Page 28 of House of Dusk
“You saw her last night.” A slow step. Was the king pacing? “The toll it took on her. I...she is my daughter, Lacheron.”
Yeneris chewed down a surge of bitterness.I was someone’s daughter, too.
“Of course, sire. And I know it is the hardest thing in the world, to ask your child to risk herself like this. To watch her suffer, even knowing the cause is just, that it is all part of a greater purpose.”
Interesting. That actually sounded like true emotion, for once. Was he speaking from experience? Mikat’s people had found little information about the Heron’s past. No family. Barely any records at all, prior to his first appearance as Hierax’s advisor nearly two decades ago.
Whatever it was, he quenched it, continuing in his normal calm tone. “It would crush any man. But you arenota man. You are the Ember King reborn. The only one with the power and determination to destroy death itself.Thatis why the Fates granted their visions to your daughter. They know that you stand at the brink of a change that will reshape this world. To reject their gift would be...profane.”
A clever bit of manipulation. Mikat was right to have warned Yeneris about the Heron.
“A new world awaits you, my king. But such things do not come without a cost, and I am sorry that your daughter must pay it. Perhaps I can find some means to help her control her gifts, once I return. I fear that she remains too free with them.”
“Yes,” agreed the king. “She is too free with many things. Which is why I will not risk her beyond these walls. You will find some other way to convince Agia Halimede to grant her blessing, Lacheron. And soon. My queen has waited long enough for her restoration.”
Just try it.Yeneris trembled, tension and fury and cold fear mixing in her veins, as she listened to the two men’s footsteps fade.Just try it, and you’ll find out soon enough that youarejust a man. A man who can bleed and die like any other.
CHAPTER 9
SEPHRE
“Gran never really liked honey cakes, but the tomb keeper told us that honey was best because bees are messengers from the spirit world,” said Timeus, trotting up the trail with the boundless energy of a young goat.
Sephre squinted ahead, hoping to spot a twist of smoke. Something to indicate they were nearing the village. Her knees had begun to twinge unhappily with the seemingly endless ascent. If she hadn’t been such a prideful fool, she might’ve put the cookpot in Timeus’s pack.
She still didn’t understand Halimede’s decision to send the boy with her. Why not one of the initiates? Timeus had no flame. No way to guard himself, if another skotos came for her. It would be up to Sephre to keep him safe.
Maybe that was the point. Halimede wanted Sephre to know that she trusted her. That she was counting on her to bring the novice back to the temple unharmed.
“I must have mixed the batter wrong, though, because they just turned into sticky rocks,” Timeus prattled on with the earnest enthusiasm of someone utterly convinced that he was speaking to a rapt audience. “Then I tried to hide them in the trash heap, but ants found them and the whole back wall of our apartment was black with them.” He made a face.
So did Sephre, but that only seemed to encourage him to continue.
“Mother forbid me to make any more of the grave gifts, but she fell to ash the next day anyways. Mother said it was because Gran lived a virtuous life, but Rhea said it was because she didn’t want to face any more of my baking.” He gave a rueful laugh. “It’s funny how it can take years for some spirits to be reborn, and others take only days. Mother said it took Granddad a full year because he was so sour over his brother stealing his recipe for goldenrod dye, and he refused to move on until Uncle Dymos burned ten bundles of his finest yellow cloth as a grave offering.”
Sephre responded with a grunt, partly because she had no breath to spare, partly because she didn’t really want to think about it. How long she herself might wander those gloomy pathways.
“I guess holding a grudge isn’t that bad, though. I mean, compared to other things,” Timeus went on. “It must be even harder when you’ve done really bad things. Do you think it’s true? That—” He lowered his voice,”—that the skotoi can sense sinful spirits? That they hunt down all the murderers and traitors and...cowards?”
Sephre paused to catch her breath, and to fix the boy with a sharp look. The question had an edge of worry that was too personal. “We don’t know anything for certain.”
He continued to watch her hopefully. And she was his teacher, now, Fates help him. Fine. She remembered the lessons well enough. “The teachings say that you need to give up your burdens—your hates and regrets and fears—in order to find your way through and be reborn. But we can also set those burdens aside in this life.” She ought to be ashamed of herself, giving the boy advice she herself followed so poorly. “And we can help others. Our holy flame can cleanse the spirits of the dead. Protect them from the skotoi.”
Timeus bounded up a shelf of stone, then turned to offer Sephre his hand to tug her up. “Like that girl from Tylos?”
“What?” Sephre stumbled as she clambered up. “What about the girl from Tylos?”
Timeus flushed. “I know. I shouldn’t listen to gossip. But the other novices were talking about it. How Sister Beroe gave her the invocation of merciful flame, and then the crypt was empty this morning. Her spirit has already been reborn!”
Sephre grunted, clamping down on a wriggle of guilt in her belly. She had told Halimede the truth. If the agia chose to let the rest of the temple believe a more pleasant lie, who was she to argue? She certainly didn’t want to have to explain to the poor girl’s family that her corpse had actually been stolen by a demon from the netherworld, her spirit annihilated. Even Beroe’s invocation hadn’t been enough to guard her from that fate.
The thought was a lance in her chest. She hoped they would find answers in Potedia. Something—someone—behind all this. Maybe Halimede’s stranger withstrikinggreen eyes. She’d prefer an enemy she could fight straight on. There were too many secrets. Too much she didn’t know. What was it that Halimede had sworn to protect from the Ember King? And why?To prevent a second cataclysm.
One had been bad enough. It had happened three centuries ago, but the signs of the upheaval were everywhere. As a girl, Sephre had loved to explore the tumbled ruins not far from her village, finding treasures there: shards of broken pottery glazed in crimson and black, etched with fanciful creatures. Glass beads. An arrowhead shaped like a hawk. She’d kept searching, until the day she found something smooth and gray, half buried in the ashy soil. When she uncovered it fully, the eye sockets stared up at her accusingly, as if the skull were offended by her living touch. And perhaps it was. It should have fallen to ash long ago. Unless the spirit bound to it was still within the labyrinth. Still wandering, unable to escape to be reborn. She’d shoved dirt back over the thing, and left it, and had nightmares for a month.
Sephre hastened after Timeus, whose long legs ate up the trail, making her feel like a beetle trundling after a grasshopper. At least he didn’t seem to notice her silence, too busy spilling out his own thoughts.
“My mother says Helissoni spirits are always reborn in Helisson, but I don’t know if that really makes sense. How would a spirit know? Especially if they forget everything from their previous life? And besides, it’s the Fates who decide where to send them.”
