faster than he.
“I fear you’re in danger,” she said far more quietly.
“If they wished me dead, I would have met that fate outside Dunlyn.”
She was now confused. “Then why are they here?”
“I do not know, and as I said, I do not care. I won’t be drawn into whatever is happening across the Triton Sea. It is not my life. My world. My home. And it never again will be.”
“Do you think they’ll just go away?”
“I think, when they wish their presence to be known, and their message to be delivered, they will do it.”
“But they don’t wish you harm.” She made a statement that was a question.
“Harm comes in many forms, my warrior,” he replied. “And whatever their business, them coming from there will cause me harm.”
“Chu,” she whispered.
“I survived assassins, mouse, I’ll survive whatever this is.”
She did not look convinced, but she didn’t say more.
“Have you ever fucked aboard a ship?” he asked.
Her face changed, and not to what it normally did when he would utter such words.
To obstinacy.
His woman was anxious.
“We are nearly there,” she remarked.
“And?” he asked.
She shook her head, “It won’t work, Chu, you will not turn my mind from my worries.”
“Care to wager?”
She studied him.
He moved to her.
She did not wager.
Which was well and good.
For she would have lost.
Queen Ha-Lah
Queen’s Study, Keel Castle, Nautilus
MAR-EL
“You feel sure of this,” Farah asked Ry where they all sat about, pouring over the tomes they had confiscated from Go’Doan, as well as the ones Ry had brought to Sky Bay, all of which covered the makeshift table that Tint, Bond, Ore and Nis had set up in my study.
“Before they were captured in the stones, they cursed the gods who created them, and…” Ry lifted the armless spectacles to his eyes, but even so, he squinted over the volume before him and read from it, “and vowed vengeance with no mercy that they would wreak destruction across the lands and to the peoples the gods had also created, before they sought the gods and consumed them, taking their all-powerfulness within themselves and replacing the makers so all would worship them or know tyranny.”
“And you are certain the gods who created them are Triton and Medusa?” I queried.
Ry shoved aside the book in front of him and reached for another beyond that, which was opened to a pertinent page.
I had earlier read from that book myself.
It was entitled, THE CREATORS: TRITON AND HIS QUEEN.
He bent over it and read, “To the sirens, as demi-gods, they gave them their dominion as was their wont, fearsome power to play with those on the seas, so the sailors would revere them and pray to them. To the Mer, their chosen, the ones that sprang forth from their love, they gave the bounty of The Deep. To the beings, they gave them land to sew and reap and make plenty. To the charmed, they gave magic, to hold and protect. To the demons, they gave havoc, in order that all their creatures would know adversity, and how to draw together to overcome it.”
Ry pushed that tome away, pulled another out from under one to his left, opened it at a marked page, and read.
“But the demons did not lose their purpose. And when the land was locked in turmoil, the Beasts would sleep. But when the land sought serenity, the Beasts would awaken. And those proclaimed would face the challenge. In victory, this homage to the goodness of the gods would make them rise. In defeat, the demons would kill the gods to become gods themselves and the realm of Triton would grow dark for eternity.”
He turned to another marked page.
“For the proclaimed would be born holding the power of the gods. And they would wield it. But the god would call his sacrifice. And he would have it. And then the power would be unleashed.”
“What sacrifice?” Farah whispered.
“You have all sacrificed along this journey, have you not?” Ry, catching her mood, said soothingly.
I sat, struck.
“Yes,” Farah answered.
“No,” I said.
They both looked at me.
“You…” Farah began, but she didn’t go on, for it was true. I hadn’t. Not like the rest of them. Then she said, “Aramus lost his man in Fire City.”
“Aramus did, but I barely knew him.”
I said these words at the same time I felt my blood run cold.
Farah reached a hand to me and murmured, “Ha-Lah.”
“Is there more about this sacrifice?” I asked G’Ry.
He shook his head. “That is the only mention of it, my dear.”
“You barely knew Aramus