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‘What happened?’ she asked
‘Strain,’ he replied, shaking his head ‘Magical strain’
‘Bird ic,’ Dreadaeleon said, all but spitting ‘Of course It’s nothing so ’s brain functions It’s birdwithout willing it, the words hissing through his teeth ‘What would you know?’
‘Dread …’ She recoiled, as though struck
‘Sorry,’ he muttered ‘Sorry, sorry It’s just … a headache’
In the bowels, he added mentally, the kind that makes you explode from both ends and probably kills you if it is what you think it is He shook his head No, no Calhing ‘Denaos said you’d exerted yourself’ She offered hilad you did?’
You’re probably going to develop so out your lad?
‘I mean, I knoas a lot,’ she said, ‘but you did save us’
‘Oh … right,’ he replied ‘The ice raft Yeah, it was … nothing’
Nothing except the inability to stand up on your oer Good show
‘It’s just a shame you couldn’t save the others,’ she said ‘Or … is that what you were doing with your bird e of a snarl before he twitched into a childish grin ‘And … yes Yes, I was looking for the?’
‘Not yet’
‘I suppose you wouldn’t, would you?’ She sighed, looking forlornly over the sea ‘We were lucky to escape, ourselves Anything left by the wreck would be devoured’
There was so not there Ordinarily, her eyes followed her voice, always a sharp little upscale at the end of each thought to suggest that she aiting to be proven wrong, waiting for soh ti hope against the hopeless
But such an expression was absent today, such an upscale gone from her voice She spoke with finality; she stared without blinking And she looked so very, very tired
‘They … they ht be out there,’ he said ‘Wouldn’t Talanas watch over them?’
‘If Talanas listened, ouldn’t be here in the first place’
And then, he saw it, in the seriousness of her eyes, the firm certainty in her jaw The idealistic hope was ree that he was always certain indicated at least a one from her voice She was a person less reliant on faith, if she had any at all anyht She doesn’t believe in gods Not right now, at least
There were a nuratulate her on her enlightenment, rejoice in the fact that they could finally couide her He rejected the, he kneas a less appropriate reaction than the tingling he felt in his loins
Stave it off, stave it OFF, he told himself This is the absolutely worst possible ti?’ she asked suddenly
‘Absolutely not,’ he squealed
She see off into the distance ‘So … like I felt back at Irontide Hot and cold …’
He quirked a brow; she had sensed ic back then, he recalled, but ifts And the source at the tih beacon that even the thickest bark-neck would have sensed it
This concerned hi in the air, none of the fluctuating chill and heat that typically indicated a ht be faking it
Her left arh it were consuonised whisper as she scratched fiercer and fiercer until red began to stain the sleeve of her robe
‘Dread,’ she looked up at hi?’
Eight
THE NATURALIST
The crawling thing picked its way across the sand, intent on sos, two clao bulbous eyes and, apparently, no visible destination Over the bones, over the tainted earth, over the fallen, rusted weapons it crawled, eyes always ahead, eyes never
Surely, Sheraptus reasoned, so Could it even comprehend the vastness of the worlds around it? The worlds beyond its own da, never stopping
Until, Sheraptus thought as he lifted his boot over the thing, it became aware of just how se in the wind, a fluctuation of temperature He turned and looked into the distance
‘There it is again,’ he muttered
‘Hmm?’ his companion asked
‘You don’t sense it?’
‘Magic?’
‘Nethra, yes’
‘I as, I am afraid’
‘So you say,’ Sheraptus said
‘You have no reason to distrust me, do you?’
‘Not as such, no’ His lip curled up in a sneer ‘That provides me little comfort’
‘What is it that troubles you, if I nature, a fleeting expenditure of strength It’s not what you’d call "big", but rather … pronounced It’s a moth that flutters before the flame and disappears before I can catch it in my hands’
‘A moth?’
‘Yes They do fly before flame, do they not?’
‘They do’ The Grey One That Grins s teeth ‘You sees insect today’
‘Ah, but did you not say that this thing--’ He flitted a hand to the crawler
‘Crab’
‘This crab It is not an insect?’
‘It is not’
‘It has a carapace, s …’
‘It does’
‘Why is it not an insect, then?’
‘Its identity is its own, I suppose’
Sheraptus glanced down to the sand and the tiny crab ‘Why does it exist?’
‘Hless direction as other tiny things, that looks exactly like other tiny things, but is not the sa as the others?’ He quirked a brow ‘I have never seen such a thing’
‘They have no such things in the Nether?’
‘None Females are females Males are males Fes are’ He sighed, rolling his eyes ‘This is what reement’
‘Naturally,’ Sheraptus said He adjusted the crown on his head, felt the red stones inside it burn at his touch ‘And while I arateful for your donations, I have some reservations’
‘Such as?’
‘This world … I have difficulty coical It makes sense This one …’
‘What about it?’