30 

Scythe halted and faced Parne’s wall, releasing another throaty destroyer-call that rippled through Kien as if his body were water. The eagerness in the warhorse’s tone made Kien straighten and stare upward. Did he dare to hope? He refused to even think her name lest disappointment shred his most heartfelt desire. Was she there? Infinite?

A woman appeared on the wall above, outlined in the first hints of dawn. Pale robes, long, dark, wild hair . . . delicately sculpted form. Ela! Kien stifled a shout of celebration.

Obviously in agreement, Scythe curveted, his unexpected leap nearly tossing Kien to the ground.

Kien grabbed another fistful of mane, secured his seat, then hissed in the destroyer’s ear, “Shh! Everyone’ll come running.” He intended to be selfish, not sharing this encounter with anyone—except a capering, joy-maddened warhorse. “Hush. Not a sound!”

Sides heaving in an unmistakable and valiant effort to obey, the monster-horse settled. But he kept tilting his dark head to and fro, staring up at Ela.

Understandable. Kien stared up at her, longing to climb that huge wall. He’d steal Ela, and then he and Scythe would run away with her—never mind if she argued. Actually, she appeared to harbor the same thought. She was climbing higher on the wall, tucking herself into a stone embrasure, never once looking away from him. Adorable prophet! Kien craved a chance to hold her, to console her for Tzana’s sake, and to breathe in the scent of her unbound hair. Her hair . . .

A sudden memory unnerved him. Ela, her black hair unbound and wild the night before battle. Before Istgard’s final defeat in the bloody fields beyond Ytar.

Had she spent the entire night trying to warn Parne, as she’d warned Istgard? And he noticed one more oddity, too unusual to be ignored. Why wasn’t Ela carrying the branch?

Infinite? What’s happening?

Pet! Dear monster. And Kien . . . safe! Oh, thank You, Infinite!

Kien’s smile enticed her, warm as sunlight. If only she could descend from this wall and run away with him. Or, at least, if she could hold Kien one last time. She’d take refuge in his embrace. It was impossible, of course. And for the best, because once she was in Kien’s arms, she’d be unable to leave him and fulfill her work as prophet. For her family and friends’ sake, Chacen must have no doubt where she was, living or dead. Dead. Her empty stomach constricted.

Enough. Deliberately, Ela set aside thoughts of death and Chacen. She’d been granted one last glimpse of Kien and Pet. Wasn’t this exactly what she’d begged from her Creator? A dream answered.

But how could she see Kien or Pet if she was crying? Foolish tears! Ela swiped at her eyes. She needed to celebrate this last fragment of their time together. First, Pet deserved a treat.

She dug her booted toes into a mortared line of the wall and climbed into an embrasure crowning the wall. Settling as best she could within the snug space, Ela reached into a fold of her mantle and retrieved a piece of the fruit she’d picked from the tree. What was the use of keeping it? A few bites of fruit wouldn’t save her.

Waving a plump violet and green fruit that gleamed in the first hints of dawnlight, she whispered to Pet, “Here. Catch!”

The destroyer pranced beneath the wall, like a child in a game. Ela pitched the fruit and laughed silently when Pet caught it. Nimble monster! He took his time munching her gift, obviously savoring it. Happy.

Unlike Kien, who suddenly looked older. And as somber as . . . well . . . a judge.

What was wrong?

Was he concerned about the upcoming battle? Ela scanned the fields of tents behind him—banners of Istgard, the Tracelands, and most numerous of all, Siphra, marking the forces loyal to the Infinite. And surely the Infinite would protect them. Did Kien have doubts?

Before she could try to question him or reassure him, a breeze whisked past her face. Her signal to leave.

Aching, she gazed down at Kien, then blew him a kiss, love mingling with longing and regret. He answered, sending her a kiss in turn. And another smile, radiant with delight. How could one man be so captivating? Some of Ela’s distress eased.

Infinite, thank You!

The invisible whirlwind answered, sweeping her away, stealing her breath as only her Creator could.

Ela collected her spinning senses and tried to focus. A good thing her stomach was empty; otherwise she’d be violently ill with this unexpected shift. Where was she now? Another sea of tents swam before her. Ela blinked. She was on the opposite side of the city, facing Belaal’s army and its allies’ forces.

More numerous than Istgard’s, the Tracelands’, and Siphra’s.

Swallowing her fears, Ela asked silently, Infinite? Why did You bring me here? What is Your will?

The answer came, brief and mostly bearable. Even so, she had to lean against the wall to absorb the vision. Belaal was saddled with the most prideful king alive!

Belaal’s sentries had seen her. Already, foot soldiers were racing toward the royal pavilion to alert their king to her presence.

Bel-Tygeon appeared almost at once. He strode from his yellow pavilion into the early morning shadows, poised, bareheaded and casually robed—an apparent fault his servants were trying to remedy. Even as he walked toward Ela amid his prostrated subjects, one servant flung a glittering cloak over the king’s shoulders while another rushed after him with a gold sword and its matching belts. Others brought torches, lighting their god-king’s path within the gloom. And illuminating his face, which was handsome, cold, and nowhere near as amused by Ela as he’d been before.

Ela drew in a breath. “Bel-Tygeon, this is your Creator’s last warning! You are not a god, yet you persist in requiring your people to worship you. Therefore, in five days, the Infinite will bring His hand against you, a mere mortal. Stop Him if you can!”

“Where is He?” Bel-Tygeon demanded, lifting his own hands, spreading out his arms as if he’d searched the skies and found nothing. “If He is Lord above me, let Him appear! Why does He send a girl to taunt me? Is He so weak? I demand to see Him now!”

“Who are you to command the Infinite? Your pride is too great, O King! Punishment of your own making stalks you like a predator. Before you glimpse a hint of His glory, your Creator will bring you low. Your face will be in the dust! And, yes, I am His prophet—a mere girl, daring to scold you! This is the first indignity you’ve suffered as king. But only the first. He has warned you!”

A clatter of footsteps and weapons sounded from the stairs behind her.

Ela exhaled. Time to surrender to Chacen. She turned from the wall and hurried down the nearest path toward the stairs.

If only her heartbeat would slow. Her hands were shaking, chilled with the sweat of fear. Infinite!

I am here.

Thank You. She clung to His words. The assurance of His presence and strength. He sheltered her within that strength now, so comforting that she wanted to cry. Yet she wouldn’t.

She had every reason to be grateful.

He’d allowed her one last glimpse of Kien and Pet.

He’d saved her family, friends, and His faithful ones.

He walked with her now. Unseen, yet so present she almost felt His hand rest on her shoulder in a gesture of protection. Infinite, who is like You?

Her heart’s frantic racing eased. She stood at the top of the stairs and waited.

Ela watched Chacen lead his men onto the rooftop path, his face hollowed by hunger and hatred. Yet he looked healthier than most of his zealot-followers. No doubt he’d been rationing a secret cache of food, saving himself while more vulnerable citizens starved and died of disease in Parne’s streets.

Even in this high place, on the wall walk above the city, Ela inhaled the heavy sickly sweet odors of decaying flesh. Her stomach clenched in revolt.

You added to their deaths, Ela told Chacen in her thoughts. You wielded such power! Everyone trusted you. Instead, you followed your desires into secret shrines and yielded your soul to deceivers. You’ve killed your people as surely as you intend to kill me.

Zade Chacen stood before her now, breathless with the effort of running up the stairs, and triumphant, yet wary. “I see the Infinite has abandoned you.”

“No. He hasn’t.”

“You say so, but your hands are empty. The branch is gone.”

“By His will.” Ela clasped her hands and extended them. Surrendering. “Here I am.”

Zade didn’t question his sudden victory, or her evident weakness. Gloating, he ripped cordage from his own mantle and bound her hands with savage motions, pulling the cord so fiercely that she gasped and staggered for balance. Chacen wrenched Ela upright and shook her hard. “Tonight we’ll have peace! No footsteps waking the weary. No traitor screaming foolish, weak-minded warnings!”

“You’ve declared the Infinite’s warnings traitorous.”

The deposed chief priest slapped her so sharply that her senses spun.

The taste of blood, thick and metallic, welled within her stinging mouth. Chacen shook her again. “I want to hear nothing from you but curses against your Creator as you die!”

If he thought such a thing would happen, he was truly mad. Ela clenched her hurting jaw.

The former chief priest and his zealots led her across Parne’s open rooftop paths, toward the temple. Past bodies, bloated heaps. So many bodies . . . Unable to restrain herself, Ela snapped at Chacen, “Look at them! If you were the leader you should have been, they’d be alive now!”

Zade’s gaunt face contorted with rage. He threw Ela onto a path, then kicked her back and ribs, provoking her shrieks as he bellowed, “Don’t make me kill you here and now—I could!”

Ela tried to think past the pain in her sides and a myriad of hurts along her arms and face. Did she want to die quickly? No. Despite all her resolutions, an anguished, terrified part of her soul begged to live. If only she could. Infinite . . .

At last Chacen turned away and two of the zealots, with the smooth hands and fine robes of priests, hauled Ela to her feet. Her slapped, scraped face burned with the rawness of its torn flesh. And a shiver-inducing trickle that could only be blood worked down her right cheek. Her eyesight dimmed and her hearing buzzed unpleasantly. Ela lowered her head, trying to concentrate on breathing. On remaining conscious.

She revived in the temple’s outer courtyard, aware, in her first slight breath, of nothing but peace. Bliss. And the overwhelming need for sleep.

Until a slap stung her face and a man’s voice snarled, “Wake up!”

Dazed, Ela remembered what was happening. Particularly as Zade Chacen shoved her with his booted foot, provoking fresh pain. “Stand up.”

Could she? Ela eased to one side, forcing herself upright a bit at a time. Chacen remained composed as she stood and steadied herself. Disturbing, that composure. He clamped a hand on the back of her neck and guided her toward the open well usually reserved for the priests and their families. Zade pointed at a step adjoining the well’s low, encircling stone wall.

Wary, Ela obeyed and mounted the step. By now a small crowd had gathered. Mostly priests and a few of their wives, all of them emaciated, and none sympathetic to her plight. Indeed several were gloating.

Shifting her gaze from the priests to the well’s darkness, Ela confronted what she’d been trying to ignore. Zade intended to wound her and drop her into the well to die. Useless to beg . . . His expression, when she dared a glance at his face, chilled her with fear. As did the knife he removed from a scabbard at his waist. The blade glistened in the morning’s first light. A crystal knife. Yellow crystals. Caustic ores. Wounds that failed to heal. . . .

Zade smiled. “Your expression, Prophet, is laughable. You know what this blade is carved from.”

“Yes,” she mumbled, her swollen mouth making it difficult to speak. “The poisoned ore you accused my father of selling.”

Don’t touch them, Father cautioned in her thoughts.

Chacen was talking. “When I thought of killing you, I decided you must have time to think while dying. To repent of your guilt. You’ve betrayed us all. My sons died because of you!”

“Parne is dead because of rebels like you!” she retorted, speaking through the pain. “Yet the Infinite will forgive you if—”

Zade shook her. “Be silent!”

He slashed at her left arm, the blade leaving a burning wake in the flesh over her bicep. Even as she gasped at its searing torment, Chacen sliced the skin over her right bicep. Ela clenched her teeth against the fiery cut and watched blood ooze from her wounds. Sweat stung her skin from scalp to toes.

Zade pushed her forward. “Climb up. Hurry, or I’ll carve your pretty little prophet-face!”

She climbed. If only she had the courage to provoke him to stab her through the heart. It would be swifter. More merciful. However, mercy and Chacen obviously weren’t compatible. At least where Ela Roeh was concerned. Praying she could endure the poison without going mad, she sat on the well’s edge, feet dangling. Chacen shoved her in.

She gasped and dropped endlessly into the blackness. At last, her feet struck the well’s muddy bottom. Stabs of pain shot upward through both legs. “Augh!”

Ela fell backward in the well’s dank interior and consciousness vanished.

Kien pivoted away from the impromptu meeting before Akabe’s royal pavilion, watching as Scythe galloped beyond the Siphran army’s encampment. The destroyer’s giant hooves hammered tremors through the ground, unnerving all the encampment’s occupants—himself included. Kien’s heartbeat raced. “Ela . . .”

Infinite? What’s happened to her?

Followed by Jon, Akabe, and Tsir Aun, Kien ran for the destroyer. Scythe flung himself at Parne’s walls, slamming his massive hooves against its stones in a futile attempt to break into the city. “Scythe, stop! Obey!”

Scythe huffed, then stomped, managing to sound offended and distraught in the same gust. But he held still, glaring and seething as Kien and the others approached. “Calm yourself,” Kien urged, trying to take his own advice. “If pounding on those walls would help matters, I’d join you!”

Akabe, Tsir Aun, Jon, and a handful of guards closed ranks around Kien. Jon said, “This is how he behaved when Ela’s enemies attacked her before the siege. No doubt something’s happened to her!”

Tsir Aun exhaled, his stern face tense as he watched Scythe. “Whatever’s happened, it concerns more than Ela, I’m sure. The last time I knew of Parne’s prophet walking throughout the night, as Kien said, Istgard was defeated and our king was cut down in combat.”

“I thought of that same night,” Kien agreed.

Akabe stood to Kien’s left now, wary of the destroyer. “We are at risk for combat today. Belaal’s certain to find us now that the sun’s up.”

Tsir Aun grunted. “Given his reputation, Bel-Tygeon is likely to send negotiators first, without honor, to gather information.”

“Undoubtedly,” Akabe agreed. “Everyone spread the word. We must fully arm ourselves. Now.”

“Thank you, Majesty.” Kien grabbed Scythe’s halter, willing to face anything to free Ela from Parne. Infinite? When?!