The Shadowglass (The Bone Witch, #3)(103)
The rest of the daeva were already present, but they gave the broken circle of mountains a wide berth, their reluctance to draw closer obvious.
“She is here,” the Dark asha murmured as we disembarked. “She is not even hiding it.”
“What happens now?” Zoya asked.
“Say and do nothing until Tea orders it,” Kalen told her. “You could have stayed with Kance, you know. Shadi would not be happy, you coming along.”
“Shadi isn’t here. And we need a representative from Kion to see this through. Empress Alyx would appreciate my efforts.” She leaped to the bone witch’s aid when the latter stumbled, her breathing uneven. Kalen sprang to her other side, arm hooked underneath hers.
“Are you sure about this, Tea?” the Kion asha asked, biting her lip. “You aren’t well. You cannot think to go there and confront Druj in your weakened state.”
“I am not going to get any better, Zoya.” The Dark asha straightened. “It would do you and the bard well to stay outside the ring and let the rest of us enter.”
“I didn’t come all the way here to be banned from fighting. I can feel the wards, and they’re far too strong to unravel.” Lady Zoya paused, looking down. A sob rose from her. “I’m sorry. I haven’t apologized, have I? All those years waiting for the right time, never realizing there would never be one until I made it so. I’m sorry.”
The Dark asha laughed her little, golden laugh. “You’ve apologized many times over with actions rather than words…but I am happy, all the same.”
“We’ll go in with you, and we’ll come out together. Years from now, we’ll laugh about our foolishness. Just you wait.”
“But how?” Lord Khalad asked. “With the wards in place, none of you can use spells.”
“There’s one more way,” Lady Zoya said. “We can link with each other to overcome the wards. Linking with all the daeva will be more than enough to counteract those barriers—not even a Faceless of Druj’s caliber could withstand all seven. But with such potential for destruction, Tea isn’t in any shape to confront Druj on her own. If the rest of us could tap into the reserves she holds, it will be enough. But we’ll need to lure Druj out of the ring and into the open. If we can’t bring the daeva to her, then let’s bring her to them instead.”
The daeva retreated farther as we approached the ranges. “Garindor was right,” Lord Kalen said. “There is something within these ruins that they fear, and I suspect it isn’t Druj’s wards. We can convince them to linger by the entrance, but they’ll take no further steps.”
There was nothing majestic or breathtaking about the Ring of Worship. There was only a long stretch of sand within that circle of mountains, no more than one or two kilometers in diameter, with only a narrow passage as entrance and exit. The sky was a giant, blue eye above us, peering in. Strange, yellowing plants—pale and unhealthy looking yet thriving despite the lack of rain—crept along the edges where the mountains threw meager shade.
There were no stones or monuments to decorate this place, no inkling that four great warriors had entered here and never left. Rashnu’s accounts of his comrades’ fates had talked of a sacred tree, of a light so fierce that it had turned able warriors into nothing in an instant. I stepped warily inside, searching for unseen dangers I knew I had no skill at sighting.
Druj showed no such prudence. She stood at the very center with her back to us, staring down at her feet as the Dark asha approached. The strange woman wore a cowl to obscure her vision, carefully wrapped in heavy robes to deter the sun’s heat. Beside her was the only patch of green on the desolate field—a paltry festering of weedy plants with tiny, apple-shaped fruit that swayed gently in the wind.
Kalen signaled for us to stay behind, letting his beloved walk on alone. “Whatever you do,” he muttered tersely, “do not stray too close to those runeberries.”
“They’re unlike any runeberries I’ve ever seen before,” Lady Zoya murmured.
Lord Khalad grunted in understanding. “The First Harvest, aren’t they?”
“I would have thought they’d look more impressive…”
“So did four of the Great Heroes, I’d wager, and it cost them their lives.”
The Faceless spoke up. “I take it you have saved your Odalian king and other kingdoms besides.”
“You wanted them to invade Adra-al,” the bone witch responded. “You wanted them to watch in horror as you transformed the people there into your blighted pets. No doubt you had already killed Aadil.”
“I must plan my own precautions. But their lives are spared now that you are here. You were victorious at the Hollows. Isn’t it nice how things work out?” She turned to smile at us, and she wore the face of the asha Altaecia. Zoya’s breath left her in a soft, shuddering gasp.
“Assume your own face, you scum,” the Dark asha snarled. “You aren’t worthy of hers.”
“Even knowing she betrayed you, Tea? You still harbor fond memories of my ward?”
“She did what she thought was right, misguided as she was. You convinced her that you would rid the world of magic. You lie. I know better.”
“How do I lie?” The Faceless’s face rippled, her own lovely features supplanting the other asha’s. She was a breathtaking beauty, as the bone witch had described, though there was a cruel tilt to her mouth. “We want the same thing. You will not live for much longer, and you must make a choice soon. Will you take the First Harvest and save us from magic, or will you subvert it to create a paradise of your own making?”