Page 39 of Eyes of Kings

“What the fuck was that?” he asks in return.

No one answers, because the answer is obvious, and Anton himself knows too. The Crescents are uncovering a lost language.

Bibi scowls. Without further remark, she turns, marching in the direction of the palace. Calla gestures for Anton to hurry and follow, and Anton frowns, waving his hand for Calla to go first. She stays put.

Anton relents, brushing by. Calla inhales. The wound at the back of her head has almost healed over entirely.

She picks up the pace behind Anton and Bibi, trekking through an emptied San. Perhaps as a result of the riots, the industrial alleys have emptied—the factories dead silent, as they would be at three in the morning while the neighboring casino’s lights are bright. The coliseum appears within view, but Bibi does not proceed toward it. She keeps walking directly ahead, and Calla knows they must be heading for the hidden door: the one she used during the takeover to avoid being seen.

Only when they turn the corner, there’s a group of Crescents already waiting.

Bibi halts first. She holds out her hand, indicating Calla and Anton should let her handle this.

“Woya,” she greets. “What’s going on?”

“We’d like the princess to come with us,” the man remarks. He’s dressed in the black robes of a cleric, though the edges are worn and tattered. At the side of his neck, his crescent tattoo is lined with red. Whether it is a design choice or an infection, Calla can’t quite tell. “It’s for her safety.”

“She will be perfectly safe under my eye in the palace,” Bibi replies. “Please, excuse us.”

Woya tucks his hands into his pockets. “I like you a lot, Bibi. But I don’t like you enough to ignore cross-temple agreements. It’s only until we have the barrier in place.”

“You are not to shut off San-Er’s access to qi,” Calla interjects. “I forbid it.”

Bibi sighs. She’s tried her best to prevent an altercation, but there is only so much she can do.

“You are not in a position to forbid it,” Woya replies. “The heretics are beyond powerful. This is the only way to stop them.”

Calla frowns. She exchanges a quick glance with Anton, who has caught the same oddity. He asks, “Why areyouusing that term?”

A pause. Perhaps the Crescent Societies were not aware that Anton Makusa fed this into their news stations.Old gods, new heretics.

“I know why we condemn the heretics,” Calla adds lightly. “We can’t have them threatening my rule here. But why areyouquestioning a potential god’s power? You are believers, are you not?”

“There is no such potential. The earthly realm is for mortals. The heavens are for gods.” Woya waves his hand. His Crescents—three on either side of the door—start to move forward. “We do not worship pretenders wanting to muddle the designation.”

“Ah,” Anton says. “I see. You are like us too.”

“We are nothing—”

When Woya steps forward, Calla takes the opportunity. She lets power pour forth from her, from the divine crown. She identifies the qi that the cleric occupies in the physical world, then his Crescents too, and she shoves them all to one side of the alleyway, pressed against the wall. They make no sound. They are not capable of making a sound. Calla says, “Let’s go,” and Anton strides through, Bibi following a second later with a wince.

Anton pulls the door, and they slip inside. When Calla releases the Crescents outside, she turns her attention to the door, shoving at the latch hard. The metal distorts, holding the door in place.

“If the Crescents want you under their care,” Anton says, “that’s not going to hold them off for long.”

It’s dark in the passageway. A smell wafts around the walls, different from the stench of the qi block, but unpleasant all the same. How long until the Crescents manage to put that into effect properly? Calla expected that the Crescents would turn on her, but she thought they would at least have the foresight to wait until August was gone. Until August was no longer a threat and could not decimate the capital with his superior resources. Instead, they have taken a whole new route, one she hadn’t even considered as a possibility. Block the qi in San-Er; equalize everyone before the clerics can be taken off guard. All who march into San-Er will be as powerful as a regular shopkeeper. Their adversaries must fight with blades or gunpowder, and the Crescent Societies have that battle secured.

“No, this won’t hold them off,” Calla agrees. “But I have the divine crown. Harming me is akin to closing the banks in San-Er ten times over. I only need to keep evading capture until I can detangle myself.”

Bibi blanches at the thought, but she does not protest. Her eyes only flicker quickly, up to the crown. A reminder, perhaps, that though she aided the Crescent Societies in taking the capital, she swore to serveCalla’swar upon her reentry. And when those elements are no longer one and the same…

The world inside the wall and the world beyond it are not so different after all. Those in the provinces pray to the heavens for guidance; those in San-Er kneel to the crown’s heavenly mandate. How did the palace ever think it could erase its gods when its very throne was built on divine selection?

“We should set up in the war room,” Anton decides. “Bibi, who’s watching Venus Hailira?”

“An attendant. I’m connected to a camera in her quarters.” She brings out a remote device, glancing at the blurry screen. “Did you want her released?”

“Why don’t you check on her?” Calla suggests. “Anton will send word shortly on how to proceed.”