Page 168 of The Stolen Throne
“Yeah? Well maybe I need the body heat,” he grumbles into the top of my hair. I can hear the grin in his voice.
“P-p-poor little Wanderer. I don’t think we’re in the desert anymore.”
“That’s for damn certain.”
I grin to myself. I also don’t move. He’s blocking some of the cold spray, and he’s right. I’m not shivering quite so hard.
The strait we’re headed toward is hardly wide enough for a Devourer to pass through—even Bene when he’s full size. It cuts a swath through the circle of land that makes up the dominion, the gap spanned by a flat bridge not high off the water. We are almost to the bridge, where our boatman will drop us off. I can see it in the distance, built from stone and not very wide.
I frown. Bene could have gotten in here. He flies, and based on what he’s said, only Aryd and Wildernyss were off-limits to him. And the Reverie can apparently walk on shore in human form. Why can’t she attack the people of Mariana in the bay?
My frown deepens. This isn’t a very well protected dominion.
I stiffen, checking the water all around us, almost expecting a long tentacle of the Hollow or the ramming head of the Gorecutter to be coming for us.
“Hey, Bene.” I try to keep the question quiet from the boatman. “Do the other Devourers get in here?”
He raises his head from his paws. “The others are water bound and can’t make it over the land or past the Whirlpool. Andromeda comes on shore. Not very far, because in her natural form she breathes water, so she can’t be out of it long. But she does wander the beaches near the Whirlpool. Not always as a person, and never as anything that’s a recognizable threat.”
Terrific.
A sentiment Horus and Cain basically both echo when I tell them.
“Something keeps her there. She never leaves. I think, now, perhaps she can sense her goddess at the bottom.”
Well, that’s…awful.
And now I’m dealing with sympathy for a Devourer we might face. I shouldn’t have asked.
Finally, the boat anchors to a dock at the edge of the bridge. “I won’t wait here,” the boatman warns us, glancing around and wringing his hands.
Horus stiffens. “That’s not the deal we made.”
“I will return for you.”
We look at each other. The man is visibly frightened. He knows what lurks around this area even though, according to Bene, the Reverie can’t get this far. Only an impressive amount of coins—I have no idea where Horus came up with it, and I didn’t ask—convinced him to bring us here in the first place. No way is he coming back here alone.
“I’ll go with him, domina, and bring him back later,” Horus says slowly, brows drawing tightly together until his eyes are squinty.
I don’t need to ask…he doesn’t want to leave me.
We shouldn’t have to go far to the Whirlpool from here. I glance to the sky where the sun hangs over the horizon like it might sink into the waters, dousing its light forever. It took much longer to make this journey than I’d expected. I have no idea how much time this will take us or if we’ll even survive. We have no choice. Timing Horus’s return is near impossible.
“No. We’ll find our own way home.” Bene can fly us, or I can make a portal. We’ll figure it out after we get the amulet.
The boatman glances between us like we’ve lost our wits. I’m not sure we haven’t. Desperation, I’m starting to learn the hard way, is the biggest motivator out there. That and death.
In agreement, we get out of the boat and make our way past the bridge. Almost as soon as we can no longer see the bay behind us, blocked by the rocky, rolling shoreline, a roar—constant, steady, and monstrous—rises on the winds.
What starts as a snow-covered beach gradually changes to what should be snake-ridden hills, except I’m pretty sure the snakes couldn’t survive this weather. Meanwhile, loose shale under the snow has us slipping and sliding as we go. It’s not mountainous here, but the deceptively flat land rises slightly and continuously. Enough that I’m breathing hard and at the same time grateful for the pants and tunic and warm cloak Horus obtained when we got to Sentium.
As we walk, the roar of the Whirlpool grows louder. The sun has long since set, all three half-formed moons lighting our path now. I top a rise and yelp at the sharp drop-off that came without even a hint we were close. Maybe fifty feet below us is the Whirlpool itself.
Scrambling back, I stumble straight into Cain, who bobbles before he wraps his arms around me, turning me away from the sight.
Hands on my arms, he looks me in the eyes, right in my face, sincere and concerned. I stare back, my eyes narrowing when his lips quirk. “Still don’t like tall things, hmm?”
Understatement. I straighten, subtly tugging from his hold. “I’m fine.” No one warned me that cliffs would be involved.
