22

The cave was dim but not as dark as she expected. The fissure went all the way through the hill, as if some force of nature had split it in half, and a narrow crack at the top let daylight in. Even so, Kel's presence behind her was the only thing that kept her moving forward as she took her first few steps inside. She wanted to turn around and ask why he couldn't go first — he was the one with the sword, after all — but the fact that she was the only one who could see this god they were looking for was answer enough.

She tried to tell herself not to be scared. Not to worry too much — after all, neither Towr nor Saofoth had been violent, and she didn't even know if gods could physically hurt people. Except… hadn't Galin's father been injured by this one?

Her steps faltered.

"Have you seen something?" Kel asked from behind her.

She shook her head, mute. The crying was louder now and seemed to echo from all over, though it could only be coming from ahead of them. Trying to ignore the uneven bumping of her heart, she started moving again. There was a spot where she had to turn to the side to squeeze through, and when Kel passed, she could hear his armor scraping against the rocks. The sound made the crying stop, and a resounding silence took over.

On the other side of the narrow gap, the fissure opened up a little and the crack at the top widened enough that she no longer had to strain her eyes to see. The light revealed a puddle of something dark congealed on the floor. Her eyes fixed on the puddle, then followed the smeared drag marks away from it, to a dark shape that lay in a crumpled heap against the wall.

For a second, her stomach dropped with sheer horror as she thought that the lifeless form was Galin. Then she made out a curled horn, the outline of a ear, and the tufts of fur that were scattered around it, and she remembered Dalton's stolen and slaughtered goat.

Then the crying started again, harder this time, and her gaze snapped toward the sound. There, sitting against the crumbling rock of the far wall, was a boy. He looked about Bria's age, and there was no one it could be other than Galin, but Lyra's mouth went dry when she saw him. She couldn't call out, couldn't announce their presence. All she could do was stare.

Because Galin was crying, but it was a little girl's voice coming out of his mouth. She looked around in case she was missing someone else. The cavern was empty other than him, but a dark tunnel branched off to the side, and a trail of dark smears on the ground led to its entrance — blood, she was sure of it. Her heart felt like it was bruising itself on the inside of her ribcage. All she wanted to do was get out of here.

Kel brushed past her, stopping a few steps ahead of her. He still had his sword drawn and he looked tense, and she remembered what Saofoth had said about Galin's sins. He had advised her not to bring Kel, but she hadn't listened. She knew there was no way she would have been brave enough to go into this cave without him, but she didn't like how hard his expression was as he stared at the crying boy.

Edging forward until she was even with Kel, she cleared her throat. Galin must not have noticed them before because he jumped when he heard her and looked up, his eyes widening in his tear-streaked face.

"Are you here to take me home?"

The voice that came out of his mouth had the high-pitched, unsteady tones of a young girl, but Lyra tried to calm the creeping sense of unease that crawled up her spine by telling herself maybe this was just how he sounded. Some people had high voices, and Galin was just a kid, barely even a teenager — maybe he was just a late bloomer.

"Yes, we are," she said, her voice sounding too loud in the sudden silence of the cavern. "Your mother sent us; she's very worried about you. She's right outside, along with your friend Bria."

"Bria isn't my friend, she's Galin's," Galin said.

"But aren't you Galin?" she asked, taking a shaky step closer. Her eyes darted to each corner of the cavern and lingered on the tunnel. She hadn't seen any sign of the god yet, but she remembered how suddenly Towr could appear, and she didn't want to be caught off guard by something that had injured a man's face so badly that it was still leaking blood through bandages when she saw him hours after the fact.

The boy shook his head, his eyes wide and terrified. Lyra shifted, not sure what to do. Her job was to get him out of this cave, right? They said they needed her to talk to the god, but if the god didn't show up, then getting Galin out of here and back to his parents was the next best thing, wasn't it?

Before she could move any closer, Kel grabbed her shoulder with his left hand. "Wait, priestess. Something is not right."

"Yeah, I kind of noticed that," she snapped, the terror and tension making her temper short. "The sooner we get out of here, the better."

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"You don't see the god anywhere?" he asked. "It injured a man already. Why is it letting us walk in here without challenge?"

"I don't know, I'm hardly the expert on these things," she hissed back through clenched teeth. "Let's just get the boy and figure everything else –"

She broke off as a scraping sound filled the cavern. Her eyes snapped to the tunnel entrance, but she couldn't see anything in the darkness. Unlike the little cavern they were standing in, there was no fissure at the top to let in light.

"What is it?" Kel asked, his voice so low it was hard to make out. He'd shifted his stance, both hands gripping his sword now.

"Don't you hear that scraping?"

He shook his head. Lyra's mouth went suddenly dry as she stared at the dark entrance to the tunnel. If he couldn't hear it… then the god must be making that sound.

"Hello?"

She hated how frightened her voice was, but she couldn't disguise how she felt. She had never been more terrified in her life, not even when she first arrived in this world. A stench reached her nose, faint at first but growing stronger. It was the cloying, unmistakable smell of something rotting.

Galin, or whoever the boy thought he was, started crying again, his sobs pairing with the odd scraping sound in a way that made everything worse. Something shifted in the shadows at the tunnel entrance. Lyra's breath came fast and shallow as she watched one large, fur-covered, bestial hand reach out of the darkness. It had five elongated fingers, each tipped with a curved claw. The claws dug into the stone and pulled back as it dragged itself forward, leaving shallow scrapes in the ground. Kel oriented himself to the spot, gripping the sword so tightly his knuckles were white.

"Can you see that?" she breathed.

He nodded once, curtly. "I saw the scrapes appear. What does it look like?"

She opened her mouth, but her words died as the thing inside the tunnel climbed further out.

It had long, lanky arms, twice as long as they looked like they should be if the thing was proportionate. All of it was covered in matted blackish-brown fur, and it was taller than her and Kel combined, tall enough that it had to crawl to move through the tunnel. It had the elongated, digitigrade feet of a wolf, and its head was vaguely canine-shaped too, though the muzzle had way too many teeth, and she was pretty sure most wolves didn't have eyes that were nothing but bloody pits. Its two pointed ears were small and tilted toward her with keen interest.

"Lyra?"

From far away, she heard Kel's voice, and at a different time she might have felt a surge of victory that he had actually used her name instead of calling her priestess, but right now, she couldn't register anything except the thing in front of her.

It looked at Galin for a moment, then turned its empty eyes toward her. They looked like they had been gouged out, and the sockets were still wet with blood, but it didn't seem to stop the thing from seeing her. Its nostrils flared, and it took a step toward her, moving on its hands and feet like a parody of a wolf. Its mouth opened, its teeth more needlelike than doglike, and she saw blood on its lips.

"Priestess." Its voice was a low rumble, and its breath smelled like bloody meat and something cold and damp as it washed over her. "You bear the blessing of another god, yet your soul is not yet claimed. Be welcome here. Have you come to make an offering?"

She shook her head, not sure if she could make her mouth work. Where Towr had been unsettling and faceless, this was so much worse. This god didn't look anything close to human. It was monstrous, something old and alien. Something she had never been meant to encounter.

"Priestess, you must speak to me. Where is it? What does it look like? What is it saying?"

The god turned toward Kel. It inhaled, as if taking in his scent. "You bring with you a paladin with a god-slaying relic. Have I angered you, priestess? Are you here to drive me back into the darkness as your ancestors once did?"

It moved so fast that she couldn't track the motion, launching itself forward so it almost collided with her. It towered over her; her head had only come up to the middle of its just, and it was hunched over, its long, lupine body curled as if it was ready to leap. Its clawed hands were on either side of her, and as it looked down at her, its muzzle was less than a foot away from her face.

It was fear, not bravery, that rooted her in place. A terror so strong that she didn't know how to handle it, so her body just shut down and did nothing. She couldn't even manage to scream – all that came out was a strangled squeak.

"I am strong again. Stronger than I have been in a long time. I could rip him apart before he could cut me with that sword." Its head lowered, its furred muzzle brushing her cheek as it inhaled again, its breath ruffling her hair. "But I have wants. I'll tolerate your paladin as long as he does not turn the blade against me. I ache to be worshiped again, to taste the prayers and desires of my flock, to relish their offerings. It has been so long, and my hunger is so great. Will you be my voice, priestess? With you by my side, I could become something magnificent."

"Leave her alone!"

The voice snapped her out of whatever had frozen her to the spot, and she stumbled back, gasping for breath. Galin was the one who had spoken, but it wasn't the same girl's voice that had come out of his mouth before. This time, he sounded more like what she would have expected a thirteen-year-old boy to sound like. He had risen to his feet and was looking in her direction, his eyes darting around as if he couldn't see the god but knew it was there regardless. He must have seen its breath ruffling her hair.

"Please, don't hurt anyone else. Haven't you done enough? Just let them go."

"Boy, can you see it?" Kel asked.

"No, but I saw her hair move. It's right there, I know it is. I don't know who you are, but you have to get out of here. The god attacked my father; I don't know what it will do to you."

"Priestess, you must say something," Kel said, turning to her. The motion took him back a step, and he brought his sword up between them, his eyes constantly roaming as if looking for the god. "What is it doing? Is it threatening us?"

Invisible to both Kel and Galin, the God circled around behind her. She felt one clawed hand close on her shoulder, possessively, and it lowered its head until its muzzle was right next to her face. "You're a frightened little thing, aren't you?" it rumbled. "I can feel your fear. It makes you weak, like a rabbit cowering from hunting dogs. But your paladin has the right of it. Speak, priestess. I can read your soul but not your mind. Pray to me, and I will give you what you want."