tumbling to the center of the tunnel. Pupp hurried toward them, eyes shining with fury and concern.
Laurelle scrambled and fought to free herself from Dart’s tangled limbs. Dart searched around for what so terrified her friend. Had she seen Yaellin? Was he coming for them?
But the passage, well lit by Pupp, was empty.
“A daemon…” Laurelle cried, still sounding strangled. She gained her feet and backed away, one arm out toward Dart, trying to draw her, too.
On the ground, Dart finally noted the source of her terror. Laurelle’s gaze was fixed upon Pupp. She could see him. The blood from the root must have splattered over him.
“There’s nothing to fear,” Dart said hurriedly and reached out for Pupp. Her fingertips found substance again. He pushed his muzzle happily into her palm, needing reassurance. His bright glow faded with his relief. “He’s my friend.”
Laurelle remained standing, but ready to bolt. “What… how..?”
Dart stared up, pleading with her eyes. “He’s Pupp.”
Laurelle’s brow pinched in confusion, then drew even tighter. “Pupp… I remember… Margarite told me… laughed… some imaginary friend of yours… You used to speak of it when you were a firstfloorer.”
“Not imaginary,” Dart said.
Laurelle stared from girl to daemon. She slowly lowered herself to her knees. The horror faded from her face and something bordering on curiosity replaced it. “What is he?”
Dart glanced to Pupp, who sat on his haunches, glowering at the arch of roots. She remembered bits and pieces of her dream a few nights back. She had been a babe. Pupp had been suckling at her navel. “I don’t know,” she said softly. “He’s always been with me. A shadow no one could see or touch.”
“He’s fading,” Laurelle said.
“Is he?” Dart still felt his bronze shell, smooth, as warm as a mug of steaming bitternut. Then her fingers fell through him again.
“He’s gone.” Laurelle searched the passage, blind to Pupp, who continued to sit on his haunches.
Dart waved her fingers through his body. “No, he’s still here.”
“Truly? Then what made him plain to the eye just now?”
Dart pointed to the glowing ichor on the floor, still dripping from the torn root. “Blood… blood rich in Grace,” she answered, then added quietly, “… or my own blood.”
“We must show him to Lord Chrism,” Laurelle said, renewing her resolve to continue. “Perhaps Pupp has something to do with Yaellin’s interest in you.”
“I don’t see how. No one but me has ever seen Pupp.”
“Lord Chrism will sort it all out.” Laurelle nodded forward. “I think the others have stopped. The light has stopped moving away.”
They continued together. Dart sidestepped the bleeding root and waved Pupp away from the pool below it. He seemed happy to oblige, though he did sniff at it. Could he smell the Grace?
As Dart continued, she eyed the knots of roots with raw suspicion. Blood roots. If these were indeed the roots of the myrrwood tree, why did they bleed? She recalled the history lesson given by Jasper Cheek, the magister of the grounds and towers. His words repeated in her head. She could still hear the pride in his voice. Lord Chrism was the first god to marry himself to the land and share his Grace with all. His own hand laid the first seed, watered with his own blessed blood.
Dart shivered. Was that why the roots bled even now?
She kept well away from the tangled root briers. The tiny hairs continued their ominous waving, seeking purchase.
“Do you smell that?” Laurelle asked.
Dart noted a sweetness to the air, a blend of honey and loam. She drew in a deeper breath.
“That’s myrr,” Laurelle said. “I have some sweetwater scented with it, a gift from my mother.”
Dart felt a slightly warmer breeze wafting to them, the exhalation of spring, warming away the damp, winter chill of the passage. They were drawn toward it. Their pace increased. The lamplight grew brighter, plainly having stopped not far ahead.
They hiked the last few bends in the passage.
A short stair appeared, leading up, lit well.
They cautiously approached. There were only ten steps.
At the top, the lamp appeared in view, hanging on a peg and shining upon another stone door. This was carved like the first: twining rose vines amid a smattering of Littick letters. Warded, too, Dart noted. And like the other, it was ajar.
A murmur of voices could be heard now. More than two. A gathering.
Laurelle glanced to Dart, then back to the door. Together they both cautiously mounted the stairs and crept to the door. There was enough room for both to peek out. Pupp simply walked through the door and out into the open glade beyond.
From the doorway, Dart spotted the limbs and trunks of the ancient myrrwood, lit from below by small fires dotting the edges of a glade. Trunks were so thick that it would take a dozen men linking arms to measure around them. Heavy limbs climbed so high even moonlight failed to shine through. The glade appeared more like a giant raftered court than a forest glen.
Voices could be heard, talking in low tones, but clearly urgent.
The speakers were not in plain view.
Laurelle urged Dart out with a nudge. They slipped out the open door and hurried to a patch of bushes at the edge of the glade. They ducked down. The bushes were unknown to Dart but appeared more thorny than leafy. They could peer through them with ease.
Beyond, lit by the fires, a strange group of people gathered in the center near a raised mound surmounted by a pair of twin stone pillars. The stone columns were plainly ancient, hoary with lichen, half-wrapped in brown vines.
Lord Chrism climbed the mound, arms raised. He was bare-chested now. Both wrists had been cut and bled down the length of his arms.
The others gathered at the foot of the mound, a score of men and women. She recognized not only Mistress Naff, but also Jasper Cheek, and several guardsmen who served the High Wing.
Chrism faced the others, standing between the two pillars. When he spoke, it was in his softly assured, sad tones. “Here is where I first settled the land.” He pointed to the mound at his feet, blood dripping to the soil. “I allowed myself to be tied here, strung between these two pillars. I had my body cut at the throat, at the wrist, and the groin. That is how a god settles a land, tying place to blood and flesh.”
A murmur passed through the crowd.
“No longer.” Chrism stepped back and spat at his feet. “I have broken free of my place, severing my connection, freeing the land and returning it to my people.”
Dart tensed at these words. Laurelle and Dart shared a frightened glance. Was what Lord Chrism claiming true? Had he unsettled himself from the very land he had blessed? Dart remembered Jacinta’s last words before falling upon the cursed blade, expressing a similar sentiment: Myrillia will be free.
Chrism continued. “As I was the first to bring peace to Myrillia, so now I will bring it true freedom. You are my chosen. Together we are the Cabal. Others across Myrillia already join our ranks. Let us once again, as we do with each new moon, swear our allegiance. Raise your cups. Be blessed and draw strength from my Grace.”
All around the mound, the gathered men and women lifted their cups and drank. Dart noted the glow about the cups, the same as seeped from Chrism’s wrists.
Blood… they were drinking his blood.
“No,” Laurelle moaned under her breath.
Blood drinking was an abomination, used in black rites. A god’s Grace was too strong. It took only a touch to the skin, a single drop, to pass on a blessing. To consume blood risked the loss of both will and body. It enslaved and deformed.
Chrism raised his arms out to his minions. A glow spread over the god’s form, starting at the wrist and spreading outward. He was calling down a blessing.
“Be free.”
