Nevernight (The Nevernight Chronicle #1) - Jay Kristoff Page 0,140

until I’m ready, next time?”

“That’d defeat the point of the exercise, wouldn’t it?”

“Damn Itreyans,” Tric growled. “You can always count on them to stick the knife in when you turn your back, aye?”

Marco’s handsome smile slowly died. “You’re half-Itreyan yourself, you fool.”

Mia’s heart sank. Tric’s eyes widened. And then it was on. Fists and curses, elbows and snarls, the boys falling into a tumble on the stone. Tric split Marco’s brow with his fist, punched his lip bloody. Solis soon broke it up, thrashing both boys with his belt like children until they stopped fighting. Hauling Marco to his feet, he ordered him to go see Marielle and get his hurts mended.

“And you,” the Shahiid growled at Tric. “Ten laps of the stair. Down and up. Go.”

Tric glared into the blind man’s eyes, and Mia was honestly wondering if he was about to try to take a piece. But with a black scowl, the boy obeyed. Solis roared at the other acolytes to get back to work, and Hush stepped into the circle to begin his round. Mia noticed Tric never returned to the hall after his tenth lap.

She went searching for him when Songs was done, checking his room, the Sky Altar, the athenaeum. She finally found him the in the Hall of Eulogies, thumbs hooked in his belt, staring up at the statue of Niah. A thousand corpses’ names carved on the stone at their feet. Nameless tombs on the walls all around.

“How do, Don Tric?”

He glanced at her briefly. Nodded once.

She edged up to him slowly, hands clasped behind her. The Dweymeri boy had turned back to the statue, looking up at Niah’s face. The statue’s eyes had the disconcerting quality of seeming to look right at you, no matter where you stood. The goddess’s expression was fierce. Dark. Mia wondered who or what the sculptor had imagined Niah staring at when he crafted her countenance. For the first time, she noticed Niah held her scales in her right hand. The sword gripped tight in the other.

“She’s left-handed,” Mia said. “Like me.”

“She’s nothing like you,” Tric growled. “She’s a greedy bitch.”

“… Are you entirely sure it’s wise to call her a bitch in her own house?”

Tric looked at her sidelong. “I though you didn’t believe in the divinities?”

Mia shrugged. “Hard not to when the God of Light apparently hates your guts.”

“Fuck him. And fuck her. What good do they do us? They give us one thing. Life. Miserable and shitty. And after that? They take. Your prayers. Your years.” He waved at the unmarked graves all about them. “Even the life they gave you in the first place.”

Tric shook his head.

“Take is all they do.”

“… Are you all right?”

Tric sighed. Shoulders slumped. “Shahiid Aalea gave me the word.”

Mia waited patiently. The boy pointed to the ink on his cheeks.

“I’ve put it off as long as I could,” he said. “After dinner. My turn with the weaver.”

“… Ah.”

She placed an awkward hand on his arm. Unsure what to say.

“Why were you avoiding it? The pain?”

Tic shook his head. Mia said no more, letting silence do the talking for her. She could see the boy struggling. Feel Mister Kindly in her shadow, gravitating toward his fear like flies to dying meat. He wanted to speak, she knew it. All she had to do was give him the room to—

“I told you about my mother,” he said. “My … father.”

Mia nodded, almost sick with sorrow at the thought of it. Touching his hand again. Sighing, Tric stared at his feet. Words struggling behind his teeth. Mia simply stood beside him, holding his hand. Waiting for the silence to fill.

“You asked about my name when we met,” he finally said. “Told me Dweymeri have names like Wolfeater and Spinesmasher.” A momentary smirk. “Cuddlegiver.”

Mia smiled in return, saying nothing.

“And you told me my name couldn’t be Tric.”

“… Aye.”

The boy looked up to the statue above. Hazel eyes dark and clouded.

“When a Dweymeri is born, the babe is taken to the high suffi on the isle of Farrow. The Temple of Trelene. And the suffi holds the baby up to the ocean and looks into its eyes and sees the path that lies before it. And the first words she speaks are the baby’s name. Earthwalker for a wanderer. Drakekiller for a warrior. Wavedrinker for one fated to drown.

“So like a good daughter of the bara should, my mother took me to Farrow when I was three turns old.” A bitter smile. “Runt,