She cringed, knowing what was about to happen.
The moon swept around, passing ghostly through Frell and Rhaif. Xan lifted her staff against it, but it rushed through the wood, too. The moon circled the shimmering world, growing ever closer—at first slowly, then faster.
Finally, it made one final pass and slammed into the world. The impact shook the image above the table. Waves of destruction spread outward from the strike, wiping away all in its path: lands, oceans, ice, and sand. Nothing was spared. In a breath, the ruins of the Urth shone before all of their stunned faces.
“Moonfall…” Nyx whispered. “What I saw in my vision.”
“The portent of the jar’wren,” Xan intoned.
Shiya cast her gaze around the room. “This is what woke me. We who are the Sleepers, buried deep in the world until we are needed. But we are not the only sentinels planted here as the world slowed. Those who came before—”
Shiya stopped and frowned, clearly struggling for the words to explain, or maybe she was simply trying to knit what she knew over the gaps of knowledge shattered on the floor. She started again. “Those who came before, they instilled gifts into others, seeded into their blood, creating vessels of memory. They were living sentinels who watched while we slept, who could change with the world, while we could not. They were created to sustain an eternal memory, one shared and preserved across their many numbered.”
Nyx breathed harder and closed her eyes.
I know those sentinels.
She remembered the attack in the swamps, when her mind was cast throughout the avenging horde descending on Brayk. She had shared their eyes, their lusts—but she also pictured the pair of fiery eyes gazing back at her. In those moments, she had sensed the greater mind behind that gaze, something ageless and dark, cold and unknowable. Its vastness had unnerved her.
She opened her eyes to find Shiya gazing upon her. Her bronze face shone with that same ancientness.
Nyx knew that the fiery intelligence in the swamps was equal to what lay here. That huge pair of eyes—staring out of the darkness at her—wasn’t just the shared minds of the bats living now. It was all their minds, past and present, the memories of every bat that had ever lived, stretching back into the ancient past, forged into one force.
Shiya seemed to read this dawning knowledge and nodded to her. She then glanced across at the others. “The gift given to these living sentinels … we Sleepers also share it.”
“You speak of bridle-song,” Xan said. “It is our gift, too.”
Shiya smiled sadly. “By mistake.”
Nyx flinched, but Xan looked aghast, wounded.
“I don’t malign you with these words,” Shiya consoled. “This gift drifted into your lineage long ago. Maybe infused by disease, maybe by a mix of venom and blood. But once there, that seed found fertile soil, a usefulness worth passing on, and so it rooted deep among certain blessed people.”
“The Kethra’kai,” Xan said.
“And maybe others.” Shiya’s bronze brow bunched with frustration. She again struggled, perhaps brushing against another frayed place in her memory. “Not only did that seed spread inadvertently, but the gift … it has changed while we slept, growing branches no one imagined.”
Her gaze again found Nyx.
Frell interrupted this discourse. He had been walking around the table, staring at the ruins of the Urth glowing there. “That is all fascinating, but it’s not what we should be focused on.” Worry lined his face. “Moonfall. When will this occur?”
Shiya’s lips thinned to a frown.
Rhaif pressed his palms together. “Please don’t say much was lost again.”
Shiya’s expression softened, and she reached to touch Rhaif’s arm. “Not that. But the variables are many. Even for me. I can only approximate an answer.”
“When will it happen?” Frell persisted.
Shiya spoke more softly. “No longer than five years. Maybe as short as three.”
Frell looked down, plainly absorbing this dire prediction. No one else spoke. With a sigh, the alchymist again raised his face to Shiya. “Then how do we stop it?”
Shiya turned to the ruins of the Urth. “You cannot.”
55
WRYTH STOOD NEXT to the maesterwheel of the Pywll. The warship’s commander stood on its far side. Out the curve of the bow windows, a line of black cliffs divided the world ahead, with mists below and dark clouds above. Two columns of smoke rose from near the base of the cliffs.
Wryth clutched the cracked orb in his hand, his gaze fixed ahead. He cursed how long it had taken to ferry up to the Pywll and get the huge warship turned and moving toward the Shrouds. Apparently, some skirmish had already broken out at the base of the cliffs. As they had neared those dark ramparts, two flashes of fire had brightened the mists ahead.
Now the entire forecastle watched the skies.
What was happening under those mists?
“There!” Brask said, and pointed to the left.
The crest of a gray balloon cut through the white layer, then sank away again. It appeared to be running from the cliffs.
Brask identified the brief glimpse. “A sailraft.”
Then another sharper fin of a black gasbag cut high, dragging up the hull of a narrow vessel with a pointed prow.
“The hunterskiff,” Wryth said.
“It’s in pursuit of the raft.” Brask shifted along the bow window, watching the chase pass by their portside.
The hunterskiff dove back into the mists. Tiny flashes of fire lit the clouds as the attack craft tried to flush out its prey with explosive bolts, driving it away from the cliffs.
Wryth hoped Mikaen was safely aboard that skiff. The Iflelen had expended considerable effort to forge the prince into a useful tool. It would be a waste to lose him now.
The pilotman glanced over to Brask. “Do we turn and join the fray?”
“No, we’re not as nimble as the skiff. By the time we turn the Pywll, it’ll be over. Besides…” He waved farther off to port through the windows. “It looks like our help will not be needed.”
Wryth crossed to that side, widening his view to port.
Behind them, the towering mass of a billowing balloon coursed in their wake. Haddan had rallied the Tytan and now fired all its forges to follow. It was impressive how quickly the liege general had gotten his forces moving, especially with half of the warship’s gasbag ripped open to the sky. Its puckered edges flapped as it ran low over the clouds. Still, the earlier repairs had allowed the Tytan to rise high enough to lift the boat clear of the treetops—if not the mists. Below the balloon, the ship was dragged through the clouds, its foggy wake glowing with the fires of its forges.
Another brief glimpse of the gray balloon rose into view, then the sharper edge of the hunterskiff’s gasbag. Both dove away again. Still, the trajectory of this pursuit was clear. The skiff was driving its prey straight toward the Tytan.
Trusting this matter to take care of itself, Wryth returned with Brask to the ship’s wheel. The commander had clearly come to the same conclusion. They both faced the cliffs ahead.
“Ready for all stop!” Brask bellowed to the forecastle’s crew. “Bring us to halt at the edge of those cliffs.” The commander pointed to a man stationed by a calling tube. “Order all skiffs and rafts loaded below and be ready to drop.”