That I had to let her go a short while ago makes me even more pissed at Joran. Raina doesn’t want to feel responsible for further tension between the members of this group, and I’ll honor her wishes. But I don’t give two fucks about what the others think. I’ve been alone for a very long time. I might’ve given my body away in the past, but my heart has been as caged as Neri and my magick.
Until now.
“We’re just so close to the valley,” I say, poking at the fire with a stick. “I’m more than ready to be riding toward Malgros. You?”
He leans his thick forearms on his knees. The tin mug clasped between his massive hands looks like a child’s toy.
I look at him then. Really look at him. His bloodshot eyes and their purple shadows tell me all I need to know.
He scrubs his brow. “I’m not sure if I’ll sleep well until this is over. I can’t stop thinking that an answer lies in the past. An answer you must know in that enormous mind of yours.”
That coaxes half a grin out of me. “Many answers lie in the past. I have a friend in Malgros, Captain Osane, who always says, ‘The past helps us understand the present, Alexus.’ But connecting lines across the ages isn’t an easy thing.”
“I’m sure it’s not. It might help if we talk it out, though?” His face twists into a slight wince, as if he’s presenting the question to a snake ready to strike.
I sit my mug aside, toss the stick, and hold my hands toward the fire. Fuck. I like this kid. I hate it that he had to leave his mother and siblings in the East. I’m certain that’s part of his torment, a reason for his sleeplessness.
But after my conversation with Raina last night, the last thing I want to talk about is the past. While I remember certain parts so clearly, others are riddled with black holes, muddling the history of my long life. Such is the way when you face an endless existence, I suppose. Time isn’t kind.
It devours.
And yet, I find myself glancing up at Rhonin and saying, “Sure. We can talk it out.”
His blue-green eyes light up, as though I said the words he’s longed to hear. Maybe I did.
“So Neri cursed Colden,” he says, leaning closer, his voice laced with determination for answers. “And the ruling gods commanded that the truth about what Neri did to Fia and Colden be kept secret from the people. No record.”
“Yes. Gods want to be revered and glorified. Not doubted. So they did their damnedest to make certain the Tiressian people believed what they wanted them to believe. And it worked. Three hundred years later, the Tiressian gods are all dead, and yet people still worship them.”
I only learned the truth after Neri I met Colden, as a spy, before I finally left the East. There were years when we tried to convince the Northlanders about Neri. Most only saw us as deceitful, as though we wanted them to worship us instead. We learned all too quickly that it is no small task to strip people of their gods. No matter how false they might be.
“And only those of you who were there know the real story,” Rhonin replies. “And the chosen Witch Walkers. And now us, of course. Which is what I can’t stop thinking about. How the tale made its way to the Prince of the East, after all this time. Where did it come from?”
My mind reels to that moment in Hampstead Loch, watching the prince’s army riding like a squall of death into the valley.
“I’ve tossed that question around in my mind since this game started,” I tell him. “I’ve wondered if there was a traitor in our midst at Winterhold, or if Fia confided in someone and the news made its way to the prince. Or perhaps it was a mouthy wraith determined to cause trouble. I’m not sure we’ll ever have an answer.” I meet his eyes. “You’re certain you don’t remember anything from your time at the palace that might point us in the right direction?”
I’ve asked this before, but the answer is always the same.
“Trust me when I tell you that I’ve scoured my brain. Other than many trips to Min-Thuret lately, all has been the same. Then again, I wasn’t made privy to many details having to do with the prince’s affairs, unless they came from my mother. Especially prior to being moved up the ranks.”
Min-Thuret. If I could purposefully forget anything, it would be all the times that I kneeled for Thamaos and King Gherahn, and the crimes I committed in their names. I spent so many days in that temple, so many hours on my knees. Yet even those memories have splintered over the centuries. The last years of my life as a mortal in Quezira feel like a patchwork existence. If those years were a puzzle, a quarter of the pieces would be missing.
But there’s one thing I didn’t forget.
“Wait.” I narrow my gaze at Rhonin and lean forward, clasping my hands between my widespread knees. “Where does the prince go when he visits the temple?”
The glistening Shara Palace is a week’s ride from Min-Thuret. Two weeks’ ride from the coast, where the prince’s massive army remains stationed. Safety lies inland. What could he need at the old temple badly enough for frequent journeys?
Books? Codexes? Scrolls? There are ancient tomes and texts, well enough. Maps upon maps. Letters between past rulers and gods. Works on ritual and worship. On mathematics, medicine, law, astronomy.
I would know. The original collection housed and cataloged in Min-Thuret’s library had to pass through my hands before ever arriving at the archivists’ doors.
The last thing I expect him to say are the two words that leave his mouth.
“Rite Hall,” he answers, keeping his voice low as some of the others stir from their tents. “Every time,” he adds. “Alone, except for servants who tend him. They say he cuts himself when he prays. Does that mean anything?”
I close my eyes for a single breath and open them. Fuck all.
