Page 148 of Witchlight
In Cartorra, Eron fon Hasstrel maintains the helm with the assistance of his longtime advisors: a Dalmotti Glamourwitch, a Cartorran Wordwitch, and a Marstoki Firewitch general. Since the Hell-Bards are now fully disbanded, this is the empire that looks the least steady to me—and my cards confirm this. They are a muddle of different options that might steer true or might steer into chaos.
Nubrevna and Marstok are also filled with chaos, but Stix andKahina believe in their rulers—as much as you believed in Merik—and so I must believe in them too.
As for the Cahr Awen…
Well, Safiya fon Hasstrel and Iseult det Midenzi could be anywhere in the Witchlands right now. Truly. The girls and their Bloodwitch protector vanished shortly after the Great Collapse (that’s what they’re calling the day the Wells woke up), and the cards tell me nothing except that they’re still together: the Sun, the Moon, the Knife.
The Rook and the weasel bring me interesting animal whispers, though. A tale of the trio being spotted near the Sleeping Lands; another of them in the Contested Lands; and even a murmuring that put them near the Sand Sea.
No matter where they really are, it makes me happy to know that they andonlythey control their hearts, their minds, their bodies, and their destinies.For only in death could they understand life. And only in life, will they change the world.
So many things that one vision from Lisbet could mean…
I will keep writing to you, my Captain, my Heart-Thread, my Kullen. As I descend ever deeper into the Crypts. As I go where the Goddess and my own heart lead. I am no longer the last Sightwitch Sister, but I still have plenty of work to do. Plenty of new paths to find as I seek out my own future in the Witchlands.
Magic is changed. What stars will we need to think beyond now?
All the love from your maiden north of Lovats,
—Ryber
SEVENTY-THREE
It had been years since the Bloodwitch Aeduan had come here, to the Shrine of the Fallen at the Carawen Monastery. Roughly hewn in an underground cavern, its vaulted ceilings were lit by Firewitched sconces, while thousands upon thousands of opals glittered atop a hexagon of black marble.
Monks bent or knelt throughout these catacombs, some murmuring prayers, most simply silent and remembering. So many of their ranks had been lost in Poznin.The Battle for the Cahr Awen,they were calling it, and Aeduan wished that such a title—accurate as it might have been—offered some relief.
But in the end, death was death. Loss was loss. Monk Evrane Nihar had been one more soul of many who’d died in battle, and in the end, Aeduan had never gotten to say good-bye.
He’d never even seen her body.
Now here he stood, in this place that had once been the Rook King’s fortress, with an opal in his hand that had once been the Rook King’s creation.
At Aeduan’s side was Lizl, as broad-chested and high-chinned as she ever was. She’d saved Evrane’s opal for Aeduan, and it was a strange debt he didn’t know how to repay. Life-debts, he’d always understood. But kindness? Gifts simply because?
He was still sorting those out.
Along with everything else, it would seem. He still didn’t fully understand what had happened since he’d toppled his nightmares and awoken to a new incarnation of the blade and glass in his possession.
For that matter, he still didn’t fully understand how magic had stabilized. Five Paladins had died; their magic had returned to the goddess and Her Witchlands; now all of the wounds on Aeduan’s abdomen—save for one—were gone. No scars left behind. Nothing to ever show where his mother had died protecting him.
Strange, how he missed the scars. Not the pain, not the blood… but the memories. And yes, even the nightmares. For without them, what did he have left of his family? No mother, no father, and now, no Monk Evrane.
He supposed it was a small price to pay if it meant Sirmaya was no longer dying.
Aeduan set Evrane’s opal on the marble slab. It made a soft clink—one more earring, nearly identical to every other within sight. Every Carawen monk who’d ever died. Every soul ever lost in the service of a lie.
Aeduan knelt before the marble. In a rustle of fabric, Lizl joined him. Together, they bowed their heads.
“We did as you taught us, Monk Evrane.” Lizl’s voice was so low only Aeduan—and perhaps any ghost left from Evrane—could hear her. “We guarded the light-bringer and the dark-giver, exactly as you wanted. You were a hard teacher, but you were the best this Monastery ever had. The best… I ever had.”
Aeduan frowned. His fingers itched to tap at his thigh. To check that each of his blades was in place across his chest.
“Nothing to add, Monk Aeduan?” Lizl glanced sideways.
But Aeduan ignored her. His witchery was reaching outward, groping like a man suddenly dropped into darkness. Evrane had always been here. The crisp spring water from her many years near the Aether Well. The salt-lined cliffs from her childhood in Nihar. They were as familiar to Aeduan as the rocks of this monastery and the sting of Sirmayan blizzards outside. How could he be within these walls and not smell her?
Yet there was nothing for his magic to find, so he grappled clumsily at empty air.
