Past the filled graves, a giant, shallow gash lay open to the sun. Beside it, men toiled with leather gloves and thick smocks, slinging the dead into the last stretch of the mass grave. The bodies were impossibly fat, the skin greasy, black and green. Flies whirled in greedy torrents. The smell was monstrous. Evil. The workmen wore bandanas over their mouths and damp clothes stuffed with crushed mint. Dante swallowed down bile and lowered himself over the edge of the grave.
Moist soil spilled over his ankles. Bodies lay on top of bodies, limbs akimbo, skin sloughing. Yellowish fluid seeped into the dirt and muddied the bottom of the pit. A brown cloth lay under a man whose face was so swollen his skin had split around his eyes. Dante touched the rag with the lightest tickle of nether. He felt no sting. No pressure, either. He took a long, high step over the bloated man. His foot squished down into something that gave beneath him. He toppled, thudding down onto the swollen body. His splayed hand plunged straight through the man's stomach into hot, wet goo. Tears flowed down Dante's face.
"Good gods!" Nak called from the lip of the grave. "Are you all right?"
Dante nodded numbly at the field of bodies. It was hopeless. Blays was gone.
* * *
He asked every soldier, cook, porter, priest, and maid at the Citadel, but none had seen Blays leave. Blays' room had been emptied, swept, and scrubbed. Not by the servants. By Blays. To ensure he'd left nothing behind for Dante to follow.
Dante sat in his room amidst the heat. His thoughts were as useless as the dogs lying in the shade beneath the trees in the city below. When the world was so large, how could you find someone who meant to get lost?
Whenever he closed his eyes, he saw Lira's smile as she fell into the void. He thought he'd have trouble sleeping, but instead that's how he spent most of his time, napping fitfully throughout the summer heat, waking to half-remembered dreams of guts hanging from bellies and arms that ended at red elbows. Everything took on a bitter taste. From the balcony, he thought he could smell the stink of fish dying on the beach. The days were so hot they left him gasping. His stomach churned at all times; he was hungry but had no appetite, and when he forced himself to eat more than a few bites of fresh bread, he felt as swollen as the men in the graves. He read, but couldn't remember the pages he'd just turned.
In the evenings, parties flowed into the streets. Bonfires roared in the squares. Their laughter was the cackling of demons. Their fires were the mouths of damnation. Dante drank himself to sleep.
Olivander summoned him three days after he'd woken up for good. The man's quarters were trim and quaint. The corners of his bed were tucked. Wooden carvings of stags and bears battled on the mantel.
"Glad to see you up and running." Olivander smiled, well-rested, no longer battle-gaunt. "We could use your help. Again."
"We?" Dante said. "Where's Kav?"
Olivander shook his head. "I'm what passes for leadership for the moment."
"Oh dear," Dante said, finding a brief spark of energy. "Sounds like I ought to defect."
The man chuckled before turning sober. "That's the thing. The threat isn't over. The king has more men yet. What if they arrive while we have no front gate?"
"I suppose we'll be killed."
"And we can't build a new gate so long as that bottomless crevasse is in the way."
"So you want me to reverse it."
"Can you?"
"Not as quickly," Dante said. "But I'll see what I can do."
The project did not enthuse him. Stand under the sun and will a hole to become a not-hole. He went to the courtyard and knelt beside the rift. A cool breeze wafted from its depths, stirring the stench of decay. At least it wasn't bottomless, then. He hadn't touched the nether in days, and he reached for it with the hesitancy of a man testing his leg after it's been freed from a splint. The shadows came readily, winging up from the mass of bodies lying at the bottom of the hole. Dante let the darkness soak into the walls of rock and dirt. Starting at the narrow crack where the touch of his finger had opened the world, he began to bring it back together.
Two hundred feet below him, rock flowed like mud, oozing into a seamless whole. Some parts responded to his every touch, as if waiting to be reunited; other sections were bullish, stubborn, forcing him to coax them from their slumber with deft jabs and caresses of nether. He soon forgot about Lira, about Blays, about the dying faces he saw in his sleep. The work absorbed him. Focused on his breathing, the sweat trickling down his hair, and the intricacies of creation, he forgot, for a while, to hurt.
Too soon, he lost his grip on the shadows. They wavered, refusing to weave through the cool stone. A warning tingle spread through his limbs. He sat back, waiting for it to fade, then returned to his room and went to bed.
At dawn, he stepped outside and found the air was nearly chilly. He thought about going back for a coat, but knelt beside the hole, letting his mind get lost in the labyrinth of nether. He buried the dead beneath a flood of limestone. After half an hour with the earth, his power was spent. He went to the monastery's archives and requested the most frivolous novels the monks could find, picaroon epics of pirates and bandits and rebels. He found himself chuckling over their dashing gambits and ludicrous escapes. He often woke with his face pressed against the pages, a dot of drool between the elegant penmanship of long-dead scribes.
On his third day with the rift, a wind sucked in a fog from the sea. Streamers of mist furled around the spire of the Cathedral of Ivars. The air cooled. When Dante was done for the day, he took a blanket to the balcony and read beneath the overcast skies.
On the sixth day, the day he was certain he would fill the last of the shallowing hole, he crouched in the space between the wall and the rift, lifting stone up from the depths. Hooves clattered across the square. As they neared, he glanced up. A rider galloped straight for him. The man's face was smudged with sweat and dirt. His horse was lathered and gasping. He gave no sign of slowing down. Dante leapt to his feet and ran from the narrow passage into the courtyard.
"Hey, you idiot!" he cursed as the man thundered past close enough to stir the air. His horse smelled of fresh, meaty sweat. "What's your problem?"
The man didn't glance back. Dante swore some, anger blossoming from the field of his sorrow. He had barely brought himself to return to the crack when he heard the rider's news.
The lakelands of Gallador had rebelled. King Moddegan had sent Narashtovik a treaty. He offered the end of the war—and the end of norren slavery across Gask. As a gleeful servant summoned him to chambers for an impromptu meeting, Dante fumed.
Olivander's grin was as broad as the bay. It threatened to fill the depopulated council chambers—without Cally, Kav, Varla, and Wint, the room felt cavernous and empty.
"It's finished," Olivander said. He slapped parchment onto the table. Its capital letters were as finely illuminated as the monastery's gilded copy of The Cycle of Arawn. "As you sign this treaty, feel free to sigh in relief."
"Fuck that," Dante said.
Olivander stiffened. "What?"
"Moddegan's making us grants. Concessions. You only make concessions from a position of power—something he no longer has." Dante's hands shook. His anger surged up his throat and over his head, as searing and potent as if he were sinking into a cauldron of boiling oil. "I want independence. For us and for the norren. That's what we've died for. Cally. Lira. All the rest. If Moddegan wants these lands to remain a part of Gask, he can try and fucking take them."
"Would you really risk another battle?"
"In a beat of my heart."
Olivander rubbed his goatee. His gaze traveled between the rest of the Council. "Does this sound like suicide to anyone else?"
Tarkon shrugged his bony shoulders. "To hell with the king. If we want to govern ourselves, we'll never own a better chance."
"Gallador won't be simple to reensnare," Somburr said, speaking around his thumbnail as he chewed it. "I'm hearing they intend to fight. There are only a handful of passes throu
gh the mountains. Fall's coming soon. Will Moddegan want to fight through the winter?"
Hart combed his thick norren fingers through his white beard. "I've got two minds on this one. Emancipation's more than I dreamed. If we snub that, we could lose everything. But we could also gain the world."
"If we demand independence, our work's far from done," Olivander said. "We'll have to maintain our army. Replenish our arms and food. Train monks to become priests and young talents to become monks."
"I'll go to the clans," Dante said. "Let them know that, if and when the time comes, Narashtovik will stand with them again."
"Is this our will?" As the Council nodded, Olivander smiled in disbelief. "Very well. Let the madness live on."
He sent the king a message of their own. It required no response. Declarations need no signatures from the kings they leave behind.
Dante returned to the crack in the courtyard. The bottom was just twenty feet deep now, sandy white limestone peppered with brown and black and green. His anger remained, but it had diminished to a safe simmer. He used it as fuel. The ground rumbled, shimmering like a wind-tousled lake. Limestone lifted like a long, deep breath. When it rose to a few feet below the surrounding surface, Dante filled it in with a wave of dirt, tamping it down with a flourish of dust.
Cheers rang throughout the misty courtyard. He turned. All the Citadel had turned out to watch him right what he had broken. He smiled.
* * *
The feeling didn't last. Without work to steal his focus, Lira's face crept back into his waking dreams. Blays', too. The anguish that had shattered his face as he stood over a paralyzed Dante and first understood she was forever gone.
To fill the void, he found Cally's notes and set to work constructing new loons. If they were to coordinate with the clans against whatever else rose against them, they'd need a way to speak to each other again. He finished his first pair by the end of the night. He built them to be pendants, setting a hooked fang of the badger-like kapper into a piece of unshaped black iron. When the first pair was done, he rose with a grin, but it was after midnight, and he had no one to test them with.
He went to a tavern instead. The first drink tasted like relief. The third, numbness. The eighth, peace. He was sicker than ever when he woke. On the verge of vomiting. His skin as hot as sun-baked cobbles. As he worked on another pair of loons, he drank a beer to soothe his nerves. He caught Somburr in the hallway and got him to help try out the first set. They worked like a dream.
He stopped work around six o'clock. The sun was still many degrees from the horizon, but it was late enough to return to the public houses. He went in plain clothes. If anyone recognized him, they said nothing.
That became his routine. While laborers dug the foundations for a new set of gates, Dante sat in the windows of pubs, watching the streets. He never saw Blays. Once, he got in a fight; the other man started it, something about the looks Dante was giving his woman. Dante knocked him to the ground with a blunt wallop of nether, locked the man in place with shadowy chains, and laughed as he poured his beer over the man's paralyzed head.
A servant found him in the pub the next day. Olivander wished to see him at once.
Dante didn't stand. "What for?"
"He didn't say, my lord."
"I'm not going to apologize. When I'm here, I don't represent the Council. Anyway, he started it."
"All he told me is he wants to see you."
"I don't know. It's pretty comfy here."
The man clasped his hands together. "My lord, if I go back without you..."
Dante rolled his eyes. "Fine. Once I'm done with my drink, we'll go see what Captain Noble wants from me now."
He took his time. The messenger sat awkwardly, watching the other patrons. After the last sip of spiced rum, Dante slammed down his mug, stood, and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
"Well?"
The man nodded and opened the door for him. Sunset dwindled behind the blankets of fog. The air was a neutral non-temperature. Breathing felt good. Dante strolled along behind the messenger, letting his anger ferment to match the contents of his stomach. What did Olivander care if he'd knocked around some fool? Who gave a shit? Weeks ago, Dante had killed five thousand men in a single stroke. Nobody had complained about that. They'd thrown a feast in his honor while he slept, and a second when he woke. The messenger glanced over his shoulder as Dante laughed.
The first layer of stone had been set into the foundation of the gates. Twenty soldiers stood to block the open space. They let Dante through without a word. In the Council's chambers, Olivander was surprised to see not just Olivander, but the other six surviving priests as well: sprightly old Tarkon, stolid Hart, silent Joseff, foul-tongued Merria, bitter Ulev, owlish Somburr. Dante nodded their way and took his seat.
"For the last few weeks, I've acted as steward to the city," Olivander said in his baritone. "But I wasn't appointed. I accepted the mantle through default. But now it's time to do things right."
"Well, why not you?" Dante said. "You've been on the Council for years. You know how to order an army around. Sounds good to me."
"Because we've already made our decision."
Dante pushed his knees against the table, rocking his chair back. "Glad to hear it. Congratulations."
Olivander chuckled richly. "You're congratulating yourself."
Dante's knee slipped. He nearly fell from his chair. "What?"
"Will you accept the position of high priest of this council?"
"Are you all insane? I'm only 22! Do you know how drunk I am right now?"
"Sounds to me like you were just celebrating early," Tarkon said.
"Why not you?" Dante said to him. "You've been here for an eternity."
"That's exactly why it shouldn't be me," Tarkon cackled. "Put me in charge, and I might wander into the cathedral after forgetting to put on pants. How about you, Joseff? Can you even chew your own food?"
Joseff laughed hoarsely. "No. That's why I eat with a fork and a hammer."
Dante shook his head. "You'd be perfect for this, Olivander. You're so...reasonable."
"That's why I make a very fine advisor," Olivander said. "And I advise you to take the position."
"No. I can't. I don't know anything about running this city. This order."
Olivander snorted. "Like this isn't what you've dreamed of since the moment you first set foot in this room. Your ambition is hardly a secret, Dante. You wear it like some men wear a new cape."
"Maybe that's exactly why this is a bad idea."
"Then I have a compromise for you. If there are no objections, I'll continue as steward." Olivander raised his eyebrows at the other councilmen and was met with nods and shrugs. "In the meantime, you're my shadow. My sponge. Absorbing everything that goes into the administration of Narashtovik and the Citadel. When you're ready, the mantle will pass on to you."
Dante held up his palms. "Why?"
"You have ideas no one else does. You dream big, and just when it looks like that dream is about to crash, you do something else no one else can do—and save it. Callimandicus chose well when he took you under his wing. You are his heir."
Dante blinked at sudden tears. "I'm nothing next to Cally."
"Yeah, well, you should have seen that fool at your age," Tarkon said. "Take the position. There's more than one of us on this council for a reason. You do anything too dumb, you can be sure we'll let you know."
"You'll all help me?" Dante said. The Council of Narashtovik nodded. He blinked again. "I accept."
* * *
It was a nice ceremony. The Cathedral of Ivars was packed with familiar faces and strangers who might one day become friends. There were speeches. Rituals. Rich dishes of duck and fish and fruits. Beer and wine and spirits. At the end, after they pinned him with Cally's old brooch—the tree of Barden, carved from bone supposedly harvested from the White Tree itself—they literally carried him across the street back to the Citadel.
He returned
to his room fat, drunk, and happy. Yet he still felt the void. The abyss. The hole that couldn't be filled.
Working with Olivander helped. There was so much to do. On Dante's insistence, Nak was promoted to the Council, an honor he attempted twice to decline before Dante told him it wasn't a choice. They opened nominations of other monks. Dante drafted messages to Brant in Tantonnen to bargain for more grain to bolster Narashtovik's supplies in the event of a second siege. Others went to the scattered clans. Meanwhile, they awaited word from Gallador and their former king. Dante hired three trackers, gave them a two-word message, and sent them into the wilds in search of Blays. Day by day, the stonework around the missing gates climbed to its former heights.
The sun came and went, but the worst of the summer had passed. As fall neared, King Moddegan gave his reply. In exchange for their neutrality in the ongoing conflict in Gallador, as well as ongoing considerations for rights of passage and the ongoing continuation of all existent agreements in trade, Narashtovik and the Norren Territories would be freed.
As the city whooped and drank and cheered and kissed, Dante drafted a letter to Gabe, the norren monk of Mennok who had, in a way, caused this all.
Somehow, Dante found time to continue forging new loons. When he had eighteen pairs, he arranged for a trip into the newly independent Territories. It was a small delegation. He insisted Nak come with him. Olivander made him take another monk, a handful of servants, and a dozen of the guard's finest. Under the warmth of morning, they left the Citadel and headed south.
In the norren lands, whole towns had been burnt to the ground, abandoned to the sun and the wind. Crows circled the hilltops, pecking at fresh bones. Whole fields lay scorched and black. At other towns, hammers and saws rapped and soughed. Clans moved over the plains. Dante spoke to chieftains, swapping stories, news, and congratulations. After three weeks of travel, he tracked down Mourn and the Nine Pines in the hills east of Tantonnen.
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