Out of Place

CHAPTER TWO
Strange rs and Man-Birds

Daja regained her sight slowly, though she supposed her hearing was well enough because Sandry's panicked scream had already been sounding in her ears for an eternity. Your light crystal, Sandry, Daja reminded her sister-saati, crawling over to the direction of the scream. The shrill sound subsided into soft sobbing, but everything still remained black. Daja fumbled in the darkness and caught Sandry's shoulders in her hands, seeking out the string she knew would be hanging around the noble's neck. With clumsy fingers she opened the pouch that held Sandry's night light.

The crystal held enough light in it to see the bodies of their companions slumped on the ground. The smith-mage fed her power into the lamp, surprised to find how little magic she had left, and made it bright enough to clearly see the wreckage of the boat. From the direction one of the sailor's necks was turned, the woman was surely dead. Yards away, she could see the mangled remains of the captain.

"It's cold," came the drowsy voice of Briar's former student.

Daja agreed, it was cold, colder than any of the lands surrounding the Pebbled Sea had right to be at this time of year. She struggled to her feet and raised the crystal light above her head. "Call out if you can," she told the others.

Niko was the last to call out. "I'm alive, but my magic is down to a sliver," he told the others quietly. It had been a big working that had brought them here. Wherever here was.

"I think all our magic is down to a sliver," Briar pointed out as he took purchase of what was around them, "and that's plenty enough to convince me that we should get off this road." It was hard-packed dirt beneath them, obviously well travelled, and Briar didn't fancy anyone coming along it while he was vulnerable. "Wait..." he said softly before he could launch into any plan. "Where's Tris?"

Everyone perked up in alarm immediately and they scanned the site, but Tris wasn't to be found. "She wasn't holding on," remarked one of the two remaining sailors, "mayhap she fell overboard."

"She's not dead," Briar said determinedly, "we'd know if she were dead." Briar grasped fruitlessly for the link to his sister as the words slipped through his mouth. "She's there, but too far away for me to locate when my magic's so low," he explained.

Eventually they had to move off the road. It was too risky to run into raiders or soldiers who were suspicious of their sudden appearance. "It was sunset in Lairan, but so dark here," Daja noted as she helped a sailor move the two bodies off the road. Briar, Niko, and Evvy were busy combing over the crash for useful things and the other remaining sailor was too shaken to do anything but sit and watch.

Sandry was shaken too. At first she had been afraid that they would all die, and then after the flash of light all she seen was darkness. It took some time until she was able to focus on something other than the night light Daja had pushed into her hand. Over time she snapped out of her terror, and set about making sure everyone had a bit of food in them. Together, six mages and two sailors traipsed away from the road and into the thick forest beyond.

. . . .

The forceful lurch of the felucca made Tris topple off the small boat. She had never moved so fast or felt so graceful. Was this how Shriek, her once-fostered bird, had felt when he dipped and soared through the sky? There was a key difference, she knew, but falling felt a little like she had always imagined flight to be. She wanted to whoop, dart, and twist through the air, but she was also terrified.

The winds she fell through carried strange visions of impossible things. Horses with wings, tiny flying people, and even giant spiders with human heads flashed in her mind. Later, she told herself, you can pick those sights apart later. Instead, she focused on using her last tiny flicker of magic to cocoon herself in wind and slow the fall.

Down, down, down, thud. Tris lay where she had landed and let the strange visions assault her until blackness closed in. She knew nothing.

. . . .

In the morning there had been very little improvement. Although the mages woke up slightly refreshed, their magic hadn't been restored. Briar in particular lamented about only having his mage kit and not his fully-stocked workroom, although the others were almost as bad. Sandry wanted a wash, Daja wanted out of the cold, and Evvy was feeling the keen lack of her friend Luvo. They all wanted Tris.

Even worse than wanting things they didn't have was not knowing where they were or what kind of people they should expect to come across. The mages all felt that things were different in this place, even if there were some similarities. It felt like the earth had rarely known magic, and now it strained to meet them, all full of excitement.

Scrying for Winding Circle was useless; the sister-mirror, which should have put them in direct contact with senior mages at the Hub, wouldn't even do as much as flicker. Briar couldn't send a message to Rosethorn through the plants if he didn't even know what direction she was in, and Sandry was dismayed to find the magical threads she used to keep track of people had seemingly severed in the spell that had brought the Blue Rook to this place.

"I think we only have two options. We can stay here and wait for help to find us, or go back to the road and find someone who can tell us where we are," Niko announced after a rather poor breakfast of restorative tonic, cheese, and pears. They were lucky that Briar had thought to pack the foul-tasting green tonic in his mage kit as it helped to clear their heads and take away some of the sluggishness.

"Or only some could go and the rest could stay here and wait," Briar suggested with a shrug. "Seems to me it'd be stupid to drag our mage kits and the Duke's bribe purse around the countryside. If only two or three of us went for a stroll-"

Evvy let out a cry of protest, not caring whether her opinion was wanted. "Seems to me that it'd be stupid to split up," she interrupted, hands on hips and a heavy glower on her face. It had been just over a year since Yanjing and its scrambling, running, and panic. She had been separated from Briar then, which had made it easy for the Yanjingi soldiers.

We're not going to get anywhere if we bicker this much about every little decision, Sandry thought to Daja. The taller girl didn't want to enter the fray, there were far too many cooks handling the broth already, but she knew that Sandry wouldn't be able to resist. She waited for the noble's inevitable interference, hanging onto her staff with a broad grin.

"All this time arguing could be better spent," Sandry interjected, looking every bit the Duke's niece even with smudges of dirt spread across her forehead and cheeks. "We don't know yet that we're in any danger, and jumping to conclusions isn't helping, but if we want to be cautious, why don't just two of us wait by the road? That way we're not splitting up, not properly, and help will be close by if it's needed," she reasoned, borrowing her foster mother's soothing tone, "meanwhile the rest of us can stay and try to reach Tris."

"Niko and I will go," Daja offered, straightening up to her full height. Evvy wants to stick close to you, she sent to Briar before he could argue. If it had been either of their other sisters who wanted to go, Daja knew that Briar would have argued some more. Fortunately Daja had fought in enough tumbles with the former thief that he knew she could hold her own, even without magic. I'll call you if we get into trouble, she promised.

She could feel his reluctance through their magical bond as she passed through the trees with Niko. I can never be sure if I want to know the details of what happened to him in Yanjing, she thought to herself. The Briar she had known before they all split up to go travelling would never have clung to the idea that any of the girls were weaker than him. That's not it, she told herself steadily, he doesn't think we're weak, he just thinks he has to protect us. And Evvy. Especially Evvy.

Daja didn't remember the trees and shrubs being so overgrown last night, although she had to admit that she had been very tired. It had been bothersome carrying her own mage kit and the considerably heavy purse the Duke had sent them with. Just the promise of a quarter of the purse had been enough to get the Blue Rook's captain to agree to the voyage.

As they neared the road, Daja smelt the tang of metal. There was silver close by, different to stuff that was mined from the ground, and unlike anything she had worked with her hands. She hadn't caught it last night when they were at this place, so what had changed? Niko went rigid beside her as they cleared one last snatch of trees. Daja didn't have to ask why.

Before them was a creature she had never seen before, one she hoped she would never have to see again. It had a human face and chest, but the rest of it was metal, silver shaped into feathers that gleamed vindictively. "Have you ever heard of such a thing?" she whispered to Niko, forcing herself to examine the creature as it coated the dead female sailor with its own filth, cackling.

"Never," he replied, already gathering defensive spells in his mind. His voice sounded shaken, and Daja wondered if she should call for the others.

The creature's head snapped up from the captain's dead body, looking at them, and let out a loud shriek. It had a mouth rather than a beak, and a stream of sounds came out of it to form words that Daja didn't know. The man-bird advanced towards them, its claws clumsy as they walked across the ground. It continued to natter at them all the while, and advanced so much that the foul odor wafting from it almost made Daja gag.

"We mean no harm," Niko told the thing, "if you could just tell us where we are, it would be much appreciated."

The thing only shook its head in reply and bared sharp yellow teeth at them. Niko tried again in a second language, and then a third, to no avail. He started to ask a fourth time, in Namornese, when the man-bird spoke words that dripped with magic. Niko raised a shield around them as the thing pointed at them with the tip of its left wing. Dark red lightning leapt from the thing and shattered Niko's shield, though it didn't reach the mages.

"I think the man-bird might mean us harm, Niko," Daja told her companion. The creature let out words in a hiss and glared at them. I'd bet anything it's swearing at us, Daja thought to herself.

Red lightning struck again at Niko's new shield, which held steady this time, and Daja decided enough was enough. She spread her magic through the thing's metal feathers, sending rust to eat away at the metal, in hopes that the man-bird would decide they were too much trouble. The creature let out a scream of rage and pumped its wings, lifting up from the ground and disappearing into the sky. The shield around the mages dropped and they hurried towards the seamen's defiled bodies.

"Its talons must be sharp," Niko remarked, holding a handkerchief over his mouth. "And it can do magic, though we've already seen that. I made them invisible last night so we could return today and give proper rites when we had more strength," he nudged the woman's corpse.

"I think we'd best burn them," Daja replied solemnly, "the thing might dig 'm up if they're only buried."

It was a shame to do such a thing, disposing of a body like it carried disease or plague, but surely the sailors would want to be left in peace and not disturbed by a bird-creature again. Niko nodded in agreement and Daja carried an armful of splintered planks to the dead captain. She held her breath as she leaned down to wedge wood closer to the bodies. Once that was done she set the pyre alight and let it burn as Niko muttered a prayer.

. . . .

Miri Fisher offered a prayer up to the gods to help keep her temper in check. She was usually the mildest of people, quicker to smile than she was to frown, but Goddess were the trainees testing her today! The second group of Queen's Riders, Ghostwind, had been saddled with three trainees this year, bringing the group's number up to te n. They had only been riding together for a week, but the constant bickering was making even Miri's teeth ache.

"Have you had your hands clamped over your ears since March? Why do you ask so many cursed questions?" one of the trainees snapped at another. That one has too much of a temper on her to succeed in Ghostwind, Miri thought to herself. She made a note to say as much to Sarge and Evin once she got back to Corus.

"Joslin, if you've nothing nice to say, then I'd rather you kept yourself quiet," Miri informed the snippy trainee. She turned in the saddle to address the other one, a girl from Blue Harbour who hardly ever stopped asking questions. "We weren't the only group to see lights in the sky last night, but we are the closest with two mages. If you're going to get through your trainee year, and the ones after it, you'll quickly accept that unfortunately duty sometimes interferes with comfort," she explained calmly, and urged her pony on.

Truth be told, Miri wanted to be back at the Queen's Riders Barracks too. Ghostwind had been in the field for three weeks, chasing after spidrens. Catching and disposing of the nasty things had been a relief because it meant they could go back to Corus, but then last night they had seen the sky light up and their fate had been sealed. "Big flashy lights generally mean magic, so the preference is for a group with two mages to attend. Group Askew only has one," Miri's second in command, Simmen, added.

The trainees got their redemption a half hour later, when it was one of them who noticed the handful of Stormwings flying overhead. The riders all kicked their pace up to a trot, and then a cante r once they saw the immortals dive down from their heights. "Bows out!" Miri ordered as they galloped around a bend in the road. She counted six Stormwings hovering above a group of people in the distance. Urging her pony faster, she called out, "what is the meaning of this?"

Only one of the Stormwings looked at Miri, "she rusted me! The human rusted me, son of Queen Harizah Rottstreak!" Paying the Riders no more attention, he turned back to the strangers. "Now she and her people will pay," he snarled and pointed his wing at the tall, dark-skinned girl.

"And what did you do to her to deserve... rusting?" Simmen asked, mage fire already playing between his fingertips in warning.

"He only nibbled on one of their dead. It was their fault, leaving it out in the open like that," one of the female Stormwings told them with her eyes fixed on one of the strangers who had skin the colour of a Yamani.

Miri trained her bow on the Stormwing who had first spoken to them. Now that she was closer, she could see that his feathers were rusted in places. She wracked her memory, trying to recall if she had ever seen a rusted Stormwing, but couldn't think of it if she had. "If you hurt any human in this realm, we'll be forced to kill you in the name of Queen Thayet," Miri warned him.

"You and your little bows are no match for us," another of the Stormwings taunted. They immortals shrieked in unison and magic burst from them, aimed at the strangers.

. . . .

"Don't kill the creatures, we don't know who it might offend," Niko had told them. Well, Briar was no expert on diplomacy, but he was quite sure that the man-birds weren't about to offer them the same clemency. His suspicion was confirmed when a group of men and women, mounted and wearing uniforms, rode up and pointed their weapons at the man-birds rather than the Emelanese mages. Ignoring Niko's warning, Briar loosened twine that held his hidden daggers in place, and let them drop into his hands.

The man-birds screamed and magic flashed through the air, including a yellow ward that strengthened the one that Niko had set into place earlier. Arrows whirled through the air towards the man-birds, but the archers were shooting from a difficult angle if they hoped to get at any weak spots. Briar threw one of his daggers, satisfied when it landed in the throat of the thing that had aimed her magic at him.

He felt Daja's magic toss one of the man-birds to the ground in front of the ponies. Her unnatural heat spread through the metal of another creature until its feathers were red hot and the smell of burning flesh pierced the air. Briar finished that one off for her with his second dagger, wincing as he imagined how painful it would be to burn to death. By the time he had grabbed at third and fourth daggers under his armpits, the rest of the man-birds had already become the archers' pincushions.

"What did I say about not killing them?" Niko sighed, letting his magic shield seep back into him. He placed his hands in the air and looked sternly at his former students, Evvy, and the sailors, until they all did the same. Sandry escaped his glare, but only because she had given a graceful sign of surrender before being told.

The two front archers put their bows away and advanced, though the others still had theirs strung and lined up ready to do to Briar and his friends like had been done to the man-birds. They spoke to each other in a strange language that Briar had never heard, then spoke to Niko in the same nonsense language.

Niko shook his head apologetically. "Sorry," he said, "but do you know of Emelan?" He listed off many names of countries, growing more desperate as the head archers shook their head at each one. Gyongxe was the birthplace of the Living Circle, Tharios was over a thousand years old, and Mbau was so far south that it might have been familiar to someone who didn't know of the other places.

Once Niko had said the name of every country he knew, the natives began to suggest places for him. Those place names were just as unfamiliar as the language they used to speak with each other. "Where are we?" Daja asked with wide eyes. Briar noted that no one replied, probably because there was no suitable answer.

. . . .

Miri had exhausted her knowledge of geography trying to come up with a name that might set some spark of recognition on the faces of the strangers. Eventually she gave up and decided introducing herself would be more worthwhile for now. "Miri," she said, placing a hand over her chest. She flicked her badge and traced its crimson boarder, "group commander of the Queen's Riders. Queen's Riders." She gestured to her group members as she ended her introduction. Oh Goddess, I'm at a fine age to become a Player, she thought to herself.

"Niko," the tallest of them told her, gesturing to himself. That was all well and good, but Miri couldn't even be sure that she hadn't misunderstood and that wasn't his name at all! His long black hair and sense of dress reminded her so much of her mage friend Numair, it was almost uncanny.

"You said he's a mage?" Miri asked her own mages.

Simmen nodded, "the cloudy white shield around them was him. I can't see any magic on the rest of them."

Miri frowned, uncertain. "But the Stormwing told us one of the girls rusted him, unless he saw Niko's long hair and just assumed… but I can't believe that, can you?" She dismounted from her pony and minced towards the strangers, having to take careful steps to avoid tripping over stray planks of wood. Suddenly, she went pale. "This is a mast," she said, pointing down to mess of fabric and wood next to her foot.

"It can't be. We're miles from a river," one of her riders replied.

She dropped down on her knee to inspect it, "I grew up at sea. This is a mast. It's a mast, isn't it?" She asked the strangers, unhappily receiving blank looks in return. She took a deep breath and mimed the movement of water with her hands. That meant something, the strangers nodded at her. "Simmen and Una, I want to be put into contact with Corus right now," she instructed, rising to her feet.

"And what exactly are we to say?" Una asked dubiously.

Miri put her hands in the air in resignation. "Start with 'this isn't a trick'," she suggested, "tell them that we have mages who managed to get themselves shipwrecked on a spot of land that's miles from any water, and one of them can make Stormwings all rusty. I don't really care what you say; just find out what they want us to do!"

. . . .

Tris woke up with a groan and opened her eyes in just a squint. Her head hurt, in fact everything hurt, and for just a moment she forgot why she felt so weak. You undid all but the smallest of your braids and had the smarts to fall off a flying boat, idiot, she reminded herself. She had only woken because of the bright sunlight and nipping cool air.

She tried to sit up amongst orange leaf litter, but a wave of nausea and the sting of pain forced her back to the ground. It wouldn't have surprised Tris if she had some broken bones in her fall, especially because many of her bones had been fractured and healed so recently.

Consciousness would not last for long, she knew she was completely exhausted, possibly injured, and almost magic-less. The link to her siblings was so fragile, but the most logical thing to do was contact them. Tris took a deep breath and pushed an image of the clearing down their bond. That tiny use of her remaining magic was enough to make her collapse again. As she melted into the ground she had time to realise that Chime was screaming nearby, but then sleep swamped over he r.

. . . .

Daja felt like she was a dancing bear whenever she tried to communicate with the archers. Speaking with them involved making a series of gestures, pointing, and repeating simple words over and over with a great amount of focus on her expression. In the end she came up with the most useful idea. Drawing a picture for the archers accomplished what repetitive exaggerated gestures did not: the riders finally understood that someone had fallen from the ship.

By midday they were joined by more brown uniformed archers and their shaggy ponies. This meant Daja and her companions had to introduce themselves again, with everyone just as awed and confused as the last time . Soon there were maps produced of the land surrounding them, and Daja, Sandry, and Briar spent a few minutes in discussion before pointing to a spot on the map.

That was where Tris was, which meant it was where they had to go (even if it would take more than a day to ride there). The journey to Tris's clearing proved to be awkward and uncomfortable. Even Daja, who had the mildest temper out of her siblings, grew increasingly impatient at the language barrier and slow pace due to terrain. During the ride the groups didn't talk to each other, but once camp was set up the questions started.

It was very frustrating to essentially become a mute. None of the mages knew what had caused them to shift from their home world into this one, and even if they did it would be impossible to tell the riders. Whatever time Briar didn't use up worrying about Tris and his friends back home, he spent drafting up a potion that would help them learn the native language.

Just before nightfall on the second day of riding, the leader of the riders gave a command to stop and set up camp. I won't, we're too close, Sandry thought adamantly to Briar and Daja. All three shook their heads at Miri and urged their mounts on.

. . . .

Three times more Tris woke in the same manner; her limbs too heavy to move and her magic too weak to even attempt more contact. When she woke up the fourth time it was to a sensation of warmth. Familiar scents filtered their way through her sensitive nose, even if they were buried under the stink of horses and leather. That had to be Sandry sniffling beside her; the soft smell of lilac perfume gave it away.

Water, Tris thought to Sandry as she willed her eyelids to flutter open. How long?

The brunette gave a happy gasp and gently clutched at Tris's uninjured hand. Long enough, she thought back, give Briar a moment and he'll have you full of water and all kinds of nasty draughts, and I think our escorts have sent for help.

Tris gave her sister the best smile she could manage and gently squeezed her fingers. For all that Briar bemoaned fussy girls, he did a fairly good imitation of one as he cradled Tris's head and directed her to sip from a series of different cups. At some point she drifted back into unconsciousness, almost absolutely certain that one of Briar's horrible concoctions had been one to induce sleep.

. . . .

The next day it took five hours to get back to a road. Once there, they quickly set up camp. Tents were put up, not just bed rolls, and the Queen's Riders made the effort to dig latrines. In the three days since knowing Miri's group, Niko had managed to memorise each of their names. Some of them had taken the care to use maps to explain that he was in Tortall, which was a country he'd never heard of. Worryingly, Tortall was bordered by several other countries that Niko had also never heard of.

Tris had at least one of her siblings sitting with her at all times. Niko came in and out, always dismayed to see how his former student was seeped in the others' magic. He hadn't been in Emelan when Sandry was thirteen or so and had held the ailing Duke together with magic and pure stubbornness, but it was quite obvious that she was doing the same again with Tris.

When the smell of rabbit stew had well and truly settled over the campsite, Niko finally managed to send everyone away from Tris's bedside. "Just for dinner, I'm just as adept at looking after her as you three are, thank you," he assured them in his most sagely tone. Once they left he settled down beside the sickbed and smoothed hair away from Tris's face.

They sat in silence for a long while as he tried to remember when he had last seen Tris's hair unbound. She had used up almost all of the magic in her braids to keep the boat suspended and prevent them from falling, leaving her with very little energy left for herself. "I wish you had done something for me to be angry about, it would make this waiting a lot easier," Niko admitted softly as he groomed her wild locks of hair. The small amount of lightning in it only tickled, completely harmless.

Tris's reply was so soft that Niko almost thought he'd imagined it. "I'm just drained, and it feels like I broke at least two hundred of my bones," she whispered through dry lips. She opened her grey-blue eyes and looked up at her old teacher. "If... can you keep their magic away from mine? Make sure Chime is looked after, Glaki too, and everyone knows I love them?"

A tear slipped down Tris's cheek, but she couldn't lift her hand to wipe it away. Niko did that task for her then threaded his fingers through her hair once more, "they already know," he told her briskly. "As for preventing them from joining your magics, I'll try, but I don't know if I can," he told her regretfully.

"Thanks, Niko," she replied. Tris closed her eyes, slowed her breathing, and concentrated. The block would have to be perfect before she applied it, otherwise her siblings would break through.

. . . .

Sandry wondered whether her sister would even last through the night. Tris's bones had been set and numerous potions administered to her, but nothing seemed to get better. The infection and fever she was suffering through was unaffected even by Briar's magically enhanced glop. "I can't believe she did this," Sandry insisted with quivering lips and her chin set mulishly.

"We could be in a different world, and the trick you four once pulled off might not work the same here. Tris did what she thinks is sensible," Niko assessed all of them through solemn eyes. "It took some time for her to make that obstruction be twe e n your magics and he rs, she obviously thought through her decision and doesn't want you harmed."

"It wasn't her decision to make!" Briar snapped angrily from Sandry's side. "It's not for her to order us about and choose like this," he continued irately. He wanted to pound some sense into the vexatious girl, and Niko, too.

"And have all of you leap after her to die as well? Or for it to work, only to discover Tris can come back but you can't?" Niko's words were said with a firm gentleness that discouraged any future argument.

Hours went by and Tris's breathing grew more laboured. Her lungs crackled with every intake of breath, and she began to mumble words and phrases that didn't seem to make sense. She called for the absent dog Little Bear at one point, and later cried out the name Aymery. Their magic wouldn't touch her, the barrier she had constructed to keep them away was too refined.

Three hours after midnight Daja managed to make a scratch in Tris's block. The slight weakness allowed Sandry and Briar to look for more cracks while their sister deteriorated even more.

"You can't," Evvy pleaded once she understood what was happening. Briar ignored her, as did his sisters. They were too deep now to speak in the physical world. She covered her face with her hands and shook her head. "Master Niko, they can't," she said hesitantly.

Before they were fully accredited, Niko may have been able to intervene between his students. However, they were no longer children and he knew it would be fruitless to try alone, or even with Evvy's help. All he could do was watch and lament his inability to heal. Tris was going to die and her siblings would likely kill themselves trying to save her.

The sweltering tent muffled the sound of horse hooves until they were close. Niko jumped up from his seat on a log and opened the tent flaps wide, revealing a small number of men. Although they weren't armoured they did carry weapons, and for a moment Niko was unsure whether they were friend or foe.

One of the newcomers, a tall man with brown hair and an emerald mage light in his hand, swept through the open flaps. As he passed Niko he skimmed calloused fingers over the older man's shoulder, sparking a feeling of health and revitalisation.

Niko understood, this man was a healer. He nodded and followed the man to Tris's bedside, stepping between the siblings that held her vigil. He reached his magic out to his defiant once-students. Come back, he thought to Daja with his hand on her arm, there's a healer here.

None of them stirred. Niko pressed his fingers to Daja's wrist, searching for a pulse. He felt no flutter of life beneath her skin.

A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews, favourites, and alerts you've set. The past two weeks have been chaotic for me (in a good way), and I hope this update isn't too overdue. I've tried to keep things realistic in this chapter- all of the characters are very shocked, confused, and are relying mostly on instinct. This chapter also marks the beginning of my difficulties consolidating the two different worlds, because this is a collision of two separate worlds, not just countries.

Drop me a review or PM to let me know what your thoughts are. I especially love constructive criticism, but any feedback is appreciated.