“Meeka take grubs outside. Bury them.” His muzzle wrinkled in distaste. “Before grubs start melting. Turn slimy.”
“Meeka, wait,” I said as he took a hop toward the tent flaps. “Don’t go yet. It’s peak Demon Hour.”
He twitched an oversize ear at me. “Demon Hour not bother Meeka,” he said, and hopped through the flaps.
The jair’oa’s tail tuft vanished through the cloth, and I sighed. “I hope he’ll be all right.”
Beside me, Raithe smiled. “Sometimes it is the very small who are the best at surviving,” he said, with the briefest of glances at me. “Insects, rodents, and dust sparrows will still be here when the rest of us have all faded away. I suspect he is stronger than any of us realize.”
We reached the foot of the peaks just as Namaia was beginning to set. Gazing up at the imposing mountain range, I shivered. The jagged cliffs rose straight into the air and were as sharp and black as obsidian. Pointed spines towered over us, the edges shiny and serrated, looking like you would slice yourself open if you brushed up against them. The entire mountain range virtuallybristled with menace, radiating hostility. If I hadn’t had to be here, just seeing those peaks would’ve made me turn around and march back through the endless desert.
Overhead, the sky had changed, the eye-burning blue-white replaced with ominous black and green clouds. I had seen clouds only a few times in my life; rain in Kovass was almost unheard of. Years could pass without a single drop falling from the sky, and when rain did fall, it brought the whole city to a standstill, as everyone stopped whatever they were doing to witness it.
These clouds, swirling sluggishly over the jagged peaks, looked as unnatural and threatening as the rest of the landscape. They looked tainted, poisonous, as if any rain that fell from them would burn your skin the moment it hit.
“Well, this isn’t very welcoming, is it?” Halek craned his neck back, staring up at the peaks. “The Deathless couldn’t have made it any clearer if they had put up signs saying ‘Enter and Die’ or ‘Turn Back Before It’s Too Late.’” He grinned. “Of course, that only makes me infinitely more curious about what’s in there.”
“Don’t be too eager, Fatechaser,” Raithe warned. “There were thirteen original Deathless, and you’ve already seen the horrors a single Deathless can bring to bear.” He waved a hand at the looming peaks. “Imagine what thirteen, working together for the first and last time in history, could create.”
“Hm, that is a very good and terrifying point, iylvahn,” Halek conceded. “However, since we have to get to the World Scar anyway, I choose to be excited about new adventures. It will keep me from being paralyzed with dread until the horrors actually start coming for me.”
Meeka, who had been curled up on my shoulder, raised his head, whiskers twitching. “Air smells funny,” he said. “Like rotten things.”
“Oh, and the mouse is already smelling dead things. That’s lovely.”
“Not dead things.” Meeka shook his head. “Rotten things.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Is different.” Meeka pinned his ears back. “Meeka cannot explain it. Air smells rotten, but not like death.”
“It’s sulfur,” Raithe said. He gazed up the peaks, narrowing his eyes. “Or brimstone. I can catch traces of it on the wind.”
“Yes,” Kysa murmured. “That means travel is about to get much harder.”
“Why?” I asked.
Halek grimaced at me. “Because if there’s sulfur, there’s normally... Well, ever been to the lands of the magma walkers, Sparrow?”
“You know I haven’t.” I frowned at him. “Before I met you and Raithe, I’d never left Kovass.”
“Ah, well. I won’t spoil it for you, then.”
We urged the beetles forward, and the open dunes were replaced with claustrophobic gullies of black. As we passed the first jagged spine, I glanced at it and saw myself and Ratuk reflected in the dark, glassy surface, a distorted version of reality. A shiver crawled up my back, making the hairs on my neck stand up. We were walking into a place the Deathless had created themselves, a place where they’d intended that nothing would survive. What would we face beyond these shards? What horrorswould we encounter? As if a terrifying spider demon, an undead jackal army, and the soul of my mentor bound into a rotting abomination weren’t horrific enough.
Overhead, the clouds swirled. I glanced up and saw a flicker of sickly green lightning as an ominous rumble filled the air, making me shiver.
Halek also cast a worried look at the sky, wrinkling his nose at the threatening clouds. “So, ominous weather patterns aside, where is this temple, exactly?” he wondered. “Normally, temples are easy enough to spot, presuming the Deathless didn’t bury it or use magic to hide it from outsiders, like a certain city in the middle of a labyrinth.”
“Not that I’m aware of,” Raithe said. “The queen said the temple is in the center of the World Scar, and right now we’re just at the border.”
“Ah, yes. The scab around the wound, I guess you could say.” Halek grinned, and I tried not to think too hard about that description. A hot wind blew through the canyon, tugging at my hood, and he coughed. “Oh, and that must be the delightful smell Meeka was talking about.”
I took a breath, and nearly coughed myself. The air smelled... rotten, just like the jair’oa had said. I remembered a time when I had found a wild bird nest in the rafters of the guild, with two speckled eggs nestled inside. Unfortunately, they must’ve been duds, because when I picked one up, the fragile shell had immediately burst open, spilling a foul yellow liquid over my hands. It had smelled very much like the air did right now.
“That is definitely sulfur,” Kysa said, ignoring the coughing Fatechaser behind her. “We must be getting close.”
“Close?” Halek made an exaggerated retching noise and sat up. “Close to what?”
