all the wider implications hit him. “If it could do this to a Fell flight, it could do it to a Raksuran court.”
Stone’s jaw tightened, as he tried to hold back a hiss or growl that would frighten the nearby groundlings. “That would explain a lot.”
“This is our fault.” Moon looked down and wiped the grit from his eyes to give himself time to think. It didn’t help. Song, Magrim, Kellimdar, the three others on the sunsailer who hadn’t survived the poison. It had been bad enough before the Hians had killed a group of harmless Jandera traders for fear of pursuit. “We brought the shitting thing out of the city for them.” Now the Hians could do anything with it.
Stone ruffled his hair sympathetically, then said, “Stop it.”
Moon twitched, an urge to self-consciously settle the spines of his other form. “We’re only barely more than a day behind them and we don’t know if they’re still going south. Or why they stopped here.”
Stone didn’t answer, until Moon looked up. Stone’s expression was somewhere between resigned and grimly amused. He said, “I’ve got nothing else to do.”
Past the smashed tent a voice rose in anguish, speaking in Altanic, “But how were killed the Jandera? Why dead them?”
The Coastal shook its head, its crest shivering with the motion. “And who is next?”
Stone turned back to the proprietor and said, “Are there any Kish living here who weren’t Jandera traders? Any Hians?”
Following the proprietor’s directions, they climbed the stairs that wound up one of the hills, past the stone houses and the twining limbs of small determined shade trees and flowering bushes. There was less confusion up here, most of the inhabitants still huddling inside the sturdy structures. An array of small colorful birds sang and called as if nothing had happened.
They followed the staircase around and up, past an open terrace where potted garden plants had been toppled when dead dakti limbs had fallen on them, and up again. The houses had little archways marking the paths that led to their doors, most wound with vines or other greenery. They found the one with the symbol on it that the caravanserai proprietor had told them to look for. It led to a square doorway in a chunky stone façade, sheltered by the branches of a leaning fringe tree. Moon heard movement inside as they approached, and cautiously stopped short of the door. “Hello?”
A small Bikuru emerged, her large eyes curious. Stone said, “We’re looking for the Hian scholar.”
She lifted her hands helplessly. “All dead.”
Moon hadn’t expected that. He glanced at Stone, and asked the Bikuru, “It was the Fell?”
“Just dead,” the Bikuru said. She motioned for them to come in, and they passed through a cool stone foyer and into a larger room. Windows were carved in the rock but shaded by the greenery outside, letting in a cool breeze. Pieces of wooden furniture and a woven rug had been pushed aside so the Bikuru could lay out four bodies.
All four were Hians, three small enough to be children. Their clothes weren’t torn and there was no blood; it looked as if they had just fallen down dead, exactly like the Jandera.
Another groundling sat on the far side of the room, a willowy one with white hair and blue-gray skin, very thin, with long boney ridges along its arms and hands. It was shaking, making distressed noises. “We came to see the scholar,” Stone said. “What happened? Was it the Fell?”
“I don’t know.” It looked up at them with gray eyes. Its Kedaic was much better than the Bikuru’s. “She was outside when the Fell came, but there are no wounds! And the younglings were in here.”
Moon wasn’t sure what to ask. “Was she expecting visitors from the flying boat? Other Hians, maybe?”
It buried its face in its hands, made a distressed noise, then pushed to its feet and ran out of the room.
Stone hissed under his breath. The others were staring at them and Moon said in Raksuran, “We better go.”
Stone grimaced agreement. But as they turned for the door, one of the Bikuru said, “Why are you here?”
On impulse Moon decided on a version close to the truth. It had worked for Stone in the swampling city. “We’re looking for the Hians who were on the flying boat. We thought they wanted to meet with the scholar who lived here.”
The Bikuru stepped out into the foyer with them. “The ship of Kish left after the Fell died. They had devices that allowed them to lift up and down. Kish have these. You have seen?”
She meant the flying packs. Moon said, “Yes, with the harnesses?”
“Yes. Some came from the ship in that fashion. I did not see them, but Ile-res said she saw them leave the house, and now the scholar’s writings are gone.” The Bikuru watched them carefully, critically. “Do you know why they did this?”
That one Moon could answer honestly. “No.”
Stone added, “They stole from us, too. They’re thieves.”
The Bikuru watched them a moment more, but Moon got the feeling she believed them. “Most of the scholar’s writings are not here. They are at the scriptorium on the tier below.”
Stone lifted his brows. “Her writings about what?”
“Her ancestors. The ancestors of all of Kish. They had a city out that way somewhere, near the sea.” She made a vague gesture toward the south. “Under the cloudwall, in poetic terms.”
“Are the writings in Kedaic?” Moon asked, though he wasn’t hopeful. Kedaic was primarily a trade language, made up of words from other Kishan languages. He didn’t think it was something most scholars would use.
The Bikuru seemed bemused by the question, but answered, “Not Kedaic. I have not seen myself, but the scholar was partial to Kish-Kenar, and would write in High Isra, or Kenarae, perhaps.”
Someone in the house wailed again, and the Bikuru gestured a hurried farewell and went inside.
Stone made a thoughtful noise and started back down the path. Moon said, “So we know what they were here for. We just don’t know if they got it.” It didn’t sound like the Hians had had much time to go through the scholar’s papers after they killed her and her family. If the writings they wanted were stored in the scriptorium, they hadn’t realized it.
Stone said, “I don’t suppose you read High Isra or Kenarae, because I don’t.”
“No.” Moon doubted they would be able to figure it out, whatever it was, even if they could read the scholar’s books. That was a job for a mentor, or for Delin and Callumkal . . . Moon stopped on the steps. “You think that’s why they took Delin and Callumkal? Because Vendoin knew they were going to have to come here, and get something from this scholar that she needed help to understand?”
Stone hadn’t stopped, and Moon had to hurry to catch up with him. Stone said, “That, or she didn’t want them with us when we followed her and found this place. We’ve wasted enough time here. We need to get in the air again.”
“There’s one more thing we can do,” Moon said. “I want to leave a mail.”
They stopped at the caravanserai on their way out of town. Stone wrote a message and Moon added a bit of the tracking moss to it to guide Kalam’s horticultural here. Then one of the proprietor’s assistants folded it up in a waterproofed cloth packet, labeled it with Niran’s and Diar’s names and hauled it to the top of a mail pole with a flag indicating urgency.
Once that was done, they walked out of town toward the road. Moon looked up at the forest, wondering if there were any loose herd-beasts there or if they should wait until they spotted some wild grasseaters. Someone else was on the road now, another traveler standing on the raised stone surface and staring toward the town. Staring toward them . . . Moon stopped abruptly. “That’s a kethel.”