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Rock tuh in the cliff’s face, cascading around a solid shape at its center The shamans continued to dance and the musicians to play as they backed toward the place where Evvy and the other observers stood Briar whistled in silent admiration: He knew he couldn’t dance and walk backward, yet the shamans and theirforward around the line of shaain and missed Evvy took a place on the riverbank, in front of whatever was going on in the cliff, and held out her hands
Briar fought to stand, spilling the tray of ink He ignored it, but he could not ignore it when the God-King grabbed one of his arms
“Stop,” the younger boy ordered in a voice that froze Briar where he stood “She will be fine Watch”
He released Briar, who instantly found he could ain Rather than continue to try to reach his student, Briar waited
He wasn’t quite sure if Evvywall of rocks drowned out any other sound except, of course, for the God-King’s voice Briar wondered if Evvyherrock split on either side of the opening it made, like curtains before aThat was pure Evvy Neat piles of broken stone grew froap in the cliff At its heart stood a pair of e, human-like, stone skeletons As the heaped boulders and chips in front of them shifted to either side, the twenty-foot-tall skeletons walked out of the cliff
Evvy wavered She was trying to do too e where the tent was pitched, then halted again Dokyi had reached the girl He stood next to Evvy, writing signs on the air as he worked spells of his own She straightened, able to control the falling stone again with Dokyi’s help
The skeletons, which had paused when she seemed about to fall over, resumed their walk away from the cliff One of the two skulls looked curiously at Evvy and Dokyi while the other scanned the riverside behind theap in the cliff, and then the shamans and their musicians An arm from that skeleton reached around to tap the skull that had cocked its head as it stared at Evvy When that skull turned to glare at the other, the tapping hand pointed to the shamans Both skeletons lumbered toward the dancers
Briar looked at the God-King “What are they for, the statues? I don’t think you said”
The God-King squinted at the dancing skeletons “Such things are a promise from this real on the ten of our protection They tell invaders that the teods of the temple where the statues stand”
See a step, the dancers andas they went The warriors mounted horses to forroup that handled the wagon they had brought helped the musicians into it As smoothly as if they often traveled this way, the warriors and wagon set off in the lead, their half circle ending with the dancers just inside The two skeletons, arms around each other’s stone spine waist, came last of all
Dokyi turned to Evvy and bent until they were face-to-face He grabbed her by the ears and pressed his forehead to hers Briar wasn’t sure if he was trying to scold Evvy or just knock two rock heads together Thinking that he ought to intervene before Evvy said or did so The boy was scowling at the e he had just received
“You don’t look very happy,” Briar said
“I have not heard fro of Inxia” That was the realxe and the Yanjing ees who deal in conversations at a distance have not heard froers have coh the Green Pass, either”
“It is only the third month of the year,” Briar reminded him “It’s probably frozen solid”
The God-King gave him an absentminded smile “The Green Pass is in hill country, beyond theUsually it is open by this tih the weather has been very harsh in the hills this year” He stopped speaking as he stared off into the distance
Briar waited longer than he would have waited for anyone else to resuotten what he’d begun to explain, Briar asked, “So what has this Inxia fellow to do with hoell you’ll sleep tonight?” He could tell the God-King orried
“All three kingdo the e explained “Since Inxia is our closest neighbor, we have sent es and soldiers to their assistance for four of those years We should have heard what they will need for this year’s fighting by now”
Briar nodded Now he understood “Because if Inxia falls, Gyongxe is next”
“I would like to think not,” the younger boy replied, but he did not sound convinced “We have very little to interest the Eods and spirits, who are closer here than anywhere else in the world, and you can’t pay soldiers with those There are the tees do not believe they can take the curses frooods We do spread word that there are curses on anything stolen froxe, and we cannot rehed “I would feel better if I knew the Yanjingyi arain this year”
A surge of pity raced through Briar’s heart at the expression on the God-King’s face That’s not the look any boy his age ought to wear, thought Briar I’d even feel sorry for a man of twice my years in his shoes
It was at xe had told their priests to choose this boy to rule over the es, cities, faiths, and tereat inside the God-King; soer than Briar was He wouldn’t have spent a day in the God-King’s skin for all the pretty girls between there and home
“Briar, did you see it?” While they had talked politics and war, the rest of the statue-raising party had crossed the river bridge to join the God-King’s group Evvy raced over to the tent The pockets of her orange wool tunic sagged hat Briar kneere !”
“We watched the st
atue raising,” the God-King told her “I’ve seen such things before, you know Briar was impressed”
“I was,” Briar assured the girl
Evvy stopped at the open doorway and bowed to the God-King, then braced her hands on her knees while she struggled to catch her breath They had been in high mountain country for nearly two years, but Evvy and Briar would struggle with the thin air if they tried to run Rosethorn had trouble breathing all of the tih their entire journey had been Rosethorn’s idea, she had been forced to spend ardens instead of taking the aard journey down the cliff into the river canyon with Briar and Evvy that ain, so his Rosethorn could breathe more easily
“Could you see what I did?” Evvy derabbed the pack she had left with Briar and e to take them at least ten days to walk back to their home temple? They only had the five shaic going at night If they aren’t dancing, the statues won’tto be awfully tired — the shamans, not the statues I offered to clean up the loose rock, but Dokyi said the Dri with it What does that athered the stones she’d left with Briar and stowed them in her pack as well
Evuzai was a skinny former slave who never missed a meal if she could help it She was five feet tall with a strong Yanjingyi face: wide cheekbones, sharp chin, and long black eyes Briar liked to tease her that she’d smacked her face into a door once, since her nose was flat at the tip Her hands and nails showed scars and scratches froe and a lifeti in a sluic was different froive her up to a teacher of her oho would be unkind to her
The God-King stood and iant pillohere he and Briar had spent the“Wait a moment, Evumeimei”