now.”
“You didn’t die,” said Relic. “You failed. The difference is significant. The dead are devoid of hope, but the fallen may dream of redemption. I know you are haunted by the possibility that you could one day return to Qikiqtabruk with the Jagged Heart, restoring the temple and erasing your shame.”
“The Jagged Heart was destroyed,” said Aurora. “My soul was bound to it. My spirit died when the tip was shattered. It’s only my stubborn body that carries on.”
“Wrong, wrong, and wrong,” said Relic. “The Jagged Heart was never so much as scratched. Your soul was never bound to it, despite the teachings of your religion. You may have loved it so much that it felt like a part of you, but this attachment was emotional, not supernatural.”
“I know what I saw.”
Relic shook his head. “The eyes are the easiest sense to deceive. The weapon was switched in the moments it was out of your sight; the raiders masked the true shard with dream magic. When you reached the raiders, they brandished a duplicate. It is this you saw shattered.”
Aurora clenched her jaw. She placed her giant hands over her left breast as her eyes grew moist. “You know nothing. I felt it shatter. You can never understand.”
“Cling to this falsehood if you wish,” said Relic. “But the Jagged Heart still exists. It’s carried by Lord Tower on his quest. With it, he’ll slay Greatshadow.”
Infidel rapped her knuckles on the basalt column, a sound like a hammer striking brick. “Sorry to interrupt, but what the hell are you two talking about? What’s the Jagged Heart and why is it any more likely to kill Greatshadow than, say, a pointy stick?”
Aurora contemplated her question. The sea mist beaded on her leather coat, running down in rivulets, pooling at her feet. At last, she said, “The Jagged Heart was a ceremonial harpoon. As High Priestess, I would use it to hunt the spirit whales in the Great Sea Above. The shaft is carved from the tusk of a narwhale; the blade itself is a knife-sharp fragment of pure ice taken from the shattered heart of Hush, the primal dragon of cold. In shape, the blade resembles the heart from a deck of cards.”
“A fragment of Hush’s heart?” Infidel asked. “I thought that Verdant was the only primal dragon ever to be slain.”
“Hush didn’t truly become a primal dragon until her heart was broken. It was only then that the elemental cold filled the vacant space inside her. My people revere Hush; our land rests upon her slumbering back. In exchange for our worship, the dragon grants her followers magical gifts.”
“Back to the topic at hand, Tower is seriously going to try to kill Greatshadow with a harpoon made of ice?” Infidel rolled her eyes. “This is going to last, what, five seconds inside the volcano?”
“The Jagged Heart can negate any heat it encounters. Cold is the true condition of all existence; heat is merely a local aberration. If the Heart still exists, it’s the perfect weapon to destroy Greatshadow. Of course, someone would need to carry it within striking distance of the dragon. That’s a nearly impossible task.”
“‘Nearly impossible’ is semantically the same as ‘possible,’” said Relic. “With Lord Tower involved, it’s probable. He wears the Armor of Faith. It will shield him from Greatshadow’s powers.”
Infidel nodded. “Yeah, I guess that would work.”
Now it was Aurora’s turn to look puzzled. “Armor of Faith?”
“It looks like a suit of plate armor,” said Infidel. “It encases Tower completely and is filled with a lot of gears and ratchets that enhance his strength. Pretty much nothing can penetrate it.”
“Greatshadow’s breath melts armor,” said Aurora.
“If it’s metal. But this armor is made of prayer. The Church of the Book has a team of monks whose sole job is to pray Tower’s armor into existence. One monk does nothing but pray for the helmet, another prays for the greaves, another guy prays for the shoulder pads, and so on. Every single gear and rivet on this thing has a monk — actually a whole squad of monks — whose only spiritual duty is to maintain their unceasing faith that the armor can’t be so much as scratched.”
Aurora nodded slowly. “Very well. Let’s suppose the armor works. Tower can reach Greatshadow and slay his body. Then what? This is a primal dragon, the very spirit of fire. There’s a little of Greatshadow’s essence in all flame. You need to extinguish every fire in the world at once to truly kill him. If you overlooked a single flickering candle, he could eventually weave a new body and seek vengeance.”
“This is why Lord Tower doesn’t travel alone,” said Relic. “The Voice of the Book has issued a Writ of Judgment. A Truthspeaker will read this writ aloud before Greatshadow’s spirit, slaying it.”
Aurora stroked her chin, rubbing the bulges where her tusks were anchored in her jaw. “I still can’t believe they have the Jagged Heart. Maybe they’re the ones fooled by a replica.”
“But you would know when you saw it,” said Relic. “And you can see it again. Arrange for Infidel and myself to be hired as mercenaries on the quest, and when we kill Lord Tower, we’ll return the harpoon to you.”
Aurora shook her head. “I see no reason to trust you with this task. I owe the Black Swan my life, but it’s my sacred duty to recover the Jagged Heart. I’ll resign my position with the Black Swan and petition Lord Tower to join his team on my own. You may attempt the same. I won’t speak against you.”
Relic glared at her. I could tell he hadn’t considered the possibility that Aurora would take a more direct path toward recovering the artifact.
Aurora seemed unconcerned by Relic’s baleful gaze. She looked over at Infidel.
“First the sarong, now a skirt. What’s with your wardrobe lately?”
Infidel shrugged. “Once I have Greatshadow’s treasure, I’ll hire a team of tailors to follow me around. Until then, I’m getting by with whatever’s handy.”
“Why are you so confident you can kill Lord Tower? If he’s good enough to take down a primal dragon, I don’t see how an undisciplined brawler like you will stand a chance.”
Infidel chuckled. “Armor or not, I’ve thought of a thousand different ways of killing Tower. He’ll be dead before he knows what hit him.”
“A thousand?” asked Aurora, sounding amused. “What’s your grudge against the knight?”
“It’s kind of a long story,” said Infidel, raising her hand and pinching about a half inch of air between her thumb and forefinger, “but I once got this close to marrying the bastard.”
To my great frustration, Aurora didn’t ask to hear the long story, not even a short version of it. Her devotion to the unwritten rules of Commonground was admirable to a fault.
Relic dismissed Bigsby, telling him his services were no longer needed, as he and Infidel set off for the Black Swan. Aurora walked alone, a few hundred feet ahead. Relic, despite his bent form and hobbling gait, proved to be rather spry, keeping up with Infidel’s tireless pace with no sign of effort.
The sun was rising by the time we reached the docks. The daylight revealed a half dozen corpses floating in the brine. It was a rare night in Commonground that didn’t yield a few murder victims. Bleary-eyed river-pygmies in dugout canoes poled their ways under the docks, gathering the bodies. Commonground bred strange industries. Pulling the right corpse out of the drink could be the equivalent of winning a lottery. Any given body might turn out to be an outlaw with a price on his head, payable dead or alive. Or, you might recover the corpse of a wayward son of a wealthy family and demand a ransom to return the remains for proper burial. In contrast, my career of looting temples and ruins seemed like honest work.
As Relic and Infidel approached the Black Swan barge, I noticed that the stream of clients leaving the bar was a bit heavier than usual. It was like the place was emptying out completely. Patrons grumbled as they walked past us, luggage in hand. Some of them were standing around, looking lost as they stared at empty boat slips. It dawned on me that only half the ordinary number of ships were docked this morning. What was going on?
Waiting at the front door of the Black Swan, arms crossed, were the Three Goons, looking stern. When Aurora walked up to them, No-Face moved to intercept her as Menagerie locked the front door. We were still too far away to hear what the Goons said, but not too far away to hear Aurora’s loud and astonished reply: “What do you mean, I’m fired?”
Hearing this, Infidel launched herself into the air, covering the distance with a single bound. She landed beside Aurora, not wanting to miss any juicy details, as Menagerie said, “The Black Swan no longer requires your services. This establishment is closed until further notice.”
“You’re joking,” said Aurora.
Menagerie shook his head. Reeker chewed a toothpick as he stared at Aurora, obviously amused by her
