Wing & Nien Read online

  A shy’teh.

  With jaws dropping slowly and fists tightening around thin branches of scraggly brush, Nien stared up at it — and the shy’teh gazed right back. Its eyes were bright, a brilliant green, and they shone as if lit from somewhere inside its large head.

  For over two hundred revolutions the legend of the shy’teh had been told to Rieevan children. It was the only story outside of those in the Ancient Writings the adults weren’t entirely averse to imparting. The story went that a small number of their people had gone into the mountains to seek refuge. Why they’d done so was a part of the legend so varied and confused that no one really seemed to know the truth of it, but once in the mountains the refugees had become lost in a network of caves they’d entered in hopes of finding protection. In the end, they had survived only by the guidance and sustenance of a female shy’teh who not only led them out of the caves, but also sustained them with the kills she had made for herself and a single cub. The tale went that the cub perished from starvation. Reverence for this sacrifice had grown into a commonly held belief that the spirit of that cub lived on, never dying, forever choosing a single living shy’teh for its mortal abode.

  Nien had never bought into that. No creature — human or animal — would sacrifice one of its own to save another, or others. But it was a legend and as it was with legends how much of it was true could never be known and at this moment Nien could not have cared either way, he just wanted off the ledge and away from the big cat.

  Lips parted, Nien breathed shallowly, feeling Carly doing the same beside him, both watching in awe and horror as the cat narrowed its eyes, drew in the huge muscles between its shoulders, extended its claws from within the furry black of its paws, and pressed its ears flat against its head.

  “Here we go,” Nien said, his voice faint.

  “Sech’nya,” Carly swore.

  And then Wing said, “Look away.”

  Confused by Wing’s tone as well as direction, Nien nevertheless lowered his head and saw Carly do the same. With their eyes glued to the path beneath their feet, he and Carly waited, aching to see what Wing was doing.

  The moments passed interminably long before Nien snuck a glance.

  Wing hadn’t moved. In fact, he was perfectly still. But he had not lowered his head. In fact, he was looking directly up at the big cat. Heart pounding in the nervous reaches of his throat, Nien watched as the cat’s eyes shifted to meet Wing’s.

  Emerald eyes met emerald eyes.

  Though he was unsure how, Nien knew that Wing and the shy’teh were communicating. Wonder, mingled with cold fear, pooled in Nien’s belly. He was about to divert his gaze again when the shy’teh’s narrowed eyes rounded, its ears came forward, and its lips slid down over its white fangs.

  Yeckhe’tey, Nien swore silently. All right, Wing, whatever it is you’re doing just hurry it along. You may be fine, but I feel like Carly and I are about to become dinner.

  “Go ahead,” Wing said, as if having read Nien’s mind, though his eyes remained on the shy’teh.

  “Just uh, let us by then,” Nien said.

  Wing had already taken a step forward.

  “Are you sure…?” Carly whispered to Wing as she stepped in behind Nien. Her voice was anxious.

  “Yes,” Wing replied, his eyes still on the shy’teh.

  Nien felt as if many sunsteps could have passed by the time he and Carly reached the other end of the rock-strewn ridge.

  Upon more sure-footed ground, they stopped and glanced back at the short outcropping of rock.

  It was empty.

  With a chill coursing up his back, Nien shook his body, throwing off nervous energy like an animal would water from its coat.

  “Bleekla,” he said, exhaling. “I cannot believe that just happened.”

  Wing moved up the path and joined them. He seemed relaxed, peaceful even.

  Carly let out a nervous laugh. “Wing? You all right? Where’d the shy’teh go?”

  “Away,” Wing said.

  Carly waited, staring at him as if there were certainly more to his answer than that. When Wing didn’t elaborate, she said, “It just…left?”

  Wing nodded.

  “Well, yosha, that’s crazy. What’d you do, just ask it to leave?”

  “No,” Wing said. “I was just…saying hello.”

  Carly and Nien stared.

  Upon seeing Wing’s instant regret at his choice of words, Nien said, “And all the better for it.” He smiled suddenly. “What a coo! I mean, how many living Rieevans have ever seen a shy’teh! — except for you of course.”

  “That was a long time ago.”

  The thought crossed Nien’s mind that, maybe, the shy’teh on the ledge was the same that had freed Wing from the rusted trap as a child. How long did the big cats live? Or did Wing have a connection with the creature as a species — rare and few as there seemed to be?

  He dismissed the thought.

  “I’m just glad we’re alive.” And then, with mock airs, he appraised Wing and Carly. “It’s pretty risky bringing you two up here. If either of you got killed, I’d never hear the end of it.”

  Carly rolled her eyes.

  Wing laughed. “Convenient that you’re forgetting the time we brought Jake along…”

  Nien pointed at himself. “Was that me?” The side of his lip drew up.

  Wing’s mouth curled into an equally impish grin.

  Nien shook his head and started to walk away, throwing his hand out dismissively behind him. “That was only once, and I was clearly out of my mind.”

  Playfully aghast, Carly said, “If the Village only knew.”

  “No one in the Village knows,” Nien said. “Not about that. Not about all the times we’ve been up here.”

  Wing grunted. “They’ll find out eventually.”

  “You two live so far out, word would never make it into the Village,” Carly said. “And my parents couldn’t care less what I do.”

  “If you came home with a broken leg or a limb half torn away by a shy’teh, trust me, they’d care,” Nien quipped.

  But Carly merely shrugged. “Either way, it’s kind of a sign, don’t you think? I mean, what are the odds that we come looking for the Shy’teh Caves and we actually see a shy’teh?”

  The three exchanged long glances — neither Wing nor Nien replied.

  “Well, come on,” Nien said, needing to break the looming silence. “You lead, Weed Farmer.”

  “I thought you were the leader here, Deviant.”

  “Just go,” Nien said.

  Carly shook her head at their pet names for each other as Wing took the lead only to have the ground simply disappear and he along with it.

  “Wing!” Nien barked out at the same time as Carly.

  Nien rushed ahead and dropped to his knees. What had looked like natural ground had obviously been the mere collection of dead, windblown branches and leaves over what had once been a rather large hole.

  “Wing!” Nien called down into the hole. “Wing, can you hear me?”

  Only silence and the cool musty air of earth answered him. Nien could almost feel the wild hammering of Carly’s heart behind him.

  And then, from the black depth of the hole — “Ouch.”

  Nien gasped with relief. “Wing! Are you hurt?”

  “No, but wow, it’s dark in here. I can’t even see my hand.”

  On her hands and knees behind Nien, Carly asked, “Is he hurt?”

  “He’s there. He says he’s not hurt.”

  “About how far down do you think he is?”

  “He doesn’t sound too far away,” Nien said, staring down into the blackness of the opening. “Wing, are you stuck?”

  “No.”

  “Can you feel the sides of the hole?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, just stay put. We’re going to clear away some debris and see if we can open up the entrance, get some light down there.”

  Nien and Carly worked quickly to clear
away the dead branches and leaves, as well as the dirt, rock, and live reaching vine that had grown over it through the revolutions.

  Though a bit bony and not yet his full height, Wing was already tall, his shoulders broad — that he had slipped by so rapidly told them the hole was bigger than what they could see. By the time they’d dug away all the debris the hole was nearly four steps across. The sun was lowering in the sky, illuminating only about a fourth of the way down the pit, still it was enough to allow them to catch a glimpse of the whites of Wing’s eyes, smiling back up at them. Nien could feel the coolness of the mountain’s interior rising against his face.

  “Hello,” Wing said.

  Nien threw him a nod. “Let’s get you out of there.”

  “Great,” Wing replied, and then, “E’te — wait.”

  “Wing?”

  “Hold on,” Wing called back up.

  Carly and Nien watched as Wing’s darker outline within the dark at the bottom of the hole disappeared from their view, apparently walking into the mountain. Nien exchanged a look with Carly: What was Wing doing? More importantly, how?

  “Wing? Wing!” Carly called out. No reply. She looked at Nien. “What’s he doing?”

  Nien sighed, but a moment later Wing reappeared at the bottom of the hole.

  “You’re not going to believe this,” he said, “but this pit has another opening.”

  “Really?” Nien paused for about half a blink. “Well, here goes nothing.”

  “What?” Carly said.

  “I’m going down.”

  “So that I’ll have two men to rescue?”

  “Nah, I’ll use these vines.”

  “Vines?”

  “They’re sturdy enough,” Nien said, thinking, I hope.

  “Wing? I’m coming down.”

  “What? No!”

  “Catch me if I fall, right?”

  Wing backed away, disappearing into the deeper black at the back of the hole. “Not a chance.”

  Testing a handful of vine with a quick jerk and a short lean, Nien headed over the edge. Walking his way down into the dark with his feet against the dirt wall, he descended until he felt Wing’s hands on his legs. “Are you reaching?”

  “Yes,” Wing replied. “Your butt’s just above my head.”

  E’te, Nien thought, I’ve still got a pretty good drop.

  Releasing the vines, he landed on his feet next to Wing.

  Wing helped him up, flashing a smile. “Welcome.”

  Nien grinned back at him.

  Carly looked down over the ledge.

  “Come on down,” Nien called. Above him he saw Carly turn around, yank on another handful of vines, and mutter, “This is crazy,” as she started down.

  Wing took her in his arms at the bottom, setting her feet to the floor of the pit.

  Together, the three of them turned into the mountain and the black hole that yawned before them.

  “We need a torch of some sort,” Nien said.

  “I swear, we’re allergic to making intelligent decisions around here,” Cary said.

  Nevertheless, Wing disappeared again into the hole. “This isn’t dirt,” he called back at them.

  Nien squinted after him. “What isn’t dirt?”

  “The walls in here.” The pause that followed felt long and weighted. “It’s rock.”

  Rock.

  “The Shy’teh Caves,” Nien and Carly said together.

  Nien dove into the dark after Wing. Not far along, he ran into Wing’s back. In the dark, Nien felt Wing groping for his hand and, once he found it, pressed it to the wall on their left. “Feel. Here,” Wing said. Nien let Wing guide his hand over a set of worn indentations.

  “Think there might be a pattern in it?” Nien asked.

  “I wondered,” Wing said. “Not that it matters, in this darkness it’d be impossible to make out the vaguest outline.” He was silent a beat. “E’te, I’m sufficiently spooked. Let’s get out of here.”

  But Nien moved past him, saying, “I know, but hold on, I wonder what’s — ”

  “Around that corner?” Wing said. “More darkness. My curiosity faded with the light.”

  “Did you notice the walls in here? They’re getting colder. Wet, too.”

  “I noticed,” Wing replied.

  Nien went on a bit farther, practically able to feel Wing’s nervousness behind him.

  He’s thinking my “insatiable” curiosity will keep us down in these caves all night, probably getting us lost or killed, Nien thought. Nevertheless, he continued to probe into the darkness ahead mentally and visually, as if by sheer force of will he could illuminate what lay ahead.

  Finally, he spoke to Wing from the deep, “Well, we need light, and it’s getting late. We’ll be losing sunlight topside.” He heard an audible sigh of relief from Wing.

  Feeling for the wall beside him, he was about to turn about when he thought he saw a faint gleam of light.

  “E’te, Wing!” he called back down the tunnel.

  Behind him, he heard Wing start toward him slowly, feeling his way along the wall.

  “I’m right here,” Nien said, reaching out a hand for Wing to bump into. He felt Wing’s fingers brush his and he stepped up beside him. “Do you see what I think I’m seeing?”

  Taking a few more steps together, the pale gleam focused into a slender stream of light shining through at an angle toward the ground level of another tunnel.

  In a few fortuitous moments, the brothers had emerged into daylight.

  “Carly!” Nien called. “Carly, we’re up here.”

  Carly appeared at the bottom of the hole Wing had fallen into and looked up.

  Kneeling at the top, Wing and Nien smiled down at her.

  “We found an easier way.” Nien held his hand up. “Wait, we’ll come back for you.”

  Up a little from the cave-in where Wing had fallen and almost entirely hidden from the outside was an entrance between two thin, jagged outcroppings of rock. The slit between the outcroppings seemed innocuous enough at first glance, but just beneath the surface the break opened wide to the path that Wing and Nien had followed out, a path that rose easily to the break in the rocks from the larger tunnel below.

  Squeezing through the fissure, Nien and Wing made their way back down the path and into the tunnel, appearing out of the darkness and into the light at the bottom of the hole where Carly waited.

  “E’te,” Nien said. “You’ll like this way better.”

  The three returned together and crawled one by one through the break in the rocks into the fading light of day.

  “Well, that was easier,” Carly said with a grin.

  The three of them hiked quickly off the mountain. The sun had long set by the time they crept from the tree line, entering the valley just southing of the Cantfields.

  Kissing Wing, Carly said goodbye to Nien and Wing and headed for her home in the Village.

  Continuing off across the fields, Nien said, “Well, that was something.”

  The fields stretched out before them beneath a brilliant blanket of stars. Wing walked along in silence.

  “Wing?” Nien prodded. “What do you think?”

  “Think?” Wing asked.

  “The caves.”

  Wing glanced up at the sky. “I don’t know what to think.”

  “You must be thinking something.”

  “Probably the same thing you are.”

  “How do you know what I’m thinking?”

  Wing cast him an eye. “Same as I knew what the big cat was thinking.”

  “So, you did…talk with it?”

  “Of course.”

  Nien shook his head, thinking, Of course, why not? Completely natural. He probably does it every day.

  “What?” Wing asked. “You can read my mind. And I, yours.”

  “E’te,” Nien replied, acquiescing, “it just seems more normal between us.” He took a deep breath, drawing in the cold, refreshing night air. “Whether they were th
e shy’teh caves or not, I wonder if the legend is the real reason our people don’t venture into the mountains?” A familiar anger tightened Nien’s gut. “I’m tired of the excuses, Wing, our people give for why we don’t travel, don’t visit other valleys, or allow outsiders. Do you think they really believe exclusion is the only way to keep our way of life consistent with the Ancient Writings?”

  “I think some believe that, yes. Others — I have my doubts.”

  Nien made a noncommittal grunt.

  “Really,” Wing said. “I think even the most devout villager has doubts. But once out of the ground, love and fear get all tangled up, and so a choice once made in fear easily wears the face of love. The purest minds can conjure such a rationale.”

  “I think the lie is that purity is even possible. They’re afraid of having their beliefs challenged.”

  “Or losing them altogether,” Wing replied quietly.

  Nien ground his teeth. He wanted to claw out, scream, fight! break through the lies, hold them up to their people so they could see and change their minds about everything — seclusion, books, travel, outsiders, the Merehr prophecy.

  As they continued to walk, he wondered if Wing struggled with it like he did.

  “In some ways more,” Wing said. “In others, less.”

  Nien looked at him.

  “What?”

  “You heard that?”

  Wing’s brow furrowed quizzically. “You were wondering if I feel the same way.”

  “That’s what I was thinking.”

  “Oh.”

  Nien blinked at him.

  Wing shrugged.

  Monitoring Wing out of the corner of his eye, Nien thought, You can be really creepy.

  This time Wing laughed. “I told you, I know what you’re thinking.”

  “Having a pretty good idea what someone is thinking is different than actually hearing what someone is thinking.”

  “Ah. Well, I don’t think I actually hear it, either,” Wing amended. But then he grinned. “Maybe a little. Still, it’s more a feeling.”