Work In Progress: Screechers, Chapter 9

The Ospreys make themselves known

The morning after the red monsoon came late. The sun was clouded by a haze of red sand, and it wasn’t until after it had crested over the Great Church’s steeple that Sun even saw its yellow glow―and that was through a crack in the window shutters.

She had been locked in her room with ten armed guards the entire night. The wind had howled, until the pattering slam of sand on the shutters had drowned out even that.

It had not drowned out the screecher’s cry. That pitiful, terrifying sound hadn’t lasted long, but after its screeching had passed, it still filled Sun’s restless dreams.

She awoke early, begging to leave her room. But that wasn’t in the protocol, Yem said. The protocol declared she couldn’t leave until the area had been deemed safe and someone came for her. That someone was Naji, of all people, and Sun was so grateful for the gardener’s brown face, she almost threw her arms around his hunched neck.

But she didn’t. Instead, she stepped cautiously into the hall. Even though the ma…