How hadGennapossibly wronged Death? Was she supposed to deliver a happy, grateful bride in exchange for the end of Death’s campaign of conquest? Punish Taran even harder for delivering the means for Wesha to defend herself?
The set of his features did not alter with Genna’s words, but I knew the lines of Taran’s body, and it was fury that further hardened them. He replied very carefully.
“No, Peace-Queen. If you really thought there was anything Death wanted to hear from me, I assume you would have commanded me to say it to him, all those years ago.”
She wouldn’t find any impertinence in his words, but Genna recognized the shift in Taran’s mood just as I did. I found myself holding my breath, hoping that she wouldn’t take offense. Her power filled the room, clogging my nose like the scent of her blooming palace.
She smiled and let the moment dissipate.
“You’re right, of course.”
Genna ran a last finger across Taran’s cheekbone in farewell, perilously close to his eye, and nodded that we could depart.
The prolonged soakin the cold water of Genna’s audience chamber meant that I was all but hopping one-legged by the time Taran and I emerged from the forest of columns. As soon as we were outside, he whooped, swept me off my aching foot, and tossed me over his shoulder, jogging a few steps in what I supposed was pure relief that he’d gotten me out before I told Genna that she ought to be locked in a pit for abusing the trust of her son and her priests.
I pounded on his back with my fists until he pulled me forward into the easy sling of his arms.
“I don’t think that could have gone better,” he announced. “Nobody is dead, nothing is on fire—I even think she liked you. How should we celebrate? Wine? Song? I know—I’ll steal one of those roast pheasants you like, and you can sit on my knee while we eat it.”
When I curled my hands under my chin instead of teasing him back the way he clearly wanted, it wasn’t because I didn’t like the way he laughed while afraid. I’d always loved him for that, just as I’d loved him for trying, despite what must have been his own misgivings, to help us.
But I couldn’t move past the image of the Stoneborn walking mortal shores again. Reclaiming temples that had been turned to palaces, demanding tribute that had been promised to mortal rulers instead.
“What if I just made things worse?” I mumbled into Taran’s warm throat.
He readjusted his hold on me before answering, careful not topull my hair as he braced for the long walk back to the palace he’d stolen from Wesha.
“Oh, darling, you can’t think like that.”
His tone was still light and affectionate, and it reassured me.
“Do you mean it will be a good thing if Genna returns to the mortal world? Or do you think Wesha will still hold the Gates shut no matter what Genna does next?”
“I have no idea. I just meant that it’s no use wondering after the fact whether you made things worse—perhaps you might try thinking about itbeforeyou attempt to dramatically alter the course of the world?”
And that stung, but he wasn’t wrong. He could have told me that several times over the last three years, probably should have. It made me clutch him tighter.
Hearing uncomfortable truths might not be as familiar as his strong arms keeping me safe, but it gave me some hope as he carried me home that it meant we’d both live this time.
27
By the timeSkyfather and the Peace-Queen departed for the Moon’s domain, I’d managed to convince myself that it would be for the good if Genna led her priests back to the mortal world before Death could attempt worse. That morning, I’d been shaken awake before dawn by a tremor strong enough to crack the ceiling plaster and spill dust onto my face. I followed the sound of Taran’s footsteps outside and found him barefoot and shirtless in the dew, watching the plume of smoke out of the Mountain. It was closer than it had been when I arrived—not just a distant smudge on the horizon, but a defined cloud of smoke that flared and contracted. The Summerlands were shrinking, day by day.
“It’s fine,” he said to a question I hadn’t asked. “Go finish packing.”
It was reassuring to see the ceremony of the Stoneborn’s procession: the rows of priests in saffron and purple singing hymns in complex harmony, immortals carrying silk banners and playing pipes, and Skyfather’s solid gold chariot pulled by a team of eight enormous horses. Genna made anemones bloom beneath her priests’ feet, and the scent of the crushed petals covered the bitter tang of the breeze. Even the sunlight was brighter in their presence.
If the oldest gods landed on the barren, mortal shores promisingthe return of rain and growing things, it was surely not so far past the days when they ruled on Earth that we could not be reconciled. Paying tribute to the gods was no different than paying tribute to a queen—I didn’t delude myself by thinking that I would have had anyone standing behind me as I faced Death if people hadn’t been starving. If Genna’s message when she arrived was anything but vengeance, mortals would answer it. Her cruelty landed on those closest to her—ordinary mortals would only know her through her beauty and her blessings.
I was content to ride in the back of a supply wagon and think more about it. The sunlight on my face and the pretty picture of the immortal host had almost quieted my underlying churn of worry about the inevitable conflict with Death.
There was a stir of activity as Taran pulled up his chariot to fall back to my position, matching the high-stepping pace of the two horses he controlled to the plodding one of the team of red-spotted oxen that pulled my cart. My heart lifted, and not just because he looked like a child’s story of a magical prince with his hands on the reins and the wind snapping his hair around his cheekbones.
I wasn’t alone in this.
“What’s happening?” I asked when I heard a horn from the front of the procession. We’d been on the move for only a few hours and needed to keep up the pace if we expected to reach Lixnea’s palace by nightfall.
“Breaking for lunch, I think,” Taran said, scanning the other wagons and riders and then glancing at the Mountain and its reassuring seep of black smoke. “Do you think you could stand in the chariot with me for a little while, if I helped hold you up?”
