“You knew better,” Gerrod said. “You knew of the harm done to her.”
Dart’s fingers tightened on her dagger’s hilt.
Paltry ignored the accusation and spoke to the floor. “I took the soiled garment to Castellan Mirra, following her order of secrecy.”
Master Gerrod turned to the woman seated beside the godslayer. “It is no wonder I could not match the blood to any of the Hundred, yet it tested like that of a god.”
His gaze fell upon Dart’s figure. Though he was cased in bronze, there was a kind concern in his eyes. She wanted to run into his arms, to have those armored arms protect her. Or maybe it was just that his bronze form reminded her of Pupp, of his security. The loss of her friend ached inside her.
But Gerrod was not done with Paltry. “What happened after that?”
“I . . . I heard back from Castellan Mirra. She claimed the girl was an abomination. She expressed fear of some plot against Chrism.”
“If Henri had not informed her of the girl,” Master Gerrod said, “I could see Mirra making that mistake, the same as I did with the blood. And with Henri’s recent death, she must have assumed the worst.”
Yaellin stirred. “So you attempted to kill Dart. Why?”
“I was so ordered. Castellan Mirra sent gold and names among the blackfeet. She asked me to stay my hand until she could investigate further. She seemed to fear some faction at Tashijan.”
“The Fiery Cross,” Castellan Vail mumbled.
Gerrod fixed Paltry with a cold stare. “Did Mirra ever contact you again?”
“No, she disappeared . . . vanished at Tashijan. I assumed something had happened. I had no choice but to continue with her plan to kill the abomination. It was for the good of Myrillia.” Paltry puffed up at this last bit.
The master made a rude noise. “Rather, it fit your plans just fine. You didn’t want the young girl’s rape being discovered. What if she talked? So you carried forward the assassination anyway.”
Dart’s head spun with the stories being told.
“But she lived,” Yaellin said. “And the story of the illuminaria did not escape the attention of Mistress Naff. She must have told Chrism of the incident. They must have started to suspect the truth.”
“And they didn’t know before this,” the bearded man said, turning toward Dart. “Seems strange that a child Ser Henri hid from the Cabal ends up back on their doorstep, and they’re none the wiser.”
“Perhaps not so strange,” Master Gerrod said. “Remember, it was an Oracle that chose her. Such men and women are tied to the deepest desires of the gods they serve. The one who chose Dart must have made his choice based on Chrism’s deep-seated craving for the blood of a godling. The Oracle must have blindly sensed something about the girl with his Grace-blessed senses. Especially as it was the Hand of Blood for which she was picked. A very appropriate choice, considering the circumstances and his master’s desires.”
Again a heavy silence weighed upon the room.
The man with the beard tugged at his whiskers. “According to Master Gerrod’s ancient texts, Chrism arrived here with the Godsword. And we came here hoping he still had it or knew where to find it. But now we discover he’s corrupted, a part of this Cabal, if not its leader.” He turned to Yaellin. “When did you begin to suspect Chrism?”
“Only seven days ago. He hides himself well. But over the past few moons, I had noted strange happenings at the High Wing. Hands seemed to be burning faster, aging quicker. Strange dreams plagued us all. At first, I attributed it to the same malaise spreading over Myrillia. But then I discovered more and more Cabalists appearing near the castillion, acting more boldly, hardly hiding their allegiances. They seemed to be focused on the Eldergarden. Fearing some foul mischief, I ventured into the deep wood, all the way to the Heartwood. As the Hand of Black Bile, it was an easy thing to anoint myself with nullifying alchemies and move past Chrism’s wards unseen. There, to my horror, I discovered the corruption. With my father dead and Castellan Mirra gone, I didn’t know whom to trust.”
Yaellin glanced to Castellan Vail. “And when Argent ser Fields, my father’s enemy, chose you as the new castellan, I feared you might have been corrupted. I was seeing Cabalists everywhere. So instead, I pursued my dead father’s wishes. To protect the Godsword from the Cabal. I watched Chrism closely, dogging his steps in secret. I hoped to discover where the Godsword might be hidden. To steal it if I could. I’ve even searched his rooms twice.” He shook his head. “To no avail.”
Dart remembered Yaellin sneaking out of Chrism’s chambers. He had been seeking the sword. If they hadn’t followed him . . .
Master Gerrod paced around the circular room, slowly, methodically. “Which brings us to the death of Meeryn. She must have learned about Chrism. He must have sent that black naether-spawn to slay her, to silence her. But how did it kill her?”
The answer came from an unexpected source. “With the Godsword,” the man in the bed said, pushing up on one elbow. He opened eyes a startling storm-gray in color. How long had he been feigning sleep?
Dart took a worried step backward.
“Tylar . . .” Castellan Vail said with relief.
He held her back with a nod, a silent assurance that he was all right. “The beast had a weapon,” he continued. “I saw it. A lance of silver that seemed ghostly yet potent.”
“Rivenscryr,” Yaellin said. “Chrism must have been able to forge it.”
“With the blood of the infant boy,” Tylar said, demonstrating how much he had overheard. “They must have a small cache still left.”
“But the source is too meager for them to show themselves,” Master Gerrod said. “They still move in secret.”
“For now.” Tylar’s gray eyes found Dart. “I think that was why Ser Henri kept this child alive . . . in secret. He could’ve slain her to keep her blood from ever falling into the Cabal’s hands, but he knew eventually a war would arise, a new War of the Gods here on Myrillia. And he wanted our side to have a way to wield the Godsword. So he placed a guard upon the one god who had knowledge of the sword.” Tylar nodded to Yaellin, then turned to Dart. “And he locked away a source of blood to fuel the sword.”
Dart felt a growing horror at his words. Tylar continued to stare at her, sorrowfully yet fiercely.
“So what do we do?” Castellan Vail asked.
“We do what we all must. I was named a godslayer. Now I must become one in truth.” He finally faced the others. “We must kill Lord Chrism.”
FIFTH
WAR OF THE GODS
“There came a grate splitting of the sky. A thunderclap felled all to their knays. The rott’d trees cracked. The birds of the aer did stryke the ground, which did shake and growl like a beast in payn. Waters flooded their banks and drown’d the land. The sun did flare with grate fyre and fury. And the blue sky went the black of a bruise.
“And in that trembling light, he fell to the mount, to his knays, a grate lord of blood and bone, bearing a sword of light and shadow. He sayd unto me, ‘Lo, all is at an end.’ ”
—Pryde Manthion, the last human king Shadowfall [Book of Fyre, lin. 103-104]
22
UNDER THE RAVEN’S EYE
TYLAR SIPPED THE DRAFT OF BLOODVINE, BITTER BUT sweetened with honey. It was his third dousing. He held the mug with two hands, needing both. A shiver from his bones threatened to shake his frame, but he contained it.
Kathryn sat on the neighboring bed. He felt her eyes on him, a steady watch, as if expecting him to swoon at any moment. Upon his waking, she had tried to comfort him with her soothing hands and whispered words, but it grew too difficult for them both. Such intimacy was still beyond them, confused by old familiarity and new awkwardness.
And for the moment, more important matters had to be settled.
It was nigh on midday and a plan had yet to be worked that held any chance of victory. They had debated and strategized. How did one reach Lord Chrism with untold legions of ilk-beasts guard
ing his grounds and an entire castillion garrison roused to alert? And once cornered, how did one slay a god corrupted by Dark Grace and wielding untold power?
Tylar studied the room over his mug. They were too few: a thief, a warrior woman, a wise man in bronze, two Shadowknights . . . and two frightened girls.
Gerrod knelt with Dart. He peered into her eyes with a dark lens. Earlier he had pricked her finger and dabbed her blood upon a crystal wafer. He, with the assistance of the healer, had tested the girl as bell after bell chimed the passing morning.
He lowered his scope. “Thank you, Dart. That’ll be all.”
She nodded and scooted to the other end of the bed. Her friend sat down next to her. They leaned close to each other, like two frightened rabbits, eyes fixed and glassy. Tylar could only imagine such terror. His upbringing among the orphanages of Akkabak Harbor had not been easy, but it was nothing compared to the experiences of the two girls here.
Gerrod stepped over to Tylar. Kathryn sat straighter on the next cot.
The master shook his head. “Most strange. I can detect Grace in her blood, faint yet certainly present. But it is oddly and persistently inert. No alchemies can stir it or react to it. I’ve searched for any trace of quickening in her body, some faint glow at the back of the eyes, any sign that Grace manifests in the girl. But I’ve discovered nothing. It’s as if she has no ability to bless or utilize her Grace, not within herself and certainly not without.”
“So is she a god or not?” Kathryn asked.
“Not as we know a god to be. It is said that the gods, before the great Sundering of their own kingdom, bore no special Grace. That only after their naethryn and aethryn aspects were stripped from them did the remaining flesh quicken with humoral Graces. Masters have debated the reason for this over the many centuries. It is supposed that a god’s Grace manifests from some ethereal connection that persists between the gods of Myrillia and their torn counterparts, a bleeding of power that still flows through all three.”
“And the girl?” Rogger asked, joining them. He settled next to Kathryn on the cot.
“She is unsundered,” Gerrod said. “Whole. I think that is why she does not manifest with any significant Grace. But I would know more about this creature that accompanies her.”
“Pupp,” the girl, Dart, said from the neighboring bed. Despite her frightened countenance, she had been listening intently. “His name is Pupp.”
Gerrod shifted. “What can you tell me about him?” Tylar noted his calm demeanor and lack of condescension when dealing with the girl.
She licked her lips. “He’s always been with me.” She glanced over to Yaellin. He guarded the door, periodically checking the hallway, while Eylan kept a watchful eye on the healer. “Even as a babe, he was with me.”
Yaellin nodded. “I saw him in her dreams. Ugly fellow. Fiery eyes. All molten and barely formed.”
Dart’s eyes hardened.
“He’s not ugly,” the second girl declared, coming to her friend’s defense. “He’s . . . he’s . . . fearsome.”
“I thought no one could see this creature?” Kathryn said.
Dart glanced to Kathryn. The girl’s gaze was steady. There was certainly a well of strength in her small frame. “Only I can see him at most times. And even I can’t touch him then. Only stone seems to block him.”
“And he’s trapped in the Eldergarden?”Tylar asked, having heard their story.
The girl nodded with a pained look of worry.
“And when was the first time, this creature . . . this Pupp . . . revealed himself to other than yourself?” Gerrod asked.
The girl’s steadiness faltered. Her eyes sank to the floor. She seemed to collapse into herself.
Gerrod continued with reassuring tones. “You’re among friends, Dart. We wouldn’t ask this of you unless it was important.”
She kept her eyes down. Her voice was a whisper. “It was with Master Willet . . . up . . . up in the rookery.”
Dart swallowed. She let go her last secret reluctantly. Fury had given her strength before to accuse Paltry, to tell what had happened to her, but now she must reveal the end. “Master Willet . . .”
She spotted Healer Paltry leaning forward. His eyes were sharp, his lips thin. How long must he have wondered what had become of his cohort? His face shone with oil. How had she ever considered him handsome?
She turned away and took a deeper breath. “Pupp attacked him, protecting me.”
“I thought—”
She cut off Master Gerrod. If she stopped her words now, she might never finish them. “It was my blood . . . my virginal blood.” She choked on this last. So much had been stolen from her, more than she could measure. Would the pain ever end? “Pupp bathed himself in it. I think he knew the touch of my blood gave substance to his form. He blazed with fire and tore into Willet.”
Dart was drawn back to the rookery, to the blood, to the break of bone, to the sear of flesh, to the boil of blood . . . “All was consumed,” she said. “Gone. Not even blood stained the planks.”
No one spoke.
The silence drew Dart back to the room. She saw the look of horror on Paltry’s face. She found no satisfaction in it.
“And Pupp?” Gerrod asked.
Dart shook her head. “Once the blood dried from him, he became a ghost again.”
Yaellin spoke from the door. “My father, Ser Henri, knew of Pupp. Dart used to speak of her ghostly pet, before others ridiculed and chided her into silence and secrets. My father believed her companion might be some amalgam of Dart’s naethryn and aethryn selves. Born whole, Dart was not stripped of these parts. Yet they remain not fully of this world either. They cling to her.”
Dart listened, balanced between horror and understanding. She and Pupp had always been one, but she never suspected how much of a one they were. If the others were right, Pupp was as much a part of her as her leg or arm.
Gerrod nodded. “And her blood has the Grace to pull this part of her fully into our world.”
“Not just her blood,” Yaellin countered. Dart had already told him about the drop of Chrism’s blood striking Pupp, and the blood roots down in the subterranean passage. “Any blood rich enough with Grace. Pupp just needs fuel to cross the barrier into substance.”
“Such strangeness abounds,” Gerrod concluded.
The castellan rose from the cot. “Which does not settle the matter of Chrism and what we might do about this Cabal. We cannot hide forever in this cell.”
Dart listened with half an ear as more discussions and plans were weighed, balanced, and discarded. She found tears coming again to her eyes. She could not say why. They rose from the hollowness inside her. She did not fully know who she was any more: girl, god, or monster.
She stared at her hands, blurred by her tears. They seemed a stranger’s now.
A second pair of hands covered hers, grasping. She lifted her gaze to find Laurelle close to her, staring back at her. “It doesn’t matter,” her friend said. There was no horror in her eyes. “None of this matters. I know you.” She squeezed her fingers. “This is the Dart I know. You’ve shown your heart in the past and now. The rest is just shadow and light.”
Dart sniffed and took Laurelle’s hand in her own. She so wanted it to be true. But she had only to hear the others discuss slaying a god to know that there were matters greater than flesh . . . even her own. And she had a role to play. Dart had no say in her birth, even her years in the Conclave were ordered and orchestrated by others. But no longer. From here, she would have to forge her own path. It was for her to decide.
Girl, god, or monster.
Kathryn shook her head. “This is madness. We must wait on others. Bring full forces to bear. We can’t lay siege on the castillion with just the handful here.”
Tylar stood. Kathryn noted the wobble in his knees, though Tylar tried to hide it with a wave of his arm.
“Chrism will not wait,” he argued. “He knows he’s been exposed. If he has not foun
d us by sunset, there is no accounting of what he might do. He could unleash all manner of horror in the city. Or he could merely escape with his Cabal, hiding away, disappearing with the Godsword. He’d be a thousandfold more difficult to root out.”
“You propose going in on our own?” she said. “With no knowledge of what may lay in wait?”
“If we could only find the Godsword . . .” Tylar grumbled.
Yaellin spoke from the doorway. “I’ve searched everywhere for the weapon. It’s nowhere to be—”
Distant shouts silenced the man. All eyes turned to the door.
Yaellin swung to the spy hole. “It’s coming from down the stairs. I’ll check.” He lifted the bar and pulled the latch. He vanished in a whirl of cloak and shadow.
With the door cracked, the heavy tread of boots on stone echoed up from below. Surely it was the castillion guard. Orders were shouted to search every floor. This was no random search.
“We’ve been found,” Tylar said.
Kathryn slid free her sword. Others did the same. There was no escape up the tower. They’d have to fight their way to the streets.
Kathryn called up the power in her cloak, billowing darkness around her form. They had to get Tylar safely away . . . and the girl. The child could not be captured, returned to Chrism’s reach. With such a source of blood, the Godsword would be Chrism’s to wield. That must not happen.
Glancing over a shoulder, Kathryn spotted the girl crouched with her friend. She had a dagger in hand and a fierce set to her eyes.
Shadows suddenly shifted behind the girl’s shoulders.
Oh no . . .
Darkness fell across Dart, drawing her eye to the sunlit window nearby. She had left the window open after watching the flippercraft crash earlier. A naked shape crept over the sill, claws digging into stone, eyes glowing with grace. Smoke steamed its form.