Suck out the bones
And then we will feast
I’d peeled off men’s skin before. Sliced them down to the bone. Relished their screams and their whimpers and their pleading. Picked them apart piece by piece until only the part of them that felt pain remained. And I’d do it again.
This time, though, I realized thatIwas the wretched, peeled thing. The one who’d had a piece carved away.
The Circle had taken that piece from me. From meandmy brothers. And I wanted that piece back. I’d paid for it.Bledfor it. And the Circle would bleed for it, too. For everything they’d done—to us and to Therador.
Pluck off the petals
All around us, the jeweled flower of Ring-Around-the-Hill was in shambles. The worst devastation was at the Hill, but the rest of the town had not escaped the attack. Chunks of stone and debris littered the streets, and an entire section of the central market had been crushed by one of the tree’s larger branches. There were also a number of fires, some of which were spreading quickly.
Slice off the wing
People were wailing and shouting in fear and pain. More than once, I saw Oak pause, fighting the instinct to go to their aid. But he always caught himself and soldiered on, leading the way through the streets toward our quarry. Towards the man responsible for this.
Mordren had killed innocents tonight. Women. Children. Families who’d come here to celebrate, who’d done nothing to deserve the fates they’d been delivered by his madness.
Peel off the skin
I did not judge Mordren or the Circle for believing that Therador would be better if my brothers and I were dead—we were not good men. We were no strangers to violence and lawlessness and even cruelty. Me most of all.
From the pitiful thing
But I never hurt innocents. A man who killed innocents, even in the name of what he believed to be good, was the vilest of creatures, worse than the monsters that roamed the mountains. A man who killed innocents was a man who would end up beneath the point of my knife, begging for his life as I separated pieces of him from the whole.
Carve out the poison
I checked my weapons as we moved toward the southern gate. It was a ritual of mine, any time I found myself heading into something I knew would turn bloody.
Six daggers in the baldric across my chest.
Two up each sleeve.
One inside each boot.
Plus a longer one hanging on my belt, and of course my narrow sword on the other side.
With some luck, I’d get to use all of them—eight to pin Mordren to a tree in all the important places, and the rest to make him truly suffer for what he’d done. Both to this town and to us.
Sever each piece
I wanted to be whole again. I’d managed to distract myself in that other world, but now that I was home, the loss of my power was more acute. It was an endless gnawing at my gut, a ravenous hunger that never abated. I’d known true hunger for years, nearly died of it more than once, and yet somehow this was worse.
This was insidious. A jagged-edged void that was slowly driving me mad.
Suck out the bones
We’d been gods. Or as close to gods as men could be.
And now we were nothing. At least until we claimed what was ours once more.
And then we will feast
Despite the hysteria and panic around us, people were quick to scramble out of our way as we marched through the streets. Oak had that effect on people.
With me, it was the opposite—they didn’t notice me until I made them notice. And most of the time, I preferred it that way. It made my work easier.
