The thief-wheel dropped her. Perhaps she had worked her way to the end. She struck the floor of the corridor and then, mercifully, she fainted.
Chapter 19
When Marra came to, she was freezing. She had curled up under the nettle cloak but had no idea how much time had passed. Long enough for the stone floor to leach all the warmth out of her, at least. She listened for the sound of the thief-wheel but could hear nothing. “Fenris?” she called. “Agnes? Dust-wife?”
Her voice echoed but brought no response. There was no spark of light anywhere.
She got to her feet and spread her arms wide, feeling for walls. A corridor. She yelled for her friends again to no avail.
“When you’re lost in the woods, stay put,” Marra muttered. “That way people can find you. But this isn’t the woods, and I don’t think we’ve got enough time…”
Which direction had the thief-wheel dragged her? How far had she gone? She had no idea.
She took a deep breath and pulled the nettle cloak tightly around her. “All right,” she murmured. “All right.” She picked a direction and began to walk.
Doorways to tombs opened under her fingers. She ignored them. The big tombs were always at the ends of the corridors. She walked forward until she reached some kind of threshold and then felt her way forward in the dark. The echoes sounded like a large room.
Smooth metal. Carved stone. Tiny square edges. Something that felt familiar, and then Marra realized she was touching a death mask. She jerked away and blundered toward the wall, only to realize that she had lost track of where her entryway was. How would she know if she was going in the right direction?
She fetched up against a wall and felt like weeping.
I’m lost. I’m lost in the dark and I will die down here. The dust-wife might already be dead. Oh, Lady of Grackles, help me, help me. I tried to help myself, but I don’t think I can help this bit …
Silence. Cold. Dust.
And then, in the great darkness under the palace, Marra saw a light.
It was only a spark at first, more golden than torchlight. She thought perhaps it was not really there, because it looked like the gold sparks that came when she rubbed her eyelids. But it strengthened and came closer and closer still, illuminating the walls with their carvings of cold, dead kings.
It was a woman. Where she walked, she kicked up clouds of light, like dust.
Marra lifted her eyes and saw that the woman held a severed hand in her right hand and that her left wrist ended in a stump.
It was the saint from the goblin market.
A long time later, it would occur to Marra to wonder why the saint had been there, in the palace of dead kings. At the time, it did not. She was a saint. Saints walked where they would.
The saint lifted her severed hand so that the first finger lay across her lips in a gesture for silence. Marra crouched at her feet, gazing up, and nodded.
The saint beckoned, and Marra followed.
They went slowly but sure-footedly. The light of the saint’s passage glittered off carvings of men and gods and stranger things. Marra watched whole histories unfold, as carved generals defeated armies of beasts misshapen and beautiful and strange.
Then, step by step, she began to fade.
Marra wanted to cry out, to beg her not to leave, but she bit her lower lip. The gods had intervened on her behalf. Surely they would not take her only halfway.
Wait. Wait and see. The world is not always cruel.
She followed the fading footsteps of the saint. It seemed to take a long time, shifting slowly from gold to silver, and finally Marra realized that the saint was gone and the silver light came from farther ahead, from a vial filled with moonlight trapped in a jar.
She broke into a run, not caring if the thief-wheel heard her now, half sobbing. “Fenris! Agnes! Dust-wife!”
“Marra?”
She broke into the room and before she could even focus, Fenris had thrown his arms around her and had his face pressed against her hair. “You’re alive,” he said. “I thought I’d lost you. You’re alive.”
“You’re alive, too!” she said. She wanted to stop and think about what I thought I’d lost you might mean, but it didn’t quite seem like the time. And he was very warm and she was very cold and it was very pleasant to be held in such a fashion. “You’re alive.”
“Yes, yes,” said the dust-wife testily. “We’re all alive. Please don’t cry on me about it, though.”
Fenris finally released her, although not without reluctance. Bonedog immediately leapt up on her, washing her face with his tongue.