53. The Beckoning Bones (Vaye)¶
“There’s no other way in?” Vaye said, staring nervously at the pool of black water. She had really hoped the flowspring would be in a warm, dry place, but apparently Grandmother was punishing her.
The Foucanta was a Cantereian holy site, which was why the Sagradhão had been built on top of it. Unfortunately, it was on the far shore of an underground lake. To get to it, they’d have to dive into the pool and swim through a narrow tunnel, surfacing in the lake and swimming the rest of the way. Vaye had grown up by the river in Ewederi, but watching her mother drown had, for some reason, put her off swimming. Even if she’d liked water, she was still shivering from the grotto. The prospect of a swim was about as appealing as diving straight into the ground.
“Sorry, this is the only way,” Jovadão said. “But it’s not that bad. The tunnel is short. It just goes down and then back up.” He waved his hand nonchalantly, with the kind of cheerful tone Vaye associated with a shady horse merchant trying to convince a buyer that the horse was perfectly fine and had always looked like that, and that horses don’t really need all four hooves anyway.
“Great,” Vaye grumbled.
“I have to get back before I’m missed,” Jovadão said, producing a coin from his pocket. “I’ll return here tomorrow. If the spell is successful, leave this on the floor below the torch, and I’ll know the plan is on.”
“What about the page?” Vaye asked. “Won’t Ravásie notice it’s gone?”
“I’ll create a forgery,” Jovadão said. “It’ll be wrong, but they won’t know the difference.” He turned to Gadarien. “You remember how to get to the Tine?”
“I’ve got it,” Gadarien said. Jovadão had drawn them a rough map on the floor. Vaye was glad Gadarien was so confident, since she hadn’t been able to follow the directions at all.
“Good,” Jovadão said. “You’ll need to be at the summit by dawn of the next new moon. That’s when the battle will begin.” He squeezed Gadarien’s shoulder, looking around at all three of them. “It may be that no one will ever know what we did. But our deeds will echo long after our voices have gone silent.”
Gadarien touched two fingers to his throat, then placed them on Jovadão’s, his eyes shining with tears. “Goodbye, Uncle.”
Jovadão nodded to Vaye and Adranaya and departed. Gadarien turned away, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Gada,” Vaye began, “are you—”
“Let’s do this,” he said, returning to the edge of the pool. They stripped and put their clothes and other belongings into the oilcloth bags. Jovadão had left them a length of rope and two torches, one of which they left burning in a wall sconce. Naked and shivering, they tied their bags to their wrists and connected the rope around their waists, Gadarien in front and Vaye at the back.
“Don’t worry,” he said, noticing Vaye’s trepidation. “The Priests of the Canticle make this swim every dozenday, and they’re old enough to be Teira’s parents. If they can do it, so can you.”
Vaye nodded, her stomach fluttering. The Priests probably hadn’t watched their parents drown, but she took his point.
He jumped in, forcing Adranaya and Vaye to follow. The cold stole Vaye’s breath as she emerged, gasping, and swam to the far side of the small pool. True to Gadarien’s promise, the oilcloth bags were airtight, forming buoyant cushions that they had to force underwater. Gadarien dove down for a moment, then popped back up.
“The entrance is only an arm’s length under the surface. Nice and wide,” he said, breathing easily. He and Adranaya both seemed like they were meant to be in the water, but Vaye felt like a rock that hadn’t learned to sink yet.
“Deep breath,” Gadarien said. They dove, finding the tunnel mouth in the darkness below the surface. The passage sloped sharply downward. Vaye kept her eyes shut, since she couldn’t see anything anyway. She pulled herself along the rock by her fingertips, her bag bouncing against her forearm. After a few moments, the tunnel bent back upward like an elbow. There was no room to turn around, and she had to twist her body to get through the space, shoulders first, then hips.
The tunnel grew narrower, and her air was starting to run out. She dragged herself along the slope, upward now, trying to find her Balance Point and remain calm. She opened her eyes, desperate for any sort of light, but there was none. Panic would mean death here, but she felt it tugging at her, whispering that the tunnel was a trap, that something had changed since Jovadão had been here, that it would just get narrower and narrower like a closing throat. She pictured Adranaya and Gadarien trapped above her, their legs blocking the passage. They would all die there together, in the crushing cold and darkness.
No. She had to keep going. She pulled, as steadily as she could manage, her skin burning where she scraped it against the rock. Her jaw was aching, and she started to see distortions at the edges of her vision, wavering color encroaching on the blackness.
At last, a subtle current signaled the exit. The water began to take on a faint glow, and she could just barely make out the dark shapes of rock formations looming around her. With a final twist to clear the opening, she shoved upward as hard as she could, the rope tugging her along until she burst into the open air, gasping and sputtering. Her chest burned like she had swallowed a candle. She leaned back in the water, clasping the oilskin to her chest.
“You said it was wide,” she sputtered once she’d finally caught her breath.
“It was,” Gadarien grumbled. “At the entrance.”
A shaft of waning daylight descended from a hole in the ceiling, making the water glow a bright aqua where it struck the surface. All across the lake, lines of viriyeshet glittered faintly, converging on a distant point. She felt a tickle on her ribs and jumped, but it was only a tiny, blind fish, nibbling her skin.
Together, they swam toward the far end of the cave, Gadarien and Adranaya with graceful confidence and Vaye with her awkward dog-paddle. The place where the lines converged resolved into a sandy beach, bisected by a stream that disappeared into a dark crevice. They flopped down on the sand, completely drained. But their work was only beginning.
Gadarien was the first to rise. Several candles had been left on the beach, and he started lighting them while Adranaya got up to explore. “What’s the first step of the spell?” Gadarien said.
Vaye carefully dried her hands and retrieved the page from the tube. “The text describes something called a Siphon, which is a witchglass device that’s supposed to ‘pierce the living heart of truth’, but I’m still trying to figure out how...” She froze, looking up from the page. “Oh no.”
“What?” Gadarien said.
“I think the instructions for the Siphon are on a different page. One we don’t have.”
“And you just figured this out now?” Gadarien growled.
“The spell is a puzzle,” Vaye said defensively. “It takes time to decipher.”
He threw his hands in the air. “Great. Excellent plan. Very thorough.”
“I didn’t hear any better ideas coming from you,” Vaye snapped.
“Why would I bother?” he spat back. “Not with Preceptor Vaye on the job!”
A loud whistle echoed through the cave. “Hey! Stop sniping at each other and come see this,” Adranaya said, beckoning from the crevice. Vaye stood, ignoring Gadarien’s muttering.
The adjoining chamber was more of an aisle than a cave, barely tall enough for Vaye to stand upright. The stream cut a deep channel through the center. The walls were lined with alcoves, each of which held a set of human remains.
At the School, Vaye had read that the bones of powerful sorcerers glowed after death, but she’d never seen it before. The skeletons nearest the entrance had the strongest glow, indicating that they had died most recently. Light seemed to emanate from deep within them, shining through their translucent surface.
Vaye gasped as something brushed her face, but it was just a strand of glassworm silk. The ceiling of the low passage was covered with the tiny creatures, a subtle glow rippling outward from the point where Vaye’s movement had disturbed them. She crouched so the silk wouldn’t stick to her hair.
As the passage narrowed, the bones grew dimmer and dustier, but some of the oldest remains retained a bright glow even through the grime. These had been powerful sorcerers. As she drew near, the bones seemed to make her skin tingle. The closer she got, the more they seemed to tug at her awareness, drawing her toward them. Almost against her will, her fingers reached for a skull.
Behind her, Adranaya called out a warning. “Careful Vaye, you don’t know what—”
She touched the bone, and the world blinked out.
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