Song of Blood & Stone (Earthsinger Chronicles #1)(25)

Jasminda shot Jack a worried glance, then closed her eyes. Long, dark lashes brushed her cheeks and her face slackened. But instead of taking on the dreamy quality she’d worn when healing him, her face contorted in pain. Her scream tore through the air, endless and chilling. It froze his heart, but his arms reached out of their own accord to catch her when she collapsed.




The beating of drums thunders along the walls, pulsing and jittering, almost louder than the pounding of my chest. The thrum thrum thrum beats in time to the chants of my name, called over and over again until it echoes deep in the recesses of every tunnel, every crack and crevice in the mountain.

It was my name Oval's deep voice called at the Choosing.

It is a great honor to be chosen.

So as I kneel on my hands and knees while Mother shears the hair from my scalp, why do I feel such betrayal?

She wraps me in the ceremonial coverings. Chatters on about how proud she is and what this will mean for the little ones, the sisters and brothers I will never see again. The one I will never meet still lodged in her belly.

My sacrifice will protect them from the dangers threatening our caves. Our family will be held in high esteem.

I am scrubbed raw in the hot springs. My newly uncovered head is tender and aching. Blood comes away on my fingers when I rub at my baldness.

Mother pierces me with a glance. You must not waste it, she says, eyes darting around to make sure no one else has seen.

Once your blood is chosen, it no longer belongs to you.

The drums and chanting only grow louder as I follow my family to the gathering. I wish my aching head would pound hard enough to tear it from my body.

Not my body. Not anymore.

Oval is there, his eyes pale with age, leached of the fiery color they held in his youth. My eyes will never lighten another shade. My skin will never grow loose and gather in bunches, showing proof of my wisdom. I will be fourteen summers forevermore.

The chanting is frenzied now, the noise unbearable.

I am laid on the smooth stone altar. It vibrates beneath my skin. Mother does not shed so much as a tear for me. Her smile cracks me in two. I am not her daughter.

Not anymore.

I am everyone’s daughter now. I belong to the Folk, to the caves, to the drums.

When the blade comes, I do not close my eyes. The pounding in my chest fades as the sharpened stone pierces my flesh.

My blood belongs to them all now.




Jasminda clutched at her chest, pulling at the neck of her dress only to find her skin smooth and unmarred. Her breath came in shallow bursts. Her vision swam. There was no knife plunging between her breasts. No warm blood fleeing her body. No odd, chanting crowd watching, enraptured.

When her eyes focused, an anxious face filled her view. Firelit eyes regarded her and a familiar scent filled her nostrils. A man’s arms surrounded her. This was safety. Comfort. She knew him, though she couldn’t quite recall how. His face relaxed as she stared up at him, hypnotized by the color of his eyes. Voices spoke nearby, but she did not recognize the language.

“What happened?” she said.

He frowned. “I should ask you that. You collapsed. Why are you speaking Elsiran?”

She did not understand his question but caught sight of her hands. Held them up in front of her face. They were back to their normal hue, not the sickly, almost colorless gray they’d been before. “I died.”

“I can assure you, you did not,” he said, his mouth turned down at the edges. He brushed her hair from her forehead, then sat back as she struggled up to a sitting position.

“No, not me. I was someone else.”

“Someone who died?”

“Yes.” Her body was heavier now than it had been. Larger and thicker.

“What is she saying?” an aged voice called out in the strange language. She was surprised that she could now understand it. She looked up into a disapproving face that was both familiar and not. People were gathered around her, concern in their eyes, but the only one she recognized was the man. His name danced just at the edge of her memory.

“The mountain demanded my blood.” She repeated the words in the language the old man had spoken, testing it out on her tongue. It tasted wrong somehow, as though the syllables didn’t fit together properly.

“Did she hit her head?” a woman said.

“Give her some space.”

“Try to sing again, child.”

“No! That’s what got her in this state to begin with.”

The voices went back and forth. She couldn’t hold on to them. Her vision swam again, but she didn’t want to go back to that other place, the place where she was just a sacrificed girl, only worth the weight of her blood.

Something pulsed inside her, something demanding attention. She closed her eyes to focus, and it grew with her observation. Surprised, she opened her eyes again. The man watched her intently. She reached out a hand to him, and he did not hesitate to take it. She focused once more on that little pulse inside her. It swelled, unfurling itself like the wings of a bird and taking flight toward some larger rhythm. The rhythm scared her, but it was also beautiful. She plunged into it and let it consume her, leaving her in a darkness far greater than the one behind her eyelids.




“She’s coming out of it.”

“Again.”

Swimming to the surface this time was easy.