“Notallof them.”
“Well, let’s see how many we can get through,” she said plucking one out.
Geoff was standing before her in a blink, snatching the scroll away.
But Amma was just as quick, pulling another from the wall, unraveling it with nimble fingers and spinning around. The lines seemed to be written in Key, but they swam before her as if moving on the parchment, and she had to fall still to try and read them properly.
And then Geoff got that one from her too. “Prophecies are meant only to be read by official record keepers and those who are directly involved in their outcome.”
Amma pouted but plucked a third one down, muttering toherself about the oddness in the script. “What language is this?”
“Key, obviously, but arcanely protected from prying eyes.” Geoff was reaching over her shoulder for it, but she ducked away.
She tossed the one she had back to him and pulled out a whole armful of others from the section he’d suggested. “Can you read them to me then?”
“I cannot.” Geoff stuffed the three back into a random crack as Amma collected as many as possible. “I mean, I can, but Iwon’t.” In a frenzy, he went for the stack in her arms.
Vanders propelled himself from Amma’s shoulder, giant back feet sending him smoothly through the air to land on Geoff’s face. The man shrieked, he flailed, and he connected with the stack of scrolls. Parchment rained down onto the floor of the cave like soft, falling leaves, unraveling to reveal prophecies in wiggly, illegible writing.
Amma immediately began to apologize, but Geoff just threw himself to the ground, picking up the fallen scrolls one by one but with as much care as he could muster. As Amma helped, she felt her head go funny, the moving writing making her nauseated, but then a violet glow, the exact shade of Damien’s eyes, glimmered from beneath the pile. Her favorite color called out to her, and Amma stuck her hand into the scrolls to pull out a parchment that had perfectly legible Key upon it.
When the day is night, and the corners of the realm have fallen into rot, the hallowed son shall release the Harbinger of Destruction upon earth once again. Only by the spilling of the descendants’ blood may It rise, and by the spilling of the heart of the earth’s blood to beseech the gods may It fall.
“Well, that’s ominous.”
Geoff snatched it right out of her hands so fast she actually let go, afraid it might tear. “You can try all you like, but the arcana will block you out: you’re not a record keeper nor are youinvolved in this prophecy.”
Amma opened her mouth to say that she could indeed read that one just fine, but her mind was working too hard at the words themselves. It had to be the right one—it just had to, it wasglowingfor goodness’s sake, not to mention all the talk of blood and rot and destruction—but who in the realm was it actually about?
“Oh, Vanders!” Amma scooped the vaxin out of the pile where he’d landed.
“Get that rodent out of here before it chews through all this work.”
Amma clicked her tongue and swept around, back the way she’d come. But halfway up the ramp, she ran back, stooping to help Geoff clean up the rest of the scrolls and apologizing profusely. Sometimes pushiness was necessary, she realized, but there was no reason not to be polite.
When Damien and the oracle finally emerged from the tent after the sun had set, Val’tiel invited everyone to eat. The light of the fire danced over the faces sitting around it, but Damien looked particularly frazzled. Amma wanted to ask him what he’d been told, but his eyes never found hers—never found anyone’s. He simply ate and stared at the ground. It was too much, all of this destiny and destruction business, and when she read the fret on his features, she wished she could take back the suggestion they make such an ambitious pilgrimage at all.
It would be stormy that night, the oracle said, and unsafe for travel. There was an extra tent in the encampment that Damien and Amma could share, and when an oracle suggests one stay, one does. Inside, the tent was cramped, and laying beside one another brought them the closest they’d been since Yvlcon, but Damien was still thinking, flat on his back, hands folded on his stomach, staring up at the canvas in the dark.
Amma reached over and laid a hand atop one of his. “I knowI’m not an oracle or anything, but it’s going to be okay.”
“How do you know?” It was the first time he’d spoken that evening, throat raw, but there was no bite to his voice.
Thunder rumbled out over the mountains, and she inched a little closer to him. “When I’m with you, I just feel like things will be okay, I guess.”
Damien said nothing, but his hand shifted under hers to entwine their fingers, and as the rain began to pelt the tent, they fell asleep.
The next morning, the sky was clear and the air was surprisingly warm if wet as they began their descent. The red dot on the enchanted map had moved with its clever arcana, and they could see themselves now headed toward their destination instead of around it. The Temple of the Void was to the west, the city of Buckhead set between the base of the mountains and the ominous squiggles, but they could avoid crowds and potential obstacles if they took a day to go around once they reached flat land.
Damien was still in a confused mood, saying very little until the sun was high in the sky. “You still have the pendant, yes?”
Amma touched her pouch, feeling it inside and nodding.
“Good. Keep it. No matter what I say, it needs to go into the pit. Don’t return it to me, even if I ask, all right?”
Amma frowned, not liking that. “Why not?”
Running a hand through his hair as he stepped awkwardly over a rock, he hemmed and hawed before going on, “You know that I am evil—”
