But Endain, the youngest of the Billow Maidens, fell before her mother and groveled at her feet. “Please, please, oh Rahn our mother, must we never again see the sky? The darkness of your Hall will consume us, and we shall surely perish.”
And Rahn looked at Endain and pitied her. “When the moon rises as a crescent in the night, you may go up to see it, and there you shall lift your voices to the sky, so that any who hear you may pity you and come down to the depths to seek your freedom. And that task which was so revolting is yet upon you: Every ninth year you shall gather the dead and bring them to my Hall.”
The Waves wept, and descended once more into the Hall of the Dead, and Rahn compelled them take up again the harps that Aigir had made for them. So they plied the strings, and their music gave voice to their great sorrow.
And in the darkness of night, when the crescent moon showed the splinter of its face in the sky, the Billow Maidens rose up to the surface and sang, long and sad. Any man who sailed those waters and heard them singing was drawn to their voices. And whoever looked upon the Waves loved them and cast themselves into the sea and were drowned.
The Billow Maidens grew weary in their waiting, mourning the souls of the sailors they themselves called to their deaths.
But the Waves could not stop singing.
Up in the tower library, music slipped in through the window, a strange, haunting song that wrapped all around her.
Calling, calling.
Calling her.
Can’t you hear it?
Hear what?
The Waves. They’re singing.
They’d called her mother to her death—what were they calling her to do?
Talia cursed and leapt up from the chair, hurling the book as hard as she could against the wall. A sense of helpless panic was rushing up to swallow her. She didn’t want to die like her mother. She didn’t want to throw her life away chasing after a story. But how could she go on living if all of this were real? Rahn and the Billow Maidens, the Star and the Tree. Her mother damned to the Hall of the Dead until the end of time.
She unlatched the window and flung it open wide, cold sea air rushing in to swallow her.
“I don’t believe in you!” she shouted into the night. “I don’t believe in you, I don’t believe in you!”
But it wasn’t true.
The music curled into her ears, wrapped around her heart.
The Waves. Singing.
Calling her to the sea, calling her to the Hall of the Dead.
“I’m sorry, Mama,” she whispered, peering down into the dark waves. “I don’t know how to help you. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
She closed her mind against the music. She latched the window shut again.
But the song wound on inside her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
SHE WAS LATE JOINING THE OTHERS THE next morning, her head fuzzy with too little sleep and the dreams that wouldn’t release her.
The sun was unexpectedly shining, but the frigid wind bit at her ears as she stepped up to the knot of people and horses waiting in the courtyard. Blaive and Wen and Caiden stood with their mounts, Ahned holding the reins of a lovely chestnut mare with a gold-colored mane. The mare stamped impatiently, nostrils flaring. She was clearly ready for a run.
“This gal’s a lot of horse, Miss Dahl-Saida,” said Ahned as Talia came to take the reins from him, trying to force her thoughts to the present.
“Talia can handle her,” said Caiden cheerfully, swinging up onto Avial.
Ahned frowned. “So you keep saying.”
“I certainly wish you would have thought to hire more than one spirited mount, Caiden,” said Blaive, frowning. She was dressed for the day in a nut-brown riding habit trimmed with fur, and was wearing another awful hat—this one seemed to be drowning in ostrich feathers and garish velvet ribbons.
“I had no idea of you coming when I hired her,” Caiden said lightly. “And anyway, Miss Dahl-Saida is an extremely accomplished rider.”
Blaive pressed her lips together, a flush of color coming into her cheeks at the implication that she was not.
Ahned gave Talia a leg up into her saddle, and the mare danced underneath her like a spring tightly coiled.
“Up you go, my lady,” said Ahned, hoisting Blaive onto the dappled gray.
Wen climbed into his saddle last of all, and Talia looked over at him. She found herself desperately wanting to talk to him more about the temple and the myths, and why he was so certain Rahn’s Hall wasn’t real.
Ahned checked the saddle girths for all four of them, and then nodded, though he cast another disapproving eye at Talia and the chestnut. “Anira knows to expect you,” he said, addressing Caiden even though the riding party was ostensibly for Wen and Talia. “Take your time, but try and be back before dark. There’ll be a man by to collect the horses.”
“But not the chestnut,” Caiden announced. “I bought her.”
“Did you indeed,” said Ahned, unimpressed. “Before dark, my lord.”
Caiden flashed him an unabashed grin and let Avial out into a trot.
The rest followed—Wen, Blaive, and then Talia, bringing up the rear. They left the Ruen-Dahr and, despite Wen’s objections, took the path that wound down to the shore. “It’s faster this way, and Father won’t know or care,” Caiden told him.
“Uerc’s beasts tear you to bits,” Wen muttered not-quite-under his breath, and then relented.
The four of them cantered for a while along the coast, the waves bursting white against the shore and the gulls wheeling noisily overhead. Talia tried not to look at the sea as she crouched over her mount’s neck, the mare a snarl of boundless energy beneath her. She could almost feel the horse laughing at their current pace, so she wrapped her fingers in the mare’s gold mane and gave her her head.
They sprang away from the group in a flat-out gallop. Around them the world faded to a blur of sand and sea and sky. But they couldn’t go fast enough to outrun the tangle of Talia’s thoughts or the music rising suddenly from the sea.
And then there was another rider racing alongside her, matching her pace for pace: Caiden on Avial. “Is that all she’s got?” he shouted over the wind, grinning like mad. He put his heels in Avial, and the black gelding lunged ahead.
Talia leaned even tighter against the chestnut’s neck. “Run, lady,” she whispered into the mare’s ear. “Run.”
The mare leapt forward like she’d been standing still. They caught up to Avial, and for a few delirious moments they raced evenly, side by side in the sand. Caiden shouted encouragingly at his gelding to keep up the mad pace, but the red mare didn’t need any urging.
And then they were past Avial, running on alone. The wind sliced past Talia’s cheeks, so swift and cold she could hardly catch a breath. All was rushing air and pounding hooves, motion and power and speed. She rode on the heels of the wind—she was the wind, no longer moored to the earth. It numbed her so much she could almost think clearly again, almost understand the things just beyond her grasp.
But not even the chestnut mare could run forever. She slowed bit by bit, and dropped finally back to a walk, her shoulders gleaming with sweat. Talia patted her neck, singing her praises.