another bright smile, he said, “Do you know the story of the greatest lie that the raven ever told? The mountain was concerned that her beauty was fading—”
“Who stole the deities?” As soon as the question passed her lips, Liyana winced. Talu would be appalled if she’d heard Liyana interrupting a god. She bowed her head. “Forgive the interruption.” She added the formal apology to be used for an elder whom one has wronged.
When he didn’t reply, she dared to peek up at him. Again, he seemed far older than he looked. He was gazing across the oasis toward the desert mountains with an expression that she could not decipher. She followed his gaze. All traces of the sandstorm were gone. The sky was a bleached blue again, and sand swirled gently over the dunes. Each dune created a crescent shadow so that the desert looked like a sea of dark moons. “We will first need to find the other empty vessels in order to bring home all the missing gods.”
He hadn’t answered her question, but she nodded anyway. “How do we find them?”
“Horse Clan, Silk Clan, Scorpion Clan, and Falcon Clan.” He pointed to different spots on the horizon with each clan name. She marveled at his surety—all clans were nomadic, but he pointed with precision.
Her own clan was out there too, en route to Yubay. If she and Korbyn walked quickly enough, perhaps they could catch them. She spent several glorious seconds imagining that reunion. “My family can help—”
“I am sorry,” Korbyn said. She thought she heard true regret in his voice. “Your family is west, and we cannot afford the detour. Soon the other clans will conduct their summoning ceremonies. We must reach them all before any harm comes to their vessels. Not all vessels are as resourceful as you, and not all clans are as . . . forgiving as yours.”
“Oh.” Liyana studied the rip in the tent and fought to keep the lump of disappointment from clogging her throat. “Of course. I see.”
Putting the pot down, he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and then leaped to his feet. “In fact, we should begin!”
“Right now?” She looked around the oasis, her link to her family. But the sandstorm had erased the imprints from the tents. There was no trace that her family and clan had lived there for the last month. The desert had reclaimed its own. Any ghosts of her family were now only in her head. “Yes,” she decided. “Right now.”
Taking the pot, she drank her share of the tea and then cleaned the pot with palm leaves before stowing it in her pack. Korbyn balanced on one of the rocks. He was, she thought, like a four-year-old child and an ancient elder at the same time. As he experimented with shifting from the ball of his foot to his heel, she shook the sand out of her tent, rolled the tent up tight, and stuffed it into her pack.
“Ready?” he asked.
Liyana held up the two waterskins. “Can your magic keep these full?”
“No one can create something out of nothing, not even a god,” Korbyn said. “Though once, the raven convinced the hawk that she had given birth to a lizard, even though she had no mate and had laid no egg. But that began with a lizard who did not want her child.”
“These won’t last us more than a day. Two, if we ration.” She spoke her thoughts out loud as she frowned at the two waterskins. They weren’t meant for extended treks.
“You won’t feel thirst with me.” His voice was intense, and she instinctively flinched. She hadn’t meant her words to sound censorious of the god.
“It would set my mind at ease if you could be more specific.” She thought that phrasing was diplomatic and was pleased with herself. Diplomacy wasn’t normally a required skill for a vessel. In fact, Mother had threatened to tie Liyana’s tongue in knots more than once.
“I crossed the sands to you by drawing moisture into the desert plants. I can do the same for two.” He reached toward her face, and his fingers brushed her cheek. “No fear, Liyana. I won’t let Bayla’s vessel suffer.”
She shivered at the touch of his fingers. He felt so human. His fingertips were warm and soft, and her skin remembered the trace of his touch after he lowered his hand. She kept expecting him to be ethereal, even though she, of all people, should know better.
“You can trust me,” he said. “I want Bayla to return as much as you do.”
“She’s my goddess. What is she to you?” She didn’t intend to sound disrespectful, but if she was to follow him, she had to know. He could be Bayla’s enemy. He could be responsible for her disappearance. This could be part of an elaborate plot to destroy her clan. Liyana didn’t know what transpired between the deities in the Dreaming, what alliances rose and fell.
“She’s my love,” Korbyn said. “Once her soul inhabits your body, we will be together again.” As Liyana stared at him, he lifted the waterskins out of her hands. “Allow me.” He headed toward the well.
Belatedly she hefted the pack onto her back. Her wounded arm sent sharp stabs of pain up into her shoulder. Gritting her teeth, she followed her goddess’s lover across the oasis and then into the desert.
The sun seared the desert. Liyana felt the heat rise through the soles of her feet, even through her beautiful shoes, and she felt the wind wick the moisture from her skin as it scoured her with sand. Over the distant dunes, the air waved and crinkled. She placed one foot in front of the other and tried not to think about how much her muscles still hurt from her endless dance or how much her arm throbbed from her wounds.
Korbyn seemed untouched by the heat. “Once, Bayla was the beloved of Sendar, the god of the Horse Clan, but he valued his horses more than her and lost her affection. He was irate when he learned that Bayla had chosen me to replace him, and he challenged me to three races. One, his choice of mounts. Two, my choice. And three, we would both choose our favorite.”
Every time Liyana breathed, her lungs felt raw, scraped from the sand she had inhaled during the storm. She tried to focus on his words to distract herself. “You have horses in the Dreaming?” Talking felt like scratching her larynx with a fistful of needles.
“We have whatever we wish in the Dreaming. One’s will determines one’s surroundings . . . unless, of course, you encounter someone with a stronger will. Keleena of the Sparrow Clan is so indecisive that the land changes around her like the surface of the sea. You can grow a city around her without . . . But I was telling you about the three races.”
On the horizon, the air wrinkled in the heat. Sand clung to her feet as she trudged with Korbyn up and down the red dunes. She flailed in the looser sand.
“First race, he chose horses. I lost dismally. Second race, we flew.”
She yanked her feet out of the sand with each step. It felt as if the dunes wanted to pull her down into them, sweep her into their slopes, until she was a part of the sandscape. “You can fly?”
“I cannot fly here.” He raised and lowered his arms as if to show her. His sleeves billowed. She thought of his totem animal, the raven, and she thought it was apt. He did move like a bird, fast and alert. “But in the Dreaming, there are no rules. It’s a place of pure spirit.”
She fell to one knee at the top of a dune. Struggling, she stood again and continued down the slope, jarring her knees painfully with each step. “Why would you ever want to leave?”
He grinned and raced down the slope past her. “For this! All this!” He stretched his arms wide as if to encompass the whole world, and then as she descended the dune, he caught her hand and pressed the top of her hand to his lips. “And this.” Releasing her, he unwound the bandage from his burnt hand. “Even this.”
She still felt his kiss tingling on her hand. Trying to ignore the sensation, she studied his burn. The blisters looked blotchy. “It needs more aloe.” She swung her pack off her back, and pain shot down her arm from the gashes, making her breath hiss.
He waved her away. “I can fix it.” His face became blank as he held his palm steady—a trance again. She marveled at how quickly he could enter a trance. Sweat beaded on his forehead and instantly dried. His hand shook, but he did not move. Slow at first and then faster, the skin smoothed, and the red faded. In a few minutes, his palm was smooth and perfect.
“You can heal,” she said flatly.
He beamed at her. “I have many tricks.”
She clenched her jaw. Of course he could heal. Even Talu had some basic skill with mending cuts and bruises. Liyana should have realized it sooner, but she hadn’t been thinking straight ever since Korbyn had walked out of the swirling sand. In as polite a voice as she could manage, she asked, “Would it be possible for you to heal me?”
“My pleasure.” He bowed.
Liyana rolled up her sleeve and unwound the bandages covering the claw marks. Red and oozing, the gashes
