by AB Bradley
“It came back when they came back,” she said.
A jolt slapped Iron’s system. “It reappeared when the alp did?”
“And it’s trying its best not to be ruins anymore.”
“The Serpent Sun rises,” Round Gil murmured.
“Not yet, it doesn’t.” Ayska peeled off the railing and flipped her braids over a shoulder. “The Six aren’t gone yet as long as they have a few of us to keep the faith. You can’t kill gods, only forget them. Gil, get the crew ready to make port.”
The closer they sailed to the massive mound, the more the alp craftsmanship became apparent. Humans built strong structures. They prided themselves with mighty things, brick and stone built to withstand nature whereas these towers embraced it.
Iron paced the deck. They sailed at a glacier’s pace. The sun crawled over the sky. His barking hunger yelped and scurried from the low rumble of excitement coursing through him. To think, after ages in the wilderness, after the disillusion of Ormhild, he’d finally experience something truly wondrous. “Why can’t we just sail faster?”
Gil chortled as he prodded Iron toward the cabin. “We’ll reach it in time enough. It’s right treacherous a path to sail. You see those towers on the shell, but there’re hundreds more just beneath the waves, ready to tear the Widowmaker to shreds if we ain’t careful. I’ve never been much of a swimmer even though the sea’s the sweetest lady I’ve ever known.” He leaned over Iron’s shoulder and winked. “Don’t tell Ayska I can’t swim. She’d kick me off the ship at next port, and gods know we’ve been goin’ to some shit holes lately, eh?”
“Gil, if these are alp ruins like you think, the alp could be watching it. It’s not safe. Logically, they’d know where to find it.”
“We keep an eye on the horizon, don’t you worry. Nobody but nobody knows about Spineshell but the crew of the Scarlet Widowmaker.”
Iron took a parting glance at the partially submerged ruin before following Gil below deck. Fiolle, the blond woman with taught hair and a taught face sat with Vigal. They shared food from a common plate. Watching them eat together put a smile on his face, although he didn’t quite understand why.
He and Gil took a seat by them and started on their own meals. Vigal nudged Iron while he chewed on a mouth full of pickled egg. Fiolle nodded in respect. The woman kept tight-lipped most days, or if she spoke, she saved her words until he couldn’t hear them.
“You learn fast, Iron,” Vigal said.
“And you’re as good a spy as a Sinner’s man. I didn’t even notice you.”
Vigal traced the X scar running across his face. “Wish I’d been just a little better. Maybe this mug o’ mine would’ve been a lady killer and not a curse.”
“It hasn’t been that much of a curse,” Fiolle said. Iron caught glimpse of her hand as it caressed the sailor’s thigh before quickly retreating.
Vigal flashed a toothy grin and draped an arm behind his chair. “So tell me, what’re you going to do?”
A thousand ideas barreled through his thoughts like an avalanche heading for a valley. “Well, first I’d like to explore some of that labyrinth. There might be something undiscovered about the Second Sun, and I’ve always loved reading about—”
“No, no, not that. What are you going to do about the High King?”
The avalanche transformed into a few sad snowflakes. The High King wanted him, so to them, that meant Iron knew how to stop the madman. That meant Iron had some kind of secret to the king’s destruction. That meant…Iron didn’t know what that meant. He only knew what his visions told him, and they told him nothing of Sol.
“He hurt you, didn’t he?” Iron asked.
The merry mood grew solemn. Their gazes drifted to the table. “I had good farmland—fertile farmland! I had a wife and a little girl.” Vigal smiled at the memory. Iron could almost see his daughter in his eyes. “She was so little, so innocent. I carved her a figure of the Burning Mother. She slept with it every night. She was sleepin’ with it when the serpents came after us, after the Godfall.”
His jaw tightened and his nostrils swelled. Fiolle placed her hand on his and squeezed.
“They called her heretic,” he continued. “I knew they wanted my farm and were just makin’ excuses to take it from me. They didn’t have to kill them to do it. They didn’t have to slice my face up and leave me dyin’ on the road, only to wake up chained by the bastard slavers who followed them like roaches, claimin’ survivors as their property as they went.”
“We’ve all got stories like that,” Gil said. “Not one of us was born into slavery, no sir. We went there thanks to that heretic king.” Gil spit on the floor. When he looked up, a fierce anger burned in his normally cheery eyes. “If I could just get my hands around him…”
“If any of us could,” Fiolle added. “We’d show him the meaning of pain. I just wish the Six hadn’t abandoned us.”
“They didn’t abandon us,” Iron said.
“Then they should’ve been stronger. Some gods they turned out to be, letting a snake crush them so easily and leaving us all to feel its bite.” She swiveled out of her chair, marching upstairs without another word.
Iron wished he could melt into his seat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
Vigal patted Iron on the back. “She loved ‘em more than any of us. The Godfall hurt her most. Her family was at the Mother’s temple that day. Word is nobody survived.”
The sailor took a bite out of an egg. He lost himself in memory for a moment but returned with a soft head shake. The happy twinkle in his eyes reignited, and he smiled. “But enough ‘o those sad words. Now we’ve got ourselves a weapon. You’ll stop this High King and bring the true gods back. Bless the Six!”
Round Gil toasted Vigal. “Bless the Six!”
Iron plastered on a smile, but it didn’t bring him any comfort. The circle is broken. The words haunted him. If only he knew how to fix it, maybe then he could be the hero they needed.
They took a small boat from the Scarlet Widowmaker to the alp island. The little vessel thunked against the shell. Iron leapt overboard and splashed into the shallow waters. He went to a knee and pressed his palms onto the surface. Ever since his earliest memories, he loved feeling things. Reading about something could describe it, but while words were pretty nothing compared to touch. Touching something meant truly knowing it.
“There were titans shaped like humans,” he said. “Why not titan turtles? Maybe calling this place Spineshell really isn’t too far off.”
Thip, the lanky cook with a lazy gait and wispy hair, smirked and hopped onto the shell. “Titan turtles? I guess it’s as good a guess as any! We set up in the first tower over yonder.” He pointed to a short spire rising just at the point where the shell met the sea. The tower’s low balconies overflowed with vegetation tickling the waves. “Not a bad setup, if you ask me.”
“Quit chattering like two little parrots, you two.” Ayska strolled past with a box entirely too big for her lithe frame, but Iron knew her well enough now to withhold his help. Instead, he found another crate and hoisted it on his shoulder, wincing as the rough edge dug into muscles still sore from long days practicing Loyal Stance.
Sander sidled alongside him as they walked in a line toward the tower. His master gripped a swollen bag of rice and leaned to Iron’s ear. “You’re dangerously close to making friends, Iron. Remember what I told you.”
“I’m not worried about it and neither should you. Ayska’s teaching me her fighting style. That’s all it is.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about.” He looked to the sky and thought. “Scratch that. I’m always worried about you. I’m especially worried about this place. Look at all this food we’re bringing. This isn’t a quick stop we’re making.”
“We don’t have anywhere else to go, and I haven’t mastered Loyal Stance yet. Just relax for awhile and enjoy it. We can go exploring, maybe find ourselves a treasure or two for the Sinner’s glory.”
“I know what you’re doing. We can’t camp out here forever while you dance with pretty girls all day and go treasure hunting in an oversized catacomb.”
“Why? That what you always wanted with your life instead of raising me in the cold. You should be happy.” Iron sped up, and Sander drifted from view.
Sander reappeared, matching Iron’s pace. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but we have to start thinking about our exit from this situation. Spineshell’s great, don’t get me wrong, but we can’t stay here forever, especially not with them.”
Iron unleashed his most exasperated sigh. “Your reminders wear me out.”
“Well, if I wouldn’t have to keep saying them, they’d be fresh as roses each time you heard them instead of old as a titan’s balls.”
“The crew believes in us.” Iron halted and faced his master just at the tower’s shadow. “We give them hope. Even Ayska, though she’d die before she admitted it. What if…” He leaned closer, glancing to make sure none of the others lingered in earshot. “…What if we’re here to help them? This place could hold clues to my visions. We need to explore the possibilities, unless the Sinner finally answered your prayers and told us what they mean?”
“Damn you and your logic. Where did you pick that up? Gods know I don’t parse every little thing into a frustratingly rational argument.”
“I just feel like there’s something here I need to know.” He inhaled and stared at the towers. “Maybe this place has something to do with the circle. Maybe even something to do with my past that you won’t tell me. Obviously, I’ll need to figure it out for myself since you think I don’t deserve to know.”
The words just tumbled out. Lately, they did that with his master. Iron didn’t know why he thought them, why he said them, and why he wanted nothing more than to scream at the man, but he did.
Sander wrestled with his next words. Iron could tell his master’s mind molded a perfectly ambiguous sentence, and it only angered Iron even more. “Stop lying to me. Hells Sander, you raised me. You’re my family. Do you know how much it hurts to know the one person you care most about in the world keeps lying straight to your face?”
His master slumped. “Iron, I wish I could tell you everything, but I just can’t.”
“It’s my parents, isn’t it? You won’t tell me because of something they made you promise.”
Sander said nothing. He might as well have climbed the tallest tower and shouted his agreement.
“Did they hate me?” Tears swirled in Iron’s eyes as he stepped closer to the man. “Was I such a burden on them that they forced me on you?”
“No, of course not.” Sander’s voice carried a weight with it, a terrible, lonely sadness the man desperately wanted to let into the world. “You were loved. You are loved more than you know by more than you could ever imagine.”
“Who. Am. I?”
“You are Iron.”
“Tell me who I really am!”
Sander sucked in a breath. He leaned forward but pulled back at the last second, shaking his head. “I can’t, Iron. I just can’t. Forgive me.”
Forgive me. The visions wanted forgiveness, too. Everyone wanted his forgiveness for sins he’d never witnessed.
Iron threw his crate to the ground and ran. He bolted past the other sailors, ignoring their shouts and cries to slow. He rounded the tower and spotted an enormous archway leading into the shell. Darkness swallowed him as he grit his teeth and sprinted through the entrance.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The Mother's Gift
The ramp curling into the island spilled into a cavernous antechamber beneath the rolling waves. Iron’s breath sighed against its smooth walls, accompanied by the persistent drip-drip of water from the ceiling. A weary calm pervaded this room, but it did nothing to stifle Iron’s anger. Why did he get so angry all the time, and why did he direct his ire at his master?
No, it’s his fault for keeping the truth from me. I’m not wrong in this. I’m not. Just when he’d come to be comfortable around Ayska’s crew, Sander just had to stroll over and spit on everything.
Iron wiped a mix of sweat and moisture from his brow. He shut his eyes so they wouldn’t shed the tears bursting at his lids. Children cried. He was a man now, and apparently one who needed to forgive forgotten sins of gods and men.
He turned to the ramp and stared at the mouth rising toward the surface. He couldn’t face Sander with swollen cheeks and bleary eyes, not to mention the crew of former slaves who lived lives ten thousand times more brutal than his years of dancing over snows in the quiet safety of the Everfrosts.
Instead of waiting, Iron launched himself into another tunnel descending into darkness. What little light penetrated into the antechamber faded behind him. He pressed a hand against the wall to guide him and watched the dull light kiss his knuckles goodbye. Pitch black kept him company here, and he thanked it for its silence.
His footsteps thudded on the odd stone walkway. The tunnel continued its downward spill. His eardrums tightened, so he flexed his jaw until they popped. An eternity passed before he paused and glanced at the void behind him. How long he ran, he had no idea. Iron stood in the quiet, in the black, and listened to his breathing.
“I’m a spoilt shit, aren’t I? Sander’s trying, and I’m not letting him succeed. It’s just—it’s just not fair.”
The darkness watched quietly. Iron faced forward, onward into the abyss.
“I’m sorry, Sander. Everyone.” His voice echoed eerily down the hall as if his spirit wanted to apologize to eternity.
I’ve got to ride the thundersnow, he thought. He spread his arms and closed his eyes, exhaling, remembering that blissful moment when he rode the winds like a god and not a man.
When he opened his eyes, a soft light glimmered on the wall. It painted the smooth hall and revealed a curving corner. Curious, he edged deeper into the ruin. As he walked, the light strengthened. It took on a greenish hue, not sickly, but the kind of green seen in a spring leaf when the midday sun shines through the blade.
Along the curve he traveled until at last the strange corridor ended in a hall fit for an emperor. He thought the antechamber enormous. This one dwarfed it. Three of those rooms could fit in this one as comfortably as the spotted eggs of a glory hawk in their roost.
Murals splashed strange stories in gaudy tiles along the stone. Six towering alcoves spaced evenly along the wall rose from floor to ceiling, whatever statues occupied them now nothing more than crumpled stone. But the floor, the floor filled with seawater from a hole in its center and created a perfectly round pond set into the room’s heart. The rippling water reflected in emerald webs over the ceiling and illuminated the room with a soft shine.
Iron inched to the pool’s edge. He went to his knees and looked toward the hole where the sea welled into the room. Beyond the opening, a vast and foreboding world hinted at the ruins of a once great city now choked behind the impenetrable blue and green veil of the sea.
Yet some other point of light—pure light—shone within that opening. It shined no brighter than a star at twilight at first, but it quickly intensified as the point drifted nearer to him.
Iron squinted and leaned forward. The light revealed the outline of a distant fish, even though calling it a fish did it a disservice. Its willowy body sported long fins flowing from its back and belly like silk banners in a gale. It gazed at him with two polished eyes Iron immediately recognized. The creature floated just where the ruins vanished into the sea, watching the man who watched it.
“I remember you. You were the doe,” he said.
The circle is broken, her voice murmured through his mind.
“What circle? What do you want from me! I’ve found allies now. They want me to stop the king. Is that—is that what you want, too? Is the circle some kind of weapon, some kind of spell to bring the Six back to Urum? The others think I have the key to stopping Sol. Is it this circle? Tell me how to fix it!”
Beware the Serpe
nt, Iron, for he comes in many forms, and the Sun he raises will be your destruction.
“But I can fight him. I will fight him, for Ayska and her crew, for what he’s done to them and everyone else. I am the Sinner’s servant. If you’re a sign from him, I’ll do whatever you wish. You just have to tell me how.”
First, you must forgive us.
The fish turned and slowly sunk into the depths. She paused, barely visible, and floated. No, she did more than that. She waited.
Iron tore off his shirt and threw his sword over it. He ripped his boots from his feet and added them to the pile. They’d all only weigh him down, and Sinner only knew where this swim would lead. Iron said a quick prayer to the Six and took a deep breath over the opening. He shook the jitters from his arms and dove into the Sapphire Sea.
He swam quickly. Learning how to dive during the wink of summer in the frozen north taught Iron to swim speedily and with determination. He opened his eyes. Saltwater burned them, but he ignored it.
The glowing fish guided him deeper. He followed her into an enormous room occupied by statues of strange creatures larger than even the titans of Ormhild. He swam past some statue of a tentacle-laden monster, its single great eye spanning three lengths of his body.
Coral grew in reds and whites over the stones. Schools of shimmering fish every shade of gold, silver, and blue swam throughout the ruin. If he had gills, he would’ve stopped and inspected them all. As it was, his lungs already ached and begged for breath, his heartbeat thudding louder with each stroke he took.
Soon, every movement became a labor. His lungs screamed, and so did his heartbeat. Iron glanced behind him. No sign of the entrance remained. Even if it did, he doubted he’d reach it before the last bubbles of his breath slid past his cheeks on their way to the surface. Please. He looked at the fish, black edging his vision. I can’t make it.
