Etvia was like nowhere in the Canavar lands. The roads were wide and winding, the hills gentle and rolling, the people quiet and serene. The villages we passed through felt stuck in an eternal midsummer day, hazy and bright and so motionless that the only sounds came from the buzzing of cicadas and the rushing of wind through wheat fields. Every house was tidy and modest, their wattle-and-daub facades matched with a delicate thatched roofing, their windows open to let in the wildflower breeze. We bought meals at local taverns and inns, sat outside on wide tables and drank ale under the sun, and once threw dice with a group of retired farmers. The sword on my hip felt almost obscene, here, the power contained within Andiya perverse. This was not a place accustomed to violence. The Curtain kept any threat at bay, and the peacefulness seemed to have quelled any need for crime or unrest. It was little wonder the Drahko’s people thought the Canavar savage.

We crossed the Etvian countryside in two days. I saw no military presence to speak of: according to Jiyi, the majority of the Drahko’s forces were stationed in Bel Arben. We’d need to step carefully once there, she warned. The Drahko would not appreciate intruders in his lands.

Between Etvia and Bel Arben was a braid of three grand rivers: the Émeraude, the Diamant, and the Saphir. Perched on the Saphir, the largest of the three, was the city Médine, capitol of Etvia and holy seat of the Followers of the Countless. As we approached it, I pulled up Andiya’s hood, obscuring her face in shadow. All that remained of her were those thin horns spiralling out from slits in the fabric.

Médine was built low, sprawling, the streets so ancient they were worn flat. It was one of the first cities ever established in Itrera, built upon what remained of elven ruins. Incense burned from the windows of nearly every house, filling the air with a thin smoke. Bells tinkled gently from the eaves of jade roofs. Under our robes, Andiya and I drew no attention—all eyes followed Jiyi’s hulking, razor-toothed daemon. Jiyi hadn’t covered him. She wouldn’t need to, as the Empress’s envoy. But just because she wouldn’t be arrested didn’t mean that people wouldn’t hate her for it.

Médine spider-webbed over the smaller rivers, deep canals splitting the city into districts. We passed through the university, students pausing at the sight of us to mutter prayers. I saw scores of bonded, all of them in deep, formless robes that masked everything they were. They clinked as they moved.

“Iron chains,” said Jiyi loudly enough for everyone around us to hear. “The barbaric practice of a weak people. I would be ashamed to live amongst them.”

Glares burned my back, but I glared right back.

Jiyi took us to the holy district. The Grand Temple rose before us, an austere construction fused with the Curtain. It was pyramid in shape and tiered like gigantic stairs, every level comprised entirely of carved archways that led into labyrinthine, candle-lit halls. Priests walked passively with their heads down and covered daemons in tow, filling the halls with the low murmur of constant prayer.

“I’ll be done in an hour or so,” said Jiyi. “The High Priest is expecting me. Relax, look around. Look pious, if you can. Hae will come get you when I’m done.”

Jiyi left us in an open hall, Hae trotting behind.

I took her advice and explored the temple. My family and I had celebrated the holy holidays with everyone else in Barje Vos, and my father had told me tales of the Creators as bedtime stories, but so much in the temple was unfamiliar to me. Mosaics of the Creators covered every wall, wrapped every arch. I meandered past murals of Water, Life, Honour, Balance, Truth, and then a statue of twisting colour to the often overlooked Imagination. They were crafted among scenes of heaven: vast gardens, palaces piercing clouds, and rivers of pearl, the sky alit with seven suns. A curvaceous maiden with hair like abalone—Music—lounged on a bed of reeds, plucking at a harp. Craft, a wizened old woman with one eye, forged a holy blade. The golden ghost of Judgement plunged his blade through the silvery heart of End, banishing him to the furthest hell, where he would remain until his time. The deceptively beautiful, midnight-haired Wrath welcomed the birth of her first child, War.

Andiya stopped. She faced the next mural, pain coursing up the bond.

This mural wrapped the ceiling, drowning us in black tiles and bursts of quartz stars. A Creator crossed a battlefield littered with bent blades and mangled limbs. She held a golden scythe, a pallid snake wrapped around the shaft. I knew in an instant who she was. Death, delivering the justice of her father, Judgement.

I was transfixed by Death herself. They’d made her so delicate, built of glass shards so tiny that she glittered in the low light like a swath of diamonds. She was mid-stride, stars pouring from her loose white chiton, her white hair. Her eyes were closed, downturned. Sombre in the face of her duty.

“She really looks like this?” I ran a thumb along the crown of starlight that radiated off Death’s hair. Carved with such care, such reverence.

“Yes. They all do.”

I turned, taking all the mosaics in. There were countless Creators, all shrouded behind the veil of fading history.

“I wonder how the artists knew.”

“Ruins. They liked their art, the Creators. Left it all behind when they abandoned us.”

“Abandoned us? They’re not … not still here? Not in heaven, looking down?”

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“No. They went back to wherever they came from. They check in when they feel like it.” Those last words came out in a snarl. When they felt like it. Like they’d felt like killing her family.

My eyes fell back to Death. “My mother said the Creators left the world to us when humanity could stand on its own. When we no longer needed them. She said that now they watch us proudly, waiting for the day when humanity is their equal. Then we shall be as one, sharing the world together.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“Thanks.”

“No offence, I should have said. But the Creators don’t give a shit if humanity betters itself. They don’t care about anyone’s happiness but their own.”

She tightened her fists, pain and fury wild inside her. Then Andiya simply stalked off, rather than risk exploding. I let her go. I knew better than to push.

Instead, I lingered before Death. She seemed … sad. As though deep in prayer herself, begging forgiveness for the loss and suffering that raged around her. What tale was this? Had I ever heard it? I ran my hand along the cold stones, feeling the bright stars.

One popped from the wall.

As it went skittering across the floor, I rushed to grab it. It was cold against my skin, as though it had been stuck in ice. I quickly stashed it in my pocket. No one had seen.

Part of me knew I should put the star back. But it had fallen for me, and me only. I knew what Andiya thought. The Creators didn’t send the star for me.

But what if they did?

I followed where Andiya had gone, lingering on every mural. They were real, all of them. And they didn’t care about any of us. I passed several priests, deep in prayer as they walked. Were they really praying to gods who did not even bother to listen? Were the lives of those who worshipped them so worthless?

Andiya stood against the temple’s edge, looking out over the water. She was still, as lifeless as the bonded the Etvians thought she was. The gigantic wyrwood trees of Bel Arben swayed gently far on the other side of the Saphir, their thick trunks veined with a slight aquamarine glow. The deep woods stretched on as far as the eye could see, filling the horizon with a pale light that blended with the clear sky. I leaned on the rail beside Andiya. When she didn’t react to my presence, I prodded with my mind.

“I’m sorry you need to act this way.”

“It’s not for long. We’ll be in Kaelta soon enough.”

“I know. I just don’t like seeing you like this.”

“I would have thought you’d enjoy the silence, rather than hearing my opinions all day.”

“I like your opinions.”

She turned infinitesimally, and I caught her ruby eyes under her hood.

“Then can I tell you that you should have asked the Shrikes to shave your hair? It’s all messy, grown out.”

I smiled, stifling a laugh. “I’ll have it done as soon as I can, then. So you don’t need to suffer the embarrassment.”

“You’d be embarrassing with any haircut.”

At that, I really did laugh. Because there was such a welcome familiarity to her insults that I longed to hear them from her real voice, see them snapped from her lips.

“I haven’t heard you worry about Kaelta,” said Andiya. “Aren’t you concerned about entering a country of daemons?”

“I suppose I should be concerned, shouldn’t I? But you’ll be with me. I trust you, Andiya. Enough that if you say I will be safe in Kaelta, I will go.”

“With offence this time, that is massively stupid.”

I chuckled, and I felt Andiya’s light approval.

“According to you, I’ve always been a bit stupid.”

“That is true. A smart person runs away from danger. How often do you dive at it head-first?”

“At that, dear lady, I must protest.” I caught the edge of her smile under her hood. “Danger seems to find me whether I like it or not. I just do a poor job of avoiding it.”

“Right. One day your luck is going to run out, you know. What was it that Jawahir said to you? You will passively kill yourself, not actively?”

I froze on the rail. My heart skipped. “What did you just say?” I blurted out.

Andiya’s mind snapped shut, but not before I felt her panic.

“Andiya—did he tell you that? When did he tell you that?”

But she pulled back from the rail. My heart felt like it was caving in. She wouldn’t. She didn’t.

Andiya turned sharply to look down the hall. Jiyi and Hae walked briskly, and the expression on Jiyi’s face put me on my guard.

“You two need to get out of here,” she hissed. “Hae’s going to take you over the river to Bel Arben.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Your Inquisitor is here. The Shrikes sent him to bring you back. He’s got a squadron of nearly thirty bonded with him.” Jiyi grabbed my wrist and dragged me to Hae’s side. “You need to run. We can’t risk the Etvians realizing Andiya is a High Order. The Drahko will never let you escape his lands if he knows.”

A massive group of Shrike soldiers rounded the corner, making straight for us. Their group was a blend of Elementals and tiraar, and at the head of them, Seylas rode a massive wyvern, his face a mask of hard calm. Hae lay down for us to mount.

But I was looking at one of the Shrike soldiers. A scaled, reptilian, snarling daemon followed him. Thin, finger-long teeth protruded from its jaw, and it was missing a long patch of scales on its neck, as though it had been stabbed and hadn’t properly healed.

The realization stole my breath. I knew that daemon—it had been stabbed, by Irina. By an iron dagger that had nearly killed it. That soldier was a Crow, but not a Crow—only a Shrike, dressed as one. And he’d been ordered to kill the princess.

I tripped backwards onto Hae, numb with shock and horror. We’d left Irina with the Shrikes, left everyone, left Yulia—

Hae stood. Before him, Jiyi drew her blade. The runes along its face flared to life, pouring curling blue smoke onto the ground. She spoke in quick Go-Ah to Hae.

“Go,” translated Andiya. “Get them out of here, no matter what you see.”

And we were moving, bounding up the tiers of the temple. When a tiraar tried to take flight, Jiyi swiped her blade viciously. A hard blast of air burst from it, crackling with magic. It blew the tiraar into the temple, cracking its head against the stone. We watched Jiyi uselessly from above. The Shrike soldiers reached her. They clashed blades, Jiyi moving as a whirl of flashing metal and the twisting wind of a tornado. With her every strike, blasts of hard air pulsed from her blade and blew the Shrikes back. They couldn’t take off to chase us.

But she was outnumbered. A subjugator’s silver chains wrapped her, bringing her to her knees. Jiyi slashed, and a cut of air took off the head of a panther-like daemon. With a horrible shriek, a soldier fell.

Then a Shrike drove his blade through Jiyi’s stomach.

Hae roared so fiercely the temple trembled. He took a step back to Jiyi, but she fixed him with a hard look. Hae backed away, howling and howling in agony. Jiyi pitched face-first to the ground. Blood pooled around her.

Seylas turned to us, and his wyvern opened its wings.

Hae took off in a rush of wind and sunlight.