Page 118 of Cursed Shadows 4

For a lethal assassin, Dare is a bit of a priss.

Samick shrugs, a slight and glacier gesture. “Whatever unworthiness Mother meant, whether it be souls or sacrifices or the balance of the proposed bargain itself—the result was the same each time. Dokkalves attempting the ultimate bargain with Mother herself, but failing to recognise that she is as benevolent as she is malevolent.”

I look up at him from under my frown. My furrowed brows line my sight as I whisk through his theory.

The dark ones appeal only to Mother’s sadism.

That’s what he means.

The ones who offer sacrifices to Mother might forget that she is also the good kind of god, the first of all life, and that means she is both dark and light, evil and pure.

“Do you think she’ll accept this one?” I ask, a whisper.

Dare drops his hand to his thigh and, out the corner of my eye, I see the flicker of his jaw. A clench.

Samick studies me for a moment before he starts to plate up the cooked fish meat onto thick, green leaves.

Neither of them gives an answer that isn’t threaded silence. Whatever thoughts they have, they don’t share them with me.

I am left alone in wonders of Daxeel’s worth.

Is it enough for him to sacrifice me to Mother? Will that tempt her to deliver the full power of the Cursed Shadows to the iilra?

Or will she roll her eyes and turn over to fall back into her slumber?

I hope for the latter.

Selfishly, I hope she thinks the offer unworthy, not for the human realm and the survival of that race, or even for the risk to the light lands, but for me and me alone.

My compassion always struggled to extend to others.

This is no different.

I want only to protect myself.

And, as Samick hands me my leaf of pinkish flesh, I decide, I will do anything to protect my own life. Even if it means to leave Daxeel behind on this mountain, to whisper my own prayers to Mother, to live while all else dies…

Even if it means plunging a knife into Daxeel’s heart, I will fight for my life.

No one on this mountain or in Comlar loves me enough.

And so I will love myself most of all.

25

††††††

A lethal silence grips us.

Samick’s manipulation is not contained to water, I learn. It reaches the air itself.

Never in my short life have I seen any of my kind turn water into ice just by touching. But in the face of this power, this magick, water-to-ice seems like a mere parlour trick.

Samick canmist…

This mist, the one that wisps over the plateau, is born of the cold. Samick harnesses that—and brings it to circle the four of us through our trek.

The icy fog encircles us, it conceals us, but it doesn’t silence us. Bootfalls are soft on flat rock, our steps gentle.

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