Ofelia knows what Crasedes will do, or what he wants? It sounds like when you found her aboard the galleon, things had not precisely gone as she’d anticipated…”
“I’ll goddamn say,” muttered Sancia, staggering in.
“Ahh!” said Orso, turning around on the ground where he sat. “She’s awake at last. I suppose you noticed the world hasn’t ended yet. Guess Crasedes hasn’t made progress on that one.” He shot to his feet, strode over, and bent over to peer into her eyes. “Tell us,” he said. “Any contact from your little golden friend?”
Sancia was still shaken from her conversation with Polina, so it took her a moment to focus on what he was saying. “Valeria?” she asked. “What the hell do you mean?”
“The last time she spoke to you was while you slept,” said Berenice. “She seems to have more…access to you, I suppose I should say, while you’re asleep. We’d hoped she’d speak to you.”
“I take it that’s a no, then?” said Orso.
Sancia shook her head.
“Son of a bitch!” he snarled. He started pacing about the tiny, cramped tent. “We let you pass out in the mud for hours, and got nothing for it! How the hell are we going to get ahold of her? She’s the only person, or entity, or whatever the hell she is, that could possibly tell us what Crasedes is doing!”
“He wants Clef,” said Sancia. “I told you all last night. Which makes me really nervous about him being stuck in our goddamn attic! Crasedes could just fly over there, smash the roof in, and pluck him out!”
“And yet,” said Gregor. “He has not. I paid some of Polina’s people to keep watch on the place. Crasedes has yet to make an appearance, or anyone Dandolo.”
“Which is what we’ve been debating all morning,” said Berenice with a yawn, “and indeed most of the night. What is he here to do? And if he can do nearly anything, why hasn’t he moved yet?”
There was a silence. Sancia slowly walked over to sit by Berenice, and she trembled a little. Her memories of last night—the voice in the darkness, and the immense pressure of his presence—began to circle her thoughts, and she struggled to beat them back.
“You weren’t in any state to discuss it last night,” said Orso. “But please—tell us everything you experienced regarding Crasedes. Any weakness, any feature, could prove valuable to us.”
She thought about it, remembering the sight of his body amid the shadows, his mask glinting in the moonlight, her bones reverberating with the sound of his voice.
She told them. When she was finished, she said, “He…talks more than I thought he would.”
“What does that mean?” asked Orso.
“I mean, he’s…compelling. He has immense power over gravity, which we all knew. But his voice…his voice might be the most dangerous thing about him. The more I listened to it, the more I believed everything he was saying. I think the only reason I could resist was because…well, apparently Valeria gave me some kind of protections against him.”
“Yes,” said Orso, grimacing. “Very proactive of her. I expect it’s like how we scrive objects to reject a certain person, telling a door, ‘If this person with this blood comes about, don’t open.’ Only she did it to your goddamn head, and told it to reject the first of all scrumming hierophants.” He laughed miserably. “I’m sorry, this is just the maddest conversation I’ve ever had…”
“But I think the thing in black…” said Sancia. “I’m not sure that’s actually him. I think he’s wearing a living body as a suit, or using it as a totem, puppeteering it about. They just tricked the world into thinking the live body is him, by scriving his wrappings and putting the little bone in the body’s hand.”
“You mean you think it was a living person once?” said Berenice, horrified.
“Probably, yeah. Maybe a slave’s. I think the body is like a, a focal point for his presence, and his permissions. If we destroy the wrappings, or cut the bone out of him…maybe it will disperse, and he’ll go back to being…whatever the hell he