Age of Swords (The Legends of the First Empire #2)

It’s looking down at me just the same as I’m looking up at it!

“Moya!” Persephone bolted to her, grabbing the young woman by the elbow. “The rat’s death wasn’t an accident! It was pushed off that ledge.”

Moya laughed. “You’re saying the rat was murdered? Careful, Seph, that’s a pretty serious accusa—”

“I’m serious! I saw something above us.”

Hearing the fear in her voice, Moya’s eyes narrowed. She gave a glance upward, and took a step back toward where the rat lay.

“No!” Persephone said. She still had hold of Moya’s arm, and pulled her back toward camp. “Keep walking.”

“Wait. What did you see?”

“Something.”

“Something?” Moya asked.

“It’s dark.”

“You have the light.”

“Let’s just get back. I’ll explain when we get to the others.”

Persephone didn’t think all the light in the world would’ve made the vision any clearer. She couldn’t explain how she knew this, only that she did. The thing made her feel empty and cold. Even coming face-to-face with the bear hadn’t done that. This was something else, something terrifying, and it was just a few floors above them.

Did it throw the rat down to kill it? To break its shell like birds do with shellfish? Maybe it’s trying to lure us away, separating us into groups. Is it coming down right now? Or is it running off to alert others? How long do we have before they come?

“Animal, vegetable, or mineral?” Moya asked Persephone as they re-entered the glow of the camp.

“What?” Frost asked.

Moya pulled her arm back. “Persephone saw something, and she won’t say what it was.”

“You saw what made the noise?” Brin asked.

“It was a rat,” Moya said. “An odd thing that wears armor, a war-rat.”

“We call them armadillos,” Flood said.

“Are there no short words in your language?” Moya asked. “Having even a simple conversation must take hours.”

“I thought you didn’t know what Seph saw,” Brin said.

Moya shook her head. “She saw something else. Something above us on one of the higher floors.”

“What was it?” Brin asked.

“I don’t know.” Persephone realized she still had her sword out, and struggled to slip the tip back into the scabbard. “It stood on a balcony looking down at me, right above the war-rat. I couldn’t even see it at first. All I saw was…I don’t know…this thin shadow leaning on the railing.”

“A Belgriclungreian?” Frost asked.

“No. And not human, either, and not an animal. It had bright-red eyes. Could it be the demon? This Balgargarath?”

“No,” all three dwarfs said together.

“Seem pretty sure of yourselves,” Moya said.

“You don’t see Balgargarath and wonder if you’ve seen Balgargarath,” Frost explained.

“Then what was it?” Moya asked.

“I have no idea,” Persephone answered.

“Was the rat’s face missing?” Suri asked. She was sitting cross-legged before the glowing stone as if trying to warm herself at a campfire.

Everyone turned to look at her.

“You’re very odd, aren’t you?” Frost said.

“No, she’s right,” Persephone said. “It looked like something had chewed on the war-rat.”

“So you have raow here too,” the mystic said to the dwarfs.

“A raow?” Frost asked, tugging on his beard.

Suri looked up. “Evil spirit that can take over the body of a lost person. Didn’t know your kind could be turned into one, though.”

“What do they do?” Frost asked.

“Lots of things, I suppose. Don’t really know. But they eat faces first, always faces first. And they build nests out of bones and sleep on them as beds. They can’t sleep again without adding to the pile.”

“So they’re bad, then?” Moya asked.

Suri nodded. “We had a raow in the Crescent the year after the Great Famine. Tura took care of it.”

“What did she do?” Moya hadn’t taken a seat and was looking in the direction she and Persephone had come from.

“Trapped it inside a hollow oak.”

“We don’t have any oaks here,” Brin said.

“Can they be killed?” Frost asked.

“I would think so. Although, come to think of it…”

“What?” Moya asked.

“I always wondered why Tura chose to trap the raow rather than killing it. She checked the tree every day—even years later. Once when she tapped on the trunk, I swore I heard a hiss.”

“And they’re dangerous?” Moya still stood holding tight to her spear and shield.

“What part of ‘they eat people’s faces’ didn’t you hear?” Brin asked. “Yes, raow are definitely to be feared. Maeve told stories of how they decimated entire regions. Raow eat anything with a face, but people are their favorite food. Whole villages had to be moved or just died out completely.”

“Is that true, Suri? Are they really as dangerous as all that?” Moya asked.

The mystic shrugged. “I never saw it myself. Tura made me stay home and wash the berries while she ran an errand, as she called it. She had funny names for things like that: running errands, waking up the sun, bringing the rain. None of them were remotely like the description. You never wanted to see her bring the rain.”

“Still,” Moya said, “Tura was an old woman. Like Padera, right? I mean, how dangerous can a thing be if someone like Tura could handle it?”

Suri smiled then. Her face lit up as if for a moment she were in another place, another time, sharing a secret with someone none of them could see. “I saw that old woman drive a hungry bear off a deer-kill with nothing but angry words. She could calm a hive of furious bees, and tell ants to bother someone else’s picnic. Can Padera do any of that? Can you? Tura spent almost her whole life alone in the forest. I never saw so much as a scratch on her before that day. She came back hours later, exhausted, with her cloak shredded and deep cuts on her arm and across her face. Took months for her to heal and even then there were always faint white scars.” Suri looked up at them. “I can’t say for certain, because I wasn’t there. But if I were to guess, I’d say raow are very dangerous.”

“Do you think it will attack us?” Persephone asked.

Suri shrugged. “Raow have to eat before going to sleep for the night. So I guess it depends on just how hungry it is, and how hard it is to find more war-rat thingies.”





CHAPTER TWENTY


Betrayal




The Miralyith once thought themselves to be gods. I have often wondered what the gods thought about that.

—THE BOOK OF BRIN