“Nothing,” Gareth answered immediately.
“Once, I would have agreed with you. Not anymore.”
Errik led us through the doors into a huge sunken room, and the other monks flooded in around us. Tapestries depicting legends of the goddess Zelphenia lined the walls, muffling every sound.
A heavy wooden table sat at the room’s center, bordered by polished blue tiles. In front of the table was a large stone basin. It must have once been a fountain; a faceless statue of Zelphenia stood in the middle of it, her arms draped in delicately sculpted veils. Faint darkpaths streaked down her body where water had once flowed, like the echoes of tears.
But the water she had once stood in was gone.
In its place was a crimson pool of blood.
I froze. One of the monks nearest me tried to pull me forward, but I wouldn’t budge, didn’t move even an inch. The monk lost his footing and stumbled back.
“Where is the Blessed Abbot?” I said, very low.
Errik stopped at the fountain of blood and turned to face us, his hands clasped at his waist. He still wore that same mild smile plastered across his face, only now I saw clearly that it held nothing but malice.
“I tried to convince him of the truth,” Errik replied, “but he would not listen. Now his blood—and the blood of those loyal to him—will serve a greater purpose. You are familiar with the unknowable arts, I assume? The art of divining truth from natural objects? The goddess Zelphenia was particularly fond of scrying pools, and we do not reject her teachings entirely, false god though she may be.”
Suddenly the source of that basin of blood was perfectly, horribly clear.
The mocking regret in Errik’s voice made me want to tear out his throat. “What truth are you talking about? Of what madness have you convinced yourself?”
“That the gods mustn’t be found and protected,” Gareth said, his own voice hard as flint. “They must be found and destroyed. Just as Kilraith wishes.”
Errik’s face lit up with delight. “Exactly right, Professor. And there is your answer. Nothing is more powerful than our fraudulent gods. Nothing except for He Who Is All.”
“He Who Is All,” echoed the other monks.
Kilraith.
“The one true god,” Errik murmured, his eyelids fluttering closed.
“The one true god,” responded the others.
Errik’s earlier words returned to me like a blow to the temple.You killed the god Jaetris. You looked into his eyes and tore open the body that held him.
Do you think you could do that again?
“If you think I’ll help you destroy the gods,” I muttered, so furious I could hardly see straight, “then you’re an even bigger fool than I thought.”
Errik smiled sadly at me. “I understand, Mara. Unlearning years of holy teachings is difficult. But you will manage it soon, I think.”
As the doors thudded closed behind us, I spun around, fists raised, every muscle in my body taut as a bowstring and ready to fight—but then Errik intoned something under his breath, and acrid spellwork crackled through the air, stealing my breath. I spat out a curse; Errik was a beguiler. My eyes instinctively closed against the sting of magic, and when I opened them again, Gareth was no longer beside me.
He lay on the fountain’s stone ledge, kept immobile by Errik’s spellwork, and Errik himself held a knife to Gareth’s throat. The tip of the blade pressed into his neck, drawing bright drops of blood.
“Agree to help us, and I’ll spare his life,” Errik said patiently, looking back at me. “I hope you can appreciate the sacrifice I’d be making by letting him live. The blood of a sage would considerably enhance the power of our scrying pool.”
He barely got the words out before I lunged at him. My restrained power burst through me like an explosion, and in three seconds I had him pinned flat to the floor. A quick jab to his throat, and he was helpless beneath me, voiceless and gasping for breath.
My head snapped up at the metallic scrape of blades being drawn. The other monks surged toward me, withdrawing daggers from the pockets of their voluminous robes.
Daggers. I faced them all with a grin, my muscles blazing and ready. As if a few knives were enough to best me.
I flew at them lightning fast, my feet barely touching the floor. It felt so good to let loose my strength after everything that had happened—my night with Gareth, the tension between us, the strange supper in the dining hall—that laughter bubbled up in my throat from sheer relieved joy.
A monk came at me with a hard swipe of his blade, and I kicked it from his hand. It went flying, and the monk crashed to his knees, cradling his shattered fingers and howling in pain. Another monk threw spellwork at me; I recognized the murky, rotten odor of magic meant to stun my senses and leave me slow and befuddled. But I was ready for that. I ducked the spell—a shimmer of arcing light cutting through the air like a scythe—and then ran at my attacker, rammed my head into his stomach, and sent him flying. He slammed into a wall and slumped to the floor, unmoving.
