She turns swiftly to catch my gaze, her brow furrowed. “North, I will not be able to stay with you once we reach the temple. Do not be afraid, though—you will be safe, I will make certain of it.”
“Wait—what? Why can’t you stay? Where are you going?” I’m not prepared for the lurch of alarm that hits me at the notion of my one ally vanishing.
Nimh hesitates, smoothing a hand over her hair as she glances over her shoulder at the approaching patrol. Though she’s unmistakably braced for their arrival, it isn’t quite fear or nervousness quickening her movements. I’m reminded instead of the way Saelis draws himself up and goes into performance mode before he heads onstage with his quartet. She’s drawing some other persona around herself, warmth fading away, replaced by a strange remoteness.
Finally she lets her breath out and fixes me with a look of mute appeal. “They will ask you many questions—tell them nothing, except that you assisted me in finding my way safely back. Tell them I have invited you to stay at the temple for a time as reward for your service.”
I open my mouth, about to protest, though which part I want to protest first, I’m not sure.
The guards have nearly reached us. They don’t spare a glance for me—if I wanted to run, and not tie myself to this girl who apparently draws assassins to her like a magnet and leaves massacres in her wake, now is my chance.
It’s the guard at the front, a woman with dark brown skin and black curls slicked neatly back, who first spots Nimh by my side. I see the moment it happens. Her mouth falls open, and she breaks formation to run forward and skid to a halt in front of us with the whites of her eyes showing.
“Divine One!” She seems to be having trouble finding her words, and Nimh raises her hand, showing the guard her palm.
“All is well,” she says quietly. “Be at peace.”
“But Goddess, we—”
Goddess?
Nimh shakes her head just a fraction, and it’s enough to silence the woman. By now, the rest of her squad has caught up, and they’re shuffling back into formation behind her.
“I am pleased to have an escort back to the temple,” Nimh says, as though nothing weird is happening at all. I’m busy trying not to injure my neck, swiveling my head to take in first my traveling companion, then the guards, then the onlookers, who are beginning to gather.
I can feel a pulse inside my temples, and I’m blinking too fast, breathing too fast.
Nimh said their living god was the one who maintained their guardian stones. The living god knew how to use the same mist and sky-steel we have in Alciel’s engines. She told me I could find “him” at the temple.
It’s one thing to have a girl explain to me that they believe in gods down here.
It’s another to find out that she—and apparently everyone else—thinks she is one.
“Divine One?” I repeat, in a strangled whisper. “Goddess?” She meets it with a very un-goddess-like look that clearly says Shut up, not now, and I close my mouth with difficulty.
Questions and suspicions are jostling for real estate in my mind—Why didn’t you tell me? is colliding with Did you think I wouldn’t find out? and What other secrets did you keep from me?
And running through all of it is a vein of … hurt.
I trusted her, I let her lead me here, and it’s obvious now that our trust wasn’t mutual. There’s no other reason she’d lie to me.
“With respect, Divine One, we should wait for a larger escort,” the woman’s saying.
“I think,” replies Nimh gently, “that if we stand here to wait, we will keep the people from enjoying their market day. We will continue on.”
Well, I want to snap, let’s not stop anyone from having a nice day. That would be terrible.
But nobody’s looking at me, and the cat underlines her words with a cranky kind of yowling sound. Despite how fearsome the guard appears, she’s clearly as wary of the creature as I am, because she inclines her head and signals for her troop to form up around Nimh. Nimh gestures, and without a word, they shift their formation to include me, as well. I stare at her, willing her to meet my eyes, but she won’t.
One of the guards, at an urgent order from the patrol leader, sets off running ahead of us into the city. But the rest of us don’t wait, and soon we’re making our way through the crowd with guards dressed in black and gold flanking us on all sides.
I can see our destination—the temple at the heart of the city, raised up on a hill. It’s built from great blocks of stone, and it is, without question, the largest building I’ve ever seen in my life. Its layers grow smaller as they rise, lined with elaborate windows and balconies. Greenery spills out here and there to mark the presence of lush gardens on the different terraces. Intricate patterns carved into the stone wind all the way from the towering heights of the highest level down to the muddy ground below. It has an undeniably ancient quality to it, a gravity, not unlike the palace in Alciel.
We’re about halfway there when a second detachment of guards, moving at double time, arrive to greet us. One walks forward and sinks to his knees to present Nimh with a bundle of red cloth draped across his outstretched hands, topped with a crown of woven gold, simple in design but exquisitely crafted. She takes both—careful not to touch the guard—and when she shakes out the fabric, I can see it’s a large, loose robe that opens at the front. She slips her arms into it and settles the circlet on her brow, and it’s like she’s flicked a switch. Like suddenly, everyone around us is seeing something that wasn’t there before.
Like a ripple traveling out from a stone tossed into the middle of a fountain, the people around us sink to their knees, bowing until their foreheads touch the ground. In half a minute, only Nimh, the guards, the cat, and I are left standing. The words travel through the crowd like a whisper, growing louder, escalating into shouts.
“The goddess has returned!”
“Bless us, Divine One!”
“The goddess returns to the city!”
All along our path, people of all walks of life, those dressed in rich silks and those in rough-spun rags, are ecstatic to see her, dropping to their knees, calling out for blessings. Nimh’s serene, as if she’s used to it all, and the cat stalks along beside her as if they’re actually here for him.
As I watch the crowd from inside the wall of our escort, there’s another color that draws my eye away from Nimh’s crimson: gray.
Plain gray banners hang from some of the buildings and boats, big bolts of cloth fastened to window frames, draping down into the street. And there are people wearing gray too, standing mostly in groups of three or four.
They don’t drop to their knees when everyone else does. Instead, they turn their faces from Nimh, holding up one hand like they’re shading their faces from the sun, like they want to avoid seeing her.
I grew up in a palace—I know politics and intrigue as well as I know my own name. And whatever’s going on with these people in gray, it’s murky and it’s dangerous. The cultists who tried to kill us weren’t wearing gray, which makes me wonder if there are two different groups opposing Nimh.
And I can’t help wondering if these people in gray might be potential allies of mine. Nimh and I worked together to get back to the city, and I mistook that for some sort of connection. Now I have to wonder if she has any intention of helping me at all.