Chapter V
The Temple of the Damned
In which Alia makes good on a promise
Alia dispatched Sheridan to see to their gryphons, kept penned up in the fane’s aerie. Their three gryphons should transport the six of them fast enough, once they got underway.
But another matter pressed on her mind.
Back in the priests’ tower, Selàna brought up the rear as the group dispersed. Allowing Alia to neatly cut across her path and separate her from the others.
The girl halted, and blinked at Alia in obvious startlement. Her eyes darted from side to side, as if she were searching for escape routes.
Without preamble Alia asked, “Where did you—where did Zephyra dispose of the bodies of the people she sacrificed to Rahqu? My aunts, the dryads. Or the bodies of those people the Manticoran Guards murdered?”
Shuddering, Selàna pressed her fingers against her temples. “Must we speak of this?”
Alia considered her. What ghastly rites had Selàna witnessed as Zephyra? Back in Lyrcania, Alia had thwarted a soul-cutting ceremony. What would she have seen if she hadn’t been able to stop the shadow priests in time? The shadow priests were part of the Lords of Chaos, who were allied with Lord Protector Amavand—the Eye, as Junius Fellrath’s note had referred to him.
Selàna exhaled, and fixed glassy eyes upon Alia. “Every one killed in her name was brought first to the temple. Her temple. It’s beneath the palace.”
Ugh. Underground temples. The abode of death cults and other creepy, pustulant orders of spell-wielders. Shadow priests, too, though the ones she had fought had used a home above-ground.
Her stomach fluttered, for at once she realized she had never thought to look underground at the lair of the Lords of Chaos. But perhaps the Chrysopteron’s people were thorough when they destroyed the temple.
“Will I need anything in particular when I go there?” Mentally, Alia ran down a list of weapons and counterspells. “Does anything ward the way?”
“Zephyra always wore her diadem. She carried a staff, like any other priestess, but when you seized her she left it behind in her bedchamber. Those items, the staff and the diadem, gave her right of entry into the temple.”
“Ahh,” Alia sighed. When she last entered Zephyra’s chamber, a bloodthirsty drakaina barred the way. Killing the lone dragon-woman took entirely too long for her liking. Other horrendous arsh’atûm roamed the citadel, and some of them might prowl about in packs. Before storming the citadel she and the rest of her cohort agreed to only concern themselves with the ones directly in their path. The rest they would leave to the care of the soldiers of Elamis.
“All right then,” Alia said. “My gryphon can take me straight to Zephyra’s balcony. But you, Selàna, must come with me.”
Eloquent dismay was written all over Selàna’s face, but Alia disregarded it. Higher priorities called to her.
“I doubt the staff and the diadem were all that allows right of entry into the temple,” Alia pointed out. “It’s Rahqu’s temple—and you’re the vessel of the abyssal. Part of it is in you. That would be sufficient in itself to gain you entry in any place consecrated to the shade queen. Those other items are just markers of your office. They grant you authority over whatever guardian is there. Come.”
Her tone brooked no refusal, and she kept her face an inscrutable mask, yielding no purchase for an appeal to pity. But then Selàna looked up, boldly locking gazes with Alia.
“I owe those victims the rites you would give to them. I will go.”
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Selàna could not bring herself to speak. In silence she hugged herself, trying in vain to keep the cold at bay as she gazed out at the palace garden from her perch on Zephyra’s balcony. Shame and fear nailed her feet to the floor, and she made no attempt to overcome her paralysis.
Nothing deterred Ironwing. Not one word did she say to Selàna, except, “get on,” when she mounted her gryphon, and “get off” when they arrived at Zephyra’s balcony. Cool, brusque, and taciturn, this huntress. Smoothly she dismounted her gryphon.
In one fluid motion she unsheathed a strange weapon, a small gold dragon hugging a tube of ivory. Its tail projected up, in a manner that suggested it was movable, though Ironwing’s hand rested on a handle below it. This must be one of the fabled Lyrcanian weapons. Did the dragon signal the use of fire? Ironwing’s male companions carried longer versions, but theirs didn’t have dragons. Perhaps something else came out of theirs. Ice? Lightning — no, the Rasena Valentian women wielded the power of lightning, with their lightning quivers.
The exotic foreigners had shaken Zephyra by their very possession of the quivers. Only the giants were supposed to have them, yet the pair of seemingly soft gentry women had claimed them as spoils of battle. And could use them with deadly efficiency, as Optima Nuriel had done against a Manticoran Guardsman.
Ironwing aimed her dragon weapon towards the door, and hesitated. Showy pink roses adorned a pair of wreaths fixed to the double doors separating the balcony from the bedchamber. Unlocked. The doors would be unlocked, for Zephyra never locked it. As the daughter of the Lord Protector, and the high priestess of the Greatest One, Zephyra feared nothing.
With her free hand Ironwing eased open one of the double doors, enough to peer inside. Cautious. Taking her example, Selàna sheltered between the gryphon’s eagle wings and lion flank. The paradox beast gave off heat, warming Selàna’s somewhat, especially her back. It ruffled its feathers, but gave no indication of alarm. If something dangerous lurked near, surely the gryphon would sense it and cry warning?
But the beast only squawked, and made no threat display.
Whatever the huntress saw must have met her approval, because she flung the door open and strode inside, her green deerskin leather coat flapping about her legs. Not once did she look back at Selàna. Likely she didn’t imagine Selàna would dare to stay behind, not after having demanded her presence.
Selàna focused on her feet, shod as they were in simple raw leather sandals that exposed her toes.
“Move,” she told herself.
But she didn’t move. On her shoulders she carried the burden of Zephyra’s actions. Such things that woman did! And by what means would Selàna undo them? Her own clothes underscored her insigificance: she wore a simple pale blue woolen caftan. Charity from one of the temple keepers. So plain and austere a garment insisted to any who saw it that she bore no priestly authority, whether divine or infernal. Of no consequence was she, of no rank was she. In her hands she wielded no staff of office.
How, then, was she to do what Bessa wanted her to do? For that matter, how was she to do what Ironwing wished her to do?
Only a month ago—for Selàna it was only a month ago—she had told Papa she wanted to be a sea lord like him. Sailing the high seas, visiting exotic ports, bringing back fabulous treasures.
Papa had laughed and kissed her forehead, delighted in her wish to follow in his footsteps. He held her close to him as they gazed out at the horizon, where the setting sun glimmered on the waters of the Gold Sea.
Warmed inside and out, Selàna had basked in his affection, feeling safe and loved in his strong arms.
But Mama stood apart.
The horizon stole all of Mama’s attention, for she seemed to have eyes only for the sunset. Though she must have heard Selàna’s cheerful prattle, she made no reply or objection. Perhaps she truly wasn’t paying attention, for she only glanced back at her and smiled absently. A reminder, yet again, that her thoughts were elsewhere.
Mama. Did you See that this would happen?
Reflexively Selàna reached for her pendant. She froze, her hand hovering over her sternum, clutching only air. A cold wave of grief washed over her. As a child she had worn a locket, as other Rasena Valentian children did, an amulet of Amyntas.
But like any other girl, Selàna abandoned the locket after her first bleed, when she no longer enjoyed the inherent protection of Amyntas. Instead, Papa gave her a new treasure, a pendant of abalone and mother-of-pearl carved in the likeness of a dolphin. A sweet trinket imbued with the blessing of the Sea Lord’s priests.
Truly Selàna treasured the necklace, and accustomed herself to clutching the little dolphin whenever she felt distressed or preoccupied.
Selàna’s stomach plunged. What had happened to the necklace?
Now she moved, hurrying after Ironwing.
Inside was no warmer than outside, for no one remained to bring firestones to Zephyra’s chamber. Befitting her status as Amavand’s “daughter,” servants would bring her three stones in pretty ceramic dishes they would set in strategic locations about the room. The chill of winter never touched Zephyra’s skin, except for when she chose to enter the balcony or the garden.
The sumptuously appointed room was her sanctuary, where she reveled in being surrounded by ornamental ferns and fragrant flowers and luxuriant tapestries. For Selàna; however, the perfume from those flowers brought back yet more memories which taunted and tormented her.
“Get your things,” Ironwing said, breaking her reverie. The huntress looked about the room. She turned only once, to gaze upon the altar she had so ruthlessly destroyed with the lightning quiver. An altar to Rahqu now reduced to a stinking ash heap, which Selàna carefully avoided looking at.
That she had been forced into worship of a belet ershetu — a queen of the underworld, as Mama’s priests taught her— still couldn’t overcome the overwhelming shame she felt at having done so.
Or the revulsion of her memories of what she had done in the name of that wicked abyssal. Even if she bathed herself in hyssop and vervain every day, twice a day, she couldn’t be washed clean of that taint…could she? Let Zephyra and all she touched rot away.
Except … the biting cold was starting to make her feverish. At once Selàna made her way to one of the cabinets lining the walls and flung them open. She kicked off her borrowed sandals and exchanged them for supple leather boots. Then she donned Zephyra’s prized pashmina cape, dyed a fine baby blue. Lined with rabbit fur on the inside, and trimmed with silky blue fox fur on the outside, the cape imparted sufficient warmth to halt Selàna’s shivering.
She looked up to find Ironwing eyeing her, lips thinned in either disaproval or impatience. But she said nothing, and Selàna supposed the huntress did not intend for her to be oppressed by the elements. Not enough to object to her seeking a remedy for it, anyway.
Time now, to obey Ironwing’s command. Every heartbeat she tarried here was an unconscionable delay. Ironwing had come to give peace to the dead; Selàna owed it to them to speed her on her way.
First Zephyra’s staff of office, which rested in a stand with golden brackets to hold it in place. Immediately the staff’s finial caught her attention: a wreath of belladonnas and opium poppies, whose tendrils formed the terminus points of the eight-limbed figure in the center of the wreath.
“What is that creature?” Ironwing asked, coming up behind her.
“A kind of chimera. Rahqu’s servants. Her generals. The Rasena Valentians dealt with seven of them: Honoria Vartanian, Justin Kellis, Rozvan Lior, Faenus Escamilla. No wonder Amavand feared those women so. But Archelaos escaped. He reported in to Rahqu, who told Lord Protector Amavand. The sixth, Decius Galenus, was banished in the Battle of the Rhabdomachaeum on the Night of the Burning Sky. Murena was banished that night, too, in the Battle of Abris.”
“Hm. All seven of them in Rasena Valentis. And the eighth?”
“The Interceptor. The Rasena Valentians are calling it ‘the Presence.’ And keep in mind, there are other, lesser servants scattered about.”
“You mean Friya?”
Selàna paused. “Zephyra’s handmaiden?”
“A shapeshifting spirit of deception.”
Realization dawned. The lengths Rahqu had gone to! Even Zephyra had not suspected her handmaiden was other than human. Then again, even Zephyra would not have lightly passed over that small detail.
“Well, I wasn’t thinking of Friya. I meant other humans and such in Rahqu’s service. Teams in Lyrcania, a commander in the Rasena Valentian legions—those kind of servants.”
Her hand hovered over the staff. No longer could she wield it with the pride or authority that Zephyra once did. Zephyra had exulted at her role as the Handmaiden of Rahqu, and as the heart of her father, lord of Elamis. Proudly the Handmaiden served her goddess, and took her duties seriously. Every part of her role received its share of deference and reverance from her.
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Anger locked Selàna’s jaws, making her clench her teeth so hard they ached. She snatched the staff from its place on the wall and tilted it so that the finial was eye level with her.
“By all that is good and holy I will see you broken and defeated,” she vowed. Turning, she started to charge forward then stopped abruptly, lest she crash into Ironwing.
The priestess held her ground, unperturbed. Softly she replied, “So let it be done.”
Somehow, Ironwing’s agreement with her sentiments emboldened Selàna to beg an indulgence from her. An indulgence which allowed her to search carefully through Zephyra’s jewelry boxes and strong boxes and secret hiding places.
But though she searched diligently, she failed to find the dolphin pendant. Likely Amavand, or Artostes, purposely destroyed it to ensure no memory of Selàna would resurface in the mind of Zephyra. Leaving Selàna with no token left to remember her true father by.
Tears stung her eyes as she silently seethed. Below her breath Selàna prayed, “Oh Destroyer, damn them all. Damn them. Damn them.”
They returned to Ironwing’s gryphon. At Selàna’s word, Ironwing flew them to Lord Amavand’s private garden. Only a day ago they passed this way, when Ironwing and her companions sought to close the shadow gate.
Once again Selàna opened the secret passage. Though she led the way, she lacked Zephyra’s confidence that nothing dwelling within those dark depths would rise up and slay them. Instead, fierce determination imbued her steps. If Rahqu’s servants would come, let them meet their end at her hands.
She glanced at Ironwing’s weapon, which the priestess still openly carried. Well, death at Ironwing’s hands then, because Selàna was not armed, of course. Who would trust her with a weapon?
They descended the stairs. Down they went, deep into the bowels of the mountain. Torches did not light the way, but Ironwing carried a wand with her. Early on she had tapped it against the wall, and a bright nimbus of light flared. Here she took the lead, as she must, being the only one capable of handling the dangers ahead.
Danger had not come their way by the time they reached the foot of the stairs. Heavy double doors greeted them. A huge bronze medallion covered the opening of the door, ensuring the door could not open while the medallion remained. The medallion was at least an inch thick, and heavy enough that the two women together would not be able to move it. The burnished metal bore no adornment, save for a strange pattern marking the outer edge.
Ironwing stared at it a moment, then she ran her hand along the door posts. A memory flashed before Selàna’s eyes, of Bessa Philomelos standing before the door to the royal nekromanteion. The Siluran warned them to be wary of doors with hidden posts and lintels. True to her warning, the nekromanteion’s door frame had been defaced, allowing all manner of creatures to escape from Erebossa.
Selàna studied the medallion. She recoiled, recognizing the pattern. Which was not a pattern, but rather an incantation in Rahqu’s language. Memories flooded her, of Artostes schooling Zephyra in this language. Of Rahqu temporarily possessing Zephyra when she entered a trance, and speaking through her.
“We can’t go in,” she said woodenly.
Ironwing glanced back at her. To Selàna’s surprise, the huntress regarded her with concern. “What is it?”
Selàna felt as if she were trapped in a mire, a whirlpool which could suck her down into infernal depths. She managed to find her voice. “That medallion seals the doors. It won’t unseal unless you command the doors to open. You…you must say the command in Rahqu’s language.”
Despair welled within her. Mama was a pious woman, and Papa a pious man. They had warned Selàna against falling in with sorcerers who spoke infernal languages. Speaking with the tongue of an abyssal was to place a weight on one’s soul that would sink the Scales. The Destroyer would open the gates to the Abyssal Serpent for such a one.
Ironwing astonished her again by sighing in relief. “Oh, good. I thought we were about to have an actual problem.”
Overwhelmed with bewilderment, Selàna stared at the back of the huntress, who now faced the door.
“By the Huntress I abjure you: back to your maker you go!” Ironwing’s voice rang out with queenly authority, echoing against the walls.
A green light flashed. Of course! Ironwing’s medallion, an amulet of chrysoprase bearing a sigil of the golden eagle. Bright light flared, not enough to blind them but enough to make itself known. Before her eyes the door medallion melted, smoking and hissing as rivulets of liquid metal scarred the door. The door itself burst into flame, then dissolved to ash.
Stepping over the heap, Ironwing passed the threshold. After a heartbeat, Selàna followed.
Now a thick black mist beckoned, so deep a black as to be the very essence of darkness itself. Tongues of mist roiled over the women, swathing them in darkness so absolute that the women hastened to clasp their hands together—they could no longer see one another, though they stood shoulder to shoulder. The mist covered even the wand Ironwing was using to guide them, obliging her to put it away.
Selàna swallowed. Her every exhale felt expelled from her nostrils, and her every inhale fell short of a true breath. Blood thundered in her veins as terror filled her belly, an awful truth dawning: to stand within the Void was to endure the seeping out of one’s very life force. Quickly, Selàna ransacked Zephyra’s memories, until one in particular came to the forefront of her mind.
She stepped forward, and a heartbeat later Ironwing matched step with her. The priestess tightened her grip on Selàna’s hand, and Selàna squeezed back.
Stay with me!
Though Selàna’s lips formed the words, she didn’t dare utter them aloud. Words did not vanish into the Void, as the empty mutterings of someone musing aloud while alone in a room. Something was listening. This much Zephyra had learned.
With every ounce of force she could muster, Selàna struck the ground with her staff, announcing her presence.
In a loud, clear voice she declared, “Onto the path I walk, bearing the staff of Chaos, wielding a power of the one who calls herself the Greatest of All.”
Were she Zephyra she would have said, I come bearing the staff of the Greatest of All. But Selàna could not bring herself to utter the lie with any conviction.
Nothing happened.
Ice water filled Selàna’s belly as her fear grew. In Zephyra’s hand the staff’s finials would have alighted, letting her see the narrow and treacherous path through the void. But in Selàna’s hands, the staff was only a large stick. She stepped back, Ironwing with her, until they once again stood beyond the threshold of the door.
“Staff of Chaos?” Ironwing’s voice was soft beside her. As if she were worried they might rouse something out of the void before them. Already she put away her dragon weapon, but her free hand hovered over her dagger, which rested in its sheath at her hip.
“You called Rahqu a spirit of the Void. Well, this is the Void. Or a sliver of it. This bridge we stand on is between two, ah, planes of existence. The wind, the darkness, come from the Void, and this bridge is within Rahqu’s home. According to Artostes, her staff is like a key, because it’s an object of Chaos. Only an object not of the Cosmos can be used to navigate the Bridge of the Void.”
“An object not of the Cosmos, you say?” Bemusement tinged Ironwing’s voice. And suddenly her voice changed, becoming more incantatory, as if she were reciting a poem. “In Erebossa I walk in the Light, for I carry with me the Lightbringer’s blessing, and where Her light shines, darkness must flee. For She illuminates our path that we may not stumble, and lights our way that we will not fall astray.”
Ironwing’s words had not quite faded away when, in the distance, a wisp of gold dawned. Faint at first, the wisp grew larger with every heartbeat, until it became a small nimbus no larger than either woman’s fists would be. Small though it was, it blazed with the brightness of the sun itself. It hovered a few paces before them, revealing a trail beneath their feet. Subtle and narrow, the trail vanished into darkness several feet ahead.
Awestruck, Selàna gaped at Ironwing. In the golden haze the huntress looked calm, as if she had expected such a miracle. Such faith made Selàna feel a trifle small, diminished. Why was she still looking at the world through Zephyra’s eyes? Twice now Selàna had believed herself defeated, solely because she was relying on Zephyra’s beliefs about what was true. Not on what she, Selàna Sideris, had once known. What her parents and their priests once taught her. Too much of Zephyra still lived within her spirit.
I will kill you. I will root you out, I will scythe you down, if it’s the last thing I do. Do you hear me, Zephyra?
What part of Zephyra remained only answered her with a sardonic smile.
Ironwing squeezed her hand again, her strength and warmth momentarily driving out recrimination and self-pity. Unwilling to speak, Selàna exchanged a nod with the priestess. Together they stepped forward onto the bridge.
With every step the women took, the golden nimbus always remained three ahead. Focusing on the light steadied her, bolstering her courage as she traversed the bridge. At some point Selàna began counting her steps. On step three hundred and sixty-two, her courage began to falter. Fortunately, on step three hundred and sixty-eight the nimbus revealed another door.
And its sentry.
Slowly, as a sleeper might awaken, a pair of small, acid green orbs revealed themselves in the darkness.
“Oh!”
The shriek escaped her lips before she could gather her wits. Since when did the door have a sentinel? Never on Zephyra’s trips did she encounter anyone or anything. Then again, a sleeping alû would go unnoticed here, for the denizen of Erebossa possessed nothing other than eyes in the night-dark of its formless being. As Rahqu’s servant, the alû would take no notice of Zephyra. As Rahqu’s enemy, Selàna; however, caught the creature’s attention. Or perhaps it was the priestess?
The alû’s eyes appeared to move forward. Was the creature approaching? A scream died in Selàna’s throat, for Ironwing startled her by speaking aloud.
“I am Alia Ironwing, servant of the Huntress, protector of those born to man and woman. Who dares to challenge my path?”
The alû’s voice was more of a wheeze and a whine when it answered her. “Challenge you I do not, huntressss.” It drew out the final syllables in a sibilant hiss. “But thissss pretender, this falsssse one, this aposssstate issss my rightful prey. Keep me not from her!”
The green orbs hovered closer now to the nimbus than before.
Alia stepped forward, interposing herself between the Erebossan and Selàna. “By the Huntress, this girl is under my protection. Get away from here. Begone!”
Crashing thunder tore a scream from Selàna at last. Mists of the Void poured into her throat, chilling her from the inside out, and stealing her breath from her. She gasped, desperate to reclaim every shallow breath she could. Green lightning flashed around her, but she could barely take it in; her sight grew dim. Should the alû choose to, it could knock her into an eternal sleep.
But Alia did not remain empty handed; having unsheathed her sacred knife she held it up now for the alû to see.
“You don’t know who I am: I am the one who slew one of your kind not even one day ago. I destroyed many creatures of Erebossa at the gate of shadows. Will you be next?”
Selàna fell to her knees, on the verge of passing out. The alû’s reach was long, and tentacles of its shadowy form already encircled her. A thrill of terror rippled through her—the tentacles were tangible! The appendages looped tighter and tighter about her, binding her arms to her sides. She fell forward from her waist, and was much too far gone to care when her forehead kissed the Bridge of the Void. Raw, bitter cold lashed at her soul. Her limbs were innervated, their nerves tingling as if they had fallen asleep. She couldn’t move …
White lightning crackled in the edges of Selàna’s vision. Suddenly, the tendrils slackened.
When the alû spoke next, its voice sounded far off, as if it were moving away from them. “You will not alwaysss be with her, huntressss.”
“Any time you wish to be destroyed, come and find me,” Ironwing shot back.
The thunder and lightning ceased. And with them vanished the chilling oppressiveness of the Void. The acid green eyes of the alû were no longer to be found. Selàna sat back on her haunches, gasping for what air there was to fill her lungs.
But it was not enough.
Ironwing seized her hand again and hauled her to her feet. Selàna stumbled after her as the huntress charged ahead. The huntress threw open the door, opening onto a chamber that looked every bit as solid and real as a temple in Thuraia. Planting her feet in the threshold, Irongwing twisted at her waist. Like a discus thrower she flung Selàna inside, letting go at the last moment to avoid yanking her arm from its socket. Selàna landed hard on her hands on knees. Weakened, she sprawled out on the floor.
Ironwing hastened inside, and shut the door fast behind herself. With hard eyes she surveyed the room, likely checking for any threats. Only her deep, sharp exhale suggested she might not be as calm as she appeared.
Stale air, overlaid with a scent both bitter and cloying, did not deter Selàna from greedily gulping it in. After several moments she calmed herself, freed now from the danger of asphyxiation. She brushed off her knees and her palms as best she could, before rising stiffly to her feet. None too gentle, this Ironwing—though her actions lacked either heat or malice when she tossed Selàna into the room. So Selàna ignored her for the moment, and focused on the room instead. Which was not a room as such.
It was a tomb.
An altar, lacquered in congealed blood and dusted with ash, stood at the summit of a small pyramid. The pyramid, fashioned of black basalt, dominated the far end of the room. Darker black streaks marked the trail of blood left by the victims sacrificed the altar. A trail made as their bodies tumbled down the steps—a trail that ended in the pit that yawned wide at the base of the pyramid.
The bodies would land on a bronze platform at the base of the pyramid, a platform perfectly sized to accommodate an adult…though adults were not the only victims that had ever lain upon it. One memory came to Selàna then, of a youth. A youth whose name Zephyra had not troubled herself to learn. A devout, promising acolyte of the Huntress. His powers had waxed strong at the last spring equinox. Strong enough to allow him to sense the captive dryads Protector Amavand kept in the tower in the woods. The youth’s pious zeal to free the tree nymphs doomed him to die by Zephyra’s hand.
He had been defiant. The young man’s eyes were innocent as a doe’s, but they had met Zephyra’s glare boldly, forthrightly.
“The Huntress will see to you,” he cursed her, before she plunged her knife into his heart.
His heart’s blood lacquered the altar. One of Zephyra’s servants captured enough blood for a rhyton full. But the boy did not yet die then. He was alive when he was cast down to the platform.
It was there, on the platform, that he met his end.
Already the bronze surface was as hot as any stove, for as with a hypocaust, a furnace rested below. Together with the furnace, the platform became a funeral pyre. Like other victims who had the misfortune of surviving a knife to the heart, the brave youth burned alive.
Selàna’s knees weakened. She trembled. No. No. O Aletheia, take these memories from me!
But erasing her memories would be a falsehood, and the Truthsayer did not deal in such.
A sweet, mournful note sounded. Ironwing. The huntress crossed her arms over her bosom and trilled another note. Evidently the gods had blessed her with a songbird singing voice, and she used it now to sing a threnody, a lament for the dead. Her gaze was fixed not on the abomination of the pit, but rather on the golden orb that had guided their steps.
And once again, the One Who Lights the Way responded to the priestess.
Golden filaments spun out from the orb. They moved too quickly for Selàna to keep count of them as they raced through the air, aiming straight for the pit.
Charred bone fragments littered the pit. Golden light flared as each fragment was struck by the filament. As each thread found its target, a new thread formed, spreading out until it joined another. And another. Soon a network of golden threads formed over the pit.
The empty spaces between the nets began to fill, until the net became a cloud. The cloud began to ascend. It formed a twisting column, from the floor to the ceiling. The top part of the column vanished when it struck the ceiling, even as the bottom part swirled up from the pit, until there was nothing left of the cloud.
Ironwing’s song ended then. She exhaled, with feeling. Her body sagged, and for the first time she looked smaller, more vulnerable. Selàna dared not speak, allowing the huntress to keep her silence.
After a long moment, Ironwing turned to face her. Her expression was unreadable as she regarded the younger woman.
“Now they are at rest.”