Page 126 of House of Dusk
Sephre was midway across the stone bridge when a great flare of light blazed out. Crimson, edging into orange and gold. And with it, a wail of dismay, a flinching ripple of fleeing shadows.
She was on her knees by then, though she didn’t remember falling. But it was fine. She could still see them. Sparks of brightness, ascending into that grim gray sky. First one, then two, then a dozen. Then hundreds. Like a rain of stars, but in reverse. Every spark a soul spinning out into the world, to be reborn.
She stared so long it made her eyes water. Or maybe she wept. The wetness slid down her cheeks, spattering her hands, lying loose in her lap.
“Sephre?” Timeus was back, leaning over her, eyes wide with concern.
“You did it,” she said. “Good lad. I’m very proud of you.”
His expression melted. Warmth flushed his brown cheeks. “Thank you, sister.”
“Not sister,” she reminded him. “Not anymore.”
He tensed, looking past her. A faint whisper hissed over stone. Scales.
The Serpent wove toward them. Then her vision blurred. No, it was the Serpent blurring, shifting and contracting, becoming a man again.
Nilos. He looked the same as she remembered. All lean strength and smooth coppery skin, hair trimmed to a faint shadow along his scalp. But his clothing had changed. Gone were the simple tunic, the worn leather sandals.
He wore a long robe of some shimmering dark cloth, caught at the waist by a silver belt. It left bare a long triangle of his chest.
Sephre stared. The Furies would definitely curse her for thinking impure thoughts about a god, and yet she could not bring herself to look anywhere else. Certainly not his face. She thought of the eyes of the Serpent, so vast and unknowable.
I will remember you,she thought, blinking as the world spun.
Hands gripped her, lifting her. She forced her eyes open again, expecting to see Timeus. But it wasn’t Timeus who held her.
“Nilos,” she said, forgetting that he was gone.
Something flickered across his face, too quick to catch.
The Serpent lifted her as if she were a feather, setting her on her feet. Turned her gently toward the far end of the bridge, where a bright flame burned within a bowl of stone. Sparks rose crimson and gold, from an unwavering heart of palest blue.
She found the last of her strength, enough to step free from his hands. To stand alone, at the edge of the stone bridge, with the waters of the Lyrikon spread on either side, and the flame blazing bright before her.
“Go to the flame, ashdancer,” said Nilos. She could call him that, in the privacy of her mind. She could believe that he was still there, some part of him. She had promised to remember. Just as she would remember Zander. And the woman with the baby. And the two men, who had died wrapped around each other, holding on.
She would never regret carrying the flame. Or her time at Stara Bron. The place—the people—would never leave her heart. But it was time to walk a new path.Assuming it doesn’t kill me.
She turned her back to the flame, shaky, but certain. “No,” she said. “Not this time.”
Then she let herself fall, backward, one step into empty air. A rush. A cry that was probably Timeus, because why would the Serpent cry out for her?
Then the waters of the Lyrikon caught her, and pulled her down.
• • •
Sephre had expected pain. Instead, she drifted, her limbs loose and soft and untethered. Even the ache in her knee was gone. She floated in a wavery, watery light. It reminded her of a day they had been patrolling along the eastern shoreline during the siege, and had found a tiny sandy cove tucked into the sharp crags, practically invisible from outside. It was hot as blazes and they’d been hiking since dawn. She’d planned to keep going for another hour, but Zander had been very convincing about the tactical necessity of a swimming break.The Bassarans might be using underwater tunnels, he’d said, already stripping off his tunic.We need to make a thorough search.Vyria had added,Just as well we take a dip. Some of us are starting to stink like the Beetle’s ass,which had led to a long debate about whether beetles had asses, which had only ended in a water fight.
The sea had been such a vivid blue-green that it was like floating in the heart of a jewel, the world a bright and glittering place that could do no harm to anyone. She had held that day like a treasure, locked away deep. This was the first time she’d thought of it since the end of the war.
The rippling light surrounded her, but it had no source. Her feet touched no sand, no stone. Then something shifted, the light thickening before her, taking form.
It was the woman again. Younger than Sephre, but no willowy girl either. Unremarkable, with curling dark hair that hung to her shoulders, held back by a twist of blue cloth. Freckled olive-toned skin, a hawkish nose that might have seemed too sharp on another face. Thick, dark brows and a pair of clear gray eyes that regarded Sephre steadily. Not beautiful, but compelling.
It wasn’t her own face, but it was close enough they might be mother and daughter. “Who are you?” she asked.
“An echo of a memory,” the woman said. “I have no name. I gave it up. Burned it to ash.”
