Borderless Birds
An eye for an eye, a soft whisper for a piece of gold.
* * * * * * * *
She was about to run out from the airship and grab him to safety, but at the sight of that crimson fire snapper that obviously belonged to the commander, she stopped. Waited. Watched that dragon slap Hazuli and watched Hazuli roll to a stop, all of his body covered in mud. She pulled out her dagger. The moment the dragon flew past her, it’d be dead.
“It’s been a while, Tish.”
The voice caught her off-guard, and in that moment, she missed her opportunity to jump onto the dragon. It picked up Hazuli and flew away.
Fuck. She inhaled in annoyance and put her dagger away. “You got something good this time?” She turned to the shadows in the dark of the airship. “More than omnigold, I sure hope.”
“Nah,” Bladen stepped out from the shadows with a casual smile. “You know the Chief Drakon won’t let us barter with anything else. There’s no way.”
“If the next thing that comes out of your mouth isn’t information, you’re trading your tongue.”
“Whoa,” Bladen laughed. He put his hands in the air and gestured for her to calm down. “I sense some resentment. C’mon, Natisha. We’ve been through some shit.”
Szak’s voice traveled past the metal walls of the air ship. “Where’s Bladen?”
Bladen gestured a thumb outward. “Don’t got much time. What can you share?”
“Oh, piss off.” Natisha brushed her blonde and silver streaked hair back. “You and your ‘friends’ on the other side. You know that when I get nothing from you, I’m the one that looks bad.”
“Same, same,” Bladen shrugged. “We’re in this together. C’mon.” He leaned over and placed a dragon-leather pouch on the wooden floor of the airship, between them. “What’s it like back home, huh?”
Natisha glared at him, one eye of a Desireen siren’s beautiful hazel, one eye of a Tumesys’ as black as the abyss.
“Go on, look inside.” Bladen pointed at the leather pouch again. “More than just omnigold, I swear.”
She kept her glare on him as she reached down to grab it. She shook its unnaturally light contents and only stopped her glare to look down into the open pouch. Pellets of omnigold lay inside. She tossed the pouch slightly into the air. It was extremely light, even seemed to have hovered in the air slightly before coming back down to her hands. Just the way it had to be to be worth the most possible.
“Yeah, you’re gonna need to shake it some more. Go on.”
Natisha eyed him before shaking it, harder this time.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
“Hurry up. It’ll be a matter of time before they jump in this blimp and look for me. Best they don’t find you.”
As annoying as Bladen was, she listened and shook the pouch harder and faster. Beneath the gold pellets were little white capsules, so small they looked like medicine only found in parts of Oblivion—namely, Lestris and Inez. One of the capsules was red.
“Found them? There you go,” Bladen snapped his fingers and nodded, goofy smile plastered on his face. “Now you got the goods.”
“What’s in it?” Natisha asked, pulling the strings of the pouch back to a close.
“The info you wanted last time.”
She scoffed when she put the pouch away. “That was months ago.”
“Would’ve been longer,” Bladen shrugged. “Didn’t expect you to be in the Isles Skell. What for?”
“Trade the boy back to me, and maybe I’ll tell you.”
“What boy?” Bladen raised a brow.
“The one that dragon just grabbed.” Natisha gestured outward. “What do your friends want with him?”
“No idea. Wasn’t part of the mission.” Bladen shrugged. Natisha rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Wasn’t this blimp carrying children to the port? Maybe he’s one of them?”
“Fuck off if you’d think I’d care about a slave baby.”
Bladen pretended to be taken aback. He pressed his lips together before responding. “Okay. So what do you want the boy for?”
“He’s ours.”
“You gotta be reasonable, Tish. I can’t just bring a boy over the Edge like that. The Chief would drag me back here just so he could have my head, too.”
“Over the Edge?” A scoff. “Wow. You sound just like them. Guess that side giving you the good life.”
Bladen saw she was about to leave and ran to the entrance to block her. “You know what I’m playing at.”
“No,” she snapped, pressing a hard finger into his chest twice. “I don’t think you even know what you’re playing at.”
Bladen inhaled, held his breath, and let it go with a shake of his head. “Alright, next time, then. I gotta run.”
“Of course you do.”
“Sidian’s in the shadows of the airship. They’re searching for me and getting closer,” Bladen whispered quickly. He met Natisha’s eyes, as if begging. “Where will you be next?”
Natisha looked away. “Delivering your info, of course. I’ll be north for a while.”
“I’ll look for you.” He gestured at the pouch. “That’s for last time.”
“Uh-huh.”
“We’re even now.”
“Don’t start.”
“Hey.” Bladen demanded. Natisha looked at him. “I’ll see what’s up with that boy. But you know canaries don’t carry bodies.”
“Yeah, just songs,” she grumbled.
“That’s it, you’re getting the hang of it,” Bladen smiled. And with that, he jumped out of the blimp and landed in the mud outside.
Natisha listened to his steps take him away. With a siren’s ears, she could hear him rejoin three others with their dragons. One of them had asked what he was up to.
“Just double checkin’ the shadows. What I do best.”
It wasn’t until all of them had left, that Natisha reopened the pouch. She reached in and pulled out two of the capsules, one white, one red. With a soft twist, she opened the white one first and found a small, rolled up parchment. She unrolled it.
ss confirmed
Natisha blinked. That was certainly news. One she knew a particular Kylmis would pay a hefty sum for. She rolled the parchment back up, placed it back in the white capsule, and twisted it back to a close before dropping it back in the pouch. She opened the red one.
26 of 28 thx
She read that a second time, then thought back to the last time she met Bladen. She had tipped him off on the next trade location for twenty-eight children who had been kidnapped along the border of Aideyll. He was to pay up in both omnigold and information. He ended up paying with neither, and had left her with the excuse that he had to leave before becoming suspicious to his command.
That was, of course, a lie.
He could’ve just tossed this pouch over last time. Natisha grabbed the pouch tighter, annoyed yet again. Aideyll was definitely bartering for more information than their omnigold stash could trade for. She twisted the red capsule back to a close and stuffed it into her pocket, mind on Bladen’s demeanor from earlier.
Something about him had changed since they made the agreement to work together over three years ago. Something.
She wasn’t sure what, but it was something.