The old man looked at the boy questioningly before nodding. “I was glad to hear that your family was all right. Girl wasn’t sure when we first met. She was mighty worried about all of you.”
Without giving Xae a chance to reply, Damaris gestured to the couch and stools. “Please, let’s sit.”
The little group took their places, with the Keeper and Tibbot on the sofa and Mariah and Xae each perched on a stool.
Tibbot took a pipe and flint out of his coat pocket, but after a stern look from Damaris, he tucked it back where they had come from but not without a scowl.
“Tibbot,” Mariah asked. “What are you doing here?”
“Knew you’d show up here sooner or later, so I decided it was a good place to wait.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, a couple o’ things. First, when I visited the temple in Kannuk, I heard that this one’d been shut down by order of the king, and I knew something was up. Visited a couple a more. None of her”—he leaned his head in Damaris’s direction—“sisters would help me, but every one of ’em seemed on edge. After the third, I figured I was wastin’ my time, so I tried to catch up with you in Laikos, but you’d already gone. But that Ruby girl caught up with me, told me the boy’d been there too. Told me about Shira’s folks. So, I knew it was only a matter of time before you’d come runnin’ to Glenley, ready to play rescuer again. Lucky for me, Keeper Damaris here was kind enough to let me stay and wait.”
“Is Ruby okay?” Xae asked before Mariah could get a word in, and she gave him a sidelong look.
“I’d say so,” Tibbot responded. “Told me she’d chased her former pack leader off, that her forest was finally safe again … for the time bein’.”
“Keeper, excuse me, but isn’t it against the rules of your order to shelter us?”
“You know that, do you?” Damaris chuckled, and Mariah couldn’t see what she could possibly find funny. “That was true for a long time, I admit, but things are changing, miss …”
“Mariah.”
“Mariah, then. As you saw from outside, the king has taken action against us by keeping the citizens of this fair city out of our temple. He has been getting anxious of late, and although we have done nothing to provoke it, he acts as if we will rise up against him any day, bringing the people of Glenley with us. No matter that the people’s interest in the Althamir and their temples has only waned since the time of his father’s reign.”
Despite her words, Damaris stared at Mariah expectantly, as if she expected her to be able to explain the king’s behavior. When Mariah didn’t answer, the Keeper continued. “My sisters and I agreed to allow Master Tibbot to stay. As an escaped prisoner of the king, he would be in particular danger in this city, and there are signs, as I said, that things are changing. I believe our strictures will soon be lifted. The days that we continue to accept his rule are numbered.”
Mariah’s eyes drifted to the low-burning fire in the hearth, and the words of the woman in her dream drifted back to her. Until the Banished One is lifted from obscurity, you must be the king’s faithful servant. It is the only way to protect her, to protect me. If the temples served the gods, were they under the same restrictions? Or had the gods put restrictions on them for a different reason?
Realizing everyone was looking at her, Mariah cleared her throat. “Thank you for sheltering Tibbot. He is a dear friend to me, and I am glad that he was able to find safety here.” She looked to Xae and then Tibbot. She wanted to tell him about the Sovereign and about their plans, but—
“Girl, you can trust her,” Tibbot grumbled, seeming to read her misgivings on her face. “I wouldn’t have stayed here if you couldn’t.”
Xae nodded. “The more allies we have, the better.”
Mariah sighed and then began to tell her story to Keeper Damaris and Tibbot as Xae looked on.
* * *
Damaris sat quietly while the three of them spoke. If it weren’t for her eyes, which were attentively following their conversation, Mariah would have thought she had drifted off or was thinking of something else.
After Xae ended the discussion by telling Tibbot about Midelia going into the keep and them finding Han’s little abode, the room quieted.
“So, now we wait, I suppose,” Mariah concluded. “Either for Midelia to bring us news or for the others to arrive.”
A moment of awkward silence filled the room until the Keeper took in a slow, deep breath and spoke. “You bring portentous news indeed. The prophecy of the Banished One has long been known among the Keepers, although it is not ours. I am privileged to be the first among my kind to make your acquaintance, although I’m sorry to say that your coming may bring destruction before it brings freedom.”
“Did you know who I was when we were outside?” Mariah asked, ignoring the implications of the Keeper’s final statement for the moment.
Damaris shook her head. “The gods have bestowed upon me a small gift, and sometimes, I receive visions of what is to come. I only knew that I was to distract the guards and invite someone to the top of the tower.” She chuckled. “I really had no idea until I opened the upper door what you were or how you would get there. But when I saw your hawk form, I knew you must be Tibbot’s friend, the one he’s been waiting for.”
Xae barely waited for her to finish before he jumped off his chair. “What do you mean her coming will bring destruction?” He loomed over the Keeper, who remained seated, and Mariah put a hand on his arm, encouraging him to sit back down and stop looming.
As for herself, she had heard so much about what she was supposed to do, who she was supposed to be. It was all so vague and overwhelming that she didn’t know what to think. She decided that she would not let these prophecies and predictions rule her actions. She could be only who she was. It would have to be enough.
Xae did not sit, but he did back off a bit.
The Keeper eyed him thoughtfully before she turned back to Mariah. “It has long been known among the temples that an age of war would come to Varidian and perhaps the world over. We have seen the beginnings of this in the campaigns our king has waged. Thus far, he has fought most of his battles in faraway lands. However, this era cannot end until the war is brought to our very doorstep, until it divides our people. Your coming is fateful, and although you may be a bellwether in this conflict, you are not its harbinger. For that, we await the coming of the First.”
“The First?” Was it another name someone had come up with for her? As much as she didn’t want to be the Ceo San on which so many pinned their hopes, it seemed to happen every time she met someone new. But Damaris had implied that the Banished One and the First were not the same, that they still awaited the arrival of this … First.
Damaris nodded but did not elaborate. Instead, she continued, “When the signs are clear, we will open our doors to the masses. The temples will serve and provide succor to all who are wounded or broken, no matter which side they are on. We will be commanded by none save our gods, and all previous constraints will be lifted.”
The room was quiet. Ever since she had heard Shira’s story about her babyhood, how the temple, although sympathetic, had refused to aid her, Mariah had hoped that someday things would change, that the temples would help the Ceo San gain freedom. But the implications of the Keeper’s words were ominous, and they sat heavily in Mariah’s gut.
“Can this war be prevented?” Hadn’t Mariah just committed herself to not being led by prophecies and predictions? And now she was trying to figure out ways to stop a war?
“The common consensus among my sisters is that there is only one alternative.” The Keeper closed her eyes, and her voice became husky and grim. As if quoting, she intoned, “If the Banished One capitulates to the warlord king and forfeits her freedom, she will be giving her entire race and, indeed, her entire people to him. There will be no more war, only subjugation.”
&
nbsp; Chapter Thirty
Dragon-Etched
Exhaustion had seeped into every fiber of Mariah’s being, and by the time she and Xae returned to Han’s room, she needed to only lie down before she fell into a deep and troubled sleep. In her dreams, she thought of flying away, of leaving everyone she loved behind to protect them. If she didn’t stay, she couldn’t become a slave or lead a war, could she?
But without a leader, without their prophesied Banished One, what would the Sovereign do? Would they lead themselves, or would they remain hidden until the king ferreted them all out and none remained free? And what about the children who were not yet cuffed, who awaited a life of slavery in the king’s training camps? Would the Sovereign help them if Mariah was not there to order them to do so? She had little hope that they would act without her. The thought felt callous, arrogant even, but it also rang true. After all, they had waited underground, out of the sun, for decades for her to lead them.
No, Mariah could only continue to do what she had returned to Varidian for. She was no longer the girl who flew away from danger. And although she had doubts as to how much she could accomplish before the king or one of his soldiers managed to kill her, she would do her best to free Rose and Jahl and the children, and she would use the Sovereign to help her. And, in the meantime, she would do all she could to stay out of the king’s clutches.
You will leave Glenley then? A voice resonated in her thoughts, rousing her from sleep. You will leave the capital and get far away from him before it is too late?
The words were desperate but hopeful, and they hung in the roiling darkness of her mind like frozen motes of dust in the sunlight. Leave Rose and Jahl to the king’s whims?
I cannot.
There was no response, but the curtain of darkness around her became complete as sleep once again took her.
* * *
Early the next morning, Mariah was woken by a quick, timid knocking at the little door to Han’s dwelling. Rising and blinking at the light seeping in through the one small window, she stepped over Xae, who was rolled in a blanket atop the rushes, and went to the door. She unlocked it and opened it only very slightly, peeking out against the dawn. Midelia, with her clothes rumpled and her ashen blond hair tousled, stood outside in the gray light, a cloth-wrapped bundle in her arms.
“You’re back!” The sight of her brought Mariah the rest of the way awake, and she pulled the door all the way open. “Come in, come in.”
Midelia hurried in, and Mariah shut the door behind her. She ushered the woman over to sit on the side of the bed.
“I found them,” she breathed. “Your people.”
Xae, who had begun stirring, sat up. “Where?” he asked in a voice still filled with sleep.
“In special holding cells near the king’s throne room.”
Mariah’s hope for a quick and easy rescue from a dark, abandoned dungeon seeped away.
“And they are guarded well,” Midelia continued, slumping in on herself. “I was almost found out.”
“What is it?” Mariah asked, still trying to process the news. She sat down next to Midelia and put an arm around her.
The woman looked up with gratitude in her eyes and squeezed Mariah’s hand. “They are guarded by Trapper pairs. By wolves. I have never seen wolves in the castle before, but these … these Ceo San, they are ragged and scarred as if they have seen battle very recently. Perhaps they come from Adis Ador? One of them very nearly caught me when I ventured too near.” She looked down at her lap. “Their presence prevented me from getting too close, from advising your friends of our coming.”
Mariah swallowed. Wolves? She looked to Xae and could tell he was thinking the same thing she was. It was too much to be coincidence. Ruby had finally rid the forest of her father and his supporters, and now, the king had wolves to guard Shira’s parents. She didn’t think they had come from Adis Ador.
Xae perked up. “I could fly back,” he said, scrambling to his feet and grabbing his pack. “I could tell Ruby, ask her to help, to bring her pack.”
She counted the miles in her head before shaking it. “It’s too late, Xae.” He ignored her, so she rose and went to him. “We need to get into the keep as soon as Shira and the others arrive. The wolves cannot get here that fast.” She pulled him around, forcing him to look at her. “And if we tried to get in the castle with so many, we’d be caught before we got anywhere near Rose and Jahl. And you heard the Keeper last night. We can’t risk capture.”
His shoulders drooped, but his eyes pleaded with her. She knew he would bring regiments to bear if he could to save Shira’s parents, Rose especially. She had been a mother to him when his own had been imprisoned, and he wouldn’t easily forget that.
“We’ll save them, Xae,” Mariah pressed, “but we have to be careful.”
The boy nodded and let his pack fall to the floor.
In a small voice, Midelia said, “I also found the other things.”
Mariah turned to her, confused for a moment before her eyes went to the bundle in the other woman’s arms. Hope rose in her chest as Midelia pulled back the fabric to reveal a leather backpack and a belt attached to a hunting knife.
“Oh gods, thank you, Midelia, thank you!” She surprised the woman with a brief embrace before gathering the items gently, as if they might disappear in a puff of smoke if she wasn’t careful.
“They were in a storage closet off the dungeon. It seems they just throw prisoners’ belongings there to be forgotten.”
Mariah could never forget these. Though they were dusty, she recognized her father’s hunting knife and the backpack Bria had made for her before she had flown to Varidian with Xae to rescue his family. Hoping against hope, she opened the pack to search its contents. There, at the bottom, under extra trousers and the fossilized remains of a honeycake was her mother’s letter, the one that Gwyn had kept from her for years, the one that had told her about Direstrand and the baker woman’s treachery.
Xae and Midelia were quiet as she sat on the floor staring at the only things she had left of her mother and father.
* * *
For the next several days, Mariah and her companions shared their time waiting for the company from Falmermere to arrive between Han’s small abode and the temple. At least one of them always stayed in the room behind the blacksmith, where they had agreed to meet Berg, Han, Teneth, and Shira.
In the meantime, the Keepers had opened their library to the four Ceo San. They had even shown them easier ways to get in and out of the temple. Unknown to the king and his men, there were tunnels leading out from under the structure that led to different parts of the city. Damaris showed Mariah one that ended at a small, empty house not far from Han’s room, and she and her friends were able to use it to avoid notice as they went to and from the temple.
During her time there, Damaris showed Mariah different writings about the Banished One and the prophesied war. Mariah pored over them again and again, hoping to find something that would help her or prevent the conflict. But the texts were obscure and felt almost as if they had been written by someone dreaming or hallucinating. More god-influenced dreams? Only a very few of the writings were clear, including the line about the Banished One becoming a slave, the one Damaris had quoted to them. After several days of frustration, Mariah’s head could take no more, and she gave up on the library. For the moment.
Late on the fifth day, as she waited for Midelia to finish her own studies, Mariah sat in the temple sanctuary, doing little more than contemplating the statue before her and trying to briefly shut out the anxiety that grew within her with every passing day that Shira’s parents remained at the mercy of the king. At the very least, they were probably half-starved by now, as she had been during her time in his dungeon. The only comfort she had was that Rose and Jahl were together. Midelia had been able to confirm at least that.
As she was studying the ma
jestic wings of the Dragon and wondering about the way he sheltered the other gods, the mouse woman joined her. They made their way out of the temple through the tunnels and into the city beyond, bearing some food that the Keepers had sent along for dinner.
When Mariah entered their small, temporary abode behind Midelia, she bumped into the woman, who had stopped suddenly in her tracks.
“What is it?”
When the other woman didn’t respond, Mariah stepped around her. When she saw what was laid out on the bed, she nearly dropped the basket of food she carried but, instead, turned quickly and shut the door, fastening the latch. She took a deep breath and turned back to Xae, who stood over the bed with an unreadable expression.
Laid out neatly on the coverlet was a large golden breastplate. Emblazoned in the center was a magnificent black dragon. Attached to it via a small hook at the waist, a golden chain ran to a golden cuff, inlaid with a smaller version of the same black dragon and resting casually on the bed. To Mariah, the chain looked like a viper waiting to strike.
“Where in Whitelea did you get that?” she breathed, resisting the urge to flee or take the thing and throw it into the blacksmith’s forge nearby.
Xae pointed behind him to a chest along the wall. It took a minute for her to understand.
“You went through Han’s things?”
“I was bored,” he responded, a faint blush of embarrassment coloring his pale cheeks. “And I started thinking about his plan, the one he told us about in the Cellar. He wasn’t lying about these.” It wasn’t the first time the boy had gone rifling through someone else’s belongings. He’d nearly gotten them captured when he’d done the same in a soldiers’ camp in the Highlands.
Mariah looked back at the armor. It was certainly large enough for the big man she had come to think of as a friend. Han had almost become a Trapper. During that long night in Nilovi’s burrow, he’d told them that he had been notified of his promotion right before he went on leave. When he returned to Glenley, he was to begin his training.
Revelation of the Dragon Page 28
