The sun had barely finished rising when Rian, Halbert, and Eiva continued across the plains of Acra. They had barely stopped to rest, and they hadn’t gone near any villages. Even seemingly alone on the plains, the three of them kept the hoods of their cloaks up. So far, they hadn’t come across any Sancta Knights, but the Sancta would be looking for them. To execute them.
Eiva was slowing down, but so were Rian and Halbert. She needed to rest and they needed burial ground. Rian didn’t know where they would find proper burial ground that wasn’t near a village, but hopefully Eiva could rest in the forest. The group was headed toward Blossom and Leaf’s village of wild Ectu in the forest between Acra and Urvus.
“What village did you grow up in?” Rian asked Eiva, hoping the conversation would distract them both from their exhaustion.
“Oat village in Virida,” Eiva said. “It’s north of Derwen. The man who raised me was an herbalist in Brush.” She hesitated. “He took me in after my father died. The herbalist moved to Oat with me not long after.” Her hood hid her expression, but he heard a smile in her voice. “He taught me about herbs and antidotes.” She sighed. “He was old when he took me in and died just before I left Oat. Many in the village were wary of me because of ravens being drawn to me, and they knew the herbalist found me under strange circumstances. I knew I couldn’t stay there.”
“So you joined the Sancta,” Halbert said.
Eiva nodded. “I had hoped serving the gods would rid me of my strange magic.” She shook her head. “It’s hard to believe Dienia would turn against Mortua like this. People were sacrificed and their souls were trapped, and for what?”
“There is more to the gods than we know,” Halbert said.
“Especially Mortua,” Rian said.
The silence returned again.
“Where do you think Ransey will go next?” Eiva asked, her voice quiet.
“He will go anywhere his lady sends him,” Halbert said, “and do anything she asks of him.”
Rian hesitated. “You said he settled in Rise. Where is he from?” He almost tripped on a rock hidden in the grass, his exhaustion making it hard to focus.
“He was raised in Aster, in Urvus,” Halbert said. “He had no family and was taken in by a priest of Mortua, who taught him loyalty to the Lady of the Perished. Eventually Ransey set out to spread the word of Mortua. He settled in Rise, in Caerulis. There was an abandoned shrine there. He made it a shrine to Mortua. That is where I met him.”
Rian wasn’t surprised Ransey was raised in Aster. The entire village was fanatically loyal to Mortua. The three of them continued across the plains in silence. Rian couldn’t help but think about things along the way. He knew there were many things Trivius wasn’t telling him. Things about himself that Trivius knew and he didn’t.
Halbert still carried the bag with the objects used to seal the Bone Garden, or to open the way. The skull of a former ruler of Haren, a stone from an old crown of Urvus, a carved statue of a vulture, a withered plant that grew only in the abandoned village of Marlar, and a crescent shaped stone. Since sealing the Bone Garden, they hadn’t yet had a chance to find hiding places for the objects.
Rian wasn’t sure what to think of Trivius anymore. He was a god, not just a powerful being that had pretended to be one, or had been worshiped as one. Not only that, he was the brother of Quidvis, the All-Keeper. Trivius was the true God of Death, and Rian was his Speaker. The part of Trivius in Rian said nothing to these thoughts.
The group reached the edge of the forest and stopped to rest again. The sun was setting when they reached a small clearing. Dark clouds had moved in overhead, not quite obscuring the light of sunset. The wild Ectu didn’t live in houses. Several were sitting in a circle together, others were standing off to the sides. Their clothes were made of various plants and some hide.
The wild Ectu glanced at Rian, Halbert, and Eiva, but continued their conversations. Rian noticed there were a lot of Ectu in the clearing and some who might have been half Ectu. Some wore clothes like those in cities and villages. Blossom and Leaf left the circle, coming over to Rian and the others.
Leaf was about the same height as Eiva. Blossom was only a little shorter than Leaf, with long, pointed ears. Leaf’s eyes were a pale shade of purple from his pact with an animal, something only Ectu magic could achieve.
“We heard about the execution,” Blossom said.
“My father escaped,” Rian said. “We don’t know where he’s gone.” There was more to it than that, but he was too tired to talk about this.
“There are many here,” Halbert said.
Blossom nodded. “Wild and nonwild Ectu have come to my village for protection against the Sancta.” She frowned. “The Sancta is searching for you. If you stay here, the village will be in even more danger, but you need to rest.”
“We should continue on our way,” Eiva said.
Blossom shook her head. “Not yet.”
Leaf and Blossom led the three of them further among the trees, barely out of sight of the clearing.
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“The Sancta’s new focus on Ectu won’t end well,” Leaf said. “More Ectu are leaving the cities and villages, shunned by the Sancta and those loyal to the Sancta. The Sancta has attacked several wild Ectu villages already. The Sancta fears our innate magic, and many Ectu and Half Ectu who have never lived in the wild fear their own magic.”
Blossom was frowning hard. “King Tierney of Acra has taken an interest in Ectu magic. That can’t mean good things for us.”
“Tierney is working with Dienia,” Eiva said. She told Blossom and Leaf all they had discovered.
Leaf sighed. “Even if we knew why Dienia gave Tierney magic and turned against Mortua, I doubt it’s a good reason.”
Blossom was scowling. “I always thought the gods were too good to be true. The Sancta makes it sound like they’re beings of ultimate wisdom.”
“I was in Isley a few days ago,” Leaf said. “I heard Percival is now High Priest of the All-Keeper, the new head of the Sancta. He’s seeking the sword of the All-Keeper.”
“Isn’t that a myth?” Eiva asked. “I didn’t think even the Sancta believed it was real.”
“Percival believes,” Leaf said. “He also believes the sword will allow him to end wild magic and all who use it.”
A heavy silence fell over the five of them.
“You should stay here for the night,” Blossom said.
“But we’ll be endangering the village—” Eiva started.
“It’s already in danger,” Blossom said. “You need rest. This might be the safest place you will find for a long time.”
Blossom and Leaf led them back to the clearing and got Eiva food and water. Leaf led Rian and Halbert to the unmarked burial ground further among the trees. Rian took his cloak off and lay on the burial ground, the energy flowing into him. He let himself stop seeing, then he let the ground pull him under. Everything slipped away, but he didn’t see the musty cave where the dead sometimes spoke to him, or the Bone Garden where the rest of Trivius was.
He saw memories that weren’t his. He saw Derwen, the main city of Virida. Ruari, Knight of Derwen, didn’t believe in the gods. Rian knew Ruari’s name, knew these were Ruari’s memories, but not why he would be seeing them. He knew what had happened, what was said, but the memory was silent. Ruari’s friend, Dion, was also a Knight of Derwen. He believed in the gods, but was wary of them. The two were sent to look into a disturbance in the forest near Derwen, long before Fen village had been built there.
Ruari and Dion talked on the way, about the weather, their captain never doing any of the work himself, and what they might find in the forest. It was strange for Rian to see the plains and the familiar forest without his home village there. Ruari and Dion entered the forest, neither speaking now that they were there. The sun was setting.
They hadn’t gone far before they found an old stone shrine, barely intact. Some pillars had collapsed, and there was no roof, if there ever had been one. A stone altar stood at the center of the shrine, with nothing on it other than cracks and a bit of dirt. The light of sunset shone through the pillars, across the altar. As the sun finished setting, something flickered over the altar. It flickered again, then held steady for only a moment.
The faint gray light held the shape of a towering skeletal being with long, curving horns. Ruari felt something flowing into him and mentioned it to Dion, who felt the same thing. The being didn’t appear again. Rian knew, but he didn’t know how he knew, that Trivius had given Ruari and Dion magic then. At the time, neither knight had known what had happened.
Rian woke up back on the surface of the Ectu burial ground. The sun was rising, and Halbert had returned to the surface as well. Halbert and Rian put their cloaks on and pulled up their hoods. Rian was certain he’d seen a memory, not a dream, but why would he be seeing someone else’s memories? The memories of someone who had come across Trivius a long time ago.
“Did the dead speak to you?” Halbert asked.
Rian hesitated. “No. I saw the memories of a Knight of Derwen from a long time ago. He found a shrine to Trivius out in the forest near Fen, but Fen hadn’t been built yet. Trivius gave him magic.”
Halbert was quiet for a long moment, then he sighed. A long, weary sigh despite having no breath. “I don’t know why you would be seeing that, or how to stop it. Or what it means. Much of what I learned from Norris’s book is wrong, and that is where I learned all I know about necromancy and being undead. I don’t know how much of it was wrong.”
“Where could we find out more?” Rian asked.
“I don’t know,” Halbert said. “That was the only book that I know of, the only book Norris knew of.”
The two of them returned to the clearing. The Ectu were waking up. Eiva was eating with them. Leaf joined Halbert and Rian, where they stood at the edge of the clearing.
Leaf sighed. “I want to help you warn the royal family of Urvus. They have been our allies for so long…” He shook his head. “The village needs Blossom and I here. We will likely have to move soon, or the Sancta will find us.”
“Is there anything we can do to help?” Rian asked.
Leaf smiled briefly, but it didn’t touch the sadness in his eyes. “Warning Urvus about Tierney is enough.” He frowned. When he spoke again, he lowered his voice. “I believe Tarthala is real. The forest in Urvus, that only Ectu can enter. The forest at the mountains. Blossom believes too, but she doesn’t want to abandon her home.”
“I’m sure Ninette and Odell would allow you to enter Tarthala,” Halbert said.
Leaf nodded, looking away. “I know they would. I don’t want that to be our only option, but the Sancta is hunting Ectu and half Ectu, in the forests and in settlements. Now Tierney’s taken an interest in us as well. I know not everyone agrees with what the Sancta is doing to us, but the Sancta is too strong for a few dissenting voices to help us.”
“Urvus would help you,” Halbert said. “Perhaps not openly, as that would invite retaliation from the Sancta, but they would aid you.”
Leaf sighed. “I hope so. We cannot stay here much longer.” He frowned hard and put a hand on Rian’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, for all that’s happened. I wish it was safe for you to stay with us, but it isn’t.” He looked at Halbert. “What of Andred?”
“He has gone the same way as Arwel and Norris,” Halbert said. “He regrets it, but I don’t know if that is enough to bring him back. For now, we don’t know where he’s gone.”
Leaf started to say something, but Eiva joined them there. “Good luck out there,” he said.