“I knew it the moment they brought you in here,” Skye whispered, her gaze turning tender as it moved over Eris. “I see him when I look at you.” She shook her head. “Day didn’t find you on the steps of the scrin. He brought you there—to hide you from my enemy. To keep you safe. He knew they were searching for you.”
That was why Leandra killed Day.
Eris remembered the night the scrin burned. How right before Leandra murdered him, Day looked to the stars and whispered a prayer to the god of souls.
“You’re her.” Eris swallowed. “Skyweaver.”
Skye’s silence confirmed it.
My mother.
Eris’s heart squeezed at the thought.
She hadn’t been abandoned. She’d been hidden and protected.
But if Skyweaver was here, locked in a cage, who was spinning souls into stars?
Who would save the Star Isles from the empress?
“Day’s dead,” she whispered. “Leandra killed him.”
“I know,” Skye whispered back, her eyes shining with the grief of it. “Eris, listen to me.” Her voice gleamed like a polished blade. “You were Day’s greatest hope. I failed to stop Leandra. But you—you are a daughter of stars and shadows. You will not fail. Day knew this, as I know it.”
Eris lifted her head. Even if she weren’t locked inside a cage, how could she possibly stop Leandra?
Skye leaned forward, looking toward the door far below them. Lowering her voice, she said, “A long time ago, before you were born, I stole something of your father’s and hid it in plain sight. It must be returned to him.”
Eris frowned, thinking of the ghost in the labyrinth. Of what he told her when she asked what he wanted.
Climb the Skyweaver’s tower. Take back my soul. Then bring it here, to me.
“You took Crow’s soul,” she realized aloud.
“He wasn’t Crow then,” said Skye, glancing down into her lap. “He was . . . something else.”
But that means . . .
“He’s the Shadow God,” Eris realized at the same time Skye said, “He’s your father.”
They were one and the same.
Suddenly, the world was spinning too fast, and it wasn’t from the rotating cages.
I know him, she realized, thinking of the man with raven-black hair and gray eyes. I’ve known him all this time.
But if her parents were gods, what did that make her?
“Leandra knows what will happen if the Shadow God gets free of his prison. She’ll do everything in her power to stop it from happening. It’s why she’s been hunting you all your life.”
“The knife,” said Eris, thinking of the weapon the Namsara was carrying. “You hid his soul in your knife.”
The Skyweaver nodded. “Do you have it?”
Eris shook her head. “And they took the spindle. So even if I had the knife, I wouldn’t be able to bring it across.” She looked away. “I can’t free him.”
The Skyweaver shook her head. “The spindle isn’t important. It’s a key your father made me, when I was mortal. One that led to the place he built for me. I gave the spindle to Day because it was the only way for him—for a mortal—to cross and escape with you. But you are the daughter of the Shadow God. And the Shadow God walks where he wills. Day needed the spindle and the doors, just like I needed them. But you don’t. You can walk where you wish—just like your father.”
“Even with these?” asked Eris, raising the stardust steel manacles.
The Skyweaver’s mouth turned down at the sight of them. “No. Not with those. You’ll have to find a way to get them off.”
A loud noise echoed up through the room, making both Eris and Skye lean toward their bars, looking down. The empress stood below, looking up. Her gray eyes fixed on Eris, completely ignoring the Skyweaver.
Eris’s cage shook suddenly, then swung as one of the Lumina soldiers unhooked the chain fastening her cage to the wall. As they started to lower her, Eris gripped the bars, glancing back to the Skyweaver.
“There’s something else,” said Skye, her gaze fixed on Eris. “Your father turned me into a god to save me; and in saving me, he destroyed the girl I once was. But you . . . you gave her back to me—my memories, my mortality.”
Eris frowned, not understanding.
“I’m human,” she said, speaking quickly now. “I can’t spin souls into stars. Only a god can do that.”
And then, just as she disappeared from view, Eris heard her whisper: “You could do that.”
Me?
But Eris wasn’t a god.
Was she?
Forty-Five
Safire had difficulty determining how long they’d been out at sea. There was no light in the hold except for the occasional flash of lightning that managed to squeeze through the cracks in the deck above.
She’d cut the other captives out of their rope bonds long ago and they now crawled through the darkness, looking for any object that might prove useful against those above deck. In their search, they’d found barrels of water, bottles of spirits, sacks of potatoes, and a variety of salt fish and pickled goods. The closest approximation of a weapon was a broken broom, which Safire gave to a girl several years younger than her. Some of the men were currently smashing bottles and handing them out—their broken halves would be able to slice a man as easily as any knife.
“Once we’re up on deck, we’ll need to use the element of surprise to our advantage. The point isn’t to fight them. The point is to lessen their numbers as quickly as possible. As soon as your feet hit that deck, don’t think. Just do whatever you can to get them over the side of the ship and into the sea.”
There was a mumble of assent.
“Don’t be afraid of them,” said the man who’d broken the bottles, now standing at Safire’s side in the dark. His name, she’d learned, was Atlas. “Damaged goods fetch less of a price—or no price at all. And that’s what we are to them: goods. They’ll do everything they can not to damage us.”
Surprised by this, Safire looked to Atlas, but could make out nothing but the rough shape of him. “I hadn’t thought of that,” she said.
“I wasn’t so different from them once,” he said. “I know how they think.”
Now for their most pressing problem: getting out of this hold.
The ship’s crew had pulled up the ladder leading down into the hatch, and the space between it and the floor was now too high for a single person to reach.
To solve this problem, they rolled barrels full of salt fish and set now-empty boxes of spirits below, creating makeshift steps up to the hatch. Safire selected five others to go with her as the first line of defense, while the next five would ensure everyone escaped from the hold.
Once everyone was on deck, they would do whatever was necessary to thin the crew and take the ship.
When they were all in position, Safire pressed both her palms to the door of the hatch. She was just about to push, when someone screamed from above, “Monster!”
Safire froze.
“Sea monster!”
A shout of alarm rose up, echoing across the deck over Safire’s head. The thud of running boots filled her ears.