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“What?” a guard asked. They all blinked, then looked at each other in confusion.

“I want your birds,” I explained.

“But—But—Phrer,” one sputtered. “We cannot grant such a request.”

“You don’t understand,” I said, drawing a crossbow from under my robes. “I’m not asking.”

The five of them gaped, too stunned for the moment to even reach for a weapon. By the time they remembered steel, Valyan and Kreeg had stolen up and cocked their crossbows loudly just behind them.

“Don’t,” I snapped at the two who started to turn. And they all stood quietly while they were disarmed and bound against the wall.

In another few moments, with the mist pearling all around us in the coming dawn, we had opened the sabrun mews and led out the birds. They were balky about being awakened, and fluffed steel-gray feathers at us while glaring from violet eyes. But they were well trained and did not threaten to use their beaks or black talons against us.

Two of the birds were already saddled and Diken and Valyan saddled two more, moving swiftly in the vague grayness. Still, I chafed at the delay. It was barely a handful of minutes before the bell of the fifth dhaur would call the morning. Then the sun would pour over the horizon and the light would grow swiftly. The flyers of the day patrols would lift and we would certainly be seen. And even the swiftest sabrun cannot outrun a flyer.

Then the birds were ready and the last problem we had to solve was upon us; I had never ridden a saddle bird before. Graye and Valyan were experts. Even Kreeg had experience. It is something most Taleran warriors and nobles do at one time or another.

Valyan gave me three minutes of instruction. “There are four reins,” he explained. “Left, right. Up, down.”

I noted that the reins were attached to a black iron collar that fit snugly to the bird’s neck. From there they ran to an elaborate metal bit that locked around the beak, serving not only to guide the beast but also to keep its hooked and deadly mouth closed.

“Left and right reins are the same as in a horse or tasaber,” Valyan continued. “Up and down are just what you’d expect. Don’t get them confused. The sharpness of a turn depends on the amount of pressure you exert. Haul back on the reins to slow and stop. Release them for speed.”

I nodded.

He handed me the “wing-stick,” a blunt-headed prod about two and a half feet long, with a wrist strap at the other end.

“You can use this to help guide him,” the Nakscherii warrior told me. “Or at worst you can beat him about the head with it if he tries to eat you.”

I glanced at him to see if he was joking. If there was a smile, it was well hidden.

“Thanks...ever so much for the advice,” I told him, as I took the prod.

The bird squatted when I touched its throat with the wing-stick and I climbed into the small saddle, which sat just forward of the massively thewed pinions. I locked my feet in the attached stirrups as Valyan showed me how to hold the reins, down and left reins in the left hand, up and right in the right hand. It was awkward to have to use the fingers of the same hand independently.

The green Llurn strapped me in and then raced for his own bird. Graye and Kreeg were already mounted. As Valyan saddled up, the morning bells pealed out and my heart caught. Now the city would begin to awaken.

“Haih Kerang,” Graye shouted, and his sabrun took two steps and leaped from the roof of the keep. I heard the snap of wings and the bird rose, Graye clinging to its back, working the reins. Kreeg followed, looking distinctively ill. And then it was my turn.

“Haih Kerang,” I shouted. “Let’s ride.”

Now my bird took its two steps and leaped. For a blink we were in free fall, my heart hammering, the earth rushing fast to meet us as I jerked the up-rein taut. Massive wings spread and snapped against the foggy air. The jolt nearly took my breath as the sabrun’s fall was arrested in an instant and we were rising instead.

I saw Kreeg and Graye above me, their birds still climbing, and already the lifting