Chuckling, I wiped the sweat from my brow.
"Fever?" She set the lantern down. "Or dreams?"
"Just dreams." I glanced around the quiet tent. "How did you manage to get rid of Reese?"
"Easily. I know how that man works.” Brighid pulled her satchel off and scooted closer to me. "I told him one of the bards noticed shadows in the woods, and off he rode." She snapped the satchel open. "Did you enjoy the show?"
"Depends. Which one?" When she offered a smirk in response, I leaned toward her. "Whatwasthat?"
"Fae magic,” she answered, producing an ancient cylinder, rusted and worn.
"Fae? The make-believe fairies who steal children from their cribs?"
"Is that what you Stormborn think?" Brighid arched an eyebrow. "No, they're quite real. And much more dangerous than that. But that's beside the point."
"The existence of child-snatching fae is beside the point? I beg to differ?—”
"Don't interrupt me," Brighid said.
Twisting open the cylinder, she pulled out a scroll. Darkened, stained, and torn, it looked like it had come from the beginning of time.
"The story you saw unfold," she said, tapping the old parchment. "Is written here."
I leaned closer as she unrolled the parchment. Glyphs patterned the pages, faded and indecipherable. Her fingers trembled; her eyes danced with palpable excitement.
"A lost remnant of history.” Brighid met my eye. "One of only two accounts of the Diath that still remain."
A dragon of flame was drawn on the scroll's lower right corner. My eyes traced the other figures as Brighid spoke.
"Forlaith scrubbed all mention of the Diath centuries ago. It seems they were premier mages of their element, revered as kings or even gods."
A leviathan curled around the upper right corner, reaching toward a faded figure with butterfly-like wings. The final corner was burned away.
Beside each beast soared a bird. A sparrow flitted alongside the leviathan, and a heron strolled beneath the butterfly. Small, tucked at the bottom, was a charcoal crow.
"Interesting," I mused, looking up from the scroll. "Why did Forlaith care?"
"Because they wanted Solathair to be the only god. Unlike Aenir's saints or Lavaire's spirits, these were tangible. People you could reach out and touch." Brighid shrugged. "Or so I presume."
"Ah.” I nodded. "I'm amazed that even this managed to survive the Inquisitors’ wrath."
Brighid's fingers strangled the cylinder. "It drives me mad, thinking of all they've destroyed. But, don't you see? The end of the play—it's written here." She tapped the parchment. "The dragon plunged his city into flame to keep it from Forlaith. It was like that for years. The charred ruins stand to this day. Doesn't that sound familiar?"
Someone might as well have slapped me across the face. I reeled, mind spinning.
"I think a Diath is to blame for Tirnanog's state.” Brighid leaned forward. "And I think only a Diath can reclaim it."
A remnant of history had stepped from its tomes and stolen my home? Why?
"How would we find them?" I asked. "This Diath?"
Brighid's eyes fell to my hip. To Cierthine. "Cierthine picked a woman for the first time. Why, if not because she is exceedingly special?"
I looked down at myself, at the white hair tumbling over the shoulders of my gray cloak. At the heavy fur tunic Reese had wrapped me in to keep me warm while I recovered.
Me, a mythical hero the ancient Forlains had scrubbed from history?
"I'm flattered," I said. "That you think me akin to a king who turned into a dragon. But—” I glanced at the fluttering tent flap. "Why couldn't you tell the others, too?"
