Thousands of them.
“Keep your secrets,” I say, gaze bouncing from cross to cross. To the map’s left, a blade’s been stabbed into the stone, and from the constellation of indents surrounding it, I garner it’s not the first time it’s wound up there.
“Believe me,” Kaan mutters, gathering some bits of clothing he’d left lumped on the seater. “I’m under no false assumption that you’re even the slightest bit interested in my secrets.”
“Realistic expectations are healthy.”
He grunts, carrying the clothes through a wide doorway to the right, disappearing into the darkness within while I do another visual sweep of the space, noticing a fine sheen of dust on his shelves. Actually, pretty much upon everything except his instrument, the seaters, that bottle of spirits, and the dagger stabbed in the wall.
Huh.
“Guessing you don’t … entertain much?”
Or even let somebody in to clean.
“The bolted door puts most folk off,” he says from somewhere within the adjacent room. “Suits me just fine.”
Right.
Likes his privacy.
Got it.
I look to the lofty domed ceiling adorned with overlapping dragonscales I suspect are Rygun’s based on their burnt-blood tone. A huge chandelier hangs from the peak, pieced together with more Sabersythe tusks than I’ve ever seen in one place, all of varying shapes and sizes.
“Wouldn’t want to be standing here if the mountain shook,” I murmur, gaze shifting to my right as Kaan emerges from the shadowed doorway with two towels—tossing one at me.
“Thanks,” I say, using it to sponge some of the water clinging to every inch of me like the remnants of a slumber-terror, drying off my garments while he does the same. I drape my towel across the back of a seater, along with my satchel.
“This way,” he rumbles, tossing his towel next to mine, then moves toward the twin doors ahead. They look out onto what appears to be an overgrown private garden doused in so much shade I’m surprised anything grows out there at all.
He unlocks the doors and steps through, and I follow into the humid midst, down an unkept path that often requires me to duck—insects creaking, water beading off the faces of round velvety leaves the color of clay.
A ruffle of wind offers me a glimpse through the dense foliage to the sandy view beyond, and I realize this garden looks south toward The Fade.
Away from the sun.
“It’s just down here,” Kaan says, moving toward a fall of coppery vines that clothe segments of the steep, uneven wall surrounding this garden. He parts the natural drape, cleaving an opening through to a hidden tunnel beyond, then ducks and shoves in ahead of me.
I frown. “I’m not following you down there.”
He pauses, looking at me over his shoulder. “Why not?”
“Because that’s how folk die, Kaan. I know because that’s how I—”
His brow bumps up.
I pause, reconsider divulging my trade secrets with a king I only decided to semi-trust two seconds ago, then figure it’s best he knows I’m a bloodstain on his pretty paradise.
“Assassinate. This right here”—I gesture to the tunnel he’s leading me down—“is a prime location for you to slit my throat, then carve some letters on my chest.”
Wonder what he’d give me. Probably:
R E T U R N S P R E C I O U S G I F T S
He turns to fully face me, eyes beseeching as he says, “Listen, Raeve.”
“I am. Obviously.”
“No,” he growls, placing his hand on the smooth, rounded wall. “Listen.”
I open my mouth, close it when his meaning sinks in. “But he’s so—”
“What?”
Stable.
Sturdy.
The absolute opposite of me.
Crossing my arms, I shake my head and sigh, loosening my internal sound snare almost wide enough to let him in …
Bulder.
I hold Kaan’s stifling gaze a moment, then loosen the snare that little bit more, slapping a wide-holed sieve atop the opening and bracing myself for Bulder’s grinding vibrato that … doesn’t come.
Because he’s not singing—not at all.
He’s humming.
A deep, droning roll … almost like a baritone coo.
My brow buckles, my own hand coming out to flatten on the burnished stone. “It’s—”
“This is a place of nurture, Raeve. Of love and worship. If I wanted to harm you, I certainly wouldn’t do it within this cavern,” he says, holding my stare with chest-crushing intensity.
“Can’t you just tell me what’s down there?”
His eyes soften. “I can’t. This is something you need to see for yourself.”
Creators.
“Fine,” I snip. “But just so you know, I coaxed your guard into swapping an empty crockery dish for his dagger that’s currently strapped to my upper thigh, and I’m not afraid to use it.”
He blinks, shaking his head as I step into the tunnel, letting the fall of foliage sweep shut behind me—engulfing us in shadow.
The tight stairwell is littered with small glowing bugs that remind me of Moonplume moons, offering a meager amount of light for our journey down the endless coil of stairs I wish I’d counted from the beginning. I’m certain we’re over a thousand steps down by now, my skin no longer warm but delightfully cold—my exhales like puffs of smoke.
Kaan fills the stairwell so entirely the top of his head nearly brushes the light-smattered ceiling, his shoulders almost too big for him to be moving down faced forward. Every now and again, I try to peep past him and see if there’s an end in sight, but it’s useless.
He’s a giant stairwell plug.
I collect the damp length of my hair to squeeze the gathered moisture from the ends, frowning when I realize the water has begun to stiffen.
To frost.
“Much farther?” I ask, brushing the fractals off my hands, wondering if he’s walking me all the way through to the other side of the world. If we’re going to emerge near Netheryn—the Moonplume nesting grounds.
“Not far.” Kaan looks at me over his shoulder, his eyes glinting in the dark as he assesses me. “Are you okay with the cold? You can have my tunic if you—”
“I’m fine.”
Something flashes in his eyes, like perhaps he assumes the thought of wearing his tunic makes me uncomfortable.
It doesn’t. At least not in the way he probably thinks.
I don’t tell him the deeper we’ve drilled, the less tentative I’ve been about this decision to follow him down a twirling tunnel into a dark abyss. I certainly don’t tell him the growing cold feels a lot like …
Home.
The reason I keep trying to peep past him isn’t because I’m worried he might be taking me down here to murder me. Not anymore.
No …
Some innate part of me is drawn to whatever’s at the bottom of this never-ending stairwell.
The frosty nether nips at my skin, turning the tip of my nose so blissfully numb, the chilled air beginning to lap at me like an undulation of icy waves that tug in their withdrawal—urging me deeper.
Deeper.
Each step folds me further into that tiding tug until the darkness gives way to a silver light that kisses the walls and steps. That turns Kaan into a gloomy silhouette against the radiant luminosity trying to squeeze past him from whatever’s on the other side.
“We’re here,” he murmurs, his voice a shockwave through the hungry silence that lifts the hairs on the back of my neck.
He steps to the side, dousing me in light.
So much light.
My heart stops, an icy cleft of awe fracturing my chest as I take in the circular cavern, the swooping walls embossed in magnificent, detailed carvings of Moonplumes.
The same magnificent creature in hundreds of different stances—long neck; big, wistful eyes; spindly tendrils that trail from its jowls and whisk with its crafted movement. Elegant tri-membrane wings fit for speed and unmatched agility, wispy tail with silken threads that sweep and coil and flick with a gush of personality.