When they’re out of sight, I begin to breathe more easily.
Linsfall itself seems quieter than I remember. Is that Killian’s doing? What has he done to my country now that he’s reinstated himself as king?
“Just the lateness of the hour,” Anassa says, but her voice betrays a shade of doubt.
Our past visits were brief enough that all I remember are flashes of places and street names.
I recognize the inn where Stark and I stayed, glance up briefly at the window of that tiny room we shared. My lips twist as I remember lying alongside him, fervently denying to myself the heat of attraction I so clearly already felt.
Cratos shifts and stamps a little as we pass.
“Do you remember…”
“Yes,” Stark confirms instantly.“I should have taken better advantage of our tiny room and shared bed. I certainly wasted enough hours thinking about it, when I should have been sleeping.”
I can’t see his face because of our rift, but regardless, I can feel his eyes on me.
My blood heats.
“Not now,” Anassa chides.“Plenty of time for mating after you get the Tear and kill Killian.”
“Anassa!” I gasp in mock outrage.“Stop listening in.”
“Stop broadcasting your desire so strongly that I can’t tune it out,” she retorts.
Fair enough.
We pass closed shop fronts, windows dark. The flats above them are illuminated as often as not, late-night candles burning against the engulfing night.
The city square opens up ahead, and Anassa and I both draw in a breath, our bodies in sync as we gaze at the statue of the Faceless Goddess at its center.
“It’s almost like I could feel something here last time,” I muse to her as I slip off her back, focusing my energy to maintain the shadowy cloak around both of us now that we aren’t one single unit.
“The Sturmfrost in you knew,” Anassa responds simply, settling back on her haunches as I take the last few steps toward the statue. Just like last time, Stark and Cratos hang back, letting me approach alone.
This time, no snow obscures the shape of her, and the glow from the lantern posts spread around the outside of the square lights up every tiny detail of her etched robes, her delicate hands.
Like last time, her larger-than-life hands hold a scattering of flowers and coins, offerings from the people of Linsfall to the mysterious, faceless deity.
I reach up, touching two fingers to the smooth planes of her face.
Now, I can imagine the features that should be there, the golden skin.
What magic stripped away her face, her name, her story? Why was her identity lost to time?
Anassa huffs. “Perhaps the answers will be held in the final Tear,” she suggests, gently nudging me back toward what I’m here for.
My fingers drift down, and I place my hand in her stone one. But as with last time, the stone is anything but cool. A steady, welcoming warmth emanates from her cupped hands despite the persistent chill of the air.
“It must be here, in her hands,” I say to Stark.“But I can’t see an opening, a latch… how am I meant to…”
Stark and Cratos move closer.“We can take a look if you think it would help?”
Do I have to smash the statue? Is it inside? It seems an insult to the Faceless Goddess—taking a chisel to this gorgeous monument that has stood here for who knows how long.
And now that I’m standing here, something is holding me back. Almost as if the goddess herself is warning me away.
I fight to identify the feeling: Is this some kind of magic I don’t understand?
