The welcome surprises continued when her brother-in-law joined her and Devin, his shy smile making it seem like he was embarrassed to call attention to himself. An enormous pack hung from straps around both his shoulders. He carried a lantern in his left hand, which he carefully held aside to make room for her hug.
“Hey, Tommy,” Adria said. “Things must be serious if Devin managed to drag you out from your tower.”
“It’s… it’s been a curious trip,” Tommy said, shrugging his shoulders. “I think I’ll let Devin tell most of it. You won’t believe us otherwise.”
“Both of you, get back in line,” a guard shouted as he approached the trio. “Dallying or exiting prior to interrogation is expressly forbidden.”
Adria whirled on him, putting herself between them and the guard.
“You address the ordained Mindkeeper of Low Dock and one of the church’s most respected Soulkeepers of West Orismund,” she said. “Who are you to order us?”
“It’s all right, sis,” Devin said. “He’s just doing his job.”
The guard bounced his gaze between them, suddenly nervous.
“Those are the orders,” he said, almost as an apology. “But Soulkeepers and Mindkeepers have their own orders, am I right?”
It sounded like he was pleading for an out, and Adria quickly gave it to him.
“You are correct,” she said.
“Your friend, though,” he said, pointing to Tommy. “He’s neither Soulkeeper nor Mindkeeper. He goes with the rest of them, no exceptions.”
“It’s quite all right,” Tommy said. He kissed Adria on the cheek. “It is wonderful to see you again. When things calm down I hope we can catch up together over a giant plate of biscuits.”
Tommy left, accompanied by the nervous guard. Adria’s insides churned with curiosity. What had happened outside Londheim? Why the refugees? And was it tied to the strangeness that had happened today?
“I’ve a lot of questions for you,” Adria said.
“And I’ll answer as best I can,” Devin said. “But not here. To the western wall. We’ll discuss more there.”
Adria watched her brother stare at the distant mountain from atop the wall surrounding Londheim. It looked five to six miles away, and the sight of it put a pit of worry deep into Adria’s stomach. Just as worrying were the new signs of battle etched upon her brother’s face. Sweltering purple bruises covered his throat, new scars dotted his forehead, and a particularly brutal scar covered much of his left cheek. Whatever story Devin had to tell, she feared it would be nothing but hardship and suffering.
“Have things been, well, different here?” he asked, breaking the silence that had comfortably settled upon both of them during their walk to the wall. Such a vague question shouldn’t have meant much, but Adria immediately sensed what her brother was alluding to. So it wasn’t only Londheim…
“In many ways, yes,” she said. “Why do you ask?”
Devin shook his head and finally turned her way.
“Because all the world has changed, Addy, and I’m not thinking it’s for the better.”
Adria looked over the wall to the throng pouring through the gates.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “If they don’t want anyone to interact with these people, why aren’t we setting up camps for them outside the city until we’re better organized?”
“Because it’s not safe outside,” Devin said. “I’m not sure it’s safe inside, either, but we must hope.”
“Safe? Safe from what?”
Her brother drew in a long breath and then hesitated.
“This might take a while,” he said.
Devin began with his arrival at Dunwerth, his encounter with the wolves, and then meeting the stone creature named Arothk. Every sane part of Adria told herself to doubt such outlandish nonsense. But perhaps it wasn’t so strange after what she’d witnessed herself. Then came the black water. Adria shivered at the retelling, unable to imagine something so terrible. She wished to wrap her arms about her brother and comfort him, but he looked too lost in his own thoughts to even notice.
“I was worried it was the whole world,” Devin said after a momentary pause. “With every flower, tree, and blade of grass dead, civilization would soon follow. Such a pathetic, ignoble end to humanity.”
“Clearly it did not end,” Adria said, careful to frame her comments as neutrally as possible. She wanted to believe her brother, and she also wanted to prove him undeniably wrong. “I see Tommy survived these events as well.”
“He’s got his own scars,” Devin said. “I think he’s the only survivor in all of Crynn. Can you imagine that, Adria? All that death around him. It’s a miracle he stayed sane.”
“You endured similar, and you’re still sane.”
Devin softly laughed, that sound precious to her ears.
“I’m not so certain. A lot of us have been asking ourselves that question. But I more meant… it’s Tommy. You know how he is. After Brittany died it took him a month before he’d leave his home on his own. If it weren’t for his books…” He shook his head. “I’d rather not think of it.”
“What happened after you left Crynn?”
“We—”
Little quivers shook through the wall, traveling up their heels to the small of their backs. Devin faced the mountain, and she swore he looked ready to draw his pistol.
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
“No,” he said. “I don’t think I am. I’m exhausted, Addy. I’ve seen thousands die, and this whole world feels like one long nightmare I can’t wake up from. I thought it’d be better when we arrived here, but it’s not. The mountain is following us, Adria. It’s following us.”
“I… I don’t understand how that’s possible.”
“None of this is possible,” Devin said. He gestured wildly about him. “The whole world’s turned upside down. The dead are walking, fire is alive, and Tommy can call down a strike of lightning with a few words and a wiggle of his fingers. If the sky opened up tonight and dumped a legion of locusts on our heads I wouldn’t fucking blink.”
The other guards on the wall were starting to stare. Adria grabbed her brother by the scruff of his shirt and yanked him closer.
“Get a hold of yourself,” she said. “You’re a Soulkeeper. Act like it.”
Devin looked at her, really looked at her, and finally she saw a bit of his old self reemerge. His arms wrapped about her shoulders, and despite his larger size, he leaned his weight against her.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’ve been strong for everyone else since this whole thing started. It feels good to finally break down a little.”
“Until you tell me everything that’s going on, I’d prefer you keep it at just a little.” She grinned at him, just like she had when they were kids. “Or does my big brother need his little sister to hold his hand during story time?”
Devin wiped at his face as he shook his head and laughed.
“Coldhearted bitch.”
“Unstable dick.” She smiled. “Are we better now?”
“Such uncouth language for a Mindkeeper. And yeah, I think I am.”
“Good. Now what in blazes did you mean by Tommy can call down lightning?”
Devin shrugged his shoulders and looked across the field to the mountain.
“I wasn’t kidding when I said the world has turned crazy. I’ll start with what I found when I arrived at his tower.”
Every minute it seemed her brother’s story grew that much more incredulous. She tried to imagine Tommy commanding the power Devin described but could not. It was like imagining a butterfly overcome with bloodlust. He kept silent on what Tommy had been through prior to his arrival, sticking only with what he had seen for himself.
“We caught up with the villagers from Dunwerth not long after we left,” Devin finished. “After that, it was mostly a tedious march to cross the rest of the miles here to Londheim.”
“And the mountain?”
The wall rumbled, as if the earth were aware of the question.
“We saw the distant peaks of it yesterday morning when we awoke,” Devin said. “The ground’s shaken ever since. As we’ve traveled east it’s gotten nearer, not farther. It’s been following us, Adria, and I can’t explain how or why in the slightest.”
Adria joined her brother in leaning over the parapets to watch the pale gray mountain. From base to peak it looked around one third of a mile high, and perhaps twice that in length. She could see individual peaks, sharp and angular. They appeared white along the tops, but something about the light and detail felt off. The color wasn’t snow, more likely a discoloration of the rock. The rumbling ground was growing more and more apparent. From the mountain, perhaps? But again, how, and why?
“We should get going,” Devin said. “I’m sure the church needs every hand at its disposal.”
Adria tucked her arm through his.
“Not yet,” she said. “I expect we will both be busy for the next few weeks, so let us have our time together while we can.”
Devin removed his folded hat and tucked it under his free arm. “Fair enough. But in return, you must tell a story of your own. I saw how you reacted to my questions. There’s strangeness afoot in Londheim as well, isn’t there?”
Adria bit her lip. Her other hand subconsciously drifted into her pocket to touch the smooth porcelain of her mask. Yes, there was indeed, and was it really any more fantastical than what her brother shared?
“I… I healed someone with my prayers this morning.”
He lifted an eyebrow her way.
“Healed as in how?”
“Healed as in I put my hands on swollen, infected flesh, prayed, and then lifted my hands off perfectly healthy skin.”
Devin whistled softly.
“No wonder you didn’t immediately call me insane,” he said. “Tommy theorized that the Goddesses’ strength was returning to the Cradle. Perhaps he’s correct.”
“Or perhaps you’re correct, and we’re all going insane.”
“That, too. I put it at a coin toss for either.”
She withdrew her arm and they fell silent and watched the mountain. It was two miles away, maybe three at most, and there was no doubt at its approach. The first visible proof was when one of the larger hills collapsed in half, parting in a cloud of black earth to make way for the enormous bulk. They could finally see the base of it, and Adria stared for a good long time while her heart hammered inside her chest cavity.
“Devin…”
“I know,” he whispered. “I see it, too.”
The mountain did not move. It crawled. Six legs poked out on either side, the way a turtle’s appeared from beneath its shell. Unlike a turtle, though, these bore massive claws the size of buildings, each leg bigger than the Sisters’ Tower. It dragged its bulk straight through the dirt, carving a massive canyon in its wake. Each shudder forward sent shock waves. Most terrifying of all was its eyeless serpentine head. It hovered mere feet above the ground, every inch of it so dark it appeared made of onyx or obsidian. Though its mouth was closed, enormous streams of black water dripped down its chin and splashed across the churned earth.
“Goddesses help us all,” Devin said. “It’s not a mountain. It’s… it’s like the void-dragon walks the earth.”
“‘And the dragon shall throw down the stars so he might finally walk the Cradle,’” Adria recited. “‘Then will the Sisters return alongside an army of great heroes shining with the light of their souls to slay the void. The Cradle shall be cleansed, its souls protected in Anwyn’s hands, until Lyra builds the land anew, free of the dragon’s corruption and perfect once more.’”
“The First Canon doesn’t make that sound quite so terrible,” Devin said. “But this isn’t the time of Eschaton and the Cradle’s destruction. I don’t see any great heroes to do battle. Do you?”
Her brother often joked when he was nervous. As always, she hated it.
“I don’t know what I see,” she said, her short fingernails digging into the thick fabric of her dress. “I’m not sure I want to know.”
Adria stepped closer to her brother, who wrapped a welcome arm around her shoulders. Together they watched the crawling mountain approach the edge of Londheim.
The guards stationed along the walls grew more frantic with each shuddering step of those twelve gargantuan legs. They ignored Devin and Adria, too focused on their own task. Younger men passed out crossbows and arrows from heavy packs on their backs. Older men with rank set up formations, focusing heavily upon the closed gates of the city. The idea that the crawling mountain would need to use such a gateway amused Adria. At least, it would have amused her, if everything weren’t so dire.
By now they could hear the mountain’s footsteps, not just feel it. The sound reminded Adria of when builders had demolished an old home in Low Dock for fear it would soon collapse. Those few seconds of breaking brick, erupting dust, and splintering wood were a pin fall compared to the thunderous scraping of the mountain’s chest as it carved a canyon through the field.
“What might our weapons do against such a thing?” Devin wondered aloud. “You can’t bring a mountain low with arrows. You can’t crumble it with the strike of a sword. We’re at its mercy.”
“Quieter,” Adria reprimanded. “You are to inspire hope in those around us, not drain it away.”
Every guard looked frozen in fear. Word of the crawling mountain’s approach spread among the citizens of Londheim down below. The rumble of their frightened cries joined the piercing of the earth. Smoke rose from the far eastern wall of the city. Riots, no doubt from people fleeing the city. Adria couldn’t blame them. What else could you do against such inexorable creeping doom?
Half a mile west from Londheim, the living mountain halted. Its legs sank into the dirt and settled. The rumble ceased, and it seemed in the sudden silence that all the city held its collective breath. The rock of its face cracked along the top to reveal gigantic, piercing blue eyes. They looked upon the walls of Londheim. Judging it? Examining it?
A crack split from side to side of its face, then grew. The monster’s mouth opened. Teeth like marble stalagmites and stalactites jutted from the obsidian surface. Black water poured out in waterfalls. Wind blew across Adria’s skin as it took in one deep, long breath. And then the mountain roared.
The walls of Londheim shook. Devin stumbled to hold his grip on the parapet. Adria clutched her hands to her ears and pleaded to the Sisters. The head turned and from its gullet blasted a veritable river of black water to the north of the city. The sun glistened off the water’s surface like oil. Stars shimmered in its waves. The river continued seemingly forever, covering every stretch of grass and tree visible from their wall. At last the flow ceased from its mouth, and the monster slowly turned its head toward the south.
“The black water you spoke of?” she asked amid cries of terror from both guards and citizens.
“That’s it,” Devin said. “This monster is responsible for all those deaths. Perhaps it is the void-dragon, Addy. It’s taken enough lives to claim the title.”
Adria watched, paralyzed by the implications of Devin’s words. Here was the proof of all the strange stories her brother told, and the truth of her experiences that day. If this water existed, and mountains crawled, then all else was true. Tommy wielded storm and fire. The dead walked among the living. Ancient spider-women, sentient stone monsters, and living flame all graced their world. And for whatever reason, her prayer-clasped hands could heal.
Adria’s heart seized in her chest. The dragon turned the gaze of its enormous blue eyes to Londheim. Black water bubbled from the corners of its mouth.
“Goddesses save us,” Devin said breathlessly. “It can’t happen here. Not like Dunwerth and Crynn. Please, Sisters, have mercy.”
“Will the water climb the walls?” Adria asked.
“I don’t know. And I don’t think it matters.”
The crawling mountain op
ened its throat once more. A deluge of shining black water roared toward the walls of Londheim. She thought of Devin’s description of the rot that had overwhelmed Dunwerth. Buildings crumpling. All food turned foul. Those touched becoming twisted and vile. That horror took place in a small village with a couple hundred men and women at most. Two hundred thousand lived inside Londheim’s walls, and there would be no chance to flee.
Devin extended his hand, and Adria took it so they might together watch the doom rolling forth. The river of black water silently flowed over the western road. Many on the wall screamed. Others dropped their weapons and ran. Devin locked her fingers with a vise grip, bruising her knuckles. Adria bit her tongue and stared straight ahead. She would not look away. She refused.
Two hundred yards from Londheim’s city gates, the water violently forked to either side. Twin rivers rolled north and south, carving a perfectly straight line in the grass. Not a drop passed this sudden line of demarcation. The water continued until reaching either edge of the city and then dissipated. The fearful screams of the city dwindled to a murmuring chorus. The mountain shuddered, its tremendous weight settling into the earth with a deep rumble. The blue eyes closed. All was still.
“What does it mean?” Adria asked after several minutes passed.
“It means we’re still alive.”
“But for how long?”
He offered her a grim smile.
“Until that thing awakens and decides otherwise.”
CHAPTER 13
Three years ago a barrage of tornadoes and storms had devastated the southern half of West Orismund, tucked between the Oakblack Woods and the Triona River. Lack of homes, food, and money had driven hundreds to seek shelter in Londheim. The people had come in droves, whole communities banding together for safety on the road. The mayor had shuffled dozens into Adria’s poor corner of the city, providing shoddy tents in alleys as their main form of shelter while the wealthy debated solutions to the problem. Adria forfeited hours of sleep each day making her rounds among the tent communities, fighting a losing battle against disease, starvation, and despair.
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