mouth. The wobbly boat rose again quickly, much lighter.
“What did we—” he began to ask.
“Well,” Hayden drawled, “looking down through the cargo hold, I can see the tops of the trees where part of the hull used to be. Reckon that ain’t good.”
They rose higher as they circled the southern, then eastern faces of Zephyr Hill. Wind whipped Indris’s face as they swept by the pale incline, almost cliff sheer. In a few moments the galley was careening past hillocks of sparse grass, on course for the splintered teeth of boulders that dotted the hillside where it stretched toward the Marble Sea. To the east and south, Zephyr Hill descended in a series of sharp terraces dotted with trees and huddled stones rounded smooth by wind and rain. Sea eagles nested there, plumage ruffled, their voices shrill in the wind of the galley’s passing.
“Tell Ekko they’ll have to jump as soon as we stop moving,” Indris choked out to Shar. “This thing won’t last much longer.”
The Seethe war-chanter dashed away, sure-footed despite the deck bucking beneath her. Indris spared his shipmates a glance. A few of the Tau-se shrugged as they sauntered to the edge of the deck or to the few rails that remained. Others jokingly threatened to push their comrades off. Some even had to be kicked awake where they had slumbered in the sun.
As the fragmented hull touched the ground, part of it sloughed away. Timbers flew into the air, snapped as if rotten. Brass and iron fittings pinged into each other, then ricocheted into nearby boulders. Great clods of earth were hurled up as the sharp prow sliced into the earth. Then it, too, gave way.
The galley shuddered to a halt in a long furrow of soil and stone. No sooner had the vessel stopped moving than the Tau-se bounded for the ground. Shar leaped gracefully, so light she seemed to glide to the ground. Two Tau-se grabbed Hayden, then hurled him into the waiting arms of two of their companions who had already made landfall. Indris pulled Changeling from the deck. Wood puffed away as ash as he dashed for the side and jumped over.
As he hit the ground, Indris urged the Tau-se further away from the wreckage. From behind them came ticking creaks, the dry snap of wood, and the bellowed protests of metal bent out of shape as what remained of the galley collapsed. The galley slumped as parts of it were consumed in smokeless tongues of nacreous light. When it settled, finally, there was little left except for the top deck and jagged beams of the forecastle.
“We really did make it,” Ekko observed. “Though I doubt the galley is going anywhere soon.”
Indris laughed weakly, then lay back on the sun-warmed grass. He folded a forearm over his eyes. Lightning flashed behind his closed eyelids and his hearts tolled. The taste of bile built up in the back of his throat, and he sat up. He could feel the acid burn in his chest. He imagined a lightning rod might feel like this after a violent storm, if the same lightning rod was thrown from the roof and run over by a herd of stampeding horses.
Changeling was in his hand, the weapon silent as even she struggled with the reaction from channeling so much disentropy. Despite his fatigue, to hold her was intoxicating. The way her energy had flowed across his soul like honey over a lover’s skin. He could almost taste it.
Ekko assembled his people. The Tau-se split into five-person formations. Three formations ranged up the shallower incline here near the top of Zephyr Hill. The others took position around Indris, eyes focused outward. One of the squads near the crest of the hill loped back to speak with Ekko.
“We are only about one hundred meters away from the Garden of Stones,” the woman reported in a purring voice. “There are soldiers wearing the colors of the Great House of Näsarat guarding the Lotus House. They wear the insignia of Roshana’s Whitehorse. There are others with them.”
“Heavy cavalry.” Ekko’s opinion was quite clear from his tone. The Tau-se rarely rode animals for any reason.
“Ekko, please tell me you still have the Angothic Spirit Casque?”
“I still have the casque, Amonindris.”
“Then gather the Lion Guard, if you would. There’s a daughter who’s lost a father whom I may need to help become a rahn.”
“You’re late,” Femensetri observed as Indris entered the Lotus House. Roshana and Siamak looked up from where they sat. There was