Ishbel, I am sorry, but I am afraid that Isaiah is dead.”
Ishbel stared at Maximilian, unable to believe he had actually said those words.
Maximilian glanced at Lister, standing to one side, before looking back to Ishbel. “We are not completely certain, but we cannot think what else has happened.”
“There is no contact,” said Lister. “Before, he and I…there was always awareness of each other’s presence. Now—nothing.”
Ishbel tore her eyes away from Lister and stared across the grasslands. Some part of her shocked mind noted that the snow had by now almost melted, and that spring could not be far distant. There would be new growth soon, and the plains would be green again.
And Isaiah was dead and would never see the fresh growth.
“Ishbel?” Maximilian said.
“I felt nothing,” Ishbel said. “Nothing. How could I have felt nothing?”
“Ishbel,” Lister said, “you didn’t have the bond with him that Maximilian and I—”
“You have no idea of the bond I had with him!” Ishbel said. “He was a better man than you, Lister. Why could it not have been you who died?”
“Ishbel—” Maximilian said.
“I loved him once,” said Ishbel. “I can’t believe…oh gods…”
“I’m sorry,” Maximilian said, and Ishbel saw that, indeed, he was very sorry and sympathized with her. It comforted her that he understood, and that he wasn’t jealous of her grief.
“Axis will be upset,” said Ishbel. “Axis loved him, too.”
“I know,” said Maximilian. “I have sent BroadWing. He should be there by now. Axis isn’t that far distant for an Icarii.”
They lapsed into silence, Lister looking a little impatient, Maximilian at ease with the quiet.
“There is something we need to discuss, Ishbel,” Maximilian said eventually. “We’d agreed not to unravel the Weeper’s soul until we were safe inside Elcho Falling.”
Lister, who had been looking bored and slightly irritated with the silence, now looked sharply between Ishbel and Maximilian.
“But now…” Ishbel said.
“But now I think I need to know who and what the Weeper is.”
“Too much has gone wrong for you,” said Lister. “You need all the help you can get.”
Ishbel had to look down at the ground and clench her hands to stop herself hitting the man.
Maximilian gave Lister a steady look, then looked back to Ishbel. “Ishbel, I hate to ask this…”
“When?” she said.
“Tonight,” Maximilian said.
“Good,” said Lister. “I can help, and certainly ensure Ishbel’s safety. I—”
“I don’t want you present,” Maximilian said, then addressed Ishbel again before Lister could respond. “I know you wanted to be safe in Serpent’s Nest, or perhaps Elcho Falling once it is raised, but I no longer want to wait. Something terrible took Isaiah, and I—” He stopped, glanced at Lister, then continued. “I need whatever aid I can get.”
“Tonight, then,” Ishbel said.
“He said, ‘I need whatever aid I can get,’” Lister told Ravenna, “but not my aid! Nor yours.”
Ravenna wrapped her arms around her shoulders. They were standing in the dusk, hidden in the long shadow of one of the tents, and the air was chilling rapidly. She wished she’d brought her cloak with her.
“I am the very last person Maximilian would want,” she said, “while Ishbel was being heroic…and vulnerable. What do you think is in that bronze statue, Lister? Good, or bad?”
“I don’t know,” Lister said, frustration roughening his voice. “I don’t know! It is powerful—it must be if it gave wings to StarDrifter and his wife…and if it kept half of Coroleas in petty enjoyments for thousands of years. But what? What connection to Maximilian and Elcho Falling?”
“It hated me,” said Ravenna. “I could barely hold it without the damn thing hissing.”
Lister finally laughed, soft and genuinely amused. “Then it must be a Persimius, my friend.”
She shot him a dark look. “What if whatever is in there is Ishbel’s dark conspirator? Could that be why it never liked me?”
Lister went very still, thinking.
“What should we do, Lister?” Ravenna said, quietly.
He continued to think, his eyes fixed on the distant horizon, his teeth working at an edge of his lower lip.
Eventually he put a hand on Ravenna’s shoulder, pulling her close. “How powerful are you, Ravenna? And how badly do you want to save this land?”