And this wasn’t the sign the High Luminance wanted.
Not more senseless death for the Dead God.
His steps turned toward the frozen fountain with the replica of the godstone at its center. Was that the sign the High Luminance wanted? For him to unfreeze the fountain and bring the burble of flowing water from the top of the mountain to the people of Temit. It sounded right, though he wasn’t sure exactly how he’d do that with the God of Storms and the Goddess of Life. A lightning bolt to crack the ice. Warm sunlight to melt it. Maybe.
But the longer he stared at the fountain, the more he felt a tug deep inside of his chest away from it.
Closing his eyes, he placed his hand over his heart and tried to focus on the feeling. Kaes wasn’t the answer. The tug was Tula. She would know her brother, right?
Still blind to the square, Caelan followed the tug, turning slowly on his right heel. When it felt like he was facing the correct direction, he opened his eyes to see a smaller rectangle at the far side of the square like a low-walled garden.
I hope you’re not interested in this spot just because it looks like a garden, Caelan directed toward Tula.
I am the beginning. My brother is the end, was Tula’s only response.
Not exactly helpful, but there was something very calm and peaceful about the goddess right now. It was preferable to her soul-scorching rage.
“Your Majesty?” Rayne’s questioning voice drifted across the square, but Caelan didn’t slow from his course. He already knew what his advisor was thinking. Why wasn’t he going to the fountain? The brief message they’d received from Yash Magar had said that the most important thing in the square was the fountain, emphasizing that it had been frozen from the moment it had been built and filled with water.
It did sound logical.
But if this was supposed to be a sign from a god to a god or at least an emissary of that god, shouldn’t he be listening to one of the gods in his head?
The rectangular garden was surrounded by a crumbling stone wall that came up no higher than his knees while the enclosed space was no more than ten feet across.
But inside, he actually saw dirt. Everywhere he’d visited in Temit had been stone. All the flowers were made of silk or painted.
Of course, the dirt was hard and packed. It probably couldn’t have supported the life of a handful of weeds. Which explained the dead tree in the center of the garden. The trunk was no thicker than his own body and gnarled limbs reached up toward the bleak sky. No nutrients below to support its life, no light overhead to give it warmth.
Stepping inside the garden, Caelan walked up to the tree and placed his hand against the bark. It was surprisingly hard and smooth, almost as if the poor thing had petrified into stone.
Wake the tree, Tula whispered.
Caelan didn’t get the chance to question what she meant by that command. The energy was already flowing up from the well of power in his soul and into the tree where his hand rested. It poured in as if falling into a bottomless pit, and with it, Caelan felt part of himself falling into that nothingness. Blackness consumed him, and he lost touch with the square and the world around him.
Panic poured through, threatening to choke off his air, but before he could gasp out a plea for help, that panic was swallowed up by the blackness as well. All of his emotions fell into that tree until he was sure there would be nothing of him left.
He didn’t know how long he fell. Seconds, hours, days. It was just darkness. Then, at long last, there was a gentle throb of light. He didn’t see it piercing the darkness, but he felt its warmth like a small, fragile heartbeat. The energy from the Goddess of Life flowed straight into the slender thread, filling it until it grew fuller and stronger. In just a blink, he was carried upward through the darkness to break through again on a hard gasp.
Bright light blinded him, and he squinted against the sharp pain while lifting a hand to shield his eyes. Why was it so bright?
“Easy now. Slow, deep breaths,” Eno coaxed, his voice a soothing touch to the suddenly ragged edges of his nerves. “We’ve got you.”
It was only then that Caelan realized that he wasn’t standing upright, but partially lying down. There was an arm at his back, holding him in a reclined position. The cold ground was under his legs, and the wind was nipping at his cheeks. Blood was heavy in the air. He was still in the square.
“I passed out again?” he asked in a rough voice, though it was more than a little obvious that he had.