Page 64

INARA RUSHED DOWN THE LADDERS, WHILE LESSA LEFT Rhiyande in charge of the bridge and followed.

‘Which fire god, Ina?’ Kissen demanded, clattering down behind her.

‘Inara, answer her!’ barked Lessa.

Several of the Irisian crew turned to stare at them as they barrelled past.

‘Captain, are we under attack?’ said one in Middric.

‘Not yet,’ said Lessa as they charged down the next deck. ‘Stay at your posts.’

Inara was barely listening, but Skedi she could not ignore.

You’ve been speaking to her, haven’t you? he said.

Not Hseth.

I meant Hestra! She is dangerous.

Inara bit her lip. She should never have let the symbol remain in the fire. Why were the gods and kings of this world so intent on making her homeless? Seemed a bit petty, seeing as half of them were about invading the homes of others.

She was starting to lose her own faith. In gods.

Maybe in herself. There had been so many who had given her kindness, offered her help, even if Aan’s most recent advice had been next to useless.

But then Hseth, Hestra, Satuan … even Yusef.

Especially Yusef. Inara felt unsettled, so deep in shades of grey that she was forgetting what colour looked like.

Was this growing up? Or was it losing hope?

She could feel the warmth of the galley on her cheeks, smell its scents, before she reached it.

Yellow peas for the evening fare. They served them mushed, dressed in anchovies, with vinegar greens, biscuit and bread.

She could smell salted beef too, already red with ageing and further brightened with spice.

But under the scents as she entered the kitchen was the smell of smouldering embers, the sharp sap of pine roots, and the almost-sweetness of burning hay.

Hestra.

The woman made of twigs was sitting in the centre of the oven where Inara had previously tried to talk to her.

But she wasn’t all twigs. Inara had not seen her in this form before.

She appeared more human-like, her hair soft and brown, though still threaded with lichen and wool.

Her structure was still all branches, thickened with moss and sometimes with gleams of twig and fine bones.

In size, she was the height of a child, but she did not look young.

She looked like an ancient being from before time, before house and home, back when hearth might be cave and hope.

Then Hestra looked up. Her eyes … they were paler again. Strangely human. Soft and blue.

But the illusion shattered when Lessa and Kissen came in: the god hissed, flames brightened in her mouth, sparks flying around her teeth. We did not ask for you , her inner voice whipped out, lashing at the two of them.

‘Tough shit,’ said Kissen, the flicker of the flames brightening the red of her hair, the scars of her neck, her chin, her hands. She had grabbed all her blades and was stuffing them back in their places on her person.

Skedi flew in, landing on Kissen’s shoulder, the size of a mouse. ‘How is she here?’ he said.

‘Our sneaky little demigod has been trying to make new friends,’ said Kissen, though her voice lacked sting.

‘It was after Satuan,’ said Inara. ‘I just …’ She was torn between Hestra and Kissen, and settled for standing up straight, hands by her side.

Like her mother did. ‘I wanted to help, but Hestra wasn’t interested.

’ She aimed the last words at the god. She must have used some power to reappear in this shrine.

‘Is the king dead?’ said Lessa, to Hestra now, her voice unreadable. ‘Is that why you’re here?’

‘No,’ said Hestra. ‘He lives, and gains strength and power. Though he also gains enemies and loses land.’ Embers ran up her arms, dancing and crackling, a few flames caught.

The room was warm, not oppressively hot.

Comforting. ‘The end of this war is coming for us. Which end, I am here to see. Did you succeed in your quest?’

‘We have Irisian ships on their way,’ said Lessa. ‘They will be a few days behind us, archers, land army, and sea fighters, two thousand in number. Can you last that long?’

Hestra crackled, pausing as if listening. She must be speaking to the king. Inara’s heart and stomach burned and tightened. So, she was back in line with Arren. He had managed to convince her. Or something else had.

‘We are drawing them away from the city of Lesscia,’ said Hestra. ‘To open battle. Hseth is too destructive to meet elsewhere. Gefyrton and most of Daesmouth have already been lost to flame.’

‘Gefyrton?’ whispered Inara, and she felt, rather than saw, Kissen and Lessa exchange a glance. What had been happening since they had left? Their weeks of travel suddenly felt less like building an army and more like finding a last dreg of hope. ‘Where is Elo? Is he all right?’

Hestra smiled knowingly. ‘The king’s knight is well enough,’ she said. ‘He speaks to the king’s heart, and they both bade me come here.’

Inara stared at the god, and the god stared back.

‘Give me an offering, girl, and I will tell you more,’ Hestra said. ‘I have not the power now to run from port to harbour, hearth to hearth, without something more to bind me here.’

Inara saw Skedi’s wings raise. ‘She has given enough, hearth god,’ he said, before Kissen could. ‘Ask something else.’

Skedi, you don’t have to …

How many pieces of yourself can you give away, Inara, before there’s nothing left?

But … it was what she could do, wasn’t it? There was little else she could contribute.

‘You came here on the king’s power,’ said Lessa. ‘Use him as an offering, not us.’

Hestra turned her attention to Lady Craier, moving her twig-face into a mask of disappointment. ‘If you wish for my guidance, we will both need a stronger tether to this ship.’

Lessa clicked her tongue. Inara could see the charcoal mark she had made on the oven, still there, but fading. It would not be long before Hestra could not return to the ship, having no semblance of a shrine to root herself to.

‘Shrines,’ Kissen muttered. ‘Everyone wants a fucking shrine. What happened to just having your own built because people actually like you?’

‘No one asked you, veiga,’ whispered Hestra.

‘Give me a knife,’ said Lessa, holding her hand out to Kissen.

‘You’re not serious,’ said Kissen. Lessa looked at her and her dark eyes brooked no argument. Kissen sighed and drew Osidisen’s blade, putting it in her hand. It was as good as permission.

Lessa approached the oven and carved Hestra’s symbol, the one Inara had drawn in soot: two lines going diagonally down, a straight line carved across the top, over its front. The simplest kind of hearth.

The lines she flared, turning yellow then orange. The scent of greenwood intensified, the salted stink of the beef reducing against the cracks and twists of woodsmoke and embers.

Lessa returned to Inara’s side. ‘Will that suit you, hearth god?’

No negotiation, no requests, no offers of bigger and better.

Inara bit her lip. She had offered too much for Yusef; she knew that.

She had not thought how poor Middren might be after a war, after losing a port city, half of Sakre, Blenraden, Gefyrton.

The country was gutted and ruined. Her country.

And she had offered the god of a foreign power a home when her own was burned.

‘It needs antlers,’ said Hestra, without looking, and Inara noticed, beneath the branches and colours of her hair, two little nubs were showing through, soot-dark and shaped like fungus, velveted like the tops of stags’ antlers in growing season.

They are becoming more entwined , said Skedi. Hestra and the king. It seems I am not the only god that can change.

Lessa leaned in and struck two upward strokes from the hearth, like rays, or like antlers, then threw the knife point down in the boards. Done.

Hestra nodded her head. ‘You must dock east, in Yesef lands. There is a small fishing harbour you can enter at high tide.’

‘I’ll get the charts,’ said Skedi, taking off from Kissen and swooping up the stairs to find the state room.

‘What of the Irisians?’ said Lessa. ‘They cannot load on some fisherfolk’s dock.’

‘There’s a deep Movenna harbour not far from there,’ said Kissen. ‘They’ve been cutting in steps down to the waters so they can start a bigger port. That would take them’

‘They never reported this to the king’s council,’ said Lessa.

Kissen grinned. ‘And get taxed to shit before it’s done? You should do some more walking.’

Hestra had turned her head to the side, listening again, or speaking to Arren. ‘The Restish and Talicians have been spotted moving ships west. If they make land, we will be forced again to fight on two fronts, and this war will be over.’

Over. Inara caught her breath, and Hestra looked at her.

‘I take it, beast, you did not find the power you were looking for?’

Inara swallowed, shook her head. ‘There are no great gods that will help us,’ she said. ‘Not without them taking more than we can give.’

She felt Kissen’s eye on her, but the veiga and her mother both decided not to comment as Skedi came gliding in, a bundle of rolled papers in his mouth.

Lessa pulled them free then laid them out in front of the hearth, and Hestra opened her mouth: sparks flew out from between her teeth, drifting on the air and then landing on the map to burn tiny holes, one for the Yesef harbour, the others marking positions east.

‘These points are where the invaders’ ships have been sighted,’ she said. ‘We will need the Irisians for our sea defence, aligning with our own boats. The rest of you will meet us east of Sorin, on the Arrenon. There, the Fireheart awaits with his lion. And me.’

In a flare of heat, she was gone, and Inara let out a breath.

‘Fireheart?’ said Kissen. ‘Pissing “Fireheart”? He is such an arsehole.’

‘He chose it for her,’ said Inara. ‘Sunbringer cut her out, Fireheart brings her back to him.’

Kissen cursed under her breath, and Inara too felt a surge of rancour.

She had wanted Hestra to come to her, to work with her, undo the king from the inside.

She still wanted revenge, when all of this was done.

If the two were together, she might not have as much power to match him as she had hoped.

They seemed to be becoming one creature, one god.

It could not be true. Arren shouldn’t get everything he had wanted, it wasn’t right.

‘One problem at a time,’ said Lessa, then leaned down to retrieve Kissen’s dagger and looked at its edge before handing it back to her. ‘Things in Middren are more desperate than we feared.’ She put her hand on Inara’s shoulder, giving her a squeeze.

‘Give nothing else to the gods,’ she said. ‘No matter what happens. You do not owe them. You don’t belong to anyone but yourself.’