Yes. Most likely a dock. Unless…
Chaser, come home.
“Exquisite,” said my mother, and I turned.
A cyr of hammered bronze rose like a lamppost out of the sand. Sitting atop it was a head.
She placed her fingers on his cheeks, then laid a palm across his eyes. This was her realm; I knew it well. The space between life and death, the cold dread of the unknown, and the bargains made in its shadow. She leaned in as if to kiss him and breathed in deeply, letting his taste fill her mouth before exhaling. She stroked the forehead, smoothed the stringy hair from his face.
“He died late last night,” she said. “He was afraid and did not know what killed him.”
“The Priestlord killed him,” said Liskeel. “Look, the cuts…”
Three fatal slices beneath the chin.
“Impressive,” said Tek.
I remembered Worley saying how he’d torn Commodore Bracebridge’s face “clean off.” I had scars from when he’d caught me. I knew how lethal those talons could be.
“ThreeRhi’Ahr,” said Echo suddenly. “Coming this way.”
Dev stepped forward, raised his sword, and I pulled my gloves off, tucking them in my sash.
“Veil,” said my mother.
Tekamorian snatched the cyr and tossed the head into the sand, and the ironmages stepped into a pattern. I could have sworn the air rippled around us, and the sky echoed with the cry of a winter hawk.
Suddenly, aRhi’Ahrburst from the trees, followed by a second and then a third. My heart thudded in my chest as they stumbled toward us.
“Nisseth vraie dennayarh,”gasped the first, and he wiped his brow.“Asak laithe ni’dellen.”
They didn’t see us.
I slid my eyes over to my mother. Her face was taut, concentrating.
“Ni allath,”said the third.“EndorathilsilMarelethanfa’ardenn.”
I whispered thecy fwthiluunder my breath, prayed they didn’t see my fingers spark behind my back.
“Curse this island,” said the second. “We are dead men for agreeing to this.”
“We were the ones who defiled our goddess the Tree,” said the third. “We are the cursed ones.”
“Now is not the time for contrition, Tannalyth,” growled the second. “You made your choice between a dead tree and a living king.”
I held my breath as the trees around seemed to shake at his words.
“It is the judgment of GoddessLindurithain,” Tannalyth snapped. “The demon hawk is her decree.”
Liskeel nodded, and, like a cat, my mother moved. Slowly, silently, she slipped toward them, sliding the bone pins from her hair. I remembered those pins from our life in the Spits. She pricked the neck of the first man as she swept past, and he slapped his skin as if stung by a pinewasp. By the time she pricked the second, the first had buckled to the erthe, foam bubbling from his teeth. Within moments, both were dead.
And I knew now how she’d secured her place among the Court of Sand.
As she reached for the one called Tannalyth, he spun, catching her wrist with one hand and her throat with the other.
“Shroudling!” he hissed. “Demon!”
Beside me, Liskeel launched into the air, and in three flaps, he’d sunk his talons into the man’s shoulders. The surprise had him releasing my mother as he shrieked in pain. Liskeel lifted him, twisting and thrashing, from the ground. With a roar, Tek hurled the cyracross the clearing and sent the man crashing into the trees.
