Chapter Fifty-Six
Fifty-six
Faolan
“Neath the drowning sky, oh, ’neath the drowning sky. Tear the—what the feck comes next?”
I’m fairly shouting at the cluster of old hunched-over figures now, elders of the Gan Ainm.
Some of them I recognize, and a handful recognize me in turn.
Those are the worst of them, watching tight-lipped with disapproval as I pace in front of the bloody sanctuary, not allowed in with my current attire—even though I stripped myself of damn near everything worthwhile.
I did away with the rings. I even took my various braids and bits out, tying all my hair back in a tidy knot, but I refuse to take off the blue wool coat Saoirse made for me, gold buttons catching every speck of light.
“We keep the sacred songs,” says one of them, with a squash-shaped nose. “We do not dole them out.”
“I’m not asking you to, I know the damn song.” He smirks, and I scowl. “Parts of it anyway.”
“If you’d followed our laws, obeyed our ways, you’d know it by heart, lad.” This comes from a toady-looking woman with sallow jaws.
“Well, I didn’t, did I.” Throwing my hands in the air, I turn on my heel to stalk off—then stop, remembering Saoirse’s face as she lay there. How it had been as pale as a corpse, a low keening of pain caught in her throat.
Dammit.
My tendons burn as I pivot again, not quite recovered from the breakneck run. “This is more than just a simple query—more than your own pride or mine. The whole Crescent is in danger.”
“So they said before, when they slaughtered the holy gods.” A third speaks up, their hair bristled like a haystack framing a pointed face. “And look where that got us.”
“Right, yes, look where that got us—and where it will get us again, promptly, if you refuse to help.”
The eldest Gan Ainm stands then, wearing the same tunic as he had three days ago, and the same inquisitive expression. “What would you use this knowledge for, lost one?”
“My wife.”
He frowns. “The goddess, Saoirse?”
I swallow down another curse and nod. “Aye.”
“To heal her from the effect of drinking a soulstone. Balance the scales from such cruelty as the destruction of one.” The eldest Gan Ainm touches his chin, stroking the soft skin there, so smooth he must shave it morning and night. “Interesting.”
“Not interesting—horrible. A bloody disaster.”
“Just as the great slaughter once was.” He faces the others, tilting his head to one side. “We have many histories. Hopes and omens. The one you speak of has faded with time, its meanings changed or reinterpreted with every new age.”
“So tell me what your preferred interpretation is, and I’ll do my best to keep up.” I barely bite back the you eejit, but I’m sure he knows it’s implied.
The eldest Gan Ainm faces me. “What will you give us for this?”
“What?”
“What will you sacrifice?”
“Nothing—I don’t owe you anything.”
“Lost one—”
“Stop feckin’ calling me that!” My snarling shout carries through the trees, sending a couple of birds flying. But I’m past caring, my temper rising high and fast. “My name is Faolan. Faolan!”
“My child, you have no name.”
On instinct, I reach for my sword, but my hand finds only smooth leather—the weapon abandoned out of respect for their tradition. He still marks the movement with a flick of his eyes, a frown tugging at his mouth that almost looks like disappointment.
“Would you kill me for speaking the truth?”
“No.” Even I’m not sure I mean it. I lay my hand flat, sliding it into my pocket, the urge to move building with every moment we speak. “No, but—you’re not understanding how urgent this is. If I don’t figure this stupid riddle out, she’s gone. I lose her.”
“People die.”
“Legends don’t die.”
His eyes fly wider, and then slowly, he grins. “Ah.”
“What?” I step back from the Gan Ainm, the elders exchanging knowing looks—the sort I’ve always hated with every feral instinct I possessed. “What do you think you know about me that I don’t?”
The eldest is quiet for a long minute, his silence driving me mad.
“What is your part to play in this history, lost one?”
My feet root themselves to the ground.
“What?”
“Say you were to greet the Knowing Sea,” he begins, facing the others gathered around a fire. “Holding the gods’ relics, Bandia Saoirse by your side. Would you allow her to enter it? Play her part as the goddess?”
“I—yes.” Everything in me bucks against the idea. “Whatever she needed.”
“Even if it were to eclipse you? Leave you out of the narrative?”
Something quickens in my heart.
That beast in my belly starts to roar.
“What will you do if her story does not remember you?”
The eldest Gan Ainm watches, wrinkles deepening at the corners of his eyes as a bead of sweat forms between my shoulder blades, painting a cold trail down my spine. But I don’t answer him. I can’t.
Because every time I think of those rocks—of being trapped and forgotten—the wolf inside my chest howls in anger. And every time I remember Saoirse cutting herself in the soul pools, the man inside me wants to burn the world down.
There is no good answer here—no way to consolidate my troubles and tempestuous parts. No way to allow the man to kill the beast or the beast to rip the man’s throat out, because if I ever let the two of them fight, I cannot guarantee who will win.
So I lie.
“I…don’t need her story to remember me.”
But even as I say it, I see the man’s lips spread into a sad smile, and I grit my teeth.
I can’t do it. I can’t.
I won’t lose Saoirse again, but…I can’t lose myself either.
“Look—it doesn’t matter what part I play in her story, because I’ll be there. No matter what.”
The eldest Gan Ainm watches me in silence for a long moment, then sighs. “I almost think you believe yourself.”
I lurch away from him—from them—barely fighting off the urge to snap and snarl. “I’m not feckin’ lying. I love her. More than anything! I would die for her—”
“But would you live for her?” The eldest shakes his head slowly. “I think…you ought to take a walk.”
“I don’t want a walk—I want some bloody answers!”
“Take a walk, and think it over.” The eldest massages one veined hand, watching me from beneath lowered lids. “I will measure your answer against wisdom when you return, and if the payment is sufficient, you will receive your reward.”
I’m stalking away before he’s even finished, blood boiling in my veins, though I somehow manage to hold my cursing in until I’m out of earshot. My steps take me on a rapid beat away from the sanctuary to curve near the river, and another row of plain cottages with yellow painted doors.
It’s cold enough that most of the windows are already covered by rabbits’ furs tacked over the openings, thatched roofs freshly bound for warmth.
A handful of children peek around the gray frieze tunics hanging on lines to dry, their eyes glinting with curiosity but a thorough lack of mischief.
If I had stayed, I’d have been sure to remedy that. If I’d stayed—
I stop abruptly, staring at the cottage ahead.
The walls are as freshly limewashed as the rest of them, but the door has a dent in the bottom left corner: not something to be painted over but a flaw meant to last as long as the door did. A mark of presence.
The indentation of my boot at thirteen, throwing the door wide to show my mother the summer flowers I’d found in a clearing.
My heart leaps and swells as I look past that mark to the cottage as a whole, frowning. There’s no evidence of laundry: no smell of food cooking or sound of activity inside. Chewing on my cheek, I step closer slowly, knock twice, then push the door open.
Nothing is inside.
Not the table my father carved us, the chair I broke at five, Mam’s collection of herbs in their wee clay pots she’d sculpted herself. It’s all…gone.
And it should enrage me, or at the very least hurt, but instead all I see are memories.
Mam by the fireplace, skeins of wool in her lap and a song in her throat.
Da, carving wood pieces—toys for me and the others, effigies to be understood.
Every corner has a memory to it, some story to tell of my parents.
Of Barden and Iona.
Two people who’ve all but faded to history, who were nameless for fifteen years of their lives—and who were everything to me. Not because they’d accomplished spectacular feats or sacrificed greatly, but because…they’d loved me. In the simplest scenes here, I can feel it.
“Son of a bitch.”
I turn on my heel, slamming my door on the way out.
“All we’re made of is stories.”
The eldest Gan Ainm looks up, startled, when I approach with a sharp smile.
“Whether it’s people singing my praises or a mention in an epic poem to my wife’s eyes, or—stars above, a bunch of memories only she has of me once she’s ruling the world with her fine hand.
And if the world doesn’t remember me, I’ll still make damn sure that I remember her. Does that answer suffice?”
The eldest Gan Ainm’s eyes stay on mine for a long, quiet moment, and then he raises a hand. “Sit.”
Breathing out a sigh of relief, I do. “Thank you. Now tell me how to stop him from splitting soulstones—or how to keep Saoirse from the worst of its effects.”
“I will give you the Omen of the Slaughter, lost one. But it is yours to interpret as you will.”
He turns to the others sitting together, and as one they begin the chant together, in a rhythm etched into my bones.
Drink the bones dry, oh, drink the bones dry
’Til the earth cries out in madness,
’Til the ceasing of the tide.
A thousand years it gave us, by blood and sigil, tied
’Til mortal gods grow thirsty, and drink the bones dry.
Then watch the stars lie, oh, watch the stars lie.
Trait’rous, cunning creatures
With magic in their eyes.
To slake their endless hunger, they’ll damn us all to die.
Cast the world to ruin, bathed in crimson brine.
’Neath the drowning sky, oh, ’neath the drowning sky,
Tear the stars asunder,
Return their borrowed prize.
A thousand more you’ll grant us, by age-old sacrifice.
Just split their bellies open, and bleed the stars dry.
My frown deepens. Shifts into a proper scowl even as more of that sweat breaks out across my body.
Fear prickling my every part.
“ ‘Just split their bellies open, and bleed the stars dry’?! Right. That’s not happening.”
The eldest Gan Ainm bows his head. “If what you say is true, and the Stone King has violated soulstones, then this is the only way. Blood must pay with blood, souls with souls.”
I shove myself to my feet, already backing away from the cluster of them. “Well, it’s not having her.”
“The Knowing Sea is absolute, lost one. It takes what it wants.”
“Not Saoirse. Not my wife!”
He quiets then, sallow-faced and stony. “She does not belong to you.”
“No. But she doesn’t belong to the sea either. Or Maccus, or you lot, or anyone else!”
“A goddess belongs to her flock.”
“She’s not a fecking goddess!”
The Gan Ainm stir together, pressing hands over their mouths, whispering prayers—I can’t stand it.
I lurch backward again, moving toward the huts as the eldest raises his hand.
“You must let her go, lost one. You must honor her vows to the sea! You cannot avoid this!”
“We’re pirates,” I snap over my shoulder, turning away. “We can do as we bloody well please.”