Journey to the Water Chapter XVII: The Hollow Chamber

Journey to the Water cover image: three evergreen trees stand on a hillside, shrouded in bluish fog. Subtitle reads: the sequel to Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea.

I held the unlocked manacles close to my chest and kept my head bowed, being led as I was to the slaughter. For all I knew, I would be sacrificed at the end of the tunnel. I had received no news since Mara Suryan had promised me she would try to contact my companions on the Lady of Osona and prepare a daring escape. I feared she had not been successful. Or, perhaps, she had decided that my death was an acceptable loss for the sake of the lives of her young charges. I would not fault her for that.

Ajan led me through the bowels of Salmacha. Behind me walked two other guards, mailed and armed as he was, to prevent my escape. They were unnecessary—the way back led only to my cell. The only way to go was forward.

Silence fell upon the corridor. The digging had stopped. Beneath my feet, the earth tensed and trembled; not quite a quake, but the warning of one. Whatever slept under the island was close to waking. If it did, all hope was lost.

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Part Two, Chapter Nine

Temple

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

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“I’m afraid I have to leave tomorrow,” Berend says.

Lady Breckenridge’s brows go up in a dubious expression. She holds up Berend’s old bandage, stained pink with less blood than he expected. “I don’t think you’re in any shape to go anywhere.”

He groans, a little louder than might strictly be justified, and props himself up on an elbow. The luxurious feather mattress adjusts to his new position. He’s going to miss it. He’ll miss Lady Breckenridge more. “I know, but I’ll live. I can’t let the Belisias find me here.”

“Belisias?” She scowls. “They wouldn’t dare.”

The fresh bandages wrapped around Berend’s chest are clean and neat, indistinguishable from the job the nurses did at the hospital. He’s never asked if Lady Breckenridge ever did a stint at a temple of Isra. “They’ll dare quite a bit, as it turns out,” he says. “The younger son murdered a serving girl, and his father doesn’t want it to get out.”

“I always thought there was something wrong with that boy.” She gets up and washes her hands in the floral-patterned ceramic basin, folding the dirty bandages into a towel.

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Journey to the Water Chapter XVI: Betwixt Iron and Stone

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The young man’s question lingered in the still air of the dungeon like a memory, or the smell of blood. I wanted to shout that I was nothing like King Sondassan, that my quest was selfless and righteous and far from an old king’s desire to live forever, but I held my tongue. The less the king and his high priest knew about me, the better.

What I said was, “I would never sacrifice the lives of others. I risk only my own.”

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Part Two, Chapter Eight

Rest

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Berend has, indeed, noted that Herard Belisia only wanted to do right by the girl his brother murdered after being cut off from his inheritance, but he can’t fault the man. He is, after all, a mercenary. By definition, his loyalty can be bought. Herard is buying it with promises, at the moment, and Berend’s conscience is heavy enough that he doesn’t need more.

He can’t do anything for Bessa Kyne’s soul now. Not until Warder wakes up—and he will, Berend just has to believe it. His collection of incomplete, nonsensical, water-damaged notes crinkle and crunch under his arm.

He’s headed for the city center, and the Lady Breckenridge’s apartments. Dressed in borrowed clothes from the hospital, he’s inconspicuous, but he looks over his shoulder every few paces, just to make sure. His ribs ache with every breath, and his steps are short, but he can walk. It’s midday, and the sun is warm and the wind is cool, and the first yellowed leaves drift down from overhead and skitter across the pavement.

It’s a beautiful day, and he’s alive, after a second brush with death. He didn’t even lose an eye this time.

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Journey to the Water Chapter XV: Under Salmacha

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The man in the glittering black crown smiled at me, a paternal, placating expression that did not hide the devious hunger in his eyes. Whatever his purpose was for me, I was certain I would not like it.

“After months of delays, the gods smile upon our city at last,” he said. “Where do you come from, champion? What thread of fate brought you here?”

I stepped back from the bars and crossed my arms over my chest. “If there is a task you wish me to perform in exchange for my freedom, then give it to me. I have no time to waste lingering here.”

“In due time, my friend.” His smile did not fade, and the flickering light of his torch deepened the shadows on his weathered face. He appeared carved of wood, a sinister spirit of the forest.

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Part Two, Chapter Seven

Repent

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Once outside, Isabel takes a full breath for the first time in hours. Reder Angrove’s ghost remains, for the moment, inside the chapel, and the grip of his fear and grief releases. The air is cold, and it scrapes against her throat. Autumn has arrived in Mondirra.

“Did they ritually remove your brain as part of your training, Sentinel?” Geray demands in her ear, voice shaking with suppressed rage. “Take it out and put it back in the wrong way, perhaps?”

Isabel places her hat on her head and pulls the brim down over her eyes. She can still see Geray, trudging half a step behind her with his feet two inches above the ground. “Whatever you have to say, I don’t want to hear it,” she says through her teeth.

“I had an easy solution,” Geray shrieks. “I practically served it to you on a platter!”

“Enough.” Isabel presses herself against the small kitchen’s exterior wall and cranes her neck to see out to the front of the building. Her uniform will hide her in the dark, but only if she’s careful.

Geray floats out in front of her. “Whatever happens in there is on your hands, then.”

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Journey to the Water Interlude Two: The Spirit Wilds

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Khalim was lost.

The sky was dark, and glittering with stars he did not recognize. A forest of huge trees, older than the earth itself, encircled him with darkness and the smell of green things growing.

He felt neither hunger nor thirst. That was a small mercy. Though he knew it must be an illusion, his feet pressed into the rich soil, and a cold, damp wind tugged at his clothes. He had acquired, in the center of his tunic, a ragged, burnt hole, through which the chill cut at his skin. It was the memory of the conjured lance of Malang, the war god of Phyreios, who had recognized the god inside Khalim and sought to slay him. Khalim remembered how the lance had burned, and the force of it had taken him off his feet. The cold was far preferable.

Voices filled the wood, chattering in languages he did not understand, mingling with the calls of birds and the low, threatening growls of unseen beasts. The undergrowth shifted and moved, and shadowy shapes darted in and out of sight like small, quick animals. Khalim thought he had heard someone call his name, some time ago, but he had not heard it again.

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Part Two, Chapter Six

Never

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Isabel turns to the door. Darkness has fallen over the chapel, and a black abyss stretches between her and where the constable, presumably, is trying to get in. The church is haunted. Maybe the incongruousness of a ghost on holy ground will delay the authorities’ realization of the fact, but the signs are obvious.

The knock of a heavy fist sounds again. Geray gets up and floats through the black, his form disappearing like a breath on a cold day. A howl of agony shakes the chapel.

There’s no way they can’t hear this. Isabel shelters her candle, the only light remaining in the church, with both hands. Her fingers ache with cold.

Geray reappears, accompanied by a chorus of distant screams, both animal and human. “They’re going to knock down your door if you don’t answer,” he says. “They have a battering ram and everything.”

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Journey to the Water Chapter XIV: The City on the Hill

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I climbed out from beneath the temple floor. The riches of the pirate Abraxas of Lore lay at my feet, and my companions pored over it, dreams of finery and rich foods and expeditions to distant shores passing between them in whispers. My thoughts were only with the dragon harpoon, and how if I had such a weapon in my possession on the far northern sea, perhaps I would have slain the lind-worm as I had hoped to do.

Even the gods could not change the past. I had it now, and it sang to me, a song of dragon flight and the hands of heroes. I was the last of many to carry this weapon. When the dragon who had given it shape had hatched from its stone egg, the world had been young, covered in water and fire. It was with reverence that I replaced the oil cloth covering the harpoon and fashioned a sling out of rope to carry it on my back.

“I don’t need a share of the treasure,” I told Hamilcar. “I only want this weapon.”

He looked up at me and gave an expansive shrug. “If that’s your choice, then, you can have it. Gods know I wouldn’t be able to find a buyer for months.”

“My friend,” said Halvor, “you need to learn the value of money.”

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Part Two, Chapter Five

Holy Ground

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“There is another ghost in this house.”

Isabel wakes with a start and sees nothing. It’s grown dark, which means she’s slept much longer than she planned, and she’s not entirely sure what day it is now. The translucent form of Arden Geray hovers beside her narrow bed, the sockets of his eyes as dark as the night outside.

For however many blissful, oblivious hours she was asleep, she had forgotten about him. She groans and pushes herself up. “What are you talking about?”

“A spirit,” he says, enunciating carefully as though he is speaking to a child. “It’s just arrived and it’s none too pleased. What are you going to do about it, Sentinel?”

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