Black Sun (Between Earth and Sky, #1)(83)

Denaochi nodded, as if her news didn’t surprise him. “How long do we have before they act?”

“Surely until the solstice. They only decided yesterday after the riots. Right before they stripped me of my title and locked me in my room.”

Her brother laughed, a low dry chuckle. “Well, well.”

She swallowed back her embarrassment and focused on what was important. “We can’t let another Night of Knives happen. It will rip the city apart.”

“You may not believe it, but the bosses of the Maw care about this city, too. I know I disparaged your concerns earlier, but civil unrest does none of us any good. It hurts business, scares away pilgrims and tourists with cacao, particularly before the solstice. Whether the violence starts with the Odohaa or the priests, another Night of Knives would be the end of us all. Tova would not recover. The Crescent cities already regard us like a ripe fruit, waiting to pick us apart. Cuecola chafes at our yoke, and Hokaia would follow if they broke from the treaty. The Sky Made need only to make one foolish move to put us all at risk, and this infighting would do it.”

Naranpa hadn’t even thought about Cuecola and Hokaia. “Skies, Ochi. Have the Sky Made and the Watchers become so insular? So ignorant of what truly threatens us?”

His eyes bored into her, evaluating. The same look she had given him moments ago, before she decided to confess the entirety of her situation. She braced herself.

“You mentioned Golden Eagle before,” he said, “that they have involved themselves. Perhaps the Sky Made know something of what’s at stake and have plans of their own.”

A wave of insight hit her. She felt like a fool. She accused the priesthood of being too focused inward, content to uphold the status quo, but she had been guilty of the same thing. Unable to look past Tova’s nose and see the continent gathering at their doorstep.

“So what do you suggest we do?” she asked.

He snapped his fingers, the ones on his good hand, and called a name.

A sound from the shadowy corner where she had marked a presence and then forgotten it in the heat of their confrontation. A figure unwound itself from the darkness, pulling itself forward inch by inch until it resolved into a human shape, and then a woman.

She was neither plain nor beautiful, a bit like Naranpa herself, but where Naranpa was short, this woman was tall, and where she was rounded, this woman possessed a long, lean hunger much like Denaochi’s own. Her hair was cut to the skin, and she wore a dress that covered her from neck to feet in a dark brown the color of river silt. She smiled, showing teeth.

“Tell her what you have seen in your castings, Zataya.”

Naranpa’s jaw dropped. “A witch?”

“She is my counselor,” he said. “I trust her.”

“Ochi…” Naranpa said, shaking her head. For a moment there she had admired her brother, been impressed with his knowledge and savvy. But this? “Magic is a foolish man’s crutch. It’s nothing but sleight of hand and superstition.”

The witch straightened, a flash of annoyance rippling across her shoulders. “You are not the only one who has learned to read the future,” she said. “You may look to the stars, but we of the Dry Earth look to other signs. Fire and stone speak, too.”

“Witchcraft,” Naranpa accused. “It’s not the science of the priesthood.”

“Nara, please,” her brother said, clearly exasperated. “You came to me for help. Keep an open mind.”

“An open mind is one thing. But you are asking me to believe in folly.” She started to stand. “I can no more bel—”

“You can!” he shouted, and she froze, startled to silence. “You can,” he said, quieter, calmer. “If you want to save yourself and this city, you will listen, Sister. And you will remember that while you have convinced yourself that you are Sky Made, you were born Dry Earth. This”—he gestured to the witch—“is who you are, not that tower. Now…” He gestured to her seat.

Stunned, Naranpa dropped back onto the bench.

Her brother ran a hand over his necklaces, as if the stones soothed him. He nodded. “Continue, Zataya.”

“I have read the fire,” she said, “and looked into the shadow.” She pulled a palm-sized mirror pendant from her clothes and grasped it in her left hand. Naranpa shifted uneasily. She recognized the mirror as a scrying mirror, something used by the southern sorcerers.

“That’s not Dry Earth magic,” she murmured.

“Wait,” Denaochi said.

Zataya closed her eyes and whispered an incantation. Naranpa strained to hear the words, but the witch’s voice was too low for Naranpa to decipher.

Again, she repeated the chant, a soft buzzing hiss that filled the room.

They waited.

Again, the incantation. And again. Sweat touched the witch’s hairline, her neck. She swayed on her feet.

Naranpa looked to her brother again, but he motioned her to patience.

Finally, Zataya spoke, her voice dark and sepulchral. “A storm is coming across the water, and it does not rest!” she cried. “Dark forces from the south are gathering. As the sun grows weaker, he grows stronger.”

Naranpa frowned. It sounded like theatrical nonsense. “I don’t understand.” She looked to Denaochi. “Who is he? And where in the south? Are we still talking about Cuecola? Can she see anything about Carrion Crow? What about Golden Eagle?”