Theros

by Jenna Helland

  “But the voids grow worse. The causeways are severed, some shattered, some simply don’t exist at all. I believe this travesty started with Purphoros’s attempt to destroy my realm. The stranger and the sword return to me. Now, the void grows.”

  “You believe it’s all connected?” Daxos asked.

  “It must be, but my domain is narrowing,” Heliod said. “Some force is trying to render me blind. I need you to make sense of the mortal realm, now more than ever. I believe that Purphoros has devised a new way to destroy me. And Thassa dances with him even now.”

  “Can the stranger help you?”

  “That is her destiny,” Heliod said. “I could ask her to slay every oracle in the land, except my own. And she would be powerful enough to do it.”

  “You would blind the other gods?” Daxos asked. “You would test Kruphix’s warning?”

  “Only if Purphoros forces me to,” Heliod said. “I don’t fear Kruphix.”

  “What do you need me to do?” Daxos asked.

  “Ride out and meet my champion,” Heliod asked. “But before you go, see if my brothers and sisters are aware of her and the blade she carries.”

  Daxos crawled himself up to his hands and knees. Sand covered his chest, and his legs burned from the night’s work. He emptied the space around his heart and let Heliod place the cosmos around it. Using his god-sight, Daxos tripped along Heliod’s invisible causeways of light, searching for the stranger that carried Heliod’s blade. The broken girl who stole the sword of a god. He saw her reel back off the edge of a wooden platform. The spear-blade flew from her hand. A harpy bore down on her, eager to pluck her eyes from her face.

  Daxos stumbled back into his body, his eyes watering, his bones wracked with pain. “Divine One, she is in the wilderness. And Erebos watches her.”

  “Go now,” Heliod said. “Take a contingent, and defeat any obstacle they present to her. Make her path clear to me. The pantheon won’t want me to have such a champion.”

  “What about Erebos?”

  “I will handle my mewling brother,” Heliod said. “The pathetic lord of self-pity. I promise you, Daxos. Someday I will let you avenge what he did to you.”

  Heliod had said those words before, and he’d say them again, and yet Daxos knew that nothing would come of it.

  “If she is not worthy or if she tries to flee with the weapon, you know what you have to do,” Heliod asked.

  “Kill her, take the blade, and bring it to Meletis myself,” Daxos said, but not with a will of his own. He was repeating the orders that Heliod placed in him. Daxos fought against the words, and still they tumbled from his mouth. And when he was done speaking, Heliod was gone.

  Daxos picked himself off the ground and went to meet the woman he prayed would take his place.

  When Elspeth reached the city walls of Akros after her encounter with Heliod, she found a city on the edge of war. King’s Gate, the main gate of Akros, was shut and barred, and archers on the wall aimed their bows at her as she approached. They allowed her to enter through the side entrance called Lateman’s Gate, a reinforced corridor that led through the thick wall and was fitted with sturdy iron doors on either end. Once inside the city, Elspeth had to dodge formations of soldiers drilling in the entrance square. She spotted a young woman in the shadow of the wall watching the men in their crested helms and bronze chest plates practice the motions of warfare.

  “What’s going on?” Elspeth asked the young woman, whose hair was fashioned into ramlike horns on the sides of her head.

  “Didn’t you see the fire in the sky?” the woman asked. “It was an omen. King Anax is sealing all the gates. We’re under attack.”

  “From what?” Elspeth asked.

  “Minotaurs,” the woman said. She looked incredulous that Elspeth would even ask the question. “They’re amassing against us. They mean to slaughter us all.”

  “I was just in the mountains,” Elspeth said. “I didn’t see minotaur hordes.”

  “That’s not surprising,” the woman said. She looked at Elspeth as though she was the stupidest person alive. “They live in caves.”

  The woman moved on, and Elspeth turned down an alleyway to avoid the crowded square. She didn’t want to spend another night inside a city that was about to go to war. Nor was she ready to leave Theros. But she wasn’t sure how to get to Meletis or what to think about the god who had tried to kill her—even if he did think she was a thief. She didn’t have anything she cared about back in her room in the Foreigners’ Quarter, but she headed there to retrieve her pack while trying to decide what to do.

  If you’re so powerful, Heliod, show me the way to Meletis. The words formed in her mind almost despite herself, and she looked around guiltily, as if someone might have heard her thoughts. But everyone was hustling past her as if they had somewhere important to be. The roads were clogged with soldiers marching up the hill to the Kolophon, the monolithic fortress of King Anax and Queen Cymede.

  Elspeth stayed to the minor streets, but there was no way to enter the Foreigners’ Quarter without passing the Twins. There were many shrines to Iroas, God of Victory. But the Twins was one of the few shrines that honored both Iroas and Mogis. The two gods were opposite in appearance: Iroas had the head and chest of a man and body of a bull. Mogis was depicted as a brutish minotaur.

  Akroan soldiers kept watch on the site around the clock. So many fights had broken out in the shadow of Mogis that people believed the site was cursed. Still, worshipers came, but they stayed on the cobblestones at the feet of Iroas. The God of Victory stood proudly, nearly twenty-five feet high, with a shining bronze sarissa raised in triumph. The marble statue of Mogis skulked behind him. No matter where the sun cast its rays, Mogis was always seething in the background. Yet people still prayed to Mogis. He received the most attention after a savage battle when many Akroans died. The relatives of those killed would come to this shrine and silently pray because Mogis was also the god of revenge.

  Elspeth was just a block away from her room when she thought she heard someone calling her name. Given how few people she knew in Akros, she thought she might have imagined it. But she scanned the faces on the packed street and saw Xiro waving frantically at her. When he finally traversed the crowds, she saw that he was dressed as an Akroan soldier.

  “Why are you in uniform?” Elspeth asked

  “Iroas has forgiven me. I’ve been reinstated as a soldier. There’s a war coming.”

  “How do you know?” Elspeth asked.

  “Didn’t you see the sign of fire in the sky?” he asked.

  “It was a sign that you’d been forgiven?” she asked, wondering how anyone could be sure they were reading the signs correctly.

  “No, it was a sign of war,” he said. “I went to the temple, and the priest told me I was forgiven. I’m reporting for duty at the Kolophon now.”

  “Oh,” Elspeth said. “Well, I’m happy for you.”

  “They’re going to empty the Foreigners’ Quarter,” he said. “I was afraid you’d be cast out of the city. But I found something for you. Arvid Takis owns the estate that was attacked by satyrs. He’s sending his daughter to study at the academy in Meletis. She’s traveling with the last caravan out of Akros—it’s leaving in less than an hour from War Gate. They want a female escort, and I signed you up.”

  He handed her a piece of parchment with an official seal. “This will get you in the gates of Meletis. Once you deliver the girl to the academy, you can do whatever you like. The city is yours for the taking.”

  If you’re so powerful, show me the way to Meletis. Elspeth’s head reeled. She felt as though she might start laughing, but she didn’t want to offend Xiro, who was trying so hard to help her.

  “The girl’s name is Nikka Takis. She’s sixteen, and a bit of a handful, or so her father says,” Xiro continued. “You’ll have to watch her like a hawk. They’ll pay you on safe delivery at the academy.”

  “Thank you,” Elspeth said. She took the letter and
tried to find the right words to thank the grizzled soldier.

  “Are you all right?” Xiro asked. “I thought this would be right for you. You can continue your search of the temples, though I hope your path leads you back to Iroas.”

  “Yes, I am,” Elspeth said. “I’m truly grateful.”

  They embraced briefly, and Xiro looked embarrassed. He smiled down at her. “When I think of you, I’ll imagine you walking the streets of that great city searching for the heartbeat of the gods.”

  “Maybe we’ll see each other again sometime,” Elspeth said. He winked at her as if he didn’t believe it and turned to leave. At the last minute, he turned and pointed to the east.

  “War Gate is that way,” he called. And then he disappeared into a throng of passing soldiers. A street crier rang his bell and warned all outsiders to leave the city. Elspeth was happy to oblige.

  Elspeth left Akros with the last caravan out of War Gate. Behind her, the city disgorged the rest of its unwanted onto the rocky plateau. The stragglers unattached to the caravan seemed to hesitate, confused at the situation they found themselves in, and then scattered with the wind. Unlike the lost souls who had been cast out of the Foreigners’ Quarter with nothing, Elspeth had an anchor—she must deliver Nikka Takis safely to the city of philosophers. Unfortunately, the sixteen-year-old girl made it clear that she wasn’t interested in having Elspeth as her watcher.

  The caravan wagon that Master Takis had hired for his daughter was by far the most affluent in the line. Most were just wooden boxes on wheels pulled by a lone horse. Nikka’s caravan was painted crimson with gold trim and had velvet curtains covering the windows. It was pulled by two horses, and Elspeth was glad that her only responsibility was caring for Nikka and not tending to the animals. The caravan master employed drivers and stable boys who would see to the rest.

  The caravan would follow the Great River Road out of the flatland and along the Deyda River to the sea, where ships would be waiting to sail them to Meletis. Elspeth had wondered why they didn’t take a boat down the Deyda—until she caught sight of the river at the edge of Akros Flats. She looked down into the gorge where the mighty flow of water rushed in white-water rapids hundreds of feet below. Despite the distance, the echoing roar of the water drowned out the squeak of the wagon wheels.

  Nikka leaned out the window to look down at the river and caught Elspeth’s eye. She jerked the curtains closed as if Elspeth had been spying on her. When Elspeth was sixteen, she trained day and night to become recognized as a Knight of Bant. She never would have treated an elder so rudely. She never would have disregarded someone who had been sworn to protect her. She tried to imagine what the most difficult thing in Nikka Takis’s life had been so far. And then she realized it was probably this journey—being sent away from her parents. Today may well be the toughest day she’d ever experienced.

  It had been a mad rush in the last moments before the caravan departed. Nikka refused to say goodbye to her father, and she climbed into the wagon and slammed the door.

  “She feels like we’re punishing her,” Master Takis told Elspeth. “But this is for her own good. After what happened at the estate … well, you saw it yourself. The oracles say that evil is stirring in Akros, and I want my daughter well away from it. You will take care of her, yes?”

  “Yes, sir,” Elspeth said.

  “Don’t let her out of your sight unless she is inside the caravan and you are guarding it,” he said. “Don’t let her fraternize with men. She can be willful. And I should warn you, she’s very clever.”

  Elspeth frowned. “Clever, how?”

  But the horn blasted from the wall and the wooden doors of War Gate swung wide, and so Master Takis didn’t have a chance to tell her. As the caravan rolled out, Master Takis ran up to the gate. The soldiers held him back, but he shouted, “Don’t let her kneel at shrines! Don’t let her talk to people who say they are priests!”

  Soon the line of wagons began the descent off the Akros Flats and into the rugged mountains. The caravan master rode the line checking on the wagons. He was an ebony-skinned man with a clean-shaven head and enviable muscles. He only came up to Elspeth’s shoulder, but he was twice her width, and there was not an ounce of excess flesh on him. She could imagine him easily hoisting up the back of one of the wagons to swap out a wheel, if necessary. When he reached the end of the line, he dismounted and walked beside her.

  “My name is Ginus,” he said. “I’ve run this route for fifteen years, and know all the trouble spots. Master Takis explained your task. Come to me if you have any problems.”

  Elspeth assured him that she would.

  “The next few hours are the trickiest to navigate,” Ginus told her. “It’s ambush territory in those narrow canyons and passes. And you might want to walk on the right side of the caravan. Stay on the left, and you might get knocked off the edge and into the Deyda.”

  Ginus mounted his horse and rode back up the line. Elspeth wondered if Nikka had heard his warning. But the velvet curtains were decidedly closed, and Elspeth made no attempt to speak to her charge.

  The iron wheels rattled slowly down the steep grade for an hour as the sun crested in the sky. Dark shapes circled high above them, but Elspeth had dismissed them as large birds. She forgot them entirely when she saw the next obstacle—the road seemed to narrow dramatically to just a few inches to spare on either side of the caravan. With no room to walk on either side, Elspeth was forced to move to the very end behind the caravan where she didn’t feel as if she was going to fall off into the river gorge or be crushed against the mountainside.

  The drivers shouted down the line, “Halt!” And the caravan stopped abruptly. The road was too narrow for Elspeth to see what was happening. As shouts of alarm rang from wagon to wagon, she realized they were under attack. With nowhere else to go, she climbed on top of the wooden roof of the caravan and saw that many of the stable boys had done the same. They were armed with bladed poles—apparently the defense of choice against the raiders from the skies. The dark shapes bore down on them. When the creatures flew closer, Elspeth saw that they had ugly humanoid faces and talons on their black-feathered wings. One swooped down near Elspeth, and it circled away. Part avian and part human, the foul creatures had emaciated torsos and yellow, splintered teeth.

  Ginus bounded between the gaps between the wagons as he sprinted down the roofs toward her. Her driver was with the horse, trying to keep it calm. If it spooked, their wagon would topple off the side and fall into the raging river.

  “Harpies!” Ginus yelled. She realized that he was coming to help her, the only wagon with a single defender.

  The harpies hit the front of the line first, and they flapped away with chests, amphorae, or other supplies hooked in their talons. They seemed to be more interested in stealing the supplies inside the merchants’ vans than killing. Elspeth readied her spear-blade as Ginus skidded to a halt beside her.

  “Are they scavengers?” she asked.

  “Yes, but this is strange,” he said. “They usually avoid caravans with this many defenders.”

  Two harpies swooped at them at a high rate of speed. There was coordination to their attack, Elspeth realized, as she crouched low and braced herself for impact. She could hear the horse nicker in fear, and the van lurched forward under their feet.

  “Steady!” Ginus shouted.

  After Heliod transformed her sword into the longer blade, Elspeth was afraid she wouldn’t be able to wield it with the same competence. But with her first strike against the diving harpy, she knew her skills weren’t impaired. The elongated blade was no heavier than her original sword, but it seemed to strike even harder than before. Between the speed of its ascent and the swing of her weapon, she cleaved the creature nearly in two. It thudded onto the top of the wagon with a wet smack. Below her, inside the caravan, Nikka shrieked at the sound.

  “Stay inside,” Elspeth commanded her ward through the roof. She shoved the carcass off with her foot and it wen
t spiraling off the side of the cliff and down to the river.

  Ginus grinned at her with approval. “You could reach all the way to Nyx with that blade!” he shouted as two more harpies wheeled toward them.

  One of the harpies circled above her, staying just out of reach. Then it made a strange, jerky grab for Elspeth’s blade with the razor-sharp talons on its feet. The motion was so unexpected that Elspeth lost her balance and fell backward off the back edge of the wooden roof and onto the road. She managed to land on her feet, but she dropped the weapon. With terrifying speed, the harpy shot directly at her. Elspeth lunged for the blade, but the harpy was faster. No longer reaching for her blade, it aimed its talons at her eyes. Behind the harpy, Nikka threw open the door of the caravan and hurled a ceramic jug at the creature. The ceramic cracked against the harpy’s skull and lamp oil drenched its wings.

  The harpy thudded to the ground, whirled around, and screamed at Nikka. The screams sounded like some guttural language, but not quite like any words that Elspeth had ever heard. The harpy lunged toward the wagon, but Nikka grabbed another jar and threw it at the harpy’s face. It hit its mark directly, and this time the harpy had enough. It went careening into the air, dripping oil and screaming its ugly words. As it flapped jerkily into the air and out of sight over the ridge, the rest of the harpies followed.

  “Good aim,” Elspeth said, grabbing her blade. She scanned the sky for more airborne marauders. “Was it saying something? Can those things speak?”

  “Oh, it’s going to tattle to Erebos,” Nikka said. “It also said unkind things about my face and your blade.”

  Elspeth gave Nikka a funny look, not sure if the girl was joking or not.

  Ginus appeared above them on the top of the van. “All accounted for?” he asked. “We better get moving, if we’re going to make the campsite before nightfall.”

  “If you see Beta, tell him I’m all right!” Nikka called after the caravan master, but she received no answer.

  “Whose Beta?” Elspeth asked.