The daiva gave a slow blink. Yes. Yes it had.
Mehr hadn’t known that daiva recognized any language beyond their own. All the daiva Mehr had ever known, after all, had responded to sigils alone. But this one was old, old and strong, she was sure of that now. It was nothing like the soft things that flitted along the edges of Jah Irinah. Perhaps in all its long years, its lifetimes upon lifetimes, it had learned something of the languages beyond its own tongue. Perhaps it had once worn a human visage, and lived among mortal men. Mehr lowered her hands slowly, mouth dry. Her heart was beating a frenetic rhythm.
“Spirit,” she said, trying to infuse her voice with the appropriate respect. “I have no blade, but I think you know what I am.”
She held her arms out, palms open and fingers spread in a gesture of welcome. She saw the eye give another slow, considering blink.
The daiva took hold of her wrists. It held them like a human would, with a simulacrum of fingers curving around her skin. Its daiva-flesh was warm. It shaped her human flesh curiously, as if it wasn’t sure what to make of her.
Mehr held her breath. She wondered if it would try to speak like a human. She wanted it to. But instead it tugged her hands, ever so gently, and began to raise them. It was trying to form a sigil, to speak to her in its own language.
Without warning its grip vanished. Its hands disintegrated around her, collapsing back into formless darkness. Its edges grew jagged; its face fractured like glass, a snarl bared on its simulacrum of a mouth. It was struggling, but Mehr had no idea what it was fighting, what force was dragging it away from her and reducing it back into shadow. She stumbled back, her hands in fists at her sides, as it began to inch away from her, growing ever smaller by the second.
Barrier gone, Mehr could see that the mystics were ringed around her, watching the daiva crumble. Standing directly in front of her was Amun.
His feet were pressed hard to the ground, knees at an angle, his back straight and tall. She watched his arms move, great sweeping motions that drew the daiva as if it had a chain around its neck that compelled it to follow. His hands were shaping a constant line of sigils, one flowing into the other with a seamless grace that Mehr had never been quite able to achieve.
He was dancing an Amrithi rite. But it was no rite Mehr had seen before. As she watched he turned, head lowered, hands sweeping the air and skimming earth. It was a move like the fall of a scythe—a transition for death dances, for grief and the fallen and harvest and forgetting. Not for this. Not for dragging a daiva across the sand, every inch of it vibrating with hollow rage.
Mehr stepped forward. She wanted to shout at him to let it go, let it go now. But Amun was lowering himself into a crouch, hands shaping the sigil forGo. It seemed the daiva had no choice. All its fragments scattered into the air. The darkness hung around them like falling rain for a long moment, a heartbeat—and then it was gone.
Amun rose from his crouch, falling into the last stance. Bahren let out a long, colorful string of curses and went to grab the fallen packs of provisions, which had somehow been discarded in the chaos.
Mehr walked over to her husband. She heard nothing, saw nothing. All she could see was Amun’s face in the achingly clear morning light.
“What did you do?” Mehr said. She was helpless to hold back the words. Helpless to hold back her horror. “What did youdo?”
Amun had thrown back the cloth around his face. In the light, the blue marks on his cheeks glowed livid. Cold fire. His mouth wore a bitter smile.
“What I was told to do,” he said.
Mehr didn’t get the chance to speak to Amun alone until nighttime. The mystics kept Mehr close for the rest of the day, surrounding her on all sides in a human barrier. They were tense and silent. They held no weapons, but weapons were no good against daiva, and they were not afraid of being attacked by mortal men. They were the blessed servants of the Maha, after all, and above such danger. Even the most desperate thieves knew that attacking the Maha’s people was worse than a death sentence. The fear the mystics provoked kept human dangers at bay.
Amun walked ahead of them all. If any daiva came, they would face him first. After what Mehr had seen him do, she knew he was weapon enough.
It was miserably cold and dark when they made camp and settled down to sleep. The tent was barely warmer than the desert outside, but Mehr was grateful for its protection.
Amun was on guard for the first few hours of the night, so Mehr waited for him, curled up under the blanket for warmth. When he came in she sat up. Amun had brought an oil lamp in with him. He set it down on the ground, light flickering over his face. He leaned down to blow out the flame, and Mehr gestured at him to stop.
“Is anyone else awake?” she asked.
“Abhiman,” he said, letting the flap of the tent fall down behind him. “He’s walking the perimeter. Speak if you like. He won’t hear you.”
“What did you do to the daiva?” she asked.
“You saw what I did.”
“The rites don’t have that kind of power,” Mehr said. But even as she said it, she wasn’t so sure. All her life she’d believed the rites were a matter of prayer, of ritual and faith. But on the night of the storm, she’d reached out a hand and the dreamfire had reached back.
When she’d danced the Rite of Dreaming that night, had she manipulated the dreamfire—the magic of the Gods—the way Amun had manipulated the daiva? Not by intent, certainly. “We don’t have the ability to control the daiva. Do we?”
Amun shrugged. “You saw what I did,” he repeated.
“Buthow?”
“I learned,” he said shortly. He had no desire to tell her more, that was clear enough.
“What you did—however you did it—was wrong. The daiva deserve our respect.”
