I had no idea how intelligent Kiki was; not that I thought she was stupid, but between her mannerisms and the way she spoke, she struck me as being about the level of a young child. Bad people could mean a whole lot of things coming from a kid. “Kiki, you said it’s been a very long time since you left Longreach. There’s a chance things changed. Maybe not all of them were bad people. Maybe the bad people left. Look, I promised my friends I would find them friends, right? Promises are important.”

  PROMISES ARE IMPORTANT. BUT YOU ARE MY FRIEND. MY ONLY FRIEND.

  The worry in Kiki’s words twisted a tiny dagger in my heart. “Look, I’ll make you a promise then. I will do my very best to come back if you can fly me a little closer. They helped save my sister, Kiki. They’re good people you can be friends with, too.”

  Kiki’s eyes focused on me. YOU SAID YOU MADE A PROMISE. THAT’S A DEBT.

  I chuckled at the unexpectedly astute observation. “It was a promise when I made it. They promised to help find my sister and I promised to help find them friends, Kiki.”

  MASTER PROMISED TO COME WITH ME. HE DIDN’T. HE DIED.

  The hurt in her words forced an unhappy sigh from my lips. “Sometimes things happen you can’t control, Kiki. I tell you what,” I leaned over and picked up a handful of shells from last night’s dinner. Counting as I went, I made a small pile with them on the floor. “There are seven shells here. Every morning, you take one off the pile. If I’m not back when you move the last one, I want you to find my friends. I can tell you where they are, that way you’ll still have friends if something happens to me.”

  Somehow Kiki made a very earnest face at me. I WILL BE VERY ANGRY IF YOU DON’T COME BACK, SAM.

  Grinning, I nodded. “I’ll be really angry if I don’t come back too, Kiki, but I have to go. Like you said, it’s a debt.”

  FINE. I WILL TAKE YOU TO THE EDGE OF THE FOG BUT NO CLOSER. IF THEY CATCH ME, THEY WILL PUT ME IN A CAGE. Kiki’s lips twitched before peeling back to reveal sharp teeth the length of short swords. I DO NOT LIKE CAGE PEOPLE, SAM. I KILL CAGE PEOPLE. DO NOT LET THEM CAGE YOU.

  And there it was, what was worse than death for Kiki. The smile that appeared on my face fit somewhere between “I wish a motherfucker would” and “That’s a bold strategy, Cotton. Let’s see how it works out for them.”

  “You’re not the only person who kills cage people, Kiki. We found out about the Syr up here from folks who were taken by slavers, your cage people probably. Any of them I run into won’t see another sunrise.”

  Now mollified, Kiki shifted from menacing to friendly in an eyeblink. YOU ARE GOOD FRIEND, SAM. ALSO, CAN I HAVE ANOTHER PEARL?

  “Uh, sure.” After she’d swallowed the one I gave, I asked, “Do these not have a lot of magic in them? Or does flying take a lot of energy?”

  THEY DO. Kiki made an unhappy noise and looked away like an embarrassed kid. I HAD ALMOST NO MAGIC LEFT WHEN WE MET. IT RETURNS VERY SLOWLY ON ITS OWN. I WANTED TO MAKE SURE I HAD ENOUGH TO CHECK IF YOU CAME BACK.

  I nodded. Her reasoning made sense to me, but what came next required more trust than I was comfortable giving. To be fair, all the counterintelligence training I’d sat through instilled an instinctive distrust of just about everything and everyone, so maybe I was just being paranoid.

  Kiki eyed me curiously as I set another pearl next to the stack of shells and opened the message book. “Okay, so I’m going to leave that other pearl to make sure you can make it to my friends. I’m going to sketch a map for you, okay?”

  A MAP?

  “It’s a drawing to give you an idea what the land looks like if you haven’t been there yourself.”

  Kiki blinked and perked up. THAT’S AN AMAZING IDEA. FRIENDS ARE GREAT.

  The skyferret leaned in as I flipped open the message book and saw Jenna hadn’t replied yet. I scribbled a quick explanation for the map I was about to draw and an apology for not clearing it with anyone beforehand. I went to the bottom of the page and started sketching.

  “Okay, so this is the tower we’re in, the river, the city, right?”

  IT LOOKS DIFFERENT FROM THE SKY.

  I closed my eyes and breathed in. “It does. I’m not used to seeing things from up high, and I’m not a great artist either. I’m just trying to give you an idea of what you’re looking for, okay?”

  Kiki nodded and leaned in to nuzzle the side of my head. IS OKAY. THERE ARE MANY THINGS KIKI IS NOT GOOD AT, TOO. I CANNOT DRAW AT ALL, YOU KNOW.

  Over the next few minutes, I sketched out my trip out here in reverse, doing my best to gauge distances. Primarily I focused on things I figured would be visible from altitude, features like the Dragon’s Fingers, the forest, and then the crater itself. I then pointed out where the Green was.

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  “Now, Kiki, if you have to fly all the way up there by yourself, you need to remember that you’re not small anymore.”

  KIKI IS A BIG GIRL.

  I grinned. “Yes, you are, but most things your size eat people. I might’ve told my sister and my friends about you, and they shouldn’t attack you, but I can’t promise you that someone won’t panic and do something stupid.”

  STUPID PEOPLE MAKE KIKI SAD.

  I couldn’t help but laugh and pat her on the head. “Yeah, they make me sad, too. So don’t give them an opportunity to be stupid. Land outside of town, close enough they can see you, but not close enough for them to attack you, okay? My friends or my sister will come out to see you.”

  Kiki’s face contorted with earnest thought. OH. OKAY. THAT MAKES SENSE.

  “One more thing, I have a special gift that lets me talk to anyone and they understand me. It also lets me understand them.”

  Kiki sat bolt upright, her face filled with startled disbelief. IS THAT WHY I UNDERSTAND YOU?!

  Smiling, I nodded. “It is, but my friends don’t have that gift. You probably won’t understand each other at all. I need you to be patient with them, okay, Kiki? They are good people, not cage people.”

  PATIENT? KIKI CAN BE PATIENT WITH NOT-CAGE-PEOPLE.

  “Good, I’m going to eat some crackers I’ve been saving, can we go once I’m done?” I asked while opening my pack to retrieve said crackers. When the skyferret eagerly nodded, I poked around for the bag I’d kept all MRE sides I hadn’t eaten yet. A little bit of hot sauce and— I winced as the memory of Tomas demanding dibs on the hot sauce jumped into my head. Fuck.

  Thankfully, eating a handful of crackers wasn’t a time-consuming thing so I didn’t have much time to dwell on that memory. After washing them down with cold water and topping Wyk’s flask off, I set about repacking everything. “Uhm, Kiki? Are you going to keep looking for Tomas?”

  I WAS, YES. DO NOT WORRY, I KNOW HIS SCENT NOW. Before I could respond, her head tilted a little. DO I NEED TO BE CAREFUL IF I FIND HIM, TOO?

  “Yes you do, Kiki. The last time he saw you was when you tore up those riders. He thinks you’re a monster.”

  The giant flying death machine pouted. BUT KIKI IS NOT A MONSTER.

  “I know that, but he doesn’t. Now, he’s got something like this,” I said and patted the rifle on my pack. “Think of it like a bow with extremely fast arrows. They will hurt you, probably quite a bit. I don’t want you to get hurt, Kiki.”

  HURT BAD.

  “Yes, hurt bad. So, if you can, you need to do the same thing like you would with my other friends. Land a decent distance away and try to make sure he knows you’re not an enemy.”

  HOW?

  A thought popped into my head and I squinted, wondering if it was possible. And with half an hour of effort, it turned out it was. By the time I climbed atop Kiki’s back, I’d taught her a very basic message in the Syr tongue, just a few words: “Sam. Friend. Here to help.” I also gave her a note written on a spare MRE napkin that explained things for Tomas a little more explicitly and we agreed to leave it under a rock next to the shells so she could take it with her when she looked for Tomas.

  After assuring me that she’d catch me if I fell off, Kiki leapt into the sky and simply just didn’t fall. I’m sure the first few seconds of flight would’ve been impressive, had I been looking, but I spent those seconds clinging to her back with all four limbs with the expectation I’d have issues staying on. Feeling a bit sheepish when that hazard didn’t present itself, I straightened up a little.

  Below us, the thickening fog streaked by as Kiki poured on speed and climbed to clear the fogbank a few hundred yards ahead and then we crested the wall into the bright morning sun. Shielding my eyes, I glanced back to Annesport and the surrounding area, trying to burn the layout of everything into my head with the assumption I might end up coming back again.

  Not long passed before Kiki started a slow bank to the left, taking us northward over the fog. The fog didn’t extend terribly far east of us, but telling distances at altitude was always tricky unless you were used to it. Hell, I didn’t know how high up we were other than we were high enough it didn’t trigger my marked dislike of heights, probably because my subconscious recognized there was no way we’d survive the fall so it stopped worrying about it. Ahead a massive green peninsula of trees atop a steep out hillside pushed into the sea of white.

  Maybe a few minutes short of crossing out of the fog sea, Kiki’s flight path suddenly curved to the left and tightened into what I quickly realized was a sharply rising spiral.

  “Ah, Kiki? What are you doing?” I asked as we circled ever higher. It seemed a reasonable question, considering the air carried progressively more chill with every pass.

  YOU SHOWED ME THE WAY TO YOUR FRIENDS. I DON’T WANT YOU TO GET LOST EITHER.

  “Oh,” I managed to say despite my ears popping. Kiki coasted to what felt like a standstill mid-air, which was terribly convenient because I’d started getting lightheaded.

  SAM, THE RIVER FLOWS AROUND THE MOUNTAIN AHEAD OF US AROUND THE LEFT SIDE UNDER THE FOG. IT THEN TURNS AND FOLLOWS THE FAR SIDE BACK TO THE RIGHT.

  “Hold on, hold on,” I muttered and dug out my binoculars which thankfully I’d moved to my dump pouch so I didn’t need to move much. With a little help from magnified optics, I realized how happy I was to not have to climb or traverse that mountain. As far as I could tell from up here, it looked a little short for a mountain, but what it lacked in height, the central ridge line made up for with verticality. The slopes were only gentle where they met the fog. Based on the handful of tree-free gaps here and there, they grew steadily steeper until suddenly dark granite stone speared almost straight up out of them. If you could get people to the top and keep them supplied, that’d be a great place for an OP.

  OF COURSE, YOU CAN’T SEE ANY OF THAT BECAUSE OF THE FOG, BUT IF YOU GET LOST, YOU CAN FOLLOW THE RIVER ALL THE WAY BACK TO MY TOWER.

  I panned about a little, trying to take in where the mountain transitioned to flatter terrain on its northeast side. I couldn’t quite guess how far it was, but there was a sizable gap between the trees on the hill and what looked like a much larger forest in that direction. “That’s good to know. What’s up with the forest on the far side?”

  THAT IS LONGREACH.

  “You’re kidding right?”

  NO. THE FOREST HAS SPREAD CONSIDERABLY. THE CITY ITSELF IS FURTHER BACK, ALMOST DIRECTLY AHEAD OF US.

  “Oh, okay.” I scanned eastward as I added, “So I was asked to check the Lord’s estate to the—”

  ABSOLUTELY NOT. THEY WILL KILL YOU.

  “What makes you say that?”

  THEY WERE THE ONES WHO KILLED MASTER AND CAGED ME.

  I blinked. “Wait, the Syr are the ones who caged you?”

  YES.

  “Hold up, something isn’t adding up here. You remember the city being in ruins when you were smaller, but the Syr are the ones who caged you? It wasn’t human slavers?”

  NO. THERE WERE NO HUMANS IN LONGREACH. THE LORD ORDERED MASTER’S EXECUTION.