CHAPTER FORTY

Teach children how to build a wall

to keep their legacies secure

let brick and mortar join to form protection.

Then enemies and friends and foes and

family with ceaseless woes can

battle the ensuing isolation.

—THE HARMONY OF BEING

Zeli returned to the palace from the trip to the Keepers’ new headquarters feeling like a tick ready to burst. Darvyn had asked her to let him inform the king and queen about the presence of the Sons of Lagrimar and she’d readily agreed. She certainly didn’t want to bring news like that to the monarchs. Darvyn was actually friends with them, let him handle that conversation.

He’d been especially tight-lipped on the drive back, obviously struggling with the revelation. What must it be like to be the Shadowfox, to have worked so hard for the liberation of his people only to be stabbed in the back by those he trusted? Varten had told her some of Darvyn’s history, which he in turn had learned from Kyara while they were imprisoned, passing the time with stories of their lives.

Kyara was someone Zeli wished she could get to know better. Tales of the notorious Poison Flame had been passed around for so long that discovering the woman wasn’t much older than Zeli was a shock. And now learning that the same infamous figure held the heart of the greatest Earthsinger to ever live left Zeli in awe. The ways of the heart were mysterious; she wished someone could explain them to her.

When she entered the Blue Library, her own heart stammered at finding Varten there, his ginger head bent over a scroll of some kind. She’d been hoping to see him—since their return to Rosira, there had been little time for them to talk and she missed him. She wasn’t certain where they stood with one another and memories of dancing in the streets of Gilmer City—and all that had happened during the Rumpus—were a constant photoplay in her mind.

Varten was concentrating on what looked like architectural drawings when she approached. “Are you searching for the obelisk?”

He jumped, startled. A wave of something warm and intoxicating hit her as he turned. “You shouldn’t go around sneaking up on people,” he said with mock affront.

“I didn’t sneak up on you. I walked normally across the room, you just didn’t notice.”

He narrowed his eyes playfully then looked back to the drawings. “These aren’t much help. The only blueprints on file are of the additions made to the palace over the past hundred years. They don’t show the older parts of the building, see how all of this is shaded in gray?” He pointed to large sections of the plans with no detail in them whatsoever. “I’ve spoken to the palace steward and he said this is all they have.” Zeli sat next to him, leaning over to study the rendering.

“Has Yllis said anything more about the obelisk?” he asked.

“No, just that it had been in a chamber in the heart of the palace. But there have been so many additions and renovations, he hasn’t been able to get his bearings.” She traced her finger across the page. The Elsiran writing was printed in neat blocks, but she saw nothing here that could help them.

“Can he sense the obelisk with Earthsong?” Varten’s voice was very close to her ear. She realized that she’d leaned far into his personal space and froze. Their arms were touching and she hesitated to lose the contact.

“He doesn’t have his Song, he gave it to Oola to awaken Her, remember? And no one else would even know what to look for.” From the corner of her eye she registered his surprise. She really should sit back, but didn’t dare move.

“Oh, I didn’t realize,” Varten said, apparently unaffected by the small point of contact. “So if—when you restore everyone’s Song, he won’t get his back?”

She struggled to follow his logic and with great effort pulled away to sit all the way back in the chair. “No, Yllis won’t get his Song back unless Oola does something—shares with him maybe. I don’t know exactly how it would work since he’s technically a wraith.”

He twisted to face her. “Mooriah still has her Nethersong—oh, but she never gave it away.” He shrugged and they settled into silence.

His fingers drummed on the surface of the table as he stared into the distance. She wanted to reach for him and hold his hand, but wasn’t sure if she had the right. Or if he would welcome the contact.

“Is something … wrong?” She winced. “I mean, something new?”

His fingers stopped their movement and his posture stiffened. “It’s the vote tomorrow. If the referendum passes, what does that mean for … the people I care about? Will Papa have to leave?” He paused, then looked at her from the corner of his eye. “Will you?”

She did grab his hand then and squeezed it with both of hers. “I don’t know what will happen. Would you be willing to live in a land full of Lagrimari?” Her voice was light, but her heart was heavy.

He squeezed her back. “If you were there, yes.”

She swallowed and smiled, looking down. He slid his fingers down her wrist, pressing gently as if feeling her pulse. Her heart was racing a bit.

Varten cleared his throat. “Um, have you talked to the Goddess? She must know where the obelisk is.”

“She’s still missing. Nobody has seen Her in days.”

“Maybe She’s trying to find Her brother.”

“I hope so,” Zeli said, unable to hide her doubt. “But there’s no way to know. We might just be on our own.”

“Again,” he whispered. “Maybe we should try to create our own drawings of the old section of the palace. We can go from room to room and measure and recreate all the missing parts of the plans. The obelisk could have been walled up during one of the renovations by people who didn’t understand what it was.”

Zeli beamed at him, a slow smile spreading across her face. “That’s a good idea.”

He shrugged and tapped his lips with the fingers of his free hand. She tightened her grip on him. “You have good ideas, Varten, it’s okay to trust them.” He ducked his head, for some reason unable to accept the praise.

“Want to start now?” she asked, letting him off the hook. He smiled gratefully.

Within minutes, he had found a sketchpad and acquired measuring tape from the palace steward. He and Zeli started where the detailed blueprints ended, evaluating the rooms in the original section of the building, making measurements, taking notes, sketching walls and doors. They worked for hours, Zeli testing her new lock-picking skills to enter unused rooms full of dusty, covered furniture.

As Varten continued to add to his sketchpad, he frowned. “Something is strange here.”

“What is it?” Zeli let the measuring tape slide back into its case with a snap.

“There’s a gap.” He led them from a room bearing only a long dining table covered in a white cloth back into the hallway. They were in the same corridor where their secret parlor was located.

“This hallway is two hundred and fifty paces long. But the rooms inside only add up to two hundred and eighteen paces. And that’s accounting for the width of the walls.”

They stepped back into what might have long ago been a small dining room. The narrow chamber featured a marble floor and walls with no windows. But none of the rooms in this section had any windows.

“So there are thirty-two paces missing,” she mused. “That’s too big for a closet.”

“Big enough for an obelisk?”

They stared at each other for a long beat before rushing back into the hallway. The next twenty minutes were spent remeasuring and checking the sketches until they’d located the missing space.

A wall stretched between two doors, papered in a faded damask pattern that looked gray but could have been red many years ago. Zeli ran her hand across it feeling the smooth, even surface.

“If there’s a room behind here, there must have been a door at some point,” she said.

Varten drummed his fingers against his thigh, scanning where the floor met the wall and doing the same for the ceiling. He ran a finger under a curling strip of paper that had lifted away from the molding along the floor. After he gave a tug, it ripped from the wall, revealing cracked plaster.

Zeli stayed watchful; though they hadn’t yet encountered another soul in this corridor, she didn’t imagine the palace staff would take too kindly to this sort of defacement. Varten continued peeling away strips of paper, which came away easily. Beneath the wallpaper, water damage from an old leak had left a brown stain. Other than that, the plaster revealed nothing—no obvious doorways that had been covered over.

“We’ll need a hammer,” Varten said, wiping dusty hands on his trousers.

“Wait, let me try.” Zeli closed her eyes and drew in Earthsong to fill her Song. She couldn’t help but smile at the sensation of life energy flooding her. On a deep breath, she focused a concentrated blast of air and pummeled it into the plaster. The wall cracked and then shattered, raining bits and pieces of gypsum all over them. Too late she realized that she could have directed it away from their bodies with a blast of air.

Her chest felt heavy from the exertion and the feeling of euphoria faded away. Her Song was already drained, just from that simple action. She wasn’t a strong Singer, and still very far from proficient after so many years without her Song, but she was still proud of herself.

Her blast had also cracked the old and rotting wooden lath strips, which lay horizontally behind the plaster. And behind that was a wall of stone.

She helped Varten clear away the wood, creating a large pile of rubbish from the castoffs. They moved faster once the rounded corner of a stone archway came into view. Soon an entire bricked-up stone entryway was visible. Carved into the top stone of the arch was an inscription written in a script similar to that of Yllis’s journal, but Zeli couldn’t read it.

“This is more like modern Elsiran,” Varten murmured. “Must be from when the languages started to diverge.”

“What does it say?”

“‘Keep the secrets. Spread the lies. Remember the truths.’”

Zeli frowned. “Strange. I wonder what that means.”

“And who put it here?” Varten shook his head as they considered both their progress and this new impediment. The bricks had obviously been added many years after the original stone entry had been constructed.

They’d need a chisel to get through it and maybe a few strong workers. Or Earthsong. Zeli’s power was depleted, likely for the rest of the day, but there were others who could help.

“Do you think the obelisk is behind here?” Varten whispered.

“It must be,” Zeli replied, allowing herself to hope.