Suddenly he relaxed. He had a task, impossible as it might seem, and now he had a mount, as
insignificant as she might appear. Life was falling together neatly.
Axis tugged at the brown mare’s forelock, and she lowered her head and gently butted him in the
chest.
“Her name’s Sal.”
Axis looked over the mare’s withers; a small, wizened man sat upon a bale of provisions on the other
side almost hidden in the shadows of a pile of canvas-covered provisions rising behind him. His small
body was hunched and rounded, his skin brown and splotched, his head covered only by several strands
of drab hair, and his face so layered with wrinkles his bright brown eyes were all but hidden. His entire
demeanour was generally plain and brown and drab, enlivened only by his mischievous eyes.
Apart from the incongruity of his eyes, there was something else about the man’s appearance that
made Axis stare. This old man, plain and drab as he was, had Icarii features.
And his cloaked, hunched form looked as though it hid wings within the shadows at his back.
But what Icarii aged, or was plain and drab, for the gods’ sakes?
The man’s mouth twisted wryly as he saw Axis’ stare. “Yer recognise a fellow, don’t you?”
And what Icarii affected such common, country speech?
Axis opened his mouth, hesitating before he spoke. “You are Icarii bred, and yet you
demonstrate none of the beauty and dignity of the Icarii. Why?”
A Traitor? A Demon?
The old man cackled, the sound curiously bird-like, and Axis moved slightly so his sword hand was
free to move.
“Well, yeah, yer do be observant,” the man all but whispered, a secretive expression on his face. “I’ll
give you that. But I were never Icarii-bred, no sir, not me. I claim no such pretensions!”
“You have Icarii features. You must have Icarii blood in you.”
The old man grinned slyly. “I do share my face and blood with your proud Icarii, man, but I’m not
one of your flighty lot.”
Axis narrowed his eyes, his hand now resting on the hilt of his sword, but he said nothing.
The wizened old man seemed not to care. “Call me Da,” he said. “It’s as good a name as any.”
It was no name at all Axis thought. “Da” was the peasant word for father.
Da pointed a gnarled ringer at the mare. “And she be Sal.”
“Well, Da,” Axis said. “You are a strange man —”
Da giggled, rocking back and forth on the bale.
“— and I would know more of you. And of your pretty brown Sal.” Axis had still not relaxed his
grip on his sword hilt. There was only one thing he was sure of, and that was that this old man was not
who he pretended to be.
Da put a finger to his pursed mouth, in a parody of thought. “Who do I be? And who do be Sal?”
Axis shifted, annoyed. The man’s affectation of country language was starting to grate.
“I do be a father,” Da said.
Father?
“I do watch over my children.”
Axis said nothing.
Suddenly the old man dropped his peasantish affectation, and looked Axis directly in the eye.
“I do the best for my children,” he said, “even when they demonstrate consummate stupidity. That, I
swear, they got from their mother.”
Axis was caught fast by the man’s eyes, fierce and angry now.
Far away he heard Urbeth roar.
Da laughed. “From their mother, aye.”
Axis went cold. His hand dropped away from his sword. “What do you want?” he said.
“To give you a gift. To give the Icarii a last gift … and still a gift of flight, methinks.”
Axis was numb, still not quite believing whom he was talking to. “A gift?”
‘”Er.” The man-sparrow nodded in Pretty Brown Sal’s direction, then turned his eyes back
to Axis. “It’s not the first horse I’ve given you, you know.”
“Which —”
“Belaguez.”
And now Axis truly did go cold. He had acquired — there was no other verb to express it —
Belaguez when he had just been appointed BattleAxe. One of the Axe Wielders had reported that there
was a grey colt tied up in the palace courtyard, with no explanation save for Axis’ name engraved on the
small brass plate sewn into the colt’s halter.
When Axis had walked into the courtyard to see for himself, a small sparrow had been foraging for
insects in Belaguez’s forelock. When Axis had attempted to brush it aside, the sparrow had jumped onto
his hand and run chattering up his sleeve to his shoulder before finally flying off.
Then, absorbed by the magnificent colt, Axis had paid no attention.
Now, he finally managed to recover his manners.
“I thank you,” he said, moving around Sal so he could bow in the sparrow’s direction.
The sparrow, still wearing its vaguely man-Icarii form, smiled gently, accepting Axis’ obsequiousness
as his due. If only CrimsonStar had been as polite and deferential as this man!
“Belaguez was … is a special horse,” Axis said.
“And he was for a special man. Men. You and your son both.”
Axis looked back to Sal. She was nuzzling her velvety nose about his hip pockets, as if she might
find a carrot there.
“But now your son’s got the starry boy, and you need another. Take Pretty Brown Sal.”
And then the sparrow repeated himself, although Axis did not notice. “She’s my final gift of flight to the
Icarii, as to all the peoples of Tencendor.”
Axis ran a hand down Sal’s neck and over her shoulder. She was only a small mare — barely high
enough to carry him — but she had a deep chest, fine strong legs, and an intelligent eye.
And the sweetest disposition, Axis thought, of all creatures in existence.
He raised his head to speak to the sparrow, but before he could mouth the words, the sparrow-man
rose, smiled, and then simply faded away into the shadows.
But just as Axis thought him gone, there was the soft piping of a sparrow, and the soft, drab form of
the father of the Icarii race briefly brushed against Axis’ cheek before finally disappearing.
Axis lifted a hand, reaching hopelessly out, but the sparrow had gone.
Chapter 37
Settling In
They had gone, and DragonStar hoped they would survive. If even one of them failed … He suddenly
grew claustrophobic in the dank chamber, and walked for the door, whistling the Alaunt
after him. Qeteb and his fellow Demons were undoubtedly occupied elsewhere and, if the
StarGrace had spoken true, he need not fear the Hawkchilds. He would surely be safe enough in
the fresh air — such as it was in the corrupted realm — for the time being.
Gods! He needed to feel the wind on his face!
But although DragonStar climbed unhindered to the surface to sit, as his father had once sat,
on a pile of rocks overlooking the Hundred Mile Beach of the Icebear Coast and the battering ocean
beyond, he did not long enjoy the peace of the pre-dawn air.
StarLaughter joined him.
“Sanctuary,” she said, and leaned teasingly close to him as she sat down.
He did not give her the satisfaction of moving away.
StarLaughter forgot her teasing almost as soon as she’d begun it. Sanctuary was so dangerous!
What if …? Momentary panic engulfed her. “WolfStar won’t be safe in Sanctuary! Qeteb will surely
break through!”
DragonStar repressed a sigh.
“We are destined for each other,” StarLaughter said, once more calm and with a faraway expression
on her face. “When he sees me again … oh!”
“He may not be as pleased to see you as you will be to see him,” DragonStar said
carefully. While, on the one hand,
StarLaughter’s insane idea that she and WolfStar could forgive all their differences, WolfStar falling
deeply in love with her the instanc he laid eyes on her again, made DragonStar want to laugh
incredulously — StarLaughter must indeed have lost her mind! — on the other hand, DragonStar did not
want to antagonise StarLaughter to the point where she might turn against him.
His task had been made infinitesimally easier by the fact that he and his could ignore the Hawkchilds.
StarLaughter shrugged aside DragonStar’s comment. “We’ve had our differences —”
DragonStar choked back a laugh.
“— but we will surely overcome them.”
“It might take some, ah, time.”
She shrugged again, but did not respond to DragonStar’s comment. Instead, she said: “How will he
manage to escape the Demons when they break through into Sanctuary?”
Now DragonStar had to fight back anger. She had no thought for the millions of peoples and
creatures trapped in Sanctuary, only for WolfStar. Her love was as single-minded as her revenge had
been.
“Axis —”
“Your father?”
“Yes, my father. Axis has charge of Sanctuary. I hope he will manage to find a way to save them.