The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)(67)

He was silent for a beat of my heart. Then two. Three. “You’ve never finished.”

“Not with another person.”

I thought he’d laugh at me. Or be incredulous, like he’d been when I told him I didn’t have shoes. And that was my own fault, thinking I’d charted him—that I could predict his derision or humor or humanity. He opened another door to himself every time.

“Pith, you think there’s something wrong with me—”

“I don’t.” Rory’s voice was gravel. “I was wondering what it would be like. Watching you unravel.”

The night was cold, the air thin, and I was thoughtless and breathless. I turned my head away from his silhouette, my pulse clamoring—

And saw a shadow move.

They looked like rocks at first. Gray, textured skin that might easily be mistaken for long pieces of shale, like they’d fallen from the mountains and come to life. But they kept moving, three of them, crawling over nearby rocks with strange, craggy hands.

Then they sniffed the air, gray lips spread over jagged teeth, a noise like fracturing stone sounding within their throats.

I gasped.

Rory was already next to me. “More sprites.”

“What are they doing?”

He turned his coin between his fingers. “I don’t know.”

The sprites crawled over the stones like great shale reptiles, sniffing. Like watchdogs, they circled the flask until, seemingly satisfied, they retreated back into shadow. Rory and I remained entirely still, waiting, watching. Just when the night seemed to return to its idle stillness—

A figure came from the dark.

Tall, cloaked, hunched, it walked with rigid steps, its long black sleeves draped over some kind of walking stick. The figure retrieved the flask of spring water, threw its head back.

And upended its contents in its mouth.

Rory’s breath caught in my ear, and a great hollowness found my heart. I knew without seeing its face that I was looking down upon a mortal, not a god.

An Omen, lured out by the smell of Aisling’s water.

The Ardent Oarsman.





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


THE ARDENT OARSMAN




The Oarsman’s stooped posture straightened. I saw then that the object he was leaning on wasn’t a walking stick at all.

It was a stone oar.

The Omen sighed a great, rasping breath, dropped the flask, and returned, like the sprites, into shadow.

Rory tugged my sleeve. “Come on.”

The mountain path was wet. Precarious. One wrong step and I might slip—fall and splat upon rock like I did in my dreams. But I kept my balance, and Rory his, and the two of us followed like specters over the ridge, careful not to step within the moon’s silver glow, watching the Ardent Oarsman as he maneuvered through shadows.

We were getting closer to the roaring waterfall. Far in the distance, I could see the shapes of the nobles—the knighthood, standing at the lip of the water, watching Benji in the nets. And while everyone was looking at the king, no one was watching the waterfall.

No one saw the Ardent Oarsman lift his oar into the waterfall’s roaring froth—and vanish.

Rory and I stopped in our tracks. “The oar,” I said. “He can travel through water with it.” I threw my head back and measured the roaring waterfall, its mist wetting my hair. “We need to get up there. Can you toss your coin?”

Rory was scowling. “It’s too high.”

There was no climbing—the rockface was sheer, slick. And the mountain path ended at our feet. The only way to scale this peak… was not to scale it at all.

“I have an idea.” I turned to Rory. “He might not like it.”

Five minutes later, Rory reappeared with a flash of his coin, holding the gargoyle by the wrist. “Unhand me, you brute!” he wailed, thrashing. “Oh, Bartholomew, thank heavens you’re here. I’ve been abducted!”

I pressed a hand over his stone mouth. “Stop yelling, no—no, do not bite me.” I looked up at the waterfall. “We need you to fly, gargoyle.”

He was not pleased. He was not pleased when I flattered him, calling him brave, and he was not pleased when Rory grinned at the sight of me groveling. He was not pleased when he took flight, lifting from his feet and soaring up, up, and over the crest of the waterfall, and he was not pleased when he returned.

“Well?” Rory stopped pacing. “What did you see?”

The gargoyle yawned. “Nothing of import.”

My shoulders fell. “There’s nothing up there?”

“There’s a flat tableland nestled within the peaks and a body of water upon it, and an assortment of rocky beasts that lie at the mouth of an ugly stone castle. Like I said—nothing of import.”

Rory’s head tipped back, like he was praying to the night sky for patience he did not possess.

I put my palm to the gargoyle’s stone cheek. “Take us up there.”

He was still sour to be ordered about. But then the gargoyle put one arm around Rory, one around me, and pressed us together so tightly I let out a sound. Rory’s front slammed against mine, and when he looked down at me, dark lashes fanned his cheeks. He held out his arms. Asked, a little breathless, “May I?”

I nodded, and he wrapped his arms around my waist.