I stop to avoid disrupting a procession of food sellers making their way down the reed street in front of me, mobbed by children hoping for a clumsy moment, for a hurried trader to drop some sticky rolls or a pouch of sweets. Another trader trails along in their wake, bearing trays full of charms to ward off pestilence and ill fortune. Such trinkets are often sold and resold without ever receiving a touch of real magic, but I can feel the faint tingle about them that tells me these are genuine, crafted by some local hedge-witch. Perhaps the trader himself, for he also carries a little spellfire lantern with a trail of curious, light-seeking insects buzzing after it.
The bindle cat sits at my feet, regarding the chaos with vigilant disapproval.
As I wait for the vendors to pass, I cast my eyes back toward the buildings crowding the narrow, winding streets that cling to the perimeter of the temple, above the flood line of the river. More than one roof flutters with pennants, those of red and gold gleaming even in the twilight. But as the morning grows lighter, I see the outline of the other banners, and my blood chills.
These flags are gray, as if camouflaged against the dim sky, and there are many of them. Many more than I knew were there.
From my rooms back in the temple, my audience chamber, the terrace where I address my people, only two of these gray flags are visible to me. The rest are hidden by draped textiles and trailing vines, by the architecture of the temple itself. So many are hidden from my usual view that I can’t believe it’s a coincidence. Was it someone among my priests, the high priest himself, perhaps, who ordered the placement of those decorations, wishing to shield me from the increasing threat against me?
Or was it the Graycloaks, deciding in their leaderless, faceless way to conceal from me as long as possible the momentum their movement has gained?
Either way, the decision was made, and no one consulted me.
“Out of the way!” a voice snaps just behind me, making me whirl around, my heart in my throat.
An older man stands there, a scowl creasing his leathery brown face where there ought to be shocked recognition at the sight of my crown and crimson robe. He wears the tattered, undyed wool of a villager from the western mountains, although a necklace of beads and bird’s bones claims him for one of the riverstrider clans.
The bindle cat, back arched and body rigid against my calf, hisses a warning at the man. I raise my staff between us, stepping back. I open my mouth, but I’ve never had to identify myself to anyone, and the words Do you know who I am? stick in my throat.
Then the man’s eyebrows rise, his eyes lighting. “You!” But where I would expect sudden shame and a scramble to repair his gruff manner, instead the man begins to croon, “Little fish, little fish, where have you gone … ?”
A shiver trembles through my shoulders, understanding dawning as I peer harder at the man’s quivering features, into eyes wreathed by puffy skin. They don’t focus, those eyes, not the way a normal person’s do—their clouded depths look past me. Through me.
Mist-touched.
He must be harmless, or he wouldn’t be permitted to roam the market, but a flicker of fear follows that shiver down my spine. He might not intend harm, but if he were to stumble forward, or leap for me …
The ravages of the mist-storms are unpredictable at best, decimating crops, transforming solid stone, ripping away by the roots trees old enough to have known a time when I was not the only god to walk upon the ground. But far worse is what a mist-storm does to an unprotected mind.
The man is still chuckling to himself, gazing through me and continuing to sing in his cracked voice. “Tell me truly, little fish, are you the only one?”
“Let me help you, Grandfather.” The endearment, even from a stranger, seems to soften him, ground him a little. I swallow my fear, one hand already dipping into a few different pouches, gathering up spell reagents. “Let me bless you and see you back to your clan.”
The riverstriders are known for taking in the mist-touched, even those exiled from their own villages for being too hard to care for. Life on the water, they claim, is a balm for the wounds left by the mist.
“The lastest and loneliest littlest fish left …” He blinks, breaking off mid-song to look at me. But when I lift my hand and open my mouth to begin the spell I hope will help soothe his inflamed mind, he interrupts with a loud guffaw.
“And so used to swimming with the hungry river-snakes, she doesn’t even know she’s alone.” He wipes at his eyes, chortling, and then fixes me with a grave look. “It is an honor to meet the last of anything, Lady.”
A tingle of warning makes the fear at his proximity flare. The mist is not malicious—it is a force of nature, the magic left behind by the world’s creation. It only becomes dangerous when it gathers into storms, and even then, its effects are never twice the same. But sometimes, very, very rarely, its touch brings along with madness a thread of future-sight …
If the Graycloaks have their way and remove me from power, then I may well be the last.
The last living goddess to walk the land.
I bend down to stroke the bindle cat, whose muscles are bunching in preparation to pounce. When I look up, the mist-touched man is gone. The market is busy now, and I can see very little past the denser ring of people trying to avoid me. As I turn to search for the old man, the ring undulates away as if pushed by some invisible force.
There is no way with the mist-touched to tell addled ramblings from prophecy until the thing they speak of comes to pass. Even if I could find him again, he likely wouldn’t remember what he said.
I straighten, trying not to let the nearby onlookers see me rattled. The riverstriders make up most of the floating market, and they’re among the most devout and devoted—but I see flashes of gray nonetheless. What began as a series of whispers years ago, deep underground, is now an open movement.
The Graycloaks.
I will not let them see my fear.
I stride forward, the ring of onlookers stretching and then snapping away, children and adults alike scattering before me.
Quenti’s houseboat has a cluttered, ramshackle look to it, as though it began as a one-room shack on a barge and other floors and chambers were added here and there as needed. Knowing Quenti, that might actually be the case.
I ease the door open a fraction and clear my throat. “Blessings upon this house,” I call tentatively—like most riverstriders, Quenti’s never been terribly formal, but he also houses half a dozen river children at any given time, and I err on the side of caution when it comes to announcing my presence.
A flurry of feet precedes a series of hushed exclamations. I look up to see a trio of round faces peering down at me from the second-floor landing. When they see the woven crown upon my head, two of the faces jolt and vanish again. The third—a girl, I think, although it’s difficult to tell in the gloom—watches me with open curiosity.
“World’s end, it’s true.” The voice is not Quenti’s cracked and kindly one. I squint in the low lighting at the young woman who arrives on the heels of one of the little riverstriders. She bends to whisper something in the child’s ear, sending him off again before descending the stairs. “Welcome, Divine One. Our thanks for the light you bring this day.”
Her voice is taut and cautious where Quenti’s would have been warm. In the tension of her voice is an unspoken question, one she dares not ask.