89
NOW: TONGUE
“No,” Gerard protested. “The tongue of soundness must remain secret from the rest of the world. It is perhaps Perpatane’s greatest weapon.”
“And, believe you me,” Starling replied, eyes almost entirely white in the reflection of the torches, “if we do not feed it the witch, she may destroy it. You failed me in that, my son. You failed to protect the tongue. Now the only way to defeat her is to let the tongue feast on her.”
“You sound insane, old man,” called Evangeline from her near tip into the tongue. “Want me to jump in and see if I drown in this sludge? It is not that deep.” Though she was bluffing, there was a strain in her question. I could see, from where I stood feeling useless without a weapon, that she was terrified of the fate’s slime.
“Evangeline,” Reed warned.
Starling slowly shook his head, quotingThe Book of Rodwin. “‘The sinner must be washed by the wisdom of reason, of good sense. They must be cleansed by the tongue of soundness.’ I tried, Roberta. I really did. I tried to save your soul at the stake all those winters ago.”
“Yes!” cried out Bertram. “She should have burned with the hag!”
Starling continued to speak, eyes on me. “When you did not go with Magda, I felt my calling was to stamp you out. I thought our saint wanted your death. I plotted it out, but you are a manipulative vixen, always evasive. I could never catch you out in your crimes until the very end, could I? And so you evaded Lord Bertram and our good captain. But—now I know. I was not meant to keep you from the tongue. I was tobring you to it. I know what our saint wants. This is our last chance to save your immortal soul, my girl. There is still mercy left for you.”
I could not breathe. I was the little girl in the box again. I was small and shriveling and cold and alone.
The priest held out a hand and turned towards the river. He glanced at it, almost lovingly. “Only something as great and holy, Roberta, only something asrighteousas the tongue of soundness can cleanse you. We must feed you to?—”
“Not happening,” interrupted Reed, shifting slightly to place himself even more in front of us. “We’ll be on our way as soon as you let my sister go.”
Gerard scoffed. “The father can have his way with the witch. I’m not letting you past that city wall. The tongue will be kept hallowed and secret only to the lords and leaders of Perpatane.”
Ilsit cackled and stepped away from the door. “Why, Gerard? Do you think that will make you a bigger man? Oh what does that book of horseshit say? ‘Those that bring the tongue the sins of others will be made kings’?”
The captain lunged. He flew at his former wife, who had arrogantly put herself in the path of danger. His sword’s swing may have been mighty, but Ilsit had never been a small woman, and she parried his blow with the hunting knife.
As Reed turned to help her, Torm and Bertram were just behind him. They came at him from his side, both with swords. Reed spun mid step, flinging Gerard’s dagger in my direction and letting both his hands fall to draw out the short swords he wore at each hip.
It was a thing of wonder to watch an air Tintarian fight. And I waswatching two of them. Farther away from me, Evangeline ducked and weaved, somehow with only one blade fighting off two swung by the guards. Her dance along the toothy lip of the channel was nimble. She never wobbled. She almost used as it as a touchstone in a frolic with doom, pivoting off of the edge every time she pushed, stepping along it if she could not get purchase by charging forward.
In front of me, Reed was less elegant, but no less impressive. Despite only being able to see fully on one side of him while being corralled in on either side by the lord of Sheridan and his heir, he met each of their blows with an invisibly placed parry of his twin short swords.
I was bent over, trying to grasp the bloodied dagger Gerard had used to stab Reed in the chest, when I felt the clammy hands of Starling at my neck. The hilt of the knife slid from my hand as the priest, still a strong man though he was closer to sixty than fifty, hoisted me to my feet in his chokehold.
I croaked and struggled, my feet trying to find the floor, but I was only lifted higher. I was trying to scream, horrified when my eyes were suddenly right up against his own demented gaze.
The priest’s hands restricted my breath more and more as I fought. And then he was speaking as well as choking me. “Rodwin warned us! He said to ‘beware the woman who entices with sweetness but strikes like an adder.’ I knew it the first time I saw you the summer after we burned the old hag. Those witching sigils on your arms, one a snake and one berries. You are the woman they warned us of.”
“You’re deranged,” I spat, but the words came out in little gags.
“It’s right there in the book,” he spoke over me, a look of almost peace descending on his face as I drew less and less breath. “It says that the adder’s ‘venom and hiss must be choked out.’ Rebellious snakes cannot have heads, Roberta. You will lose your lungs to the river. I told you ‘one day,’ didn’t I? Do you remember? It is nearly dawn. A new day.Todayis that day.”
My vision was blurring. I was aware of Evangeline’s artful stepson the lip of the river. I knew Ilsit fought Gerard valiantly. I knew Reed was holding his own against the Sheridans. As I saw him spot me—barely ducking a blow from Bertram, his lone eye wide with rage at Starling’s hold on me—I lost my grip on the world. The last thing I saw was Starling’s face, his mouth quoting scripture at me, before everything went dark.
“‘A woman’s clutches and coils will weaken the pillars of men’s reason.’”
90
NOW: ILLUSION
The room was so spare, I did not know it was a room, only that it was a space with a floor. I understood there was a table and that there was a box the length of a person on it.
I was in an old dress I used to wear when I was teenaged. Understanding that the source of light that allowed me to see the table and the box was behind me, I turned.
The man was tall, his arms thick and strong and joined to him by broad shoulders. His sharp cheekbones sat above a beard. His nose was noble, brow proud. I would have thought him naked, but he was made of flames. They shimmered on the frame of what would have been a large mortal man. His legs were more loosely outlined. If my eyes lost focus, he was a column of fire.
