Storm. Sarah Driver

eggs scooped from the bogs. I’ve been shut out of all of it.

      I slam my door and jump back onto my bed. ‘I am proper blubber-bored! They’re leaving for the Tribe-Meet at the morning bell. How can Da force me to stay here?’

      ‘At least someone cares if you live or die!’ interrupts Crow, loudly. His tone makes Thaw flap herself into outrage, rasping and spitting, eyes bright.

      ‘Calm your feathers, you stupid bird,’ snaps Crow.

      Trymakeme, hisses my hawk.

      Crow stands up, eyes on his boots. ‘Mouse, I mean – can you blame your da, really? How addled would he have to be to let you roam the place now that the Withering’s set in and there’s a hunt for your skin?’

      I pull at the loose threads in my blankets. ‘But no one gets how bad my bones are itching – itching! – to move, to rove, to do something!’

      ‘But maybe you can’t do anything, this time,’ he says more gently. ‘And maybe your da’s right – maybe, for once, you don’t have to. It ain’t your job.’

      I shine my fierceness through the grime coating my skin. ‘I can’t do nothing – that’s never been what I do.’ And it never will be!

      ‘None of this is about you, though, is it?’ He picks up the pot of grease he used for his boots and turns away. ‘What would you do if you could leave Hackles, anyway?’

      ‘Um, let me ponder.’ I chew my cheek, pretending to think. ‘Go to the Tribe-Meet, then find the Opal, and save the world ?’

      He sighs. ‘How about you start by coming to supper?’

      ‘Aye,’ I tell him, trying to keep my voice steady. ‘See you in the hall.’

      Thaw oozes a low hiss at his turned back.

      ‘I heard that, Thaw-Wielder!’ he snaps, before leaving the room.

      Thaw, I gabble quickly, my mind wheeling. I HAVE to go to that Tribe-Meet. Cos if I don’t prove myself to Da, how’s he ever gonna let me do anything, ever again? I’ve got to remind him what I can do. I’ll be back before he can blink, anyway! Thrills explode in my belly.

      Thaw’s eyes glow, but her pipes spew tiny doubts. Two-leg girl danger times . . . hunthunthunt?

      Aye, Thaw. But how’s any of them stupid lumberers gonna hunt me if I swap places with a Spearsister – like Pang? She’ll swap with me, I know it! And if the riders do a count they won’t find anyone extra. I block out a thought about what might happen if anyone needs me to throw a spear. Anything’s better than sitting here, ent it? And I might get to scratch around for snippets of news – or even CLUES – at the Meet.

      She takes to the wing, soaring in circles around me until my hair’s stirred into a black cloud. Wild girl show them all!

      Thaw wakes me before the morning bell. My limbs are stiff and cold-clumsy as I force myself out of bed. I tiptoe through the gloom to the draggle caves, pulling on the eelskin gloves Marshman Pike once gifted me to keep my fingers warm enough to wield weaponry. If I’m to be a Spearsister, I’ll have to be able to grip a spear, as well as draggle reins. I wait amongst tangled ropes of orangey draggle fur, huddled in a white goatskin cloak that Pangolin hung with iron storm-weights. Underneath clings the rune-spelled breastplate she loaned me, charged runes flickering across it like worms.

      I watched the giant shaggy beasts shuffle their wings in their sleep. When the first riders clamour into the cave, heading to the tack room to don armour and fill saddle bags with supplies, I drift from my hiding place and begin sharpening Pangolin’s spear.

      Once the whole stronghold is awake, Wilderwitches line the rocks outside. I edge as close as I can to the mouth of the cave and watch them standing, palms held up in front of them, trying to clear a sky-path through the storm. Their weather-magyk battles winds that thrash around like maddened beasts.

      A rich smell catches in my nose and I turn to see a cook with greasy white hair passing cups of bone-broth among the riders. A mug finds its way into my hands, glowing with heat that I am more than heart-glad for. I stare down at myself in the gleaming surface of the broth. My eyes are painted from brows through to cheekbones with the black stripes of a Spearsister, an eagle-feather hood is pulled over my head and a raindrop cowl is moulded to my face.

      ‘Sup your broth and prepare to fly,’ commands Leopard. She wears a long black cloak of eelskin, gifted to her by Pike. I drop my eyes while she’s talking, in case she knows my stormy greys.

      I listen to the bubbling of the broth and the crackling of the flames and the nerve-tense chattering of the draggles.

       Huntnohuntnohunt? WhywhywhyHUNGRYwherefoodfly?

      I’m half asleep with my chin propped in my hands when the storm dies, gaping breathlessness in its wake, sudden as the thunk of a dropped longbow. My chin slips out of my hands and my neck bends painfully as my head lolls. The Wilderwitches’ weather-magyk must have finally pushed the storm away from us. Now there’s just a deadened stillness.

      Leopard pulls a small bronze spyglass from her pocket and presses it to her eye. ‘The chief storm has raged west,’ she announces. She sighs, tucks away her spyglass and nods to the draggle warden. ‘We fly.’

      I blow out my held breath and we mount our draggles, Leo taking the lead. I copy the others; holding a spear in one hand and the reins in the other. When Leo raises her hand, the draggles swoop from the mountain.

      Rough air bruises my eyeballs. My belly plunges, sloshing the broth I glugged. But hidden inside my armour, my lips riot into a grin. Finally, I’m roving.

      Below, a group of song-weavers has gathered on the rocks to gift us music as we fly. A little clutch of Sea-Tribe kids – I spot the white shock of Ermine’s hair and Squirrel’s red braid – bang drums they’ve painted to look like whale-eyes. Eyes like portals, or knots in wood. I spot Da and Sparrow, singing together, and duck lower in the saddle. A flush of guilt steals across my skin, itching under all my layers.

      We pull away from the mountain, dodging the silvery ghostway tubes that cobweb the stronghold so the Sky-Tribes can pulse messages to each other. The tubes quiver with voices.

      Across the valley, tangles of lightning sprout like trees, and the sky flickers as though it’s blinking. When the lightning branches fade, their ashen ghosts hang in the air. My draggle fights the wind, despair mixing with the ice in her fur. I lean down and mutter heart-strengths to her.

      We fly over Hearthstone, where almost all the dwellings have been rebuilt, with Leo’s help. But when we reach the Icy Marshes, fury flares in my gut. Terrodyls swirl through the sky, patrolling to make certain the Marsh-folk never dare to return. All that’s left of Pike’s home is a field of blackened wooden stumps capped with bulbs of ice.

      Refugees wade through the reeds and ford the rivers on their way towards the mountains, seeking higher ground. We hover while a few riders drop to land and tell them how to reach Hearthstone or Hackles.

      As we pass into wilder territory that could be more hostile, Leo calls for us to douse our lamps. I lie along my draggle’s back and stretch to reach the metal lantern hanging on its pole. The hinges squeak as I fumble the door open, making my draggle flick her ears irritably.

      Sorry! That needs oiling, I chatter.

      I wet my fingertips and squeeze the life from the flame. As the other lamps blink out, heavy gloomlight thickens around us. We race deeper into the murk. I keep to the rear. We soar over leagues of ice-ridges carved by the storm winds; great blue-white dunes that gift the land the look of the wrinkled skin of a whale. Maybe that’s all we are. Whale lice crawling over some giant sea-god.

      When Leopard drops back to check we’re all well enough to