Free The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells

and days of travel before he could get back to more familiar territory. Once there, he had no idea. But there were plenty of groundling cities he hadn’t been hounded out of yet.
    Then the wind changed, and Moon froze.
    The Fell were still here.
    He pushed to his feet, tasting the air. No, it wasn’t his imagination. He snarled under his breath. This day just keeps getting worse.
    Moon shifted and jumped off the rock, snapping his wings out to catch the wind.
    He circled the mound, studying it more closely. There were more entrances like the one that Stone had vanished through. He landed at one near the top of the mound, across from the collapsed area.The passage slanted down at a near vertical angle, lined with rock. Not far below the edge, a tangle of rope was secured to the side by metal pegs, hanging down until it vanished into the darkness below—a rope ladder, meant for the Arbora, the Raksura who had no wings.
    Moon crouched low, tasting the cool air flowing up from deep inside the mound. It carried Stone’s now familiar scent, mingled with death and rot and charred wood, all blended with the stench of Fell. Live Fell, not corpses from the battle that must have raged inside. Moon felt his whole body tighten, felt a growl gather in his chest.
    He folded his wings back and slid into the passage to catch the ropes and climbed rapidly down.
    The rope was made of something like braided hair or silk, not plant fiber. Whatever it was, it was tough enough to resist his claws. Faint light glowed ahead, just enough to change the shade of the darkness and show that the passage opened into a larger chamber. Through his grip on the rope, Moon felt the rock and dirt tremble, as if somewhere deep in the mound, something heavy slammed into the supporting walls. Idiot, Moon snarled, not sure if he meant himself or Stone or both.
    He swung out of the passage, hanging onto the tangle of rope. There was just enough light to make out glimpses of the heavy carved logs braced against the curving walls, supporting a structure of delicate wooden balconies, bridges, galleries, many with tents of some slick material pitched atop them, the colors leached away by the dark. Some galleries were collapsed or hanging drunkenly, with the rope netting that connected them in confused tangles. Wan, yellow illumination came from hanging baskets, too small and faint to provide much light. Moon had seen magic used for light before, objects like bones or wood spelled to glow, though it usually didn’t last long, and these must be fading.
    He heard rustling, something moving. The sound came from an intact balcony occupied by a half-collapsed tent. Moon spread his wings, half-leaping, half-gliding down to the balcony. He landed amid a mess of broken crockery, uprooted plants, scattered cushions. The tent fabric fluttered as something moved inside. A flap flew up and a Fell leapt out.
    It was only a small one, a little shorter than Moon, a minor dakti. It did look somewhat like Moon; he had always understood how terrified groundlings might be confused. But instead of scales it had thicker armored plates on its back and shoulders, and its face was distorted, with a long, animal jaw and a double row of fangs. Its less flexible wings were webbed and leathery, with fewer joints. It had a severed arm clutched in its teeth, a dark limb that made Moon think groundling before he saw the claws on the rigid hand.
    The dakti stared at him in blank astonishment, the red-rimmed dark-adapted eyes going wide. Moon grinned and lunged.
    It turned to jump off the platform and spat the arm out so it could shriek a warning to the others. Moon was on it before it managed either, landing on its back and slamming it to the wooden floor. It grabbed at his arm, its claws ripping at his scales before he wrenched its head around, snapping its neck. Moon bounced to his feet, listening, but he didn’t hear any more movement nearby.
    There were three main breeds of Fell, dakti, kethel,