They didn’t use it much or even talk about it. Especially not in front of their mother, who mistrusted the magic and those who used it, particularly the Druids. She knew it was a part of her sons’ makeup—it was impossible to disguise its presence completely—but had no idea of the extent to which they had employed it. They were very careful not to let her discover the truth because their mother, like so many others, had ways of knowing things she wasn’t told.
If they were very good at hiding which of them was which, they were masters at hiding their involvement with the wishsong.
Thinking of it now, Railing stopped what he was doing and looked over at his brother. “Are we going to use the wishsong this morning?” he asked quietly. “Or do we wait for another time?”
Redden paused midway through securing a line. They had experimented only a little with using the magic to enhance the power emitted by the diapson crystals, which in turn would make the Sprints go faster. “I don’t know. What do you think we should do?”
Railing grinned. “You know what I think. One pass without using it, one pass using it. Wasn’t that what you wanted me to say?”
His brother shrugged, his lean face expressionless. “Maybe.”
They went back to work, finishing up with their preparations, making both Sprints ready to fly. When they were done, they leaned over the sides of the vessels and released the stays securing them to the trailers. A last check on the controls, making sure they were loose and ready to respond, and they were ready.
“This should be fun,” Redden offered drily.
“If we survive,” Railing replied.
They lay flat in the cockpits facing forward toward Rainbow Lake, secured their safety belts, and gave each other a final glance.
“A quick swing out onto the lake and back first?” Railing asked.
“Out and back and right into the Shredder.”
With a final nod to each other, they unhooded the parse tubes and let the light sheaths billow out. The radian draws began to glow immediately, and they felt the hum of the diapson crystals as they came alive with the sun’s raw power. The brothers engaged the control, and the Sprints lurched sharply, lifted off their cradles, and wheeled toward the lake.
“Let’s fly!” Redden shouted.
Railing flipped the thruster levers all the way forward, and his Sprint leapt away with the quickness and power of a moor cat lunging, smooth hull cleaving the air like a knife, mast vibrating with the force of the acceleration, and light sheath whipping sideways, the boom barely missing the top of his head. Out across the surrounding woods flew the Sprint, whipping so close to the treetops that Railing could hear branches scraping the underside of the hull. Reacting quickly, he eased the craft upward, away from the danger, following the sleek black hull of his brother’s Sprint. Wind whipped across his eyes, causing them to tear, and he wiped his face quickly against his shoulder.
Together the Ohmsford brothers skimmed across the canopy of the woods bordering Rainbow Lake, gained the shoreline, and burst into the clear, leveling out about twenty yards above the water’s surface. They flew north out into the open water, the lake spreading away before them in a brilliant blue that mirrored sunlight and sky. The waters were still this day, free of waves, untroubled by wind. The sun was high overhead, the sky empty of clouds. Everything was bright and sharp and clear, and as they raced out into the emptiness they could smell the lake and feel its coldness.
Only minutes had passed before Railing caught Redden gesturing in a circular motion, indicating he was getting ready to swing back around toward the Shredder. Railing signaled back that he was ready, too, and tightened his hands on the controls. Even in the few short days he had not flown while working on the Sprints, he had forgotten how free and wonderful it felt to fly them. There just wasn’t anything else like it, nothing even close. Flying the bigger skimmers and transports and scout craft was fun, but they were slow and cumbersome and predictable compared with the Sprints. Speed made all the difference. When he was flying like this—fast and unencumbered and barely under control—it felt as if he could escape everything, rise right on up into the stars and leave it all behind. Sometimes he wanted to do that. He would feel his life pressing down on him, the constraints and obligations, the demands and expectations, and all he could think about was breaking free and flying away.
It was a selfish way of thinking, but he knew Redden felt the same. They had talked about what they would do when they were old enough to leave home to explore the larger world and discover what was out there waiting for them. They could have left by now if they’d wanted; certainly they had skills and ambition enough to make their way. But they weren’t adults yet, and their mother had already made it clear she didn’t want them going until they were. Their father was a dozen years gone, dead in an airship crash—an accident that had left their mother shattered and bitter and determined to protect her children. As if that were possible, Railing thought. As if you could ever protect your children from what life might bring their way. Or even from themselves and their impulses.
But the illusion of it was all their mother had to cling to, so they had promised her long ago they would stay until they were grown. It was only now they were beginning to regret that promise. Life in Patch Run was safe and predictable, and the brothers were ready for something else. They had always been wild, a condition Railing attributed to their genetic makeup. If there was a risk to be taken, a dare to be accepted, or a boundary that shouldn’t be crossed, they were willing to defy the odds. He couldn’t explain it. But he knew how they were, and he knew it was unlikely they would ever change.
Like now, as their Sprints whipped across the surface of Rainbow Lake and closed on the wicked maze of rocks and dead trees that formed the Shredder. They had made this run several times before with much slower craft, with hybrids and modifieds and junk they had cobbled together and tested in ways that the poor things weren’t meant to be tested, just to see what they would do. When it came to airships, they never troubled themselves with measuring risk. It was the experience that mattered, and that wasn’t likely to change as long as their mother didn’t find out what they were doing.
So far she hadn’t.
Well, mostly.
They couldn’t keep everything from her. She had caught them a few times. But the things she’d found out were so insignificant she wasn’t overly troubled. Like the time they stole Arch Ehlwar’s skip and rode it across the lake and up the Runne to Varfleet to watch the Sprint races two summers ago. Or the time they flew down into the Mist Marsh and stayed the night. But she hadn’t found out how they had acquired the diapson crystals that powered their various vessels, including the ones they were flying now. She hadn’t found out how they had manipulated the black market for these and other materials they needed to construct their experimental craft.
The memories flashed through Railing’s mind as the shoreline neared and the jagged edges of the Shredder came into sharper focus. He flattened himself further against the padding, gently testing the controls, making sure everything was responding. Redden had moved into position ahead of him, leading the way. In the Shredder, there wasn’t room to fly side by side, only in line. Even then, it was extremely tight. Going as fast as they were, it was suicide.
Which made it all the more irresistible.
“Hang on!” Redden yelled sharply.
Then they were whipping through the twists and turns of the Shredder, skimming past jagged cliffs and over the tips of rugged boulders, sliding between tree trunks and through dead branches, all the while pushing the thrusters harder, making the Sprints go faster. They were flying mostly on instinct, relying on quickness of response. They knew the course they were following, had memorized it thoroughly over the past few months. But the margin for error was so tiny that all it would take was one mistake and they would be a part of the landscape.