Child of Flame (Crown of Stars 4)

Hands grabbed him. He stumbled as they dragged him along. Bowed down by the force of the sandstorm, he tugged up a corner of his cloak to shield his face. Sand dribbled down his chin. Dry particles coated his mouth, and every time he swallowed sand scraped the moist flesh of his throat until he thought his throat was on fire.

They stumbled over rough ground for an eternity as sand battered them, scouring his exposed skin. Certainly he could see absolutely nothing. All at once he felt a massive wall looming before him. A strong grip tugged him sideways, and he fell forward down a smooth slope and cracked his knees on stone. Far away up the tunnel, wind screamed. He spit and coughed and finally vomited a little, so choked with sand that he shook helplessly. His eyes stung with sand, and sand clogged his ears. His hair shed gritty particles with each shudder.

Where was Adica? Had she escaped the storm? He struggled to his feet just as a man spoke to him in a language he did not know. He spoke again in the tongue of the White Deer people, with an accent even stranger than that of Laoina but a rather better grasp of the niceties of the language.

“Rise, stranger. Walk forward, if it pleases you. A place we have for you to bathe yourself.”

Alain squinted through sand-scoured eyes. A swarthy man with a proud face and an aquiline nose examined him. Was that compassion quirking up his mouth? With an elegant gesture, he indicated a tunnel lit by oil burning in a ceramic bowl. Alain glanced back the way he had come. Three robed figures hunkered down at the entrance, armed with spears. They stared out into the storm, a void of wind and earth and spirits howling in the air. What they feared beyond the storm itself he did not want to consider, not after he’d seen the face of that snake woman.

He had never expected to see so many strange things, like visions drawn out of the distant past. The forest around Lavas Castle boasted a herd of aurochs and the occasional chance-met unicorn, swiftly seen and as swiftly gone, and there were always wolves, but the great predators that plagued humankind in the old legends, the swamp-born guivres, the dragons of the north, the griffins that flew in the grasslands, did not wander the northern forests and in truth were scarcely ever seen and commonly believed to be nothing more than stories made up to scare children.

Maybe the three men were only guarding against their enemies, the Cursed Ones. It just seemed impossible that anyone could navigate through such a storm.

“Where is the Hallowed One?”

“She came before you, before the storm hit. Come with me.”

ng her mirror, she angled the reflective face until the image of the star caught in it. She had already forgotten him as she fell into the rising and falling chant of her spell. So quickly, she pulled away from him, as though a chasm had ruptured between them. Yet how could he help but stare as she worked her magic? She looped her weaving around the stars known as the Holy Woman’s Necklace, still high in the sky and setting toward the west, and wove a gate to western lands. He had never stood so close before. He could actually hear the thrum of the threads through the soles of his feet, deep in his bones. The gate arced into being just as the hounds yelped with fear and skittered backward. Alain raised his staff as they bounded into view. Night fell.

“Go!” cried Adica, caught in the maze of her weaving.

A sibilant hiss echoed along the stone cliffs around them. Laoina needed no more urging: she bolted through the threshold.

“Go!” cried Adica when Alain hesitated. “I will follow you.”

“I won’t leave you!” he cried. The hounds raced through the gateway, vanishing through the archway, abandoning them—or scared off.

What on Earth was dreadful enough to make his faithful hounds run off like that?

A grinding weight scraped along rock behind him. He whirled, holding his staff ready, keeping his body between the crevasse and Adica, but all he could see was shadow. A heavy footfall shuddered the ground as one of the lion women padded past him, eerily silent.

“Alain!”

A hiss answered Adica’s call. A serpentine creature emerged from the crevasse, winding sideways in the manner of a snake. Except it wasn’t a snake.

It had creamy-pale skin and a torso like that of a woman with the face of a girl newly come to womanhood, fey and curiously aloof. Her hair writhed around her head as though in a whirlpool of air, or as if her hair itself were alive, a coil of hissing serpents.

“Alain!” The gate glimmered, threads snapping. The sphinx leaped forward to attack, and Alain heard Adica’s fading cry. He jumped back through threads sparking and hissing into a blinding sandstorm.

Drowning in sand, he flailed wildly. He could not breathe.

Hands grabbed him. He stumbled as they dragged him along. Bowed down by the force of the sandstorm, he tugged up a corner of his cloak to shield his face. Sand dribbled down his chin. Dry particles coated his mouth, and every time he swallowed sand scraped the moist flesh of his throat until he thought his throat was on fire.

They stumbled over rough ground for an eternity as sand battered them, scouring his exposed skin. Certainly he could see absolutely nothing. All at once he felt a massive wall looming before him. A strong grip tugged him sideways, and he fell forward down a smooth slope and cracked his knees on stone. Far away up the tunnel, wind screamed. He spit and coughed and finally vomited a little, so choked with sand that he shook helplessly. His eyes stung with sand, and sand clogged his ears. His hair shed gritty particles with each shudder.

Where was Adica? Had she escaped the storm? He struggled to his feet just as a man spoke to him in a language he did not know. He spoke again in the tongue of the White Deer people, with an accent even stranger than that of Laoina but a rather better grasp of the niceties of the language.

“Rise, stranger. Walk forward, if it pleases you. A place we have for you to bathe yourself.”

Alain squinted through sand-scoured eyes. A swarthy man with a proud face and an aquiline nose examined him. Was that compassion quirking up his mouth? With an elegant gesture, he indicated a tunnel lit by oil burning in a ceramic bowl. Alain glanced back the way he had come. Three robed figures hunkered down at the entrance, armed with spears. They stared out into the storm, a void of wind and earth and spirits howling in the air. What they feared beyond the storm itself he did not want to consider, not after he’d seen the face of that snake woman.

He had never expected to see so many strange things, like visions drawn out of the distant past. The forest around Lavas Castle boasted a herd of aurochs and the occasional chance-met unicorn, swiftly seen and as swiftly gone, and there were always wolves, but the great predators that plagued humankind in the old legends, the swamp-born guivres, the dragons of the north, the griffins that flew in the grasslands, did not wander the northern forests and in truth were scarcely ever seen and commonly believed to be nothing more than stories made up to scare children.

Maybe the three men were only guarding against their enemies, the Cursed Ones. It just seemed impossible that anyone could navigate through such a storm.

“Where is the Hallowed One?”

“She came before you, before the storm hit. Come with me.”