When Ravens Call: The Fourth Book in the Small Gods Epic Fantasy Series (The Books of the Small Gods by Bruce Blake (books under 200 pages txt) 📗

The priestess raised her eyes to the base of the swirling mist, thought she saw the shapes of bare feet disguised within.

"The scroll," she whispered, a hiss of breath so quiet she hardly understood the words herself.

"Yes."

"But my brother. He defied you, took part of the holy parchment for his own purpose."

"As I knew he would. As I needed him to."

Rak'bana leaned back, teetering, struggled to her feet with the last of her energy. Her gaze trailed up the silhouette hidden in the mist. She opened her mouth but found it dry and useless.

"Balance must exist, Priestess. They have insured the world's safety for the foreseeable future. I won't step in to this degree again. What will pass will pass."

Rak'bana's breath shortened and pain filled her chest, making it difficult to draw air into her lungs. Her heartbeat sped, hammering against her insides, and her gaze moved to the indistinct shape at Goddess' side.

"H... h... who...?"

"This." The deity gestured to the silhouette beside her. "Many turns of the seasons hence, this one will save the world. Because of you."

"The firstborn child of the rightful king."

The mist dissolved, and the figure became more distinct: a youth who'd seen the seasons turn twenty times, give or take. Clothed in the garb of a fighter, the person stood with an air of confidence, legs spread and arms crossed. The last of the haze faded from the unknown figure's face when a seizure quaked through Rak'bana. Her head flew back and her knees failed. She hit the ground, her body exploding with torment: the pain of her wounds, grief over the loss of her brother, despair at what had happened to her world. Unseen fingers wrapped themselves around her heart, squeezed it, prevented it from beating. A fat drop of rain struck her cheek, its coolness too late to offer respite. More raindrops fell, pattering against the charred earth, hissing in still-burning fires.

The priestess Rak'bana gasped a final breath, tasted ash and burnt grass on her tongue. Then Goddess stood at her side, holding her hand, stroking her forehead. Relief flowed into her, inserting itself between her and the pains and regrets. A new feeling replaced them, an invigoration, a suspicion of things to come. It was early, but she knew the time to begin preparations was already nigh.

The other figure accompanying Goddess had disappeared, leaving her alone with the Mother of Mothers. Peace filled her and life faded away.

For now.

I  Teryk - Saved

Water splashed over his head, filled his mouth and eyes, nose and ears. The waves tossed Teryk around, the current tugged, the combination turning him over and over so he lost the ability to discern up from down. He worried he'd never surface and draw breath again.

The tight panic growing in his chest took him back to the river under the castle and being trapped under the bars intended to keep people out. How long since that happened? As he struggled in the freezing ocean, the finding of a scroll written an eternity past for someone who may not have been him seemed an age ago.

The more seawater entering his throat, the less likely it became he'd fulfill the prophecy.

The prince's head broke the surface, thrusting him from the bitter sea into the driving rain. He coughed and gasped, drew a partial breath to relieve the burning in his lungs before the next wave washed over him and the current dragged him under again.

Briny water stung his eyes, but he refused to close them. A beast lurked in the depths; he'd seen the flat skull topping a long, curving neck rise above the ocean, its gaping mouth lined with ferocious teeth. Seeing it coming wouldn't prevent the inevitable outcome, but knowing the end approached might be better than having it come upon him unsuspected.

His head bobbed above the surface again. The storm roared in his ears, water splashed in his face, but he kept himself from going under again. Driving rain and sea foam swirled around him, twisting his body and forming shapes that shouldn't resemble anything, but did. Amongst them he spied his father's likeness, the firm resolution of his brow. Had he listened to him, heeded his words, he'd not be waiting to discover if he'd die by drowning or between the teeth of a god.

Teryk drew another breath, then another. Were the waves abating? In response, a swell pushed him up toward the sky, holding him above the world to peer into a trough between it and the next. The sight convinced him the size of the undulations hadn't decreased, but the opposite. He breathed again while the opportunity existed.

Before he crested the surge and descended into the furrow, a shape at the bottom caught his eye. At first he thought it the God of the Deep on its way to devour him in one bite like in the story of the sailor and his cat Nanny told them in their youth—Danya's favorite, but not his. It gave him a fear of the ocean until he'd seen the seasons turn for the tenth time.

In the tall tale, both seaman and feline survived. The cat rode a stream of water out the whale's blowhole while the sailor crawled between teeth the size of boulders while the whale napped. He didn't know if whales slept—or if they were more than mythical beasts—but he doubted his survival should a monster of the sea ingest him.

As he slipped down the swell, the wave buoyed the thing he’d spied up the other side. It wasn’t a creature swimming in the roiling ocean but a chunk of debris. Teryk stroked hard to keep himself above the surface, to get closer to the unidentified object, but briny