lighting my path through the dark.
When I am deserted and alone...
I know your hands hold the threads of my soul
and there is nothing to fear.
When the enemy surrounds me...
I remember you are with me.
And though they break my body, they can never take my soul.
They always spoke the last line together. Eris recited the prayer twice now and when she opened her eyes, she felt calmer. Less angry. But still hurt.
I should be grateful that they took me in at all, she thought.Me, a worthless orphan.
Using this thought as a shield against the hurt, Eris got to her feet. Spotting a patch of scarp thistles growing in clumps near the cliff edge, she drew the knife out of its sheath and went to cut some.
“As a good-bye gift,” she told Yew, who lay in the grass now, watching her with deep brown eyes. “For the weavers.”
Eris didn’t know when it had gotten so late, only that when Yew bolted upright, staring toward the sea, the sky was dark and the stars were coming out.
Eris let go of the thorny scarp stalk and lowered her knife, looking in the same direction.
Yew bleated, agitated. Eris laid her free hand atop his warm back, peering through the blue twilight. A silhouette came into view. Something—a man?—was walking toward them from the cliffs. Above him, a massive black raven soared through the air.
Eris frowned. There was no path up or down those cliffs. You had to climb the steps on the other side of the scrin.
So where had he come from?
Day’s warnings about strangers filled her mind and Eris stepped back.
“Who are you?” she called out.
She could see from where she stood that his gait was clumsy and stiff. As if he were limping.
He stumbled.
Eris sheathed the knife and ran to him. Yew trailed nervously behind her. As she got closer, she saw he was an older man, maybe Day’s age. His clothes were soaked and a hideous red gash sliced his forehead just above his right eye. Blood—now dry—had run down his cheek and neck, pooling in the hollow of his throat. That black raven circled above him.
“Are you all right?” Clearly, he was in some kind of trouble. “What’s your name?”
“Jemsin,” he rasped. “My ship...”
His hands shook, and Eris could see his fingers were scraped and bloody.
Had he climbed those cliffs? She looked from his hands to his face as admiration flared within her.
The raven dived suddenly, flapping its massive wings as it landed on Jemsin’s shoulder. It stared down at her with bloodred eyes. Growing strangely cold beneath its gaze, Eris stepped back.
“A wicked wind dashed us right up on the rocks,” Jemsin said. “Like we were nothing but a leaf. Where am I, girl?”
“Shadow Isle,” she said, eying the raven as she stepped carefully beside Jemsin, ready to catch him if he stumbled or fell. “The scrin isn’t far. They’ll help you. Where’s the rest of your crew?”
He shook his head, his shoulders sagging. “Eaten. The sea spirits got each and every one of them before they could swim ashore.”
Eris thought of his men, swimming through the cold silver waters as one by one their comrades were pulled under by clawed and scaly hands.
