There were only their lips pressed together, their tongues tasting each other, their hands, off weapons, on each other.
And the unending sigh of the ocean.
She pulled back, just as swiftly as she had embraced him. Her body still shook, her fingers still dug into his skin, her ears were still flat against her head. But her eyes were steady, fixed on his, unblinking.
‘I can’t change,’ she whispered, ‘anything.’
And she turned.
And she walked away.
And he stared after her, long into the night.
Forty-Two
THE ICE SPEAKS TRUE
Island of Teji
The Aeons’ Gate
Time is irrelevant
I lived on a farm before I became an adventurer. I had a mother, a father, a grandfather and a cow. None of those are important. What is important is that I don’t remember much about them.
Not much … but a little.
I remember that time seemed to stand still on a farm. We lived, we ate, we planted, we harvested, we watched births, we watched deaths. The same thing happened the next year … for as long as I was there.
This I remember. I remember it too well. Granted, the adventuring life was not too different: we lived, mostly; we ate things that we probably shouldn’t have; we stabbed; we burned; we once force-fed a man his own foot …
Some part of me, I think, still suspected life was that way, still thought that the world would never change.
But I’m learning all kinds of things lately.
Things change.
Weeks ago … gold seemed everything. Gold was everything. It would lead me back to the farm, back to living, planting, harvesting, birthing, dying. That part of me that thought the world would continue as it always had wanted me to go back, to prove it right.
That part of me is gone, though. It was cast out. It was a blanket, something thick and warm that kept me sleeping. I’m awake now.
The cave … I remember it. I remember it too well. I don’t know his name. I don’t know if he had family, if he ever planted anything or saw a child born. I don’t know how he lived.
But I know who he was. And I know how he died.
He fought the demons, back during the war with the Aeons in which the mortals triumphed against Ulbecetonth. He inspired fear in his enemies and the House of the Vanquishing Trinity that he marched with, even as they called him ally. He killed many. His purpose was to kill.
His companions feared him: what he said, what he knew, what he was. They went into that cave. They killed him. They died with him. I stared into his eyes. I knew this. Some part of me remembered it, some part that I’ve been trying to ignore. I knew him.
And he knew me. And he spoke to me. And I listened.
And it all began to make sense. I’ve seen the way they look at me, the way they look away when I stare at them. When they need order, when they need direction, they turn to me. When I needed them, they abandoned me, betrayed me.
Maybe it was stupidity on the surface. Maybe it was their selfishness, as I had suspected. Those might have been the shallows, but not the purpose. They had been waiting for that moment, the moment in which they could watch me die without retaliation.
They wanted me to die. They wanted to kill me. To kill us, but they couldn’t.
The voice told me this. It’s speaking so clearly now. It doesn’t command me. I talk to it; it talks back. We discuss. We learn. We reason. It told me everything about them, about their purpose. It made sense.
Things change.
They don’t.
I learned this too well tonight.
The voice was speaking clearly, but I was still doubting it. I didn’t see how they could hate me … well, no, I could see how they could hate me, sure. They’re assholes. But her … I didn’t believe it, not after that day.
So I watched her, as the voice told me to. I watched her go away. I followed her. I couldn’t, too closely, of course; she would hear me. She would know. So I followed her as far as I could. I heard her. I heard her talk with other voices.
I glanced out from my hiding spot and saw him.
Greenshict.
My grandfather told me stories of them. Manhunters. Skinners. Seven feet and six toes of hatred for humans. I learned more about shicts than I ever thought I would; I learned that they weren’t all bad; I learned about Kataria …
But Kataria is a puppy. Greenshicts are wolves. They kill humans. This is their sole purpose. I know this. Everyone does. She knows it, too. And she told me nothing of them.
I couldn’t tell what they were talking about. I didn’t need to know. The voice did. It told me they were plotting my murder, that she would never be able to change her purpose, her desire to kill me for what I am, for what she was. She was speaking with a creature born to kill humans.
I believed it.
I left.
And everything became clear after that.
The tome is the key. The man in the cave told me that. There’s more written on it than Miron would have me believe. His purpose was to lie and to obscure. Maybe there’s something worse written in it than I would imagine. But maybe … maybe there’s something in it I need to see, no matter the danger.
And there is plenty.
The Shen are numerous, Togu has told me. They relentlessly patrol their island home of Jaga. They tattoo themselves with a black line for each kill they make, a red line for each head they’ve crushed. I’ve never seen one without at least three red lines upon it, the rest of them in black. They are violent; they are watchful; they live on an island that no one knows the location of.
And they have the tome.
I will go after it. I will find it. I will learn the truth inside it. I will take them, the betrayers, with me.
I won’t give them another chance to kill me.
I will follow my purpose.
I will kill them all.
Epilogue
THE STIRRING IN THE SEA
Mesri had been a holy man, once: a revered speaker of the will of the Zamanthras. He had guided his people through many trials and many hardships. He was the chain that had held Port Yonder together. He was a leader. He was a man of the Gods. He was good.
And now, he was a fast-fading memory, his eyes shut tight and drifting beneath a cloak of shimmering blue as his body was commended to the depths. The last body to go under, the other victims of the longfaces’ attack having since been offered to the ocean. It had begun reverently enough, with the ritual candles burned and the holy words spoken.
But the candles had been extinguished by a stray wave. The people did not know all the words. Mesri did. Mesri was dead. So was half of Port Yonder. And once that reality became too apparent, the funerals lasted as long as it took to identify the bodies and drop them into the harbour.
By the time they sent Mesri to Zamanthras, only two remained to watch him sink beneath the blue. Only Kasla. Only Hanth.
The girl peered out over the edge of the dock. ‘Do we say something?’
‘To who?’ he asked.
She glanced around the empty harbour. ‘To Zamanthras?’
‘Feel free,’ he said.
Kasla inhaled deeply and looked for inspiration. She looked to the sky, grey and thundering. She looked to the sea, glutted with corpses. She looked to the city, its blackened ruin and blood-spattered sands. And so, she looked out over the ocean and spat.