tool as much as his body, and it has been forged in the fires of Ghenna. To unpick and reshape the works of Gods and emperors requires an understanding of the very fabric of the Land such as mortal minds could never grasp. We were never intended for that. What you see as madness might instead be Isak discovering a part of him more akin to the immortal mind.’
The three were silent as they watched Legana catch Isak’s attention and eventually down sit beside him.
Then Doranei spoke, his voice a rasp. ‘Or it could be he’s just fucking mad and we’re all screwed.’
Mihn nodded. ‘True.’
— Do you remember me?
Isak looked up at Legana’s face. There was no recognition in his eyes, but eventually he nodded. ‘We are both broken,’ he said, returning his attention to the surface of the lake. ‘All twisted and broken.’
She looked at his face side-on. The lines of his head were unnatural, reminding her of a copper bowl battered by years of careless use. White-eyes could heal remarkably quickly, and often with barely a trace of the original injury, but Isak’s head bore the record of the abuse inflicted upon him.
Scars ran up his cheek from jaw to hair-line. The curve of his earlobe was frayed, like the wing of a dead butterfly. A furrow ran down the ear that looked remarkably like a massive claw had raked it. The furrow petered out where it reached the clear indentations of a massive chain pulled tight around his throat, each link looking like it had been burned into the skin with acid.
The extent of the damage shocked her, and she was reminded of the battle between the Lady and Aracnan. Her last memory of her Goddess had been one of agony, both personal, and that radiating out from the Lady as the power of a Crystal Skull burned through her divine form.
— Not completely broken she wrote. She held the slate in front of Isak’s face, but he said nothing.
— Mihn sent a message to King Emin. About Lord Styrax.
Isak shrank back from the name in front of him, drawing his hands protectively up to his chest until Legana pulled the slate away. Eventually he took a deep breath and turned to look at her again, and this time Legana saw a spark in his eyes, the return of something human that was hiding behind the damaged remnants of his mind.
‘There are holes in my mind,’ Isak said. ‘I will never be remade - not even the Gods have such strength.’
— What do you see in those holes?
‘Shadows,’ Isak said, with a lopsided attempt at a smile that would have terrified children and unnerved the mortal Legana . . . but it was pity that filled her heart now. ‘I see shadows where once there were memories, the parts of me I’ve lost.’
Legana looked at him, and Isak reached out a hand to awkwardly pat hers; he had two fingernails missing and not one finger followed the natural line. A man’s touch had always made her skin crawl, sparked a flutter of panic in her heart. It had taken her years to learn how to keep such reactions in check, even with her unyielding strength of mind . . . but Isak was as a child.
She took his hand and held it between her own, feeling him tremble slightly as he spoke.
‘These holes are the only weapons I have.’ He raised his other hand and Legana flinched as she realised he held Eolis in it. ‘This I have no use for, I’m just waiting for someone to need it.’
Legana let Isak go and wrote - Will holes be enough?
‘Perhaps,’ Isak replied, enigmatically, ‘but no. There will still be sacrifices. How it may be done I don’t know.’
— I don’t understand.
Isak stood, and looking down at Legana, said, ‘I know what will stop . . . him . . . but . . .’ He flexed his damaged fingers, as if reaching for a solution, then said sadly, ‘The pieces are not yet complete.’
— And Azaer? ‘How do you kill a shadow?’
— There are ways. There has to be.
Isak held up a bag that hung from his waist. ‘These are the key, hidden somewhere inside them.’ He opened the bag and showed Legana the object within, a Crystal Skull. It wasn’t one of those given to Isak by the Knights of the Temples, but the Skull of Dreams, the one fused to Xeliath’s skin until her death.