He nods once. “Far. Old stone. The ones who remember say the ground hums there.”
I sit up, every muscle complaining. “If I were a sentient void developing a taste for symbolism and leverage, I’d pick old stones.”
Dreven is already moving, efficient and annoyingly beautiful about it. He finds some fresh clothes and helps me into them like I’m not fully capable. I let him. I’m shaky enough to accept a hand without biting it.
Dastian swings off the bed and starts pulling on his discarded clothes, energy already rising under his skin. “Field trip to the old Abbey ruin?”
“Looks like,” I say, sliding off the mattress. My thighs protest. I ignore them. “We don’t go in blind.”
Voren nods, face gone distant again. “They’re circling the mound. The dead from the sea. Old kings. Older farmers. They’re not afraid, but they are wary.”
“Of what?” I ask, grabbing my blade from the bedside table and sheathing it. My hands feel steadier with steel in them.
“The quiet inside.” He looks back at me. “It settled. It isn’t feeding. It’s waiting.”
“For me,” I say. Stating the obvious helps pin it down. “Good. That makes two of us.”
We dress fast. I yank my boots on and shove my hair into a high ponytail that I then wrap around into a tight bun. Drevenwatches me like I might evaporate. I meet his gaze. “I’m not going to vanish.”
“Good,” he replies.
We move out to the living room. The rain has stopped mid-drop outside, frozen in place like an installation some pretentious artist would get praised for. I shove the front door open. It clatters against the wall. The rain unfreezes and crashes down as if we’ve offended it.
“Tabitha,” I say, and she appears like she was waiting on the doorstep.
“You’re going,” she says. Not a question.
“Old Abbey,” I confirm. “If you tell me we need a permit, I’m going to scream.”
“I was going to say you need constraints.” She holds up a neat geometric sigil that hangs in the air between us. “If the Devourer attempts ingress, this will narrow entry points to the seam you choose. It won’t hold him. But it will make his options fewer.”
“Fewer is good.” I glance at Dreven.
“You will go on without me.”
I study her eyes for a long moment. “Are you sure?”
She smiles. “I am of no use to you now.”
“Two extra hands won’t go amiss,” Dastian says, giving her a nod that seems to be approval.
“These two hands will be needed to rebuild the Pantheon after you defeat the Devourer,” she says. “I’ll be waiting. I’ll know if you fail, and you will hear my goodbyes on the wind.”
“We won’t fail,” I grit out at those sombre words.
“Make sure you don’t,” she says, and then she vanishes again.
I nod and look at Dreven. “Shadows to get us close?”
He steps to my side, his expression smoothing into that calm he wraps around murder. “Always.”
Dastian cracks his neck. “Let’s do this.”
Voren grips my wrist. “The dead will guide us in. Keep to their line. They are drawing a path that doesn’t touch what he has claimed.”
“Right,” I say, and then I hesitate. “Aethel?”
“Still in the crypt,” Voren answers. “She is seething. She cannot cross.”
