Page 110 of The Thief and the Traitor Bride

“She did,” Terlo allowed. They sighed, shaking their head. “But she is a tough, cold thing, if rumors are to be believed. They say that the line has always been cruel and vicious, and the new High Lady has even more teeth than her mother. That she would take all power from everywhere if it served her.”

Nore did not have an answer to this. She wrapped her arms around herself, thinking of a wedding gown never worn and the icy chill of midwinter. Even tough, cold things had their secrets. “Do you agree with that?” she asked.

Terlo hesitated. “I don’t know. I don’t know how I would feel if I were the reason everyone I loved died—but I also remember the weeks of agony as she waited for my nation to cede to her rule. I don’t know if I can forgive her for that fear. I feel guilt and shame for what we all have done to her—but anger, too, that we are all beholden to her will.”

“That is… well considered,” Nore allowed.

Terlo led her out of the square, up the stairs, and through the large double doors to the hall.

It was a huge, cavernous space, with soaring vaulted ceilings in carved stone that fed down into pillars that were carved into ancient, unsmiling statues. The huge space seemed to be something of a social hall now, with an area for tables set up in one corner in a makeshift tavern and another space set aside for some sort of prayer and reflection. People milled about in the different areas, laughter bouncing off the stone walls; in the middle of the hall, workers were setting up for a larger event that evening.

“Let’s start there,” Terlo said, nodding to an alcove. Nore was happy to follow, still reeling from the sheer number of names carved outside.

“What are those?” Nore asked, nodding to the pillars. “The statues.”

“The Isle’s gods,” Terlo said. They pointed from pillar to pillar, reciting names: “I cannot recall them all, but there is Retarik and Kitalma; then Gremaryse, Elothan, Gramika, Maradican, Camillira, Coronen… The rest are lesser gods, whom I do not know.”

Nore recalled some of the names from Terlo’s earlier stories. She wondered if Caspian had grown up with these tales—his mother, she knew, kept to one of the older religions of Idistra. There were probably similarities.

They spent the entire afternoon in the hall, moving from alcove to alcove. Terlo read her the carvings when they were legible—some were in Auldlochan, the old language, and required extra time for translation—and they admired the tapestries and paintings together. There were many of the first mage and well, Retarik and Kitalma, and the other minor gods and goddesses that Locke’s old religion believed in.

“Do you have faith?” Nore asked when they were passing by one of the larger paintings.

“Not really,” Terlo said. “I believe in something, but I can’t say for sure what that is. My mother was a believer in the Faceless Eleven of the Seas, so that is what I’m most familiar with.” They shook their head. “We had our… difficult moments. The Faceless Eleven have very specific rules about magic. Ma thought it was sacrilege to waste miracles on the everyday.”

Nore suppressed a smile. “I suppose magic can feel miraculous sometimes,” she allowed. It was hard, when speaking of magic, to not think of Caspian.

“And you, Nore?”

Nore sighed. “Lindan keeps few gods,” she admitted. “And I keep none at all.”

“Somehow,” Terlo said softly, “that does not surprise me.”

They took it all in, from the altar to the aisle, and all of the paintings and art in between. There was a small sign near the altar that Terlo read to Nore: it was once rumored to be Retarik’s burial place, but when the vault was opened during a restoration project, it was found to be empty.

“I wonder where she is,” Terlo said, running their fingers over the carving.

Nore had a hunch, but speaking of the tombs in the wood felt like violating some sort of pact she’d made with the Isle. She wanted to investigate on her own first, and then she’d take her findings to Terlo.

“I suppose we’ll have to keep looking,” she said.

Terlo pulled out a small magnifying glass when they came to the case of old artifacts. Nore stood by, taking notes as they made observations on the small items: a token exchanged between a married couple or bound pair (apparently, the two had interchangeable colloquialisms in Auldlochan); a comb recovered from an early settlement, inlaid with dark gems; an old storybook for children, open to a page that depicted the goddess of the sea consuming a ship; a collection of spellstones that possibly indicated early exchanges of magic between systems, perhaps even a system of trade. No allusions to resurrection, nor of a constructive Lochan artifact.

They finished their investigation near one of the tapestries at the end of the hall. In it, a woman stood on a beach, watching as another woman walked from the sea, grasping a bundle in each arm. It took Nore a moment to realize that the bundles were actually babies.

“Is this the story you told us?” Nore asked, nodding up at the mural. “About the resurrection?”

Terlo studied the tapestry. “It is,” they said finally, moving to take a few steps back. “It’s a different version than the one we normally teach on the mainland—but it’s a popular variant.”

“Oh?”

Terlo nodded to the woman walking from the sea. “In some variants, more popular in Auldlochan, Retarik returned with two children: a mage and a well. One to rule, and the other to secure an alliance with the mainland.”

Nore studied the tapestry. She couldn’t fully read the little plaque, but she recognized the names: Retarik, Kitalma, Aban, Taran. Nore glanced over to the other tapestries they passed, down the hall. “That one down there,” she said, nodding to one depicting a man on a throne of stone. “That one is Taran crowned as the first High Lord of the Isle, right?”

“It is,” Terlo said. “I have a re-creation of it in my office. Taran was the first of the true Lockes, born of the Isle’s blood.”

Nore was only half listening. She crossed back to the tapestry next to it, a little less cared for, a little more worn. It depicted the stormy Isle—and the same man, Taran, handing a young woman down into a boat. Behind her, the sea raged all the way to the shadow of the mainland, only just in sight.