thinking clearly at the time. All we wanted to do was to protect Cylene. We failed. Arathé, if we cannot even protect ourselves, how can we overcome the gods?
She mind-smiled at him. Husk has given me some ideas, she said, but did not elaborate.
You’re worried about your father. I know you want to go searching for him, but if you do, he may resent it. I’m sure he’s safe. You still have a connection to him, so you would know if he was in serious trouble.
Only if he asks for help.
You’re right; we should try to find him.
Despite this thought, she could see he still wasn’t sure.
Cyclamere’s most likely with him, he sent.
She had forgotten that. Oh yes, the man who trained him. He’ll be a levelling influence, for certain.
Perhaps the Padouki removed Cylene’s body from the beach.
During an earthquake?
Duon had a wonderful heart, but sometimes she wondered about his common sense. Actually, she supposed, the fact that they were here was compelling evidence that none of them had any common sense.
Then who took it?
Duon, I was thrown clear into the forest. Cylene may have ended in the sea, or further in the trees. She might have been buried by one of those sand fountains. Of all our troubles, her missing body is low on the list.
She sensed the fright in his mind before he expressed his thought. In a very odd moment, she shared his vision: he was looking out over the bay as he spoke, and she saw it through his eyes while facing towards the forest. The ocean was emptying of water. The crazy phenomenon was accompanied by a loud sucking noise.
Where is it going?
At that moment, in a reversal of the previous sensation, she felt Duon look through her eyes to see her father stagger into view.
Noetos lumbered forward like a bear, blood streaming from a cut to his scalp. Eyes wide and unfocused, he didn’t seem to notice his children rushing towards him.
“Where is she?” he growled. “Where is she?”
“Father, we don’t know,” Anomer said, and waited for the explosion.
“I am here,” said another voice.
Unbelievably, Cylene herself emerged from the forest.
“How are you alive?” Noetos asked, his voice filled with wonder.
It was the question Anomer wanted an answer to. Alarms began to sound in his head as Cylene started her explanation. This is not right. People don’t come back to life just because their deaths are tragic. Dozens of unlikely things had happened since the gods had begun to break the world, but happy endings had not been a part of any of them. Through his connection with his sister he could sense she too was uneasy.
“I died,” Cylene said, her voice husky with pain. “There was a noise, then the ship smashed down on top of me. It broke my back and forced my face into the water.” She took a strained breath. “I tried to breathe, but all I could take in was water.”
“You drowned,” Noetos said.
He hovered over Cylene like a mother hen, kneeling beside her as she sat against a fallen trunk. He obviously wanted to embrace her, but just as clearly was concerned that she might still be injured.
She gazed up at the fisherman and Anomer’s breath caught in his throat. Had her eyes always been this dark? Was this an effect of the drowning?
“Yes,” she said. “I drowned. I struggled, but everything faded away and I floated in blackness, surrounded by a million pinpoints of light. Some of the lights whispered things to me, but I can’t remember what they said. Everything about the black place scared me; it wasn’t anything like the heaven my parents taught us about when we were children. I heard you roar, and your magic pulled me back towards my body. But I could not make the leap and I hovered at the edge of the hole in the world, waiting to see what happened.”
“So what happened?” Noetos asked.
“I watched my body start to disintegrate,” she said. “It was awful. My skin became dry and hard and I could see it turning a dreadful green colour around my mouth and eyes. There were things crawling under my skin and strange eructations throughout my body.”
This still did not ring true. Had Cylene been so absorbed in her appearance while alive that it would become her primary concern when dead? To be fair, Anomer had never been dead, so perhaps he was misreading her—or maybe his love for his mother continued to prejudice him against the