even then, its effects are never twice the same. But sometimes, very, very rarely, its touch brings along with madness a thread of future-sight …
If the Graycloaks have their way and remove me from power, then I may well be the last.
The last living goddess to walk the land.
I bend down to stroke the bindle cat, whose muscles are bunching in preparation to pounce. When I look up, the mist-touched man is gone. The market is busy now, and I can see very little past the denser ring of people trying to avoid me. As I turn to search for the old man, the ring undulates away as if pushed by some invisible force.
There is no way with the mist-touched to tell addled ramblings from prophecy until the thing they speak of comes to pass. Even if I could find him again, he likely wouldn’t remember what he said.
I straighten, trying not to let the nearby onlookers see me rattled. The riverstriders make up most of the floating market, and they’re among the most devout and devoted—but I see flashes of gray nonetheless. What began as a series of whispers years ago, deep underground, is now an open movement.
The Graycloaks.
I will not let them see my fear.
I stride forward, the ring of onlookers stretching and then snapping away, children and adults alike scattering before me.
Quenti’s houseboat has a cluttered, ramshackle look to it, as though it began as a one-room shack on a barge and other floors and chambers were added here and there as needed. Knowing Quenti, that might actually be the case.
I ease the door open a fraction and clear my throat. “Blessings upon this house,” I call tentatively—like most riverstriders, Quenti’s never been terribly formal, but he also houses half a dozen river children at any given time, and I err on the side of caution when it comes to announcing my presence.
A flurry of feet precedes a series of hushed exclamations. I look up to see a trio of round faces peering down at me from the second-floor landing. When they see the woven crown upon my head, two of the faces jolt and vanish again. The third—a girl, I think, although it’s difficult to tell in the gloom—watches me with open curiosity.
“World’s end, it’s true.” The voice is not Quenti’s cracked and kindly one. I squint in the low lighting at the young woman who arrives on the heels of one of the little riverstriders. She bends to whisper something in the child’s ear, sending him off again before descending the stairs. “Welcome, Divine One. Our thanks for the light you bring this day.”
Her voice is taut and cautious where Quenti’s would have been warm. In the tension of her voice is an unspoken question, one she dares not ask.
“I come to see Quenti,” I tell her in answer, once she’s reached the bottom of the rickety stairs. “I must speak with him privately.”
She hesitates, giving me the time to examine her more closely. She looks a few years older than I am, and wears the braids of a married riverstrider, black hair woven through with the iridescent blue-and-copper plumage of the crested flame-tail. Those feathers, and the bright bangles at wrist and ankle, identify her as a member of the same clan as Quenti. Olive skin at the neckline of her tunic darkens at her shoulders, telling of hours spent on the water under the sun, and muscle along the arm against the railing tells me she is more accustomed to river work than market politics.
The silence stretches, and I see that strong arm twitch. Realization hits me: she doesn’t know how to be around me. She is frozen between a desire to avoid offense and a fear of disappointing me.
I draw a breath, trying to ignore the abrupt sting of self-consciousness that needles at the back of my mind, whispering: Did you expect her to snap to attention? You’ve been too long in the shelter of guards and priests… .
“What is your name?” I ask her, letting go of the air of command that took me years to cultivate.
“Hiret, Lady.” She swallows. “I am Quenti’s niece. That is my sister, Didyet.” She tilts her head without looking—the girl who’d remained at the top of the stairs to watch is still there, but now that I look more closely, she is not as young as I’d first thought. Younger than me, but not by much.
“Really?” I don’t have to feign friendly delight. “I knew