small, fierce hunter beside her—and everyone else in the hallway is prey.
I throw my arms over my head, shielding myself from flying debris as boulders begin to fall, piling up between us and the cultists on both sides. Nimh’s whispering now, the hiss of it somehow cutting through the noise around us. She raises her hands as if commanding the ceiling to fall.
The air is heavy, roaring in my ears as if an impossible storm is brewing. The ceiling shudders, then splits with a great crack. Nimh lifts her hands higher, above her head, then throws them down toward the floor. With a boom like a strike of lightning, the whole ceiling comes crashing down.
It forms a wall—sealing us off from the cultists on both sides—making us safe.
She sags back against the stone behind her. The blue strobe fades. The only light is the one dim lamp nearest us.
I’m still pinned against the wall—disbelieving, awestruck, and terrified. “H-how did … ?”
Without moving, Nimh speaks quietly, her voice aching with exhaustion. “We should go. Before they remember there is a door into this section from the outside.”
I finally manage to move, stepping across a pile of rubble. “It’s still locked,” I point out, feeling a little like someone telling a master artist that one of the trees in her painting could use a couple more leaves.
Nimh doesn’t open her eyes, though she turns her head as if she wants to answer me.
“I’ll do it,” I tell her, reaching for her staff and hefting it in my hands. I hesitate for a long moment over using something so clearly ceremonial for this job. But Nimh used it to help her hike through the forest-sea, and time’s a factor. So I angle the butt of the staff toward the lock and bash at it, my mind racing.
What just happened?
Was it a virtual image? A hologram?
No, the stone piled up on either side of us is very real.
Something mechanical? Some kind of ancient defense system she triggered?
But how could—why would—the mechanism be located right where we needed it?
A distant part of my mind, observing my own scramble for logic, points out that none of these mysteries explain the intruder’s control over Nimh’s guard back at the party. How was that possible? How is any of this real?
With a final blow, the lock gives way.
The door swings open and the cat stalks forward, looking completely composed, despite the roof having fallen down around our heads. I stumble after the cat and Nimh follows. The exit leads to a dark side street that runs along the edge of the temple.
I hand back Nimh’s staff. A part of me is grateful to have her on my side—to have her power and her protection.
But another part of me—a part I can’t deny—is becoming afraid of her.
TWENTY-ONE
NIMH
The night is warm and quiet, and the streets and alleyways of the upper city are deserted. Most of my people are up at the temple. Are they captive—fearful for their futures? Are they revelers—celebrating my defeat?
Or are they prisoners—dying as they cry out for their goddess to save them?
I shudder, hunching my shoulders.
“Are you cold?” North’s voice is soft, coming from just behind my left shoulder.
“No.” I shake my head, fighting off another shiver. If it were one of my people with me, I would have used the excuse gladly. But I find I don’t want to lie to North anymore, even if it means showing human weakness. “I’m frightened.”
A sigh from North, and then, as he visibly pulls himself together: “Me too.” He looks around and tilts his head at the mouth of a narrow alley. “In there. We can hear if anyone’s following, and lose them if they are.”
We pause just beyond the lip of shadow at the alley’s entrance and stand for a time in silence. A faint breeze up above the streets stirs one of the pennants flying from a window. The Lovers have risen, but the silver rose of the moonlight leaches color in the darkness, and I cannot tell if the pennant is one of our multicolored flags of celebration or one of dull gray. In the distance I hear a shout—and then nothing.
The stillness chafes at me, my whole body twitching with the need to run, but I know North is right. Stealth is our best hope.
What kind of life has he led in his land in the clouds, that he is so accomplished at sneaking around and avoiding pursuers? How has it never occurred