There was a beat where only the ocean and the light wind in the air could be heard.
Then Thalia erupted in laughter. “Oh, I see. I see it now, Cian! You gave away so much yourself, man.” She gave a little clap with her bejeweled hands. “You cannot have that much power unless you gave up your very soul. It is that third sacrifice, isn’t it? Not just blood. Not just prayer and meditation and study. The abstract. The mind, the will, the heart. Now I see!” And she laughed again, but it was a laugh of rage.
“Explain yourself, Cian,” hissed Hinnom, his eyes wide, but while his tone was angry, there was a wicked light in his eyes, as if he craved this kind of madness, this kind of fight.
“Cousin, how could you? Did you want the throne so much?” Peregrine ranted, hand on his sword. “Because I would have given it up to prevent the fall of my country,yourcountry.”
“Scheming snake,” Hinnom practically sang. “I never liked you, Cian. So composed, so prideful even when you were little. I saw that grasping quality in you from early on.”
“What you saw,” said Cian, now with intent and no more charade of innocence, “was a child with more sanity than either you or your brother. Both of you want to keep Tintar in a dark age of war and vengeance.”
“There will always be war and vengeance,” Hinnom intoned, diversion in his expression, almost as if he were watching a performance. “But Tintar stands because Tintariswar and vengeance. That is how the world works, cousin.”
Cian shook his head. “It is time for a better Tintar.”
“You play a dirty game, brother,” came the rumbly voice of Bamber, archpriest of fire. “Your goddess will not forgive this so easily and she the most forgiving of all four.”
Cian’s face was without reaction, his right hand still clenched, the rock wall holding.
Alric was trying to scale the wall to get to me, but every time he got purchase over the end, the rocks at the top of the living wall would dislocate and replace, shoving him off. He called my name, my true name, over the wall, looking at me. “Edith!” he cried again.
I met his tortured gaze, tears in my eyes.
Next to me, Thrush lowered his sword, standing at ease, already settling in their victory.
Thalia still laughed. “Your goddess will not cover your bones in Nyossa, Cian. No one will take you there when you die. She would not even if we did.”
“You are confident in my being defeated and there being a body to take,” he replied to her, calm but showing some aggravation at her amused disgust.
“Something comes,” said Yro, his white eyes on Cian. “Something is coming. You brought this upon us and now, she will bring something even worse.”
“What the hell does he mean?” Thrush asked Cian, who glared back at Yro.
The journal, I thought. Gareth’s search.
Something’s coming of rock, roar and might
Something’s coming and with it, the stone sight
My eyes tore away from Alric’s and stared out again at Sister Sea, at the newly built warships flying the red Perpatanian pennant, closer now, the five drake rocks surrounding them, jutting up into the sunlight. Gareth’s writing came to me then.I believe a slice on the fleshier part of the left palm, cupped until full of blood and then poured out onto the body of the goddess will result in this. This is of course unusual for earth temple staff as they usually prick their right hand on the sagaris pointed end hanging to their right. This makes the mention of the use of the left hand’s blood one of significance. The mossy rock on the top of the keep is likely the best place.
I brought my right hand to the top of my sagaris, eyes blurring on the sea before me. Distantly, I heard both my first and second husbands saying my names, one Edie, one Edith. In my head, I heard myself asking Thalia, what happened to him?
There was an earthquake. We have not had one since the days of ancient Tintarians, those blessed with earth magic able to move mountains and manipulate boulders to erect buildings. He was on the bluff when it happened. It was a mystery, Edie. No one knows why he was up there or what possibly could have ever caused that quake. And his poor body was mangled beneath the rocks, most of them must have been jagged. One of his hands was completely severed from the rest of his body.
One of his hands, I thought. It would have been the left one.
Only the left hand of blood will summon the stone drakes
Only the left hand of blood makes them form and quake
I looked down at my left hand with its intricate ranunculus tattoo.
Cian’s hand was still outstretched. From the inside of the cage of shifting stone wall, Thalia, Bamber and Hinnom yelled at him, the latter seeming to jubilate in being incensed. Yro’s eyes were open and he was looking up at the sky as if he were alone, praying to Brother Air. Alric was calling my name, his tone rising in panic, while Perch, Thatcher and Fletch all tried to scale the wall with him. Jeremanthy and his men were conspiring as to how to exit the cage of Cian’s wall with its ever-moving rocks. He had enclosed them up against the bluff’s edge and the other side of their prison was a deathly drop into thin air.
I looked down at my right hand, and flipped both sides of the sagaris scabbard outward, lifting the axe out of its hole in my belt. I hefted its handle into my right hand, so that I held it in the middle of the length. I stepped back so that I was supported at my back, shoulders against the watchtower.
Alric shouted my name again.
