Page 23 of These Godly Lies
“I know it,” Silas interrupts, his voice an anchor of calm in the storm of Khiran’s fury. “I would not lead her somewhere unsafe.”
The stare they share is heavy with a history she doesn’t know. Anna folds her hand around Khiran’s wrist, fingertips brushing over his erratic pulse. She waits until Silas meets her eyes, softens under her gaze, before speaking. “You’re certain?”
His eyes hold no hesitation. “My friend, I would lay my life on it.” When Khiran gives no answering protest, Silas meets Eira’s impatient gaze. “Chicago.”
“Chicago?!” Jiro parrots, the city leaving his lips like a curse. “I’m not—”
“It’s done,” Eira snaps. Her eyes keep darting to the windows. “Grab the boy and take it.”
Jiro flushes. Outraged. “I won’t! I refuse!”
“Then you damn both of them!” The words, her voice, are serrated and sharp—biting—in ways only the truth can be. “You will live out the rest of your short, mortal life knowing they will suffer for your stubbornness long after you’re in the ground.”
The anger drains from him, the flush in his cheeks fading until he’s so pale he looks almost ghostly. When he looks at her, horror dilating his pupils, Anna wants to comfort him, wants to scold Eira for her cruelty, but she can’t. She can’t, because they have no time for convincing. No time for gentle explanations.
“We need to leave.Now.” Silas says, voice sharp with warning. He holds out his hand, palm up. “We need to run.”
This time, Jiro doesn’t argue. There are tears clinging to his eyelashes, a thousand apologies and a million regrets that will never be said shining in his gaze.
Anna hears them anyway.
She smiles, hopes he sees the love she has for him. Hopes he can carry it with him.
Jiro takes Silas’ hand, lets the god shepherd him out the door. Anna releases a shaky breath, the knot in her chest slowly loosening. He’s going to make it. Silas is going to find somewhere safe, and Jiro will have a chance to live the rest of his life without running. Without fearing the retribution of gods he never believed in until that awful moment the truth was forced on him. He can—
“She’s here. At the south edge of the forest.” Eira stiffens, her eyes finding Khiran’s with despair. Her face is ashen. “She’s not alone. She brought Malik.”
Khiran pales. “The path—”
“Silas is still traveling. I can’t change the course until he reaches the end!” Her hands tremble as she ushers them out, her expression stricken in ways that make Anna’s heart race. The beat of it so loud she struggles to hear over the pounding beat in her ears. “Start running!” she snaps. “Go north, follow the river! I’ll open your path the moment Silas steps off his! Go! Go!”
Khiran’s hand clasps her wrist, running to the back door faster than her legs can catch up. She stumbles after him, heart in her throat. Outside, the sun is bright enough to temporarily rob her of sight—a wash of light before bleeding away into reality as her heart knocks against her rib cage.
Over the meadow, a voice echoes. “Still trying to run, Liesmith?” A laugh, sharp as a blade and just as threatening, rolls from her lips. “We both know hiding behind Eira’s skirts won’t protect you.”
Anna looks over her shoulder, searching, but the house blocks her line of sight. Her foot catches on a rock, sending her stumbling, but Khiran’s grip is as firm as Eira’s scolding.
“Don’t look! Just run!”
A groan, earth deep, trembles under their feet. The meadow shivers, an invisible vibration in the roots shaking its grassy heads. It reminds Anna of the husky, rattled warnings of the vipers she’d occasionally find hiding in the rocky outcroppings back home. Then she looks over her shoulder and understands why the ground shakes and the meadow trembles.
Eira’s house is rising, lurching and peeling from the earth and leaving behind a crater in the shape of its foundation. It staggers, river rock slipping loose from its bed of mortar on the chimney and rolling off the roof. It hits the ground, shattering like a grenade. Beneath the dirt clogged joists, a pair of legs unfold—thin and wiry things that resemble twigs more than branches beneath the bulky shadow of the cottage.
They look suspiciously like chicken legs.
“What did I say about looking?! Stop gawping like fools!” Eira snaps. A quick glance proves that Khiran looks just as shocked as Anna feels. “Keep moving!”
Anna catches sight of the house charging the intruders, its bulk swaying with every lanky step, before Khiran pulls her away. A few yards and Eira shouts. “The path is open—there!”
Anna can see it. It’s just ahead, a stone’s throw away. Her lungs burn and her legs ache, but she pushes to go faster. Safety is on the other side of that path, a few more moments of pain in exchange for the freedom to hold on to each other longer. Just a little bit—
A violent crack splits the air, a wave of heat crashing like the tide at her back and sending them sprawling. When she looks up, the cottage is on fire, an inferno of embers and flame. A screech emits from the windows like a serrated whistle of a teapot bursting under pressure.
Eira is already up, dirt streaking her skirt. She pushes against Anna’s back, urging her forward, as Khiran pulls her to her feet. “Run, you stupid girl! Before the path closes.Run!”
Eira’s hands are hot.
Burning.
