Page 217 of Eldritch
“Fire. Black fire.”
A look of terror bloomed in her eyes. “Sablefyre?”
“Yes.”
“Deimos.” She sat back in her chair, and smoke seeped between her lips and her pipe as she fervently smoked it. “She has saved you for Deimos. A sacrifice, I would venture to say. Oh, goddess, what if she longs to restore the vein? To punish us?”
“How would restoring the vein punish you?”
She flipped through more pages of the book and landed on an image that yanked the breath from my lungs. A creature with antlers and bark-like skin. The same one I’d seen peel away Uncle Riftyn’s flesh back in The Eating Woods. Waving her hand over the image brought it to life, and the creature raised his bony hand, where a complicated image burned across his palm. He shot it toward a chasm in the mountains, and a violet glow flared to life on the page.
The priestess flipped to the next page and livened the image of the creature throwing flames at a shimmering wall, surrounded by trees. The Umbravale, no doubt. Another flip of the page showed a massive, rotted tree in the forest, from whichhundreds of spiders crawled. The tree split to make way for a horrifying monster—a humanoid spider, but nothing like the Primsleys or Uncle Felix. No, this one carried a dark and ancient aura. Something powerful and otherworldly that sent a shiver coiling around my spine.
I swallowed back the tremble in my throat. “I’ve seen them. These human spiders.”
“No, my sweet child. What you’ve seen is nothing more than a few harmless monsters that possess no power. This is Pestilios. A god. I was certain Morsana would protect us from him. But your vision tells me otherwise. And I will not question the will of the goddess.”
A scowl tugged at my face, and I whipped my gaze to hers. “Why? You would face destruction simply because she wills it?”
“Yes. She is the goddess. All powerful. She sees death. She writes our fate.”
“Do you truly believe she willed my sister back to life?”
“Of course. There is no other way for a mortal to return from death.”
Lips pressed together, I nodded. “Days ago, Morsana urged me to kill her. I refused.”
A look of skepticism crossed her face. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying perhaps the fate written by a goddess can be changed, as well. Maybe none of this is etched in stone. You say I am the vessel of a goddess. Then, trust my words.”
“You bear the mark. And the silver eyes. But your words prove nothing. I’m not inclined to deny the visions of a respected priestess for the empty claims of a young girl.”
Teeth grinding, I stared her in the eyes. “And I will not be used as a baby vessel based on the paintings of a woman I’ve never met.”
Her eye twitched, clearly insulted. “Then, there is only one solution. You must prove your words true.” She drew the pipeto her mouth for another puff and blew the smoke between us. “Tonight, you will show us that you can defy the will of the goddess.”
“How?”
“You will be cast into the vein. Should you walk away unscathed, then I will take your words as truth.”
“Cast into the vein? Is it not dead?”
“It is,” she said and raised a brow. “But like our people, it, too, was fated to rise from death.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
ZEVANDER
Past …
Arms and wrists bound in manacles, Zevander lay across the stone bed, his body bruised from the beating he’d endured earlier.
“That you would betray me. My loyalty!” General Loyce paced beside him, but he didn’t bother to look at her.
He no longer cared what punishment she doled out. What pain she inflicted. Whatever sliver of hope he may have harbored, imagining that King Sagaerin had come to take him away from this miserable existence, had since dissolved into a murky sludge of resentment.
Theron stood off somewhere in the room behind where Zevander lay.
