SONG of EMBER

33

THE REMNANT

🙜

Solace crept over Ember, unbidden, when he heard Ky's quiet footsteps on the path behind him. Occasionally a breathless hum reached his ears, but it was always cut short in the middle of a note and followed by a long spell of silence, in the way of someone who had caught themselves indulging in an unwelcome habit. He refused to give her the satisfaction of glancing over his shoulder, but at least he could be certain she wanted him to know she was following.

If she didn't, he wouldn't have heard her coming—something he knew from experience.

Ember…

He sighed heavily and stopped, bracing his hand against a pillar. The tiny flecks of light which had dotted his vision for the past hour had taken on the shape and hue of distant fireflies, vanishing and reappearing before him like glowing dust.

Had someone said his name?

The great pillars of the hall were dark and cracked, branching toward the ceiling in strangely natural patterns, like stone trees. The hall had slowly widened around them to make room for the elaborate carvings. It was, he thought, almost as peaceful as the woods near his cabin (though the air was not so fresh and clear). Muted golden light seeped through crevices in the walls where glowing veins of stone peeked through, and the bluish tones of the firefly lights lent the mountain a tranquil atmosphere.

It reminded him of his waking dreams.

Ember…

There it was again.

"What?" he murmured, turning around with a frown.

Ky gazed past him, her eyes flitting between the pillars, and those little fey lights had gathered around her head and shoulders. They drifted amidst the strands of her dusty black hair like living jewels and cast their brilliant reflections into her glossy eyes. His breath caught at the sight of her, there.

She flickered an ear at the sound of his voice and gave a pleased hum, for it was the first word he had spoken since leaving the hall of broken statues behind.

But an echo whispered over her single note, and he knew then that she had not called his name. He cast an anxious glance around the hall, reaching over his shoulder to touch Fishbiter's cool hilt.

Another whispering reverberation touched his ears.

Ember drew in a shuddering breath.

"Do you hear that?"

Her gaze latched onto him sharply. "What are you hearing?"

"Voices,” he admitted, rather sheepishly. “They’re saying my name.”

For a moment, they stared at each other in silence, the lights drifting between them like blown snow. He fidgeted, uncomfortable beneath the weight of her stare and leery of her words. But Ky merely tilted her head and blinked at him. "Magic here gathers more strongly than before…"

"Then you do hear it!"

"Ember," she whispered, sidling closer. Her big eyes creased at the corners, a curiously human expression that reminded him of pain—or sorrow. "The voices always speak. It is only you who cannot hear them."

Troubled, Ember removed his hand from Fishbiter and glanced up at the intertwining tree-pillars before setting out again. The air was indeed thick with magic, but it was not the crackling, dull spells that had been woven throughout the amber statues. No, this was a sleeping magic. Soft, heavy, and pleasant, it gently bade him set down his pack and lean against a pillar to contemplate the drifting lights and hazy glow for the rest of eternity.

Yet he could not allow himself to enjoy it; the magic in this mountain was too unpredictable, too awry.

The lights drifted around him, encircling him, brushing his clothing and skin before swirling away or winking out altogether. He waved his hand through them as he had countless times in the past hour and again felt nothing. He wondered, briefly, what the old Ember would think of him now. Barely a day ago—no, a week, if not more—or had it been an age?—he had been living quietly on the riverbank, safely tucked into his cabin each night and blissfully unaware of the darkness that lay within Sisters Mountain.

Or maybe I went mad the first time I saw her, and have been living a delusion ever since.

Hunter's stories of magic and forest sprites had utterly failed to prepare him for any real encounter with such things. He had leaned heavily on Ky for guidance, and now even that was slipping away from him. He understood, though it couldn't be helped now, that he had been too naive, too trusting, too hungry for adventure—and far too enchanted by her strange loveliness.

"Look up," she murmured near his ear, startling him from his reverie.

The hewn boughs spread out far above them in a latticework of stone, barely visible in the glow from the walls and the stone-light at his hip. He craned his neck, blinking and squinting. There, in the branches of the stone pillars, sat hundreds of misty shadows, each one roughly the size of a large owl.

"Are they asleep?" he whispered, enthralled.

A breathy hum tickled his ear. "Perhaps."

Ember unfastened the stone from his belt and held it over his head, straining to see how many there were. The tiny lights drifted through their short, plump bodies as if they were made of evening mist—nothing more, nothing less—but Ember was not fooled. He could still feel the lancing pain of their bites, if he thought of it long enough, and the crusted wound on his shoulder rubbed uncomfortably beneath his shirt.

As the light of the stone shifted between the boughs, a pair of reflective eyes flashed open above them.

Gr-r-ek-ek-ek-ek-ek-ek-ek, it warned, its low chitter echoing through the branches.

Ember sucked in a breath and swiftly tucked the stone into his shirt.

The eyes blinked, and then disappeared. A collective cooing and warbling rustled across the ceiling like wind in the grass before fading away to silence.

He let out the breath he had been holding in a quiet sigh, relaxing his grip on the stone. Neither of them spoke another word to each other as they ventured deeper into the darkness, and the knowledge of what lay above them stifled his breath and softened his footsteps.

❧

The lights had grown as thick around them as a luminous snowstorm suspended in the air when they encountered a fallen pillar across the path. Its branches were crushed and crumbled beneath its own weight, and those which remained intact had left shallow furrows in the stone wall.

But it was not the tree which turned his stomach.

He knelt before the ruin, putting his hands on his knees and staring in numb acceptance at the carnage before him. Nearly a hundred human skulls lined the carved bole, from one side of the hall to the other. No other bones were in sight, suggesting that they had been removed from their carcasses and dragged to this place one at a time. He remembered the beheaded warrior he had encountered when tracking Ky…

Some were obviously the remains of women or younger men—smaller, more delicate, and even more horrific. The spectacle disturbed him on a far deeper and more intimate level than the cracked, gnawed-on bones near the door in the mountain, for it reminded him—obscenely—of the antlers Alden had mounted in the village tavern.

Moments later, a silent presence crouched at his side.

She said nothing. Her desire was palpable—he could feel that she wanted to hum, to speak, to vanquish his distress—the air was heavy with it—but she refrained.

Ember swept a bit of dirt from the scratched pillar.

Strange markings lay beneath, etched into the stone long ago. He scraped away the grime as best he could with his fingernails, but though he turned his head this way and that, he could make no sense of them. They were both sharp and curved, accented with little dots and lines that surely had some significance but meant nothing to him.

Ky brushed her fingers over the symbols, eyes wide and bright. A flurry of whimsical lights scattered at her touch.

"These are the runes of my people," she whispered, her skin shivering.

Ember lifted his hand, surprised. "What do they say?"

She hesitated.

He glanced up at the shadow-birds roosting overhead, and then back to Ky. "Well?"

At last, she pinched her lips together and shook her head.

"I cannot find enough words to speak it in your tongue, and some of what is written here is not fit to repeat."

"I'm sure I've heard worse," he assured her. "Tell me."

Ky licked the corner of her mouth and glanced away, still tracing the runes with her fingertips. "Here… beneath the two-head mountain, they lie… the bane of the deep-dwellers."

Bane of the deep-dwellers.

Ember squinted at the elegant runes. It dawned on him slowly, but he hesitated to speak it. "Deep-dwellers. Your people? The river folk?"

A nod.

"And their bane—I suppose—it means… men."

"I would suppose it does."

Aren't the river-folk our bane?

Ky drew a quick breath and continued. "Buried together, fates entwined. We wish their bones will find no rest in the lands beyond—no sacred rites, nor mourning of their kin. Death is come to this place of curses, and death abandons us. We spare them none, for they are jealous of their… of their hearts. We, the deep-dwellers, must forever eat their songs."

A thrill of awe ran through him at the unusual words. "How can one eat a song?"

Ky squirmed and made a soft sound of annoyance. "There is… no word in your tongue. Only if you are a siren will you understand."

"Hmmh." He stared sideways at her. "Is that all?"

She glanced down at the runes again, her mouth pulling tight. "It says other things. What the one-who-wrote-these-words did to those he did not spare. That is all."

"What—"

"Please, Ember," she hissed, and the shadow-birds rustled above them. He put a finger to his lips, eyes widening, and she quieted her voice. "Do not be asking me. They are all dead now, and let that be the end of it." After a moment, she added more softly, "It is not my wish… to cause you pain."

Her eyes were wide and black, and when he tried to look back to the runes he found that he could not break away from her fell stare. A chill settled into his spine as he realized she spoke of more than the inscription.

What do you want from me, Ky? he thought desperately, his heart squeezing tighter with every beat. Why are we here? Only tell me, please, and I'll help you… you know that I would…

But he could find neither the words nor the courage with which to ask that question again, for he feared yet another refusal; it was almost better to believe she would tell him if he asked, now, than to ask and receive no answer.

"Shall we continue?" he said briskly instead, getting to his feet and offering her a hand.

The dying screams of the warriors seemed like a half-forgotten dream amid the dancing lights. It had been real enough, of course—as real as the dust and powdered amber on his clothes and in his hair—but to dwell upon it any longer was folly.

There would be time to reflect on what had passed, good and ill, when they were free from the twisted maw of Sisters Mountain.

He would accept no other outcome.

After a moment, Ky reached up and placed her sticky palm lightly in his, fingers curling around his knuckles. Nothing had been forgotten, but they were not enemies.

Not anymore… or not yet.

"Yes," she sighed faintly, the scent of river crocuses washing over him. "Continue we shall."