Dreybergen lay quiet beneath the grey sky. Snow covered the slopes between the three wooded hills, heaped high in some places and frozen into hard crusts in others, cracking under the weight of boots. Pale smoke rose from chimneys and hung heavy between the trees, for the cold refused to let it go. Shrines to the Lady were overflowing. Wherever an old stone stood with a wooden figure set into it, people had gathered. Men with hollow cheeks held their caps in their fingers, women with reddened hands knelt in the snow, children pressed to their skirts in silent clusters. Offerings lay in small piles: an apple marked by frost, a bundle of dried herbs, a cup of thin soup slowly cooling as its steam faded in the cold. Some murmured under their breath, others simply crouched with their eyes fixed on the ground, as if they were waiting for the earth itself to answer their silent prayers.
Hunger walked beside everyone these days. People guarded their pantries and potato cellars like treasure, bread was cut in thinner slices, and mead was replaced with hot water. Faces had grown leaner than they had been only a few weeks before, and every movement seemed careful, as if they were rationing not only food but strength. Yet messengers had arrived, and that had changed something. Breathless and frozen through, they had brought news that passed from mouth to mouth like a precious good: the Central Council had promised emergency supplies. Grain, dried pulses, fuel. They had not yet arrived, nothing was certain – but the mere prospect was enough to make voices sound a shade more hopeful, and bent backs straighten a little. Even so, most members of the Order had departed only days after the successful battle, once no pirate ship darkened the skies, so as not to worsen the strain on supplies. Eva had stayed.
She stood at the edge of Odring’s village square and let her gaze wander. Afternoon had already sunk into that pale half-light winter brought – not a clear end to the day, more a slow seeping away of brightness. The sky sagged low between the dark tips of the conifer forest that ringed the village like a protective wall. Snow lay in uneven drifts between the houses, shaped into gentle ridges by the wind. Behind the windows, golden candlelight flickered, and nearby someone plucked softly at a lute, a voice weaving a wistful melody through the notes – an old song Eva recognised at once. In this light Odring seemed small and fragile, a warm island of light and sound surrounded by cold and darkness.
“We will hold them to account,” Eva had promised her people, “but not today.” “Today” was already a week ago. She had informed the members of the Order that they would set out from the Conclave headquarters on Goldendale on a carefully planned mission to La Vergüenza. Yet something anchored her to Goldendale, refusing to let her leave. The pirates’ motive still lay in darkness for her, churning inside her without taking on a clear shape. Vaska, Airis’s testimony before the Central Council, the Guild … all of it washed to the surface of her thoughts like seaweed on a beach. Eva drew a deep breath, sending tiny clouds into the cold air. At that moment, Gunhild Vargen stepped up beside her.
The village elder of Dreybergen stayed silent for a while, as the two of them looked out over the snow-covered village. At last Gunhild said, “They never struck where it would have served them most.” Eva glanced at her. “What do you mean?” The old woman pointed with a bony hand toward the fields. “If you want to steal, you take the grain. If you want to rule, you take the harbour. The pirates did both only halfway. They burned, yes, and plenty. They destroyed our settlements and our granaries. But they could have wiped us out completely if that had truly been their goal. There is no military on Goldendale. We can defend ourselves against nothing more dangerous than the potato beetle.”
Eva fell silent. The wind swept cold across the square, carrying with it the smell of smoke and snow. In her mind, the events of the past weeks shifted and settled into a new pattern. “They were never after spoils,” she said at last, slowly. “Not really. The chaos itself was the purpose – not a means to an end.”
The elder nodded, lost in her own thoughts. “But why here?” Eva went on, lifting her gaze. “Why Goldendale of all places?”
Gunhild did not answer at once. Instead, she gestured at the village, at the timbered halls and stone houses, the animal pens behind them, the dark forest beyond. “You have been among us for some time now, Grand Master,” she said calmly. “What do you see?” Eva followed her eyes. “An old island,” she replied after a short pause. “One more grounded than most. Earthbound. Slow – in the best sense of the word. The people here cling to stories, to myths. To the Rye Wolf.”
“The Wolf is older than this village,” Gunhild agreed. “Older than the settlement of Goldendale itself. Only those who live here know that.” “No, not only them,” Eva interjected. “In the archives of Eldbridge there are records proving that the Wolf is real. It is a particular current.” She broke off. “The current,” she said slowly, “is old. Heavy. If you interfere with it here, it reacts – not subtly, but roughly. You see the consequences at once.” She drew in a sharp breath. “Goldendale was never the target. It was a testing ground.” Gunhild only looked at her. “The pirates needed to learn how to break a great, sluggish current,” Eva continued, faster now. “How much force it would take. What side effects it would have. That is why they laid waste to so much, why they burned things that seemed senseless to destroy. To sow chaos, to destabilise an island society. Perhaps also to distract from their true objective.”
“And what one learns here,” the elder said softly, “can be applied elsewhere.” Eva nodded vigorously. Before her inner eye she saw La Vergüenza and the raging vortices that rumour put in its skies. And there, according to Airis, stood a current amplifier. “They took one of the devices,” she said now with certainty. “Not to cause further harm to Goldendale or expose the Guild’s schemes, but to use it there. To magnify the vortices.”
“Eva, you’re a genius!” Corwin was beside himself. They had gathered in the Order’s great hall around the massive table, above them stretching the magnificent dome where golden stars gleamed against a night-blue backdrop. The vast, translucent surface lay before them, displaying a detailed map of the cloud islands. Goldendale, Nimbusheim, Windhold, Duskencliff, the Storm Islands, and Thur—and far on the edge, almost forgotten, La Vergüenza. All members of the Order stood around it, Masters and recruits side by side, for Eva had called a full assembly and everyone had answered her summons. The Master of Navigation had sat quietly as Eva spoke and laid out her theory, nodding, murmuring, occasionally letting out a soft “hm.” Now, however, he pushed back his chair, rose with unusual energy, and waddled to the hologram projector in the room’s center.
“Your assumption—which I believe we can confidently take as truth—is borne out by what we see in the charts,” he said, raking a hand through his hair. “If the ‘Cartographer’ Airis spoke to is indeed who he claims, we can assume he has the relevant knowledge. Eva, you remember the notes, measurements, conclusions in the books from Eldbridge? I’ll stick my neck out and say that was him. Who else would care about an ancient wind current on a farming island and go to the trouble of new measurements?” With a swift motion, he activated the table surface. Fine lines unfolded above the island images, showing the known currents that flowed calmly between the isles, moving gently like a breathing web. “This is what balance looks like,” Corwin explained. “‘Fragile, but stable,’ my professor of current theory always said.”
He tapped La Vergüenza. The display flickered there. The vortices around the island tightened, densified, accelerated. “If the pirates install an amplifier there—or even several,” Corwin continued, now more gravely, “this is what happens.” He mimicked the effect with his finger. The vortices swelled. They reached for the surrounding currents, drew them in, warped their paths. The web tore open; some lines merged into thicker streams, while gaps yawned in others.
“One must understand,” Corwin began—and some recruits winced involuntarily, knowing that tone—“that the currents of the cloud islands are no mere parlor trick. Contrary to the popular opinion of certain agnostics.” A fleeting smile crossed his face. “It’s no accident we revere the Wind as the highest god. But don’t misunderstand: this is no religious sentimentality, but pure physics. Currents are not hot air—I mean that quite literally.” He leaned forward, his voice turning sharp and precise. “They invariably affect pressure, climate, moisture balance, and thus the entire ecological cascade of our islands. Through our privileged position in this higher earthly sphere—a geometric situation I find often undervalued—the effects of fluid dynamics are amplified manyfold.” Corwin paused, fixing the group with his gaze. “In short: if someone meddles excessively with the wind, they’re playing with our very foundation of life.”
A murmur rippled through the hall. “So,” Corwin went on, “what would amplifying the vortex field around La Vergüenza affect? It might be easier to say what it wouldn’t. Traditional trade routes would cease to exist, storm zones become impassable. Unpredictable air pockets would pluck gliders from the sky; airships could be driven toward the ground or even higher into the void. We navigators would be utterly blind. The Guild could disband, and our Order with it—for you,” he pointed at Eva, “as ‘Guardian of the Free Sky’ could lock the doors here, since the sky would indeed be free, but not in the sense your title intends. Our entire world would be thrown into disarray; all that’s missing is for the islands themselves to plummet.” All eyes turned to Eva. “Goldendale was the dress rehearsal,” she said. “La Vergüenza is the lever they’ll use to shatter our order.” She placed her hand on the table. “And we’re the only ones who know what they’re planning.”
Silence fell in the hall. The cloud islands still shimmered on the table, the fine current lines flickering faintly. Corwin let his hands drop and looked at Eva. “We await your command, Grand Master,” he said. “I think I speak for everyone here when I say the Order stands at your disposal.” As if on a silent cue, the assembly saluted her, but Eva waved it off. “Enough with the titles,” she growled. “We stand here first and foremost as citizens of the cloud islands. And as ones who can fly a bit better than most.” She pointed to the reliefs depicting Order members in power dives and fierce aerial combat. “There’s no question we must destroy that device on La Vergüenza—those before us would have done the same. But how we do it, that’s the question.”
“We storm that godforsaken appendix of the cloud islands,” Sixten boomed. “Not so many pirates can hide there that a handful of our Leviathans couldn’t smoke them out.” Corwin shook his head. “To sail through those vortices, you need small, agile ships,” he countered. “And such a squadron would draw attention before you even reached the island.” Sixten exhaled sharply. “Damn,” he muttered. Then he straightened. “So a small team.”
“A very small one,” Corwin corrected. “The fewer, the better. Two or three gliders that look like a lost tourist flight. Only problem left is the vortices. You’d need a navigator who knows treacherous currents very well.” As he spoke, Eva’s gaze slid to Finn, who leaned against the wall some distance away.
He met it, arms crossed. “I knew you’d drag me into something like this eventually,” he said dryly. “But just so it’s clear: I won’t fight.” “You don’t have to,” Eva replied. Her voice was calm, almost gentle. “We’ll take a defender.” Finn was silent for a moment. Then he sighed. “The Order owes me—or rather, you owe me,” he said. “And this time for real.” “I know,” said Eva. “Remind me when the time comes.”
Sixten cleared his throat loudly. “Then we’re missing one more. Sjöberg?” Lennar said nothing. He stood straight, hands loose at his sides, his expression unreadable. His gaze flicked briefly to Eva, then back to his Master. “He’s my best man,” Sixten continued. Eva nodded at once. “I was going to ask him anyway.” She turned to Lennar. “And I don’t say this lightly: I’m glad to have you at my side.” For a heartbeat, something flickered across Lennar’s face—surprise, perhaps pride—then he inclined his head silently. “I’ll bring you both back,” he said curtly.
Epilogue
Forgive me, dear reader, if I slip from the shadows one last time. I know I promised to hold back, not to nanny you at every step or wag a finger through this tale. But there are places where even a narrator must speak up. The peak the Order called home was one such spot. The headquarters of the Conclave Aeris Fidelium perched high above the cloud island, a stone edifice that nestled into the rock as if it had grown there rather than been built. Snow lay eternal here, a white promise that all earthly things moved more quietly, more slowly, up above.
A rooftop terrace opened to the vastness, with no railing or visible edge. Just stone beneath the feet, chill mountain air in the lungs, and overhead the sky stretched like a black sea speckled with stars, so sharp you might almost pluck them from the firmament.
Eva stood alone there. Her hands were buried in the pockets of her midnight-blue coat as she gazed out. The wind had calmed, yes. But only for now. La Vergüenza loomed like a menacing shadow beyond the horizon—a place where vortices raged like open wounds in the sky, and where someone had now begun to tinker with them. A single amplifier could tip the balance, if you knew where to place it. And someone did.
Eva closed her eyes briefly. She thought of the Order standing behind her, the fellowship she could count on without question. Corwin, who considered so much, knew so much, and laid it all at her feet without hesitation. Sixten, with his unswerving sense of duty. Airis, whose truth had come too soon, too openly—and nearly been twisted against them. Lennar, tempestuous and stubborn, but fiercely loyal. Finn, who after all their adventures still stood by her side. Friendship, Eva mused, was no soft notion. It was the one thing that held when titles, orders, and certainties failed.
Above her arched the starlit heavens, vast and indifferent. They’d be there tomorrow. And the day after. And after all that was yet to come. The wind brushed the terrace, lifting a fine plume of snow from the stone and carrying it off into the void. For an instant, Eva thought she glimpsed a shape in it, a pattern—but it dissolved at once into a thousand flakes and crystals.
Not everything’s been said yet, dear reader, nor settled. But this is a fine spot to pause—let’s rest here a bit, you and I, for we’ve seen a great deal, and much more lies ahead.