The Way Into Darkness: Book Three of The Great Way (5 page)

Ivy shrugged. “The Durdric think he does. That is why they kill anyone they find carrying metal. When our kings asked about it, Kelvijinian said he could not feel mining or tilling and was pleased to share the bounty. He has not opened the ground beneath us and swallowed us whole, no? Clearly, the Durdric religious ban on mining or using metal is something they made up. Wait, you are thinking about the tunnel?”
 

“Shh! Yes, obviously.”
 

“I never asked about, you know, spells.” This last word was not said aloud, only mouthed. Still, even that was too much for Cazia’s comfort.
 

She looked over at the face again. Every time she glanced away and glanced back again, she was surprised anew by the size of the thing. “Will I be allowed to speak with him?”
 

Ivy shrugged again. “That is for my cousin to decide.” For a moment, she looked uncomfortable. “Er, for appearances, you might have to wait a bit. The faithful will certainly go before you.”

Later, Goherzma went through the camp to ask everyone, high and low, whether they wanted an audience with Kelvijinian. He did not approach Cazia and Kinz--in fact, he did not even look in their direction as he walked from place to place.
 

Belterzhimi stayed in the temple until well past sundown. Ivy explained that while she had been in her father’s presence when Kelvijinian had announced the last alarm, she had never seen one as it was created. She was as curious about it as the others.
 

“How does your god make the alarm?” Kinz asked.
 

“The face emerges from the rock and soil much the way a swimmer emerges from the waters of a lake.”
 

Creepy.
But of course, Cazia didn’t say that aloud.

They laid out woolen blankets on the wet meadow grass and ate a stew made from dried boq and summer berries collected from the nearby bushes. The clouds blew away late in the afternoon, and the sun came out. Cazia found herself staring at Kelvijinian, at the way the sunlight shimmered on the wet stone, and wished she could do so from even farther away.
 

The Indregai serpents kept a greater distance than usual from the humans, arranging themselves at the easternmost part of the clearing in a line, almost like pickets.
 

“They do that,” Ivy offered. “The serpents do not worship Kelvijinian--at least, not in any way we understand--but they do keep to the east, guarding the road to the temple. I think it is an honorable thing.”
 

Cazia laid out her bedroll that night with an uneasy feeling. Kelvijinian could open the ground beneath her, couldn’t he? He could swallow her up while she slept; she might die without waking. Of course, she was sleeping in a camp full of Indregai soldiers who were openly hostile to anyone from Peradain, including one who was friends with an Ergoll princess. That she hadn’t been murdered in her sleep already was practically a miracle.

Kelvijinian. Today, she had seen the face of Kelvijinian.
Grateful am I to be permitted to travel The Way.
 

In the morning, the huge head was still there. An eerie sense of the deep strangeness of the universe ran along Cazia’s skin like goose prickles, and then, as the morning passed, the whole thing began to lose its mystery. All through the second day, people streamed away from the camp and knelt in the temple to implore the god for one favor or another. As an Ergoll princess, Ivy was first, naturally, having gone to her audience and returned before the other two girls woke.
 

“I sent a message to my parents, of course, and asked for a good harvest and aid against our enemies. The usual things.”
 

Cazia wondered once again if the ground would open beneath her. “
Does
he aid you against your enemies?”

“Father says yes but Mother and Uncle say not really. He does not drop landslides on top of Peradaini troops, if that is what you are wondering. I am not sure what he does, and I am not sure anyone would be glad to tell me the answer.”
 

They spent their whole morning doing nothing but chores and resting their feet. Ivy and Kinz helped Cazia clean her clothes--apparently, she was not keeping them white enough, and the soldiers were whispering. Scrubbing them with water taken from streams wasn’t enough to satisfy Indregai aesthetics; Ivy gave her a leather pouch with a yellowish powder inside that, when wet, cleaned her robes astonishingly well. Cazia wished she’d known about this when she’d lived in the palace.
 

Then she got a change of bandage, an approving clap on the shoulder from the doctor treating her, and words of encouragement from the other girls.
 

Late in the morning, Belterzhimi came to visit them. He was, as before, tale, pale, and impeccably dressed. He’d put on the formal white robe that showed he was a warden. With a flourish, he made a show of thanking Cazia for returning Ivy safely to her people. Cazia was surprised; why he was thanking her now, after so many days of travel together? Then he produced a tiny green jewel from a pocket in his sleeve and offered it as a token of his gratitude.
 

Cazia’s whole body flushed, but Ivy moved slightly behind her cousin’s shoulder where he could not see her but Cazia could. The princess scowled.
 

That was pretty clear; Ivy did not want her to accept the gift. Cazia blinked and looked down at the ground so Belterzhimi would not realize that the princess disapproved. Her thoughts swirled with all the possible reasons Ivy might not want her to accept, some mortifying, some terrifying. What to do?
 

The answer turned out to be easy: trust her little sister. She refused the little jewel as graciously as she could manage three times, after which Belterzhimi seemed to feel compelled to give up. He bowed his head with formality, then stalked away, clearly annoyed.
 

He was barely out of earshot when Kinz rushed forward. “What was happening?”

Ivy pressed her lips together, unwilling to talk until her cousin had gone much farther. Cazia didn’t care. “I don’t understand. If he wanted to give me a gift to thank me, why did he wait so long? And why not Kinz, too?”
 

“He has something you want,” Ivy whispered, as she brushed the dirt off a smooth stone so she could sit on it. “Worse, he owes you because you helped me. If you had accepted the jewel—and it was so beautiful, I would bet it was one of the named jewels in the family line—the debt would have been discharged and he could have demanded something in return for permission to visit the temple.” Ivy pressed her fingers against her lips. “I can not imagine what he would want from you, though.”
 

“Information on the flying carts,” Cazia said, the realization coming to her at the same time the words came out of her mouth. “Peradaini refugees from East Ford would have crossed the Straim, right? They probably brought a flying cart across with them. You and I might be the only people he’s met who have admitted to riding on one.”
 

“Belterzhimi would want every whisper, every rumor he could get, so he could identify the driver.”
 

Kinz shrugged. “I do not blame him. If he could make to spy safely on The Blessing, he could better protect his side of the river.”
 

Cazia and Ivy looked at each other. “Did we tell him about the way the grunts destroyed those carts above Peradain?” Ivy asked. “I am not sure if we did. You should tell him, Cazia; he is my family, so I am expected to forgive very large obligations.”
 

Far across the clearing, Cazia could see the serpents still clustered at the eastern edge of the clearing. They hadn’t lingered that way at any of the previous campsites. “If I’d accepted that jewel, I could have made a translation stone for you, like you asked. Um, one moment.” She walked across the meadow, feeling the wind against her back. Soldiers watched her with blank, unfriendly expressions and she was careful to make a circuitous route that avoided the narrow stone column and roof without walls that comprised Kelvijinian’s temple. She knew she wasn’t supposed to approach it and didn’t want to give the archers an excuse to take a shot at her.
 

A dozen serpents lingered at the far edge of the meadow, but only two
 
appeared to be coiled and resting. The others held their heads high as if on guard. Great Way, they were beautiful creatures: long and muscular, their scales shimmering in the sun light like a rainbow.
 
As she came closer, she noticed a narrow path behind them, very near the base of the mountain. The serpents appeared to be blocking it.
 

Cazia told herself that Ivy knew better than she did. That the serpents, no matter how they swayed back and forth, no matter how many of them lifted their heads as she approached, no matter how closely they watched her, were allies to the humans of Indrega.
 

Not that she looked like an Indregai girl; her face was too broad and her skin too dark, but she had the clothes. That ought to be enough to protect her from them, shouldn’t it?
 

As she came within twenty paces, even the serpents who had been coiled and resting raised themselves up. All stared at her steadily, their heads swaying back and forth. Were they hissing louder as she approached? Maybe it was just that she was getting close enough to hear them.
 

Ivy had assured her the serpents were safe. Friendly, even. Her people who lived with them every day. Cazia told herself that the serpents seemed hostile because they were so different, like Mother and the other giant eagles. She was sure that, if she understood their body language, she would know that they were probably only rising up to greet her.
 

Then the nearest serpent bared its fangs and hissed at her.
 

Cazia gasped and staggered back, almost colliding with someone behind her.
 

“They know who and what you are.” A blond archer stood much too close. Cazia didn’t recognize her, but there were so many of these pale-narrow-skulled women with murderous expressions that it was hard to tell them apart. Her Peradaini was surprisingly good, though.

The archer leaned in close. “They know how many of us your people have killed. If I shoved you at them, daughter of butchers, they would probably drag you into the weeds and eat you alive. Have you ever seen someone try to scream when the lungs have been punctured by a serpent’s fangs? Can you imagine one of them wrapping the huge jaws over your face before they gulp you--”

“Enough!” Ivy’s thin voice startled the archer into silence. Although she barely came up to the archer’s breastbone, she wagged her finger in the soldier’s face and scolded her like a child. In Ergoll, though. Cazia couldn’t help but feel cheated that she couldn’t understand them.
 

“Come with me, please, Cazia,” Ivy said, switching back to Peradaini. “The serpents are territorial, and part of our understanding with them is that we will keep the lands inviolate.”
 

“So this is the edge of their territory?” Cazia asked.

“It is. The temple is as far to the east as we dare go. Not that it matters. The land in the northeast is stony and uneven, terrible for farming or raising okshim. Come. My cousin wants to speak with you. Remember to be nice; guests are not supposed to be funny.”

“I’m always nice,” Cazia snapped. She looked back at the serpents. They hissed quietly while they stared.
 

Belterzhimi did indeed want to speak with her but only to invite the three of them to his campfire for their dinner meal. The sun was low in the west by the time they joined him, and while they ate, they traded polite stories about their childhood. Belterzhimi did not press her to tell him secrets and did not seem to care if her stories were of the endless prank war she’d waged against the palace tutors and servants.
 

Only when the meal was finished did he seem ready to talk business. The smile he’d worn during their meal--which had never really seemed to suit him--vanished. He began to ask sharp questions about Cazia’s desire to enter the temple. Who did she want to send a message to? Where would this message be going? What was the content?
 

The princess tried to intercede, but Cazia laid a hand on her shoulder to let her know it was all right. Cazia explained that soldiers she knew had ventured into the west to find a spell that would help them against The Blessing. She wanted to know if they had gotten it and how the war was going.
 

Belterzhimi said that she could
ask
to speak to someone at a specific place, but that gods were fickle and if he declined, she was not to pursue the matter. One request, one answer, and she must accept it or suffer the consequences.

“I understand.”

“Good,” the warden said. “You may speak to him now, if it pleases you.”

“Thank you.”
 

She stood and started across the meadow toward the Temple. Ivy got to her feet as if to follow her, but Cazia held up her hand. There was no need for a babysitter this time.
 

Fire and Fury, that massive face! The blocky nose, the half-lidded eyes, the gaping mouth that looked like a black cave. If she climbed into that darkness, would gigantic teeth clamp down on her?
 

She glanced at the Indregai soldiers around her. If anything, their expressions were more closed, more hostile than they had ever been. She forced herself to look back at Kelvijinian and was struck again by the idea that it was everywhere around her. She’d grown accustomed to it as the long day went on, but now that she approached, she was chilled once again by its size and power.
 

She was walking on its body. She slept on it, ate food grown from it, built fires on it, dug holes in it to empty her bowels. Everywhere. All around her.
 

Goose bumps ran the length of her body and she began to feel claustrophobic. Her gods were everywhere at once, obviously, but they had always been an abstraction. The god of the Ergoll was
right there
and she was about to talk to it.