Zilok screamed and forced himself back into the threads. It was excruciating. Rather than an otter whisking down a stream, he was a rat crawling down a hole pierced by a thousand daggers, all cutting into him.
But finally, feeling like he was bleeding from horrible wounds, Zilok pulled himself out of the threads at his destination, deep in a secret passage beneath the wintery Corialis Mountains. His former anchor, Orem, was bundled up and sitting by a fire he had made to ensure he did not freeze. The man, still dulled by Zilok’s spell, stood up at the back of the cave, waiting obediently.
“Come closer,” Zilok gasped.
“Yes, my master,” Orem said, obediently walking to him.
Zilok cut his connection to the crown, reaching out with a hundred ethereal fingers and latching onto Orem’s life. He felt better instantly. Orem became Zilok’s vitality once again. Let the damned crown rot. Perhaps he wouldn’t ever go back for it. Let some other fool stumble across it and be eaten.
“That was unpleasant,” Zilok said.
“Yes, my master.”
“I must convalesce.”
“Yes, my master.”
That had been a very near thing. Zilok reached into the rich threads of Amarion, the threads that composed the rock, the air, the snow outside. He let the rich GodSpill flow into him.
...and it trickled out of him again.
“What?” he demanded aloud. Orem only stared at him.
Zilok spun. At the mouth of the cave, half sunk into the snow as though it had been dropped there, was Natra’s Crown.
10
Medophae
Medophae blinked himself awake. The salty smell of the sea was all around him. His eyes were heavily crusted with sleep, and dawn was beginning to light the sky down the beach where his feet were pointed. A wave came in, thinning as it rushed up the beach to tickle his arm and the right side of his body. The raging pain in his wrist had died to a quiet throb, and the stump had been sewn up with some slick cord that looked like sinew. The top and bottom edges of the stump had been punctured by thin shark’s teeth.
“By the gods!” He yanked his arm up out of the water. Each shark tooth had been whittled to a needle, each with a hole bored through one end of it, connecting it to the sinew. He’d never seen thread like this, but the stitch job was masterfully done. Every stitch looked just like the last, and they were tight. Even a ghastly wound like this could heal with barely a scar with stitching like that. And it was already well along with its healing, as though he’d been lying here for days.
“You should leave it,” a girl said.
He craned his neck around. Behind him, the ruffian girl stood ankle-deep in the water. She was maybe ten or eleven and, aside from the sailor’s pantaloons and tunic, she looked more like a girl he would see living in the Teni’sian palace, rather than a girl living rough with seaside ruffians. She had clean skin, big eyes, and hair that looked well-brushed. It tumbled down her shoulders to her waist in waves. It was hard to tell if it was light brown or blond. It was difficult to see by the pre-dawn light, which gave it a blueish cast.
The other ruffians were nowhere to be seen.
“Where are your friends?” Medophae asked.
“They went away,” she said. “You should keep your arm in the water. It’s good for it.”
Actually, the quickest way to bring on infection was to put an open wound in seawater, but who knew what this little girl had been taught by those men? Medophae stood up. “Went away?” He looked up and down the beach, but there wasn’t any sign of them. “Where?”
“I gave them your pouch. It made them bigger. That’s what they really wanted.”
“Bigger?”
“Everyone wants to be bigger.”
She had the oddest way of speaking. Her accent wasn’t Dandene, nor from any other kingdom on Amarion. “The pouch wasn’t what you wanted?”
She looked straight up at the sky, which was slowly turning blue, then she looked back at him with a lopsided smile. One lone dimple appeared on her left cheek. “People are funny about rocks, aren’t they?” she asked.
“Rocks?”
“Gold. Silver. Rocks. Well, melted rocks.” She paused. “And gems. Also melted rocks.”
“Those men just left?”
“They got bigger. That’s what they wanted.”
“They were going to kill me.”
“So they could feel bigger.”
“So they could steal my money.”
“You’re so big and strong. If they killed you, they’d feel bigger and stronger. That’s why they were going to kill you.”
“I don’t think that’s the reason.”
“That and their dream.”
“Dream?”
“To make themselves bigger with melted rocks.”
“You’re a strange girl.”
“But I do know how to knit things.” She made a motion with her hand like she was sewing.
“You sewed me up?”
“Well it wasn’t the ocean!” She giggled.
He looked at her, and she stared back like he was a puppy about to do a trick.
“Are they your family?” he asked.
She laughed as if that was the funniest thing. Then she stopped like someone had slapped her face. She sobered. “Well, yes.”
“Your father?”
“No.”
“Uncle?”
Her large eyes widened. “Oh no,” she whispered. “I don’t talk about my uncle. Ever.” She looked frightened. “Mother never talks about my uncle, and she forbids me to.”
“Okay,” he pacified her. “Well, thank you for helping me.”
She glanced at his stump, then back up at him. “It’s what you wanted, right? You came looking for help. You were going to give them money to help you.”
“Well... Yes.”
“But I helped you instead.”
“You certainly did.”
“Well... Do you feel cheated?”
“What? Cheated? No.” He raised his stump. It made him queasy to look at it, so...short. No hand. But without her, he would have died. “Is there something I can do for you in exchange for your help?”
“Yes!” she said emphatically, as though she’d been waiting for him to ask that question. She clapped her hands.
“Oh,” he said. “Well, I will do what I can. Tell me.”
“I will,” she said. “But not yet. I did you a favor. And you will do me a favor in the future, right?”
“You’re saying that I owe you.”
“Yes.” She clapped her hands again. “You owe me.”
“Very well.” The rising sun illuminated the girl further, and he suddenly realized her hair was actually blue. The bluish tinge was not a trick of the light. A chill ran through him. Medophae had met the goddess of the True Ocean many times. Like all gods, she could look like whatever she wanted. She could look human, or dragon. She could even be a talking wave, but she almost always appeared as a whale. She loved her whales, cared for the denizens of her ocean, and barely tolerated everything else. She made an exception for Medophae because he had killed Dervon, whom she hated above all others. Dervon had killed her daughter, Vaisha the Changer.
“Saraphazia...?” he murmured.
“Oh goodness!” She held up a hand like she would cover his mouth, but she was about ten feet away from him. “Don’t say her name, silly!”
“Who are you?”
“I’m Vee,” she whispered. “Don’t say her name again, please. She listens for her name. And she’s probably looking for me already....” Vee raised her head and looked down the coast toward the sun, as though hearing something he couldn’t hear. “Oh no. It’s too late.” She bit her lip, then said to him. “Don’t tell her I was here. Please?”
“Who are you?”
“You mustn’t tell!” She ran into the surf and dove into the face of a wave. He waded after her, but she was much faster than him.
“Wait!” he shouted. The waves pushed at him, and by the time h
e was waist-deep, he couldn’t see her anymore.
To the left, where Vee had looked, a huge swell rose on the ocean, coming his direction.
11
Medophae
The swell approached quickly, the ocean bulging like a blue blanket over some vast creature. Medophae backed up the beach, shielding his eyes as the water exploded and rushed up the beach. It took his legs out from underneath him, swirling him all the way to the trees.
The water receded, spinning him and pulling him back down the sand until he came to a stop right in front of the giant, dark blue whale.
Its head was as big as a castle, and its enormous fins—each the size of a ship—had propped it up so that it could look down on Medophae. Its girth had crushed a trench in the beach, and water sluiced around the giant body as it raced back to the ocean. The rest of its body extended so far back it disappeared into the waves.
Every god Medophae had met, save Tarithalius, intimidated mortals with their size. It was possible they just couldn’t help it, being as powerful as they were, but Medophae suspected it was just because they were bullies. They enjoyed seeing fear in the faces of mortal creatures.
Medophae coughed out water and shoved his stump into the sand in an attempt to push himself to his feet. He hissed at the pain and yanked it back out, falling on his side again. It still felt like his hand was there. With a hundred needles stabbing it, but still there. He was going to have to get better at that.
Using his left hand, he pushed himself to his feet and faced the goddess. The giant eye on her left side tracked his progress.
“Saraphazia.” He bowed low. “Thank you for coming.”
Giant waves rose and crashed behind her, along the length of her monolithic body. They were so big they should have obliterated the beach and the forest for a hundred yards, but they crashed against an invisible barrier a dozen feet away from Medophae. It was all he could do not to flinch.
Intimidation. All part of the show.
The whale’s mouth opened, revealing millions of long, white fronds that were her teeth. “Who were you talking to?” The voice emerged from the cavernous depths.
Vee’s words rang in his head: Don’t tell her I was here. You mustn’t!
“I’m in need of assistance,” Medophae said.
“Who were you talking to?”
“I was calling you.”
“Are you telling me that you weren’t talking to anyone before I arrived?” The voice boomed, vibrating his chest.
“Yes,” he lied. “I came here for you.” Part of that was true, at least.
The pupil of the eye, nearly as tall as he was, narrowed to half its size. “Something has happened to you. You no longer walk with Oedandus.”
“I have been attacked.” He held up his stump. “And now I need your help.”
“You need my help....”
“Oedandus is trapped on the continent of Amarion. He cannot reach me here, but I must get back to him. Events are moving that—”
“And what do you think I can do for you?” The sepulchral voice vibrated through him.
“A trifle, for you. I beseech you to take me back to Amarion.”
“A trifle?” She said, an edge to her voice. “I do not suffer humans in my ocean.”
“Humans...?” Medophae said. Her tone was different than the last time they had spoken. Saraphazia had always been rather cold, but in the times she’d spoken with him, she had been warmer than this. Finally, he said, “You once told me that when I needed your aid, you would come. When Dervon lay dead at my feet, you swore you would—”
“I swore to Oedandus. I swore to the vessel of my mother’s consort. I did not swear to you, human.”
Medophae’s mouth hung open. “You’re joking.”
“Take caution in your tone, mortal. I suffer your presumption because you were once part of Oedandus. You are no longer, and I have tolerated you about as far as I will.” Her thick head raised, glancing past him at the island. “This is where you were born. You can thrive here. Be grateful.”
He held up his stump. “My hand has been chopped off!”
Those giant eyes blinked, uncaring.
Medophae ground his teeth. He wanted to rage at her, to call her a faithless oath-breaker, but he had no leverage to move her. Not only did she not care about his “mortal troubles,” but she might actually just kill him. He wouldn’t be the first human she had simply decided to kill because he’d offended her. With effort, he reined in his outrage. He had to be smarter than that.
“Then I’ll trade information,” he said calmly.
“What could you possibly know that I don’t?”
“Avakketh,” he said.
That stopped her. Saraphazia hated Avakketh, god of dragons, almost as much as she had hated Dervon the Diseased before Medophae had killed him. The god of humans, Tarithalius, had told Medophae that, long before humans were created, the whales and the dragons had fought each other in a conflict called the War of the Behemoths. Back then, dragons had no wings and whales did not swim in the oceans. They were both land-bound creatures carving out their territory in the world.
Avakketh had joined the conflict on the side of the dragons, Saraphazia on the side of the whales, and their war nearly destroyed the other sentient races of the world. So Natra, the mother of the gods, sent the dragons to live in the northern mountains of Amarion, transformed them into airborne creatures, and gave them dominion over the skies. Natra then transformed the whales into hulking creatures with fins and gave them dominion over the True Ocean.
Avakketh went with his dragons to the north, and Saraphazia went with the whales. Thalius said that so great was Saraphazia’s hatred for her uncle that she cast a spell over the whole of the ocean, making it like acid to any dragon who dared set foot in the water.
“What about Avakketh?” Saraphazia rumbled.
“He is planning to attack the human lands of Amarion. He’s going to wipe out humanity. Once he realizes I’m gone, he’ll begin. There will be nothing to stop him. Every moment I’m away is dangerous. If he comes south... No one else can stand against him.”
“You?” Saraphazia said with disdain.
“I’m the same person!” he blurted without thinking. “I am the only way Oedandus can stop him. Surely you see that?”
Saraphazia said nothing.
“Well?” He demanded.
“Let Avakketh destroy the humans. They were a mistake, anyway.”
A hollow fear fluttered in his belly. “You can’t mean that.”
“Humans should never have been created in the first place. It was Thalius being Thalius. He thinks he’s funny when he does such things, but Natra never approved of a fifth sentient race. It’s ridiculous. It always was.”
“But you can’t...just let them die.”
She just watched him.
He suddenly realized what he really was to her. Humans were annoying flies to Saraphazia, to be slapped when they touched her ocean, and otherwise to be ignored. His mind raced.
“He’ll come for you next,” Medophae said.
“I think not.”
“Once he eliminates humans, he will dominate the continent, from the Spine Mountains to the True Ocean. How long after that before he decides he wants your domain, too? When he comes for you and your whales, you’ll wish you’d helped me.”
“If Avakketh or his dragons enter my ocean, I will destroy them.”
“And if he enlists White Tuana? You ripped her eyes out. You helped kill her father. She would jump at the chance for revenge. If they also bring Zetu...” He let the statement hang in the air a moment. It was Zetu, Dervon, and Tuana who’d nearly destroyed Oedandus, made him into what he was now.
“Zetu has vanished. He no longer walks the world.”
“Oedandus was also sure that Zetu wouldn’t rise against him. He thought Zetu was an ally.”
Saraphazia was utterly still. He hoped she was working out in her head what he had worked out in his. He
hoped that—
“Goodbye, Medophae. Farewell in this protected haven your god made for you. He ensured that you and your kind could fish the waters for a mile around the island, and I honor that agreement to this day. Take it as a blessing.” Water rose around her, lifting her bulk high into the air. The spray drove him backward. He stumbled and fell, again trying to break his fall with a hand he didn’t have.
He shouted through the pain, tried to rise, but got tumbled again by the water as she submerged and the wave rushed up the beach. As the water receded, he staggered to his feet.
“Saraphazia!” he yelled.
The wind and sea spray died. The ocean withdrew, and Saraphazia was gone.
“Saraphazia!”
Only a giant swell, moving quickly away, showed where the goddess was. Then that, too, flattened against the ocean, and the waves rolled in as they had before.
Medophae fell to his knees at the edge of the surf.
12
Medophae
Medophae shouted at the ocean for another hour before he finally fell to his knees in the water and bowed his head.
The thudding thump of his mortality beat in his wrist, a pulse that whispered how feeble he really was. His stomach growled. He’d been too long without food now, and those mortal hunger pangs had begun. Ever before, he could ignore that feeling for as long as he needed to.
Medophae was going to have to start paying attention to mortal necessities now. He was going to have to start accepting his situation.
The reality was this: He was trapped here. Whether a thousand years ago, a hundred years ago, or right now, no human ship had ever sailed across the True Ocean. Not once, not ever. It was impossible. The only way to cross was with Saraphazia’s blessing.
The despair Medophae had lived with for hundreds of years hung over him, thick and heavy. He’d spent those centuries twisting with indecision, not knowing what to do. Ironically, he now knew what needed doing, and he was barred from doing it.
Avakketh was coming south. While Medophae languished here bantering with a stubborn goddess, humankind was threatened with extinction, and Medophae was the only one who could stop it.
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