The Gathandrian Trilogy 01 - The Gifting

nature from its simpler valley cousin. The boy’s presence, though heavy, gave him unsought comfort. The others simply stepped upwards, as if mounting stairs visible only to them.
    Their progress appeared easier than his own. Damn it. Why was he always so weak?
    Each step Simon took brought sweat to his face and neck and, after a while, he found he was panting. As his breath became more ragged, the pull for air more strenuous, he began to wonder how much further they would need to go before rest became vital.
    “Isa- bella ,” he forced out her name as she was nearest and almost cried out when the shape of the word leaving his lips crystallised into small yellow daggers. They fell on the invisible path in front of him.
    At once, his mouth filled with the taste of iron, and he spat out blood. It landed half on his leg, poised to step up another level, and half on the boy’s arm. The boy gasped, but made no movement, while the pulse of Simon’s heart throbbed an impossible rhythm in his head.
    “Wha ..?”
    Before he could finish, blood filled his mouth again, as it had on the mountain, and he gagged, spitting out great red globules against a clear sky. Gods and stars, so far the day was not proving easy.
    Don’t speak.
    Johan’s voice echoed through him and, when Simon was finished and his mouth was clear again, he nodded.
    Why? Simon asked him mentally, realising that he need make no real effort to be heard. Johan’s tall, dark figure shimmered in the air and seemed to wink out of existence for a moment before being real again.
    This high up, the Kingdom of the Air is a fragile place , he answered. It does what it wishes, when it wishes.
    It is a kingdom then? Like the mountain? There are people here?
    He didn’t answer directly. You will see soon enough. You must conserve your energy, Simon. Even though the air kingdom gives some degree of physical strength to us all, you have little left and there is still some way to climb before we may be sure of safety.
    Before he could think of one of the hundreds of questions clamouring for his attention, Johan turned away and began to stride back to his sister.
    Quickly , he said.
    Spitting out the last of the blood and watching it form into tiny hooks, Simon did as he had been ordered. The height of the steps they took seemed steeper than before. Keeping his two companions in his vision, he hunched his shoulders and pushed on.
    Gradually, the top of the mountain fell behind; Simon could no longer sense its peaks and crags in the physical space they’d come from. The air became colder and thinner, causing his breath to come in greater gasps. Despite that, sweat drenched his skin and the boy, too, burned to the touch. Wisps of clouds drifted by, the scent of them like fields after spring rain. He could hear now and then, in the distance, the shrill cry of a snow-raven, and he hoped they were not hungry and looking for prey.
    At last, after what seemed like a time too long for the naming, one of Simon’s many steps upwards almost brought him into collision with Isabella.
    Sorry , he whispered in his mind, but she made no reply, only glancing at him once to frown and shake her head.

    Johan
    Johan pays no attention to any of this, although at the corner of his mind he is aware that something is happening between Simon and his sister. He is half-kneeling, half-sprawling across the sky. His cloak is torn and there is blood in his hair. We’ve failed, he thinks, we’ve failed . The snow-ravens have not accepted us. A sudden rush of whiteness and claw and he falls.
    “Johan?” Simon calls out his name but then stops abruptly as if being choked.
    The injured man turns, slowly, to look at the scribe. His face feels wet. Simon makes a move towards him, but Isabella gestures at him to stop and he does so.
    What’s wrong? Simon launches the question out from his mind into the air. In the gods’ names, what’s happening?
    Johan cannot answer.

    Isabella
    We-we don’t know. Panting, she answers for her brother. She has not expected the snow-ravens to attack so soon. Something is out of kilter in the kingdom. If Gelahn wants them to stay alive, then he must do something to save them. But will he? Isabella speaks to Hartstongue again, keeps him occupied. The air kingdom is angry, I think. We don’t know why. We should have reached the gate by now, but there’s nothing here.
    The gate? What are you talking about? A gate in the air?
    Yes, she says, her mind still racing