Bron glanced behind him, then back at the Hayman Stone. “Can you read the carvings?”
The face of the menhir was covered in symbols, many of them resembling those she’d translated from the grimoire. If they were like the vile prayers, ruminations, and spells written in that horrible tome, she’d turn around and walk straight into Cimejen’s arms, dragging Bron with her if she had to.
“I’ll try,” she said, praying that the stone was merely a shortcut to Luda and not a door locked shut to keep out a malice that waited with slavering anticipation on the other side for some careless idiot to set it free.
“Try quickly,” Bron said. “Cimejen and company will be here soon.”
She stepped back from the menhir so she could better see the symbols carved at the top. As with all the translations she’d read before, she turned to one side and eyed the stone askance. A dull ache started at the back of her skull as the runes reshaped themselves in her vision, becoming characters and glyphs, words she’d learned to read in the cold, spartan surroundings of a village schoolroom. She silently read the passage revealed, trying to parse out if the writing direction was top to bottom, left to right, or the opposites of both.
“How odd,” she murmured.
Bron shifted impatiently beside her. “What’s odd?”
The passage was a piece of verse, comprised of nine lines, each smaller than the one above it and read from top to bottom. One of the lines drew her near for a better look. A symbol within it had been altered. Faint remnants of the original mark beneath it remained but was mostly illegible. This, she thought had to be the modified symbol that changed the function of the gate and made it a trap instead of a conduit for long-ago armies.
Wish the place and wish the name my love
As I await your coming here
And will greet you at the gate
With joy and hope in heart
For you have searched far
Always for me
Your dear one
Who waits
Long
“Can you translate it, Disa?” Bron’s voice had taken on a more desperate note as he repeated the question.
Dear one.
Disaris inhaled, almost lightheaded with excitement. If she was right, the key to opening this gate was more than just translating. She held out her hand to Bron. “Hold on to me,” she said. “So we go through the gate together.” His warm fingers closed around hers and squeezed.
If only she could translate faster, but this was the language of an ancient people not human and mostly hidden from the world of men. She didn’t want to get it wrong by reading too quickly and mispronouncing something. The gods only knew what might happen to her and Bron if she did.
The thunder of hoofbeats sounded behind her as she read the verse out loud, mindful of her words and cadence, even the tilt of her head as she read from the corner of her eye. Bron’s hand gripped hers so hard her fingers went numb. A blast of wind, smelling of flowers, spun about her and Bron, whipping her hair across her face to block her view of the stone. She shoved the strands out of the way with a frustrated growl. Behind her the curses of their pursuers and the whinny of frightened horses grew ever louder.
She didn’t turn to look or halt her recitation. When she reached the end, she closed her eyes, pictured her sister’s face in her mind and said her name with the fervor of a supplicant before a deity. “Luda.”
“Jin Hazarin!” Cimejen’s voice boomed behind them. “Stop!”
Disaris opened her eyes as the carved symbols blazed to life, turning the menhir into a tower of violet light. She turned her face away, blinded by the brightness.
Bron gathered her into his arms. “You did it, Disa. Now hold tight.” He stepped across the threshold, chased by the whine offired arrows and accompanied by the chorus of chanting voices lifted in either welcome or warning.
Disaris fellin love with Bron jin Hazarin twice in her life, the first time when she was six years old and met the shy child she called “moon boy.” That love had been an innocent one, an affection between playmates that built a foundation of devotion and steadfast friendship that lasted for more than two decades.
The second time she fell in love with him, she was fifteen—almost sixteen—and thoroughly confused by the burgeoning feelings of longing when he wasn’t by her side, jealousy when he drew the attention of other girls, and despair when the Daesin army stole him from her to turn him into a battle mage. Burnpool garrison was a day’s journey from Panrin, but it may as well have been as far away as the moon in her opinion.
Since his too-brief visit in spring, she’d schemed of a million ways to see him again, even broaching her father with the outlandish suggestion of letting her ride to Burnpool. Reylan, normally the more lenient of her two parents, had taken his pipe out of his mouth and stared at her as if she’d suddenly grown another head. “I would have to be dead and buried half a league under the village square before I allowed you to visit anyone at a fortress full of soldiers.” He pointed the pipe at her as a thundercloud rolled across his brow. “Put that thought out of your mind, Disa, and don’t ask me again.” He scowled at his wife. “Did she ask you about this?”
Gheza had sputtered in disbelief. “Do you really think she’d askmesuch a thing? I’m fine with tossing her in her room and nailing her door shut for even having such an idea.”
