A Flight of Broken Wings, page 30
part #1 of The Aeriel Chronicles Series
As he gazed into her twisted beauty, Ruban felt fire course through his veins. It was like all the injustices of centuries past – both personal and global – weighed upon his heart, his soul, demanding recompense. Demanding vengeance.
His voice sounding oddly calm even to his own ears, he breathed: “It’s over, you know. Whatever you thought you were going to accomplish through all this bloodshed, all the lies and the treachery, it ends now. I am going to kill you. For what you did to my family, for what you did to the world. You’re going to die – tonight.”
Tauheen laughed, her voice ringing through the house, rich and mellifluous. “Kill me, will you? Idiot child. You say I am a liar and a traitor? Very well. And yet it isn’t me that has been lying to you all this time. I’m not the one who has betrayed you. Stupid, naïve boy. You’ve been played by my daughter just like the rest of them, don’t you see that? No, of course you don’t. That’s the whole point.
“She’s good at it, you know. At manipulating people, tricking them into doing her bidding. Corrupting the most honest intentions to fit her twisted purposes.”
Her gaze flicked to Ashwin and she sneered. “Sweet boy, isn’t he? Your little foreign friend. Very handy in a fight, I’d wager. He’s not what you think he is, though. Not a foreigner. Not your friend. Not human. He’s an Aeriel, my dear Ruban. And not just any Aeriel. He’s my son, Safaa’s brother. The prince of Vaan. And my daughter’s second-in-command. Another instance of her ability to corrupt all that is pure.
“He’s not here to help you, Ruban. He’s here to kill you. By Safaa’s orders. I’m not the liar, nor the traitor you need to be worrying about. You have bigger problems right now, haven’t you? You’ve been manipulated by an Aeriel all this time, my idiot boy. Manipulated and used by Vaan and my daughter to further their agenda. And all of it without your knowledge or consent. Don’t you see? That’s what they do. Twist honest, honourable men and women into performing evil deeds for their amusement.
“The question is, will you take that betrayal lying down, or will you be a man, stand up and get revenge?”
Ruban smiled. The irony of it was: it wasn’t a lie. None of what she had said was really untrue. Ashwin had manipulated him, and had done so to further Safaa’s agenda of foiling their mother. And yet, to Ruban, her implication couldn’t have been further from the truth.
Even a few weeks ago, the reminder of his naïveté would have stung, would have raised his hackles and made him defensive. Now, all it did was make him want to laugh. “Ah yes, your son. Shwaan – that’s what you call him, right? Shwaan and Safaa, quite the symmetry to it. I’ve met her too, just by the way. Wants your head on a pike, she does. Can’t say it’s much different with the boy, either. Kids these days,” he sighed, mocking, looking right into the Aeriel’s eyes. “Still, you’ve got to be a really shitty mother if both your children want you dead. That’s just a bit too much of a generation gap, wouldn’t you agree? Not in the running for any ‘Mom of the Year’ awards, are you?”
Tauheen snarled, face contorting in some nameless combination of rage and hatred; and even as Ruban watched, her form blurred, moving faster than his eyes could follow. Between one breath and the next, she was upon him. This time, she had not even bothered with an energy shell. Eyes burning, inches from his face, she raised a hand to strike him. She didn’t just want to kill him, he realised – she wanted to do it with her bare hands.
Tauheen’s hand came down in a wide arc, gathering momentum as it descended on its target. Moments before it connected with the side of his head, Ruban ducked, pressing his palm into her gut, the touch almost gentle.
His attacker staggered, her hand stopping mid-strike before falling limply to her side. Moments later, her knees buckled, leaving her prostrate at Ruban’s feet, heaving like a spent horse. Her eyes, what he could see of them, were wide with something like terror.
The enhanced sif ore – a harmless little rock to the unobservant eye – fell out of the folds of her green dress, where Ruban had pressed it into her belly, and rolled on the floor between them.
Ashwin’s wings flared out as Tauheen rolled away from under Ruban’s oncoming sifblade, which screeched on contact with the cold marble floor where the Aeriel’s body had been moments ago. Within seconds the Aeriel Queen was back on her feet, the tips of her fingers cackling with condensed energy. Ruban tensed, preparing to dodge whatever she threw at him this time. It was harder than he had imagined, fighting within the confines of a house. It was far from the worst terrain he had ever Hunted in, though. At least there weren’t any civilians to worry about here.
The next blast to rock the building did not originate from Tauheen, however. With a few flaps of his wings, Ashwin was directly above his mother. Tauheen’s own wings manifested behind her, lifting her up into the air, but before she could be level with her son an energy shell ripped through the air between them and struck her square in the chest, detonating with a blinding flash.
It knocked her back. By the time Ruban’s eyes had recovered from the flash blindness, however, she was back on her feet, seemingly undamaged apart from her ruined dress, which now hung off her in charred rags. Ashwin landed a few steps in front of Ruban, directly facing his mother, his wings almost obscuring the Hunter from her line of sight.
Over the mass of silver feathers blocking his view, Ruban saw Tauheen’s eyes widen as they landed upon Ashwin. She took a halting step forward, then swayed on her feet as if she were about to fall. Then her eyes narrowed into two glimmering slits, gaze shifting from her son to Ruban and then back.
“He did it, didn’t he?” she hissed, her voice almost feral, staring straight at the feathery appendage shielding Ruban from her death glare. “He attacked you. With that cursed blade. Tore your wing apart, didn’t he?” she screamed, her voice rising with every word. Body stiff with suppressed fury, she took another step towards her son.
“And yet you fight for him. Fight for them,” she spat. “Trying to protect them. And for what? So he can have another chance at driving that blade through your heart? So he can finally finish what he started and kill you? Kill one of us. Again?
“It doesn’t matter what you do, my child,” she said with something like pity in her voice. “He will never trust you. He can’t, being what he is. He’ll kill you the moment he’s done using you for his own ends.
“That’s what they do, humans. They never learned to trust us, not really. They’ve always hated us, since the very beginning. No matter what you do, how much you give them, it will never be enough. All they know is to take and to never give back what they’ve stolen. Since the time of Zeifaa, that is how it has been.”
Like strings pulled on a marionette, her expression sobered. “It’s what they are, Shwaan. It’s in their blood. They can’t help it. They crave blood and death like we crave the sun.
“I tried, you know. Tried to save them from their own savagery. Uplift them from their misery, show them the light. And what did I get for it?” she snarled, eyes swivelling back to Ruban. “Betrayal. Rebellion.” She took a deep breath, her breast heaving. “Exile.
“When all I’d tried to do was to drag them out of their own ignorance and give them a better life. You can’t save humans, Shwaan. Not even your little pet here. They’re all the same. Mad dogs that can’t be tamed. The best thing you can do for them is to put them down; put them out of their misery. Because all they know how to do is bark and bite. And if you’re not careful, they’ll bite your hand off as you feed them.
“But you don’t need me to tell you any of this, do you? You’ve seen first-hand the evidence of their savagery. You’ve borne it. He didn’t just attack you, my child. He attacked you where you were the most vulnerable, when you were trying to help him. What do you think he would do if you ever stood against him?”
“If we’re dogs, what do you call your own daughter?” Ruban growled, shaking with the urge to plant his blade deep into the Aeriel’s gut. “She hates you as much as we do, perhaps more. Wants you dead with a passion that’d do a human proud.” He sneered, “Or has she gained honorary membership into the canine club as well?”
With a jerk of her chin, Tauheen looked down her nose at Ruban as if he were an insect on her boot. “My daughter,” she spat, like the word left a foul taste in her mouth. “Has been tainted by her human blood. She has allowed herself to be overcome by it. She cannot accept subservience to her superiors.”
Her eyes flicked over to Ashwin, a smile touching her luscious, scarlet lips. “But you’re pure,” she crooned, her eyes shining. “Unmarked by humanity’s taint – in blood and being. My beautiful, taintless child. I love you, you know. I always loved you. Wanted you with me, even when I had lost everything. But she wouldn’t allow it. Safaa took you away from me, stole you, when she had no right!” Her eyes flashed. “But all of that doesn’t matter, not anymore. I have you now, and I’ll never let her take you from me again.”
She lifted both her hands, holding them out before her, her dark eyes locked with Ashwin’s silver ones. “Come to me, Shwaan, and we will rule earth and Vaan together. Regain all that we lost all those centuries ago, and more. Do you truly believe these pathetic, untamed creatures–” she said it begrudgingly, like she barely considered them even that. “Deserve your fealty? Your life? It is madness, what Safaa is doing. And you know it. Come with me, and together we can set the universe to rights once again. Reshape the world into what it should be. Undo the mistakes of those who came before us to create a better cosmos for those who come after.”
She released a soft breath, playing the exasperated mother with a flair that surprised Ruban. Couldn’t be easy, trying to appear motherly in nothing but a half-charred dress barely clinging to your torso. “Come with me, my child, and you’ll never have to fear a human again.”
Ashwin’s feet moved towards Tauheen as if of their own accord. Ruban wanted to say something, anything, to stop him. To call him back. But what could he say? Tauheen was manipulating the truth, twisting it for her own use. But she wasn’t lying. Nothing she had said so far had been an actual falsehood, and Ashwin knew it as well as he did. What could he say to make Ashwin turn back, when his own mother beckoned him with truth, if not with honesty?
Inches away from his mother’s outstretched arms, a shell nearly the size of Ruban’s head shot out of Ashwin’s hand, the momentum throwing him back even as the ball of energy crashed against Tauheen’s unprotected abdomen.
Eyes wide, mouth curled in a snarl cut off midway by the force of the attack, she crashed into the staircase with a force that splintered wood and bent metal, the railing folding in on itself with a deafening screech.
Landing next to Ruban, Ashwin folded his wings primly against his back, smirking as if at a private joke. “It wasn’t Safaa who was blinded by her human side, you know,” he said, fluffing his feathers to get the splinters out of his wings. “She was never the one who let her human blood overwhelm her. She wasn’t driven by their passions, overcome by their vices. That was you, mother. Always you.”
He shook his head, indulgent. “You’ve lived on mortal lands too long, you know. Your impassioned speeches and farcical eloquence might appeal to a human audience, perhaps even a few vankrai. But as you just said, I’m untainted by human blood. Did you really believe I would be swayed by that?” he chuckled. “Come now, mother. You used to be good at this. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were losing your touch.”
With a shriek that surpassed inhuman by a league and a half, Tauheen flew at her son, her body streaking through the air like a shimmering bullet as she zeroed in on her target. Moments before she reached him, a long blade flew out of the air and embedded itself into her shoulder, slowing her momentum just enough for Ashwin to grab Ruban and fly out of the way, leaving her to crash into the wall behind them.
As Ruban’s feet touched the ground once more, he could feel the house convulse around him, the walls shuddering in their very foundations.
A minute passed, then two. Tauheen lay collapsed against the nearly dilapidated wall, unmoving. Light spilled from her shoulder, casting long shadows over the floor scattered with debris. Cautiously, Ruban took a step towards her, keeping his eyes open for any sign of movement from the Aeriel. There was none. Tauheen lay still as a marble sculpture – pale, flawless and utterly unmoving. Had she been human, Ruban would have bet good money that she was dead.
She wasn’t human, though. And from what he had seen of her so far, it would take more than a sifblade to the shoulder to kill her. He was sure of that. Still, even a moment’s respite was an immeasurable asset on a Hunt, and Ruban did need to get his blade back.
Eyes boring into her listless form, he inched towards her. Finally within touching distance, he reached a hand out, fingers curling around the hilt of the blade sticking out of her shoulder.
For a heart-stopping second, the blade stuck in the Aeriel’s shoulder, as immobile as its host. Swearing under his breath, Ruban cursed his own stupidity for not thinking to arm himself better before coming to the villa. After everything that had happened in the past few months, he should have known that something like this was going to come to pass. Things never went according to plan where royalty was concerned, human or Aeriel.
Then, finally, something gave and the blade leapt into his hand, free of the flesh it had embedded itself into. Rubbing the gore off onto the plaster of the nearest wall, Ruban readjusted his grip on the handle and straightened.
An aborted cry from somewhere behind him made his head snap back – a moment’s error – before he realised what he had done and turned back to the smashed wall.
Nothing.
Tauheen was gone.
Ruban blinked, trying to process what had just happened, when a bright light filtered into the peripheries of his vision. He turned around, already knowing what he was about to see.
A few inches behind him, Tauheen floated above his head on outstretched wings. She held one hand out before her, fingers enveloped in the luminescent glow of a newly formed energy shell. If she attacked now, the range was all but point blank. No chance in the universe that she would miss this time.
Ruban was dead. And he knew it.
Chapter 14: The Clash
Consciousness returned to Subhas in fits and starts – flashes of light followed by comforting darkness. By the time he had regained some awareness of himself and his surroundings, he had no idea how long it had been since he’d last been in his senses. Light and sound filtered through next, worsening his headache. Which made him realise that he had a headache in the first place. A concussion, he suspected.
With some effort, he peeled his eyes open, raising a hand to shield them against the sudden onslaught of electric light. The world was one huge, blurry splotch. The sounds came next – wood and metal shattering, concrete cracking. Had he not been a Hunter for a solid twenty years of his life, he might have wondered if he had been abandoned in the middle of an earthquake.
But whatever was happening now, he was pretty sure it wasn’t nature’s doing.
Rubbing a hand over his face – every movement a small agony – Subhas blinked, trying to force his eyes to focus.
The first thing he saw was Ruban, standing pressed against the jagged edges of a broken wall. Chin out, back straight, he stood like defiance personified, but Subhas thought he saw something like fear in the boy’s eyes.
Following that gaze, his eyes landed on Tauheen. She floated a few feet above Ruban, inches away from the wall herself. One hand held out in front, her fingers were enveloped by the distinctive luminescence of a half-formed energy-shell. She was preparing to attack.
Another Aeriel stood behind Tauheen, its hand held out in a way that reflected her own posture. Its sterling wings all but enveloped it, denying Subhas a clear view of its face. It too looked like it was about to attack, though he couldn’t be sure who the intended target was.
As Subhas watched, the shell coalesced and solidified around Tauheen’s fingers, the unearthly light intensifying. The other Aeriel was not as fast, or perhaps it had started late. Its shell wouldn’t be ready for a few seconds after Tauheen’s had detonated.
All of this Subhas knew with a single fleeting glance at the scene before him. It was like his mind had floated back to his days as an active field agent. A real Hunter. Or perhaps that’s what he had always been, really. Subhas had often felt that that was what he truly was – a foot-soldier playing at kingship.
He still remembered his last Hunt. It was the biggest he had ever been a part of, one of the most significant campaigns of the time. He had lost two of his team, but they had managed to fell their quarry. They had captured Reivaa.
They had wanted to kill her, he remembered. She had been accused of a terrorist attack on the Zainian border – a fire that had killed over a hundred people. They’d been right, he saw that now. They should have killed her, auctioned her feathers to compensate the families of the victims.
But he had been young, zealous. Had wanted to do things by the book, to do them right. There had been some confusion over the evidence, and he had stayed the execution to clear it up. Reivaa had escaped.
Two days later, Misri was dead.
He had known, even then, that it wasn’t an accident that killed her. But he had been delirious, half mad with grief and pain unlike anything he had ever felt before. He had wanted to die, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that to Hiya. She was barely a year old when she lost her mother. He couldn’t bring himself to leave her behind, an orphan.
And so he had put the gun away.
And then, she’d come to him. Tauheen.
She told him that Safaa had killed his wife. In retaliation for letting Reivaa escape. To get her hands on the formula Misri had been working on. He didn’t even remember anymore. He didn’t think he had remembered then.
He knew now what he had done. Finally, he saw his life with a clarity that had eluded him for so many years. He had been drowning, dying, and he had clutched, desperately, at the first lifeline that had been thrown at him. The first thing that had given him a sense of purpose; that had given his existence some semblance of meaning, after he lost the one thing he loved more than anything else on earth.
